How We Made a Gray Man for “The Wheel of Time”
Every once in a while, a scene comes along that makes everyone on set pause for a moment and think: Okay… how exactly are we going to do this?
Director Thomas Napper had something ambitious in mind for a pivotal moment in The Wheel of Time S03. The scene centers on Moghedien (Laia Costa) transforming her unfortunate victim Jaichim Carridin (Jared Doreck) into one of the series’ eerie assassins: a Gray Man.
In the script, Jaichim has broken his Dark Oaths, giving Moghedien the opening she needs to turn him into a Gray Man to do her malevolent bidding. Suspended in a web of her making, she asks him if he wants to be gray. He refuses. She freezes the blood in his veins. The pain eventually breaks him, and the diabolical transformation begins.
From a filmmaking standpoint, the goal was to keep as much of the moment practical and in-camera as possible, with visual effects supporting the supernatural elements rather than carrying the whole scene. Working with a tight VFX budget and schedule, the trick was to find solutions on set that would give the VFX team something solid to build on later.
My role was to help support the creative and technical side of the sequence, working with Thomas and the other departments to find ways around the inevitable roadblocks that show up when you’re trying to stage something this ambitious. The aim was always to avoid pushing problems to the “fix it in post” world if we could solve them right there on the stage.
One of the things I enjoy most about this kind of work is being part of that process, helping translate a director’s idea into something that can be captured on set.
Building the Web
Thomas envisioned Jaichim suspended in a web that appeared to be spun from strands of his own uniform. Very much like a fly caught in a spider’s web, he was to be suspended, helpless, in a foreboding underground chamber. Moghedian’s prisoner and soon-to-be victim.
Costume Designer Sharon Gilham came up with a clever, practical solution. The web was built using elasticated threads and strips of fabric, stretched between the actor (Jared Doreck) and hidden mounts in the set walls. The elasticated webbing also allowed Jonas the freedom to struggle and react physically to Moghedien’s power, helping preserve the performance while maintaining the illusion that the web itself supported his body.
In fact, the weight support came from stunt cables rigged above and attached to his torso, arms, and legs. Those cables were intentionally left visible during shooting, painted black against the set. They did the real work of suspending the actor and were later removed digitally.
Where Visual Effects Came In
Visual effects took over for the supernatural aspects of Moghedien’s Dark Powers, the moment when Jaichim’s soul is separated from his body, and the transformation into a Gray Man begins.
Additional VFX work included enhancing the practical atmosphere with digital fog, removing the stunt rigging, and subtly augmenting his eyes, skin tone, and the veining created by the makeup effects team.
Like many of the best moments in fantasy filmmaking, the sequence blended practical effects, stunt rigging, makeup, and VFX, with each department contributing its best work to sell the illusion. The finished scene is unsettling in all the right ways.
You can see the sequence here.
Note: This sequence was originally filmed for the end of Episode 3 (“Seeds of Shadow”) but was later moved to the end of Episode 1 (“To Race the Shadow”).