September 20th, 2024 
Jackson Murphy 
Zack Snyder, director of 300, Man of Steel and 2010 animated feature Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole, is the creator and executive producer of new adult animated action series Twilight of the Gods, now streaming on Netflix. He joins fellow EPs Deborah Snyder and Wesley Coller to talk about the show and the power of animation. (This Animation Scoop Q&A was edited for length and clarity.)
Jackson Murphy: Zack, you directed episodes 1 and 8 of this, as well as “Legends of the Guardians”. What is your approach to animation like vs. your live-action films?
Zack Snyder: Well I don’t really have a different approach. I draw a lot. I do tell a lot of stories in pre-production with drawings, with 2D representations to say, “This is what I want to do.” That style translates really translates easily to animation. And because I have a pretty solid understanding of the animation process, it’s not like I’m ‘behind’. I think that’s really helpful for everybody.
JM: The show has this great connection to it, between Sigrid and Leif. Deborah, what do you love about this connection and what viewers are going to experience over these eight episodes?
Deborah Snyder: It’s a lot of things. It’s a quest for revenge. At its heart, it’s a love story between Leif and Sigrid. Against all odds, they’re trying to be together. Even the gods are against them. You get to meet all these great characters and go on this journey with them. And it’s definitely a different hero’s journey for each one of the characters. What’s really great about it is a lot of people love Norse Mythology, so seeing our take on it is great. But we can introduce a whole new audience to these stories — that have lasted and resonated with people for such a long time for a reason. They’re really great stories.
JM: Yes. Powerful stories. Norse Mythology figures are heroes and villains, like many of the films you have produced, Wesley. Do you find that correlation there in the impact of heroes and villains?
Wesley Coller: Yeah, absolutely. As a creative team, Zack as a director and a writer has always told big mythological stories. Heroes and villains are such a big part of that. This was another opportunity to really unpack the Norse Mythology we know, the pop culture experiences we’ve had with that… and then come to it with fresh eyes. We really create a story, like Debbie said, that’s a love story. It’s a tale of vengeance. And being able to take some of these mythological characters and gods and maybe place them in a column they maybe haven’t been in in previous pop culture experiences is really going to be a fun and exciting thing for audiences to go on that journey and experience these characters in a different way.
JM: Zack, what you do so well with this show, and with “Legend of the Guardians”, is the impact of animation with weather. How did you want to approach the elements with this show in many cool sequences?
ZS: You’re really also sort of obsessed with landscapes, the Scandinavian landscapes… mountains and valleys and beautiful meadows. Incorporated into that is going to be clouds, mist and crazy skies — this incredible palette that we had to work with as far as atmospherics. That was the thing I was very much into and really pushing the guys hard to keep that always as another element in the story. They did a great job.
JM: Yes, you can feel that for sure. And Deborah, I love the look of the characters. They have such sharp lines.
DS: The process of coming to the design sensibility took us months, and we did it in-house, actually. We hired a bunch of artists. We had a lot of different takes on what this was gonna be, and then we started to hone into this. It’s [so] stylized. We wanted to lean into the 2D nature of what we were doing. Sometimes [with] animation, when it starts to get too realistic, you’re like, “You might as well just shoot it live-action.” And we really wanted the hand-drawn quality to feel what the animation was like. That was the most exciting part — once we came to what the look of it was. Everyone got really excited about how simple it was with these really graphic designs, but it also gave it a sophistication at the same time.
JM: That’s an interesting perspective to showcase the animation in the way that you do and not make it too realistic. A lot of people I’ve talked to over the years would go in different directions. It absolutely works for this show. Wesley, I love the combination of the music and the sound effects, especially in the battle sequences. And you have Hans Zimmer involved in this as well.
WC: It was an honor to have Hans be a part of this. We’ve worked with him in the past and reached out, and he was very excited to join. To put together the team of him, Steven [Doar] and Omer [Benyamin]… and them to come back to us with this amazing score… the first go-around, we were in love with it. Very unique sounds and edgy ideas that they had in there. Our one note was: More of that. Create this soundscape landscape that is its own thing. The second time they came back, we were there. They continue to put beautiful music in front of us. To combine that with the sound design, it’s part of the fabric of this world and story and adds so much to it.
JM: Zack, would you return to doing another full-length animated feature, maybe with characters in Norse Mythology or something else? Either theatrical or streaming?
ZS: Yeah, I would do another feature-length animated film. Absolutely. I love the freedom and the incredible way that the characters can express [themselves]. It’s a really rewarding and visually limitless place to work.
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