WandaVision may have been the first Phase 4 Marvel Cinematic Universe project to hit Disney+, but The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was initially set to kick off the official streaming debut for the MCU.
This meant that the opening scene of the series would be the first thing that Marvel fans would be exposed to, and a lot of focus and scrutiny went into the canyon chase that kicked off episode one. However, the pandemic had other plans, leaving WandaVision to set the stage and delaying The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and its exciting opening sequence.
Weta Digital spoke with us about their work on the project, and we learned about some of the things that were added in post-production during and after the reshoots took place to try and gain some insight into what needed to be changed. In doing so, we actually learned a lot about how they fleshed out the canyon fight scene, and that they felt it didn't make much sense for Falcon to struggle to capture Batroc and his crew.
You can read what Weta Digital VFX Supervisor Charles Tait had to say about fixing the first fight scene below. Otherwise, feel free to scroll down and hear his comments yourself!
Literary Joe: Did you start chronologically with this big opening scene as your first and main point of focus?
Weta Digital: Absolutely, we did. And in fact, that was the only thing we were going to do. That's the work that we were expecting and that we initially bid on, and for us, that was what we were doing. And we spent a good long time on that. And it was only when we had the bandwidth to take on more later that we did work on later episodes.
Which, you know, the first one has to come out first, of course, and we were working on the very beginning of the first episode, so that was scheduled to be delivered before everything else. So we were going to have our crew and have time to do more on a later episode. So we picked up some stuff on the end. We added a lot more, actually. We started with 150, and we did at least a hundred more shots.
Literary Joe: I know that they reshot things, but as far as your post-production process went, did you have to change anything specifically using CG effects for the plot changes?
Weta Digital: We did. We started with some previs that we were sent for the canyon chase sequence, and we started with that. That was made by someone else and delivered to us. And we used that for bidding and getting underway and creating shots, and thinking about the processes that we would use to make those shots.
And then, as we got into it, it became obvious to all of us really, and to the client, that parts of the story didn't quite work. It wasn't finished; basically, previs wasn't finished. It wasn't fleshed out enough. And I think the main thing was that it didn't seem like it made sense that Falcon could struggle to catch the wing suiters. It didn't look like there was enough in his way, making it hard for him.
And that's when we introduced the helicopter gunships shooting at him, and he veers off. As he comes out of that narrow canyon and it opens up a bit, and we see the helicopters for the first time, he veers off in one direction to try to escape from them, and the wing suiters go the other way. This is a deliberate thing to try to give the wing suiters time to get ahead and hold him up. So we introduced that.
And then there's a beat where they fly through a very, very narrow slot, and that doesn't work for his big wide wings. And he nearly gets caught, and his wings scrape on the wall. It's another moment where it looks like it's going pretty bad for him, and it allows them to get away a bit.
These were all ideas to try to lengthen out the chase, of course in being shot at by all missiles and helicopters. And, just when you think it's under control, there's another helicopter, which is armed to the teeth, like an attack helicopter, and starts shooting at him. So those were all ideas that we introduced later. They weren't part of the original plan.
What do you guys make of these comments? Be sure to listen to our full interview on Literary Joe's Inner Child Podcast below. As always, share your thoughts in the usual spot!
Charlie Tait from Weta Digital stopped by to chat with us about his visual effects work on Disney and Marvel Studios' The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. We learned about the entire opening scene and how the canyon was built entirely with CGI. Charlie told us about Redwing and his weapon's carousel, building Falcon's new shield wings, and tons of interesting things!
All six episodes of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier are now streaming on Disney+.