2. The 11th Hour, the Finest Hour: Part 2
Episode Nine: Blackwater Commentators: Episode director Neil Marshall, Peter Dinklage (Tyrion Lannister) and Lena Headey (Cersei Lannister) Awesome directors typically bring awesome ideas along with them no matter whether it's their property being worked on or someone else's and I don't think that anyone will dispute the fact that Neil Marshall is an awesome director. While pre-production for "Blackwater" had been well under way by the time by the time Marshall stepped behind the camera, the man responsible for the all out mayhem of titles like
The Descent and
Doomsday had some ideas on how to leave his personal stamp on his first go around on "Game of Thrones." In regards to the minor touches, it was Marshall who decided to include the bucket of sick below the deck of Stannis's ship as it sails into Blackwater Bay for battle. While it'd be easy to belief that the overflowing barrel of sea sickness and accompanying anxious soldiers was inspired by the Normandy Beach invasion in Spielberg's
Saving Private Ryan, it was actually inspired by a tale Marshall's father told him of his time on a troop ship in the Mediterranean. But don't think that the man who brought you one of the bloodiest mainstream horror films of the last decade is only gifted with viscera. Not only did Marshall personally design the battering ram used by the forces of Dragonstone trying to breach the Mud Gate, but he also was charged with the unenviable task of making it seem like a siege shot on a location no bigger than a sound stage. Between both Stannis and Joffrey's forces, Marshall only had about 100 extras to work with and had to utilize a mixture of CGI replication (as the row boats make their way to the shore) and clever staging, framing and reverse shots (as the forces clash outside the gate) to clump everyone together and make it seem like there were thousands of soldiers fighting the Battle of Blackwater Bay. When it came time to shoot the climactic money shot of the Tyrell/Lannister cavalry saving the day, Marshall once again had to rely on CGI replication to make the 12 horses - yes,
only 12 - they had seem like an unbreakable wave of muscle and steel. But we can't talk about the Battle of Blackwater Bay without talking about everyone's favorite weapon of mass destruction: wildfire. As crazy as it sounds - and it sounds very crazy - Marshall actually wanted to try and create
real wildfire by attempting to get things to burn green through various chemical reactions. While working on that, Marshall also thought it would add authenticity to the battle if the actors were reacting to a real substance and thus, he had the crew build an actual catapult that would launch 'globules of what was essentially napalm.' Unfortunately, things got 'tricky' when it got windy on set so he had to settle for launching regular debris that was set on plain old boring orange fire and have it colored in post. The massive explosion as it exists in its final form was created through a mixture of real effects, CGI and digital enhancements, the details of which can be found on an awesome featurette on Season 2's final disc.