The Defiance Thread - News about the Show and Game

[ElimParra]

Since I heard about Rockne O'Bannon new project - Defiance - I wanted to know more. It's gonna be something different, as comparing TV and gaming together.

SFX posted this link on FB. Impressive people working behind this. I really hope this is successful.

[Kegg]

It's an interesting concept, and is definitely the most promising looking sci-fi show for 2013. Looking forward to it (even as I acknowledge the attempt to tie it into a videogame is the least interesting part of the project for me).

[The Wormhole]

It's funny, a few months back I was having a conversation with someone I knew about Falling Skies. He began asking "what's that other show, the one that's basically a rip-off of Falling Skies?" So I typed into Google "Falling Skies rip-off" and the very first result was about Defiance. Next time I saw my friend, I said "I typed 'Falling Skies rip-off' into Google and it came up with a show called Defiance." He responded "Yes, that's it. I knew it was called something that reminded me of Star Trek."

Okay, to be honest, Defiance doesn't sound anything like Falling Skies aside from being set on an alien occupied Earth. Defiances sounds interesting, and I'll be sure to check it out when it airs, but I thought the story was amusing all the same.

[Enterprise is Great]

I'm interested in the show but the game influencing the show business has me a little worried. Exactly how is that going to work? I've read some articles explaining it somewhat but I still don't get it.

[Kegg]

^
The videogame and the TV series are set in two different cities but in the same setting, so I suspect there will be little direct interaction between their two plots. In the first season I'd expect - at most - an offhand line about something that happened in the game world.

As season two is being developed and in-between seasons they could let what players do in the game world shape where they want to take it that year, but I'm sure they'd control what kind of choices those would be.

I dunno. It's an interesting idea, but beyond respecting the lore of the game setting as equal to the TV show (which is the exact opposite of say the Star Trek model) I don't see them getting a lot out of it.

The Wormhole wrote:

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It's funny, a few months back I was having a conversation with someone I knew about Falling Skies. He began asking "what's that other show, the one that's basically a rip-off of Falling Skies?"

It's the same genre, but if he thinks Falling Skies invented post-apocalyptic alien invasion shows weeeeell.... no.

[JD]

I've been following Defiance closely since it was first announced and right now it's my most anticipated new series for next year.
For a while they've been doing a making of series which is available on their official youtube channel. These videos give a pretty good idea of what to expect, and IMO it looks really good. They seem to have put a lot of thought and care into what they are doing. They also have to the full comic con panel up on Hulu. I only watched the stopped once they started focusing more on the game, but I thought I thought there was some interesting stuff about in the show in their.

[JD]

Defiance has released a new, more character focused trailer.
The more I see for this the more excited I get.

[Christopher]

ElimParra wrote:

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Since I heard about Rockne O'Bannon new project - Defiance - I wanted to know more.

Unfortunately O'Bannon isn't involved past the initial creation. The showrunners are Kevin Murphy of Desperate Housewives and Caprica (not the same Kevin Murphy who was Servo on Mystery Science Theater 3000) and Michael Taylor of Voyager and BSG.

I think the main draw for me here will be the cast. Tony Curran and Jaime Murray are worth watching, and I really liked Stephanie Leonidas in MirrorMask, though I'm disappointed that she's using an American accent here. (I mean, she's playing an alien! Aren't aliens usually British?) Julie Benz is pretty good too.

[JD]

Damn, I didn't realize that. I knew that Kevin Murphy was one of EPs, but I had thought O'Bannon was still involved. I loved Caprica, and I'm a fan of Julie Benz, Grant Bowler, Jaime Murray, Finollula Flanigan, and Mia Kirshner, so there's still a lot of reasons for me to look forward to this without him.
Do you know if he's any more involved with Cult? I was wondering how he was doing two shows at once, but if he's off Defiance that would explain it.

[Christopher]

I'm not paying any attention to Cult, sorry. I didn't even remember that O'Bannon was involved with that.

[Snick27]

Heard the game is pretty good too. Its in Alpha testing i believe right now. Not sure how both will connect with each other and if many will actually play the game.

[The Wormhole]

JD wrote:

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Defiance has released a new, more character focused trailer.
The more I see for this the more excited I get.

I got to admit, that is a pretty good trailer.

[JD]

Snick27 wrote:

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Heard the game is pretty good too. Its in Alpha testing i believe right now. Not sure how both will connect with each other and if many will actually play the game.

I read an article on IGN that that did talk a little more about the connection between the two. Here's some of what they said about the connection:

Murphy noted, “When some huge catastrophic weather event happens in the TV show, if you've been playing along in the game, something the player has done actually put those events into motion. And you have that extra additive experience. In the pilot, which some people saw, there's a little gadget that Nolan and Irisa have when they're opening up the Ark. If you're just watching the show, you're like, ‘Oh, cool little gadget.’ If you've actually played the game, that gadget has enormous significance from the game play that's been going on from when we do the initial launch with the Trion game when Nolan and Irisa's characters actually appear in the game.”

[Christopher]

The idea of players' choices actually setting events on the show into motion disturbs me. The storytelling on the show should be driven by the needs of the show and the characters, not by the random vagaries of gameplay. I'm hoping that the interaction is more just an illusion -- that there's a particular sequence of events that all the different players of the game have to go through in order to achieve some assigned mission objective, and that mission's success is the setup for something that happens in the show. So it's still the writers of the game and show deciding what happens, but since the players are acting out the scenario as written, it gives them the illusion that they're "causing" it to happen. At least, I hope that's all it is.

[TheNatureRoy]

Christopher wrote:

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The idea of players' choices actually setting events on the show into motion disturbs me. The storytelling on the show should be driven by the needs of the show and the characters, not by the random vagaries of gameplay. I'm hoping that the interaction is more just an illusion -- that there's a particular sequence of events that all the different players of the game have to go through in order to achieve some assigned mission objective, and that mission's success is the setup for something that happens in the show. So it's still the writers of the game and show deciding what happens, but since the players are acting out the scenario as written, it gives them the illusion that they're "causing" it to happen. At least, I hope that's all it is.

Rest easy:

http://www.deadline.com/2013/01/defi...y/#more-398600