Cory Stillman
The best TV shows find a way to constantly up the ante, and few shows have done that more so in the last year than Hulu’s Paradise, which dramatically transformed its setting and tone in its second season, following the first season’s shocking finale. After only getting brief glimpses outside of the Paradise bunker, season two sends us on a whole new journey aboveground, and we have the talented folks at Onyx VFX to thank for the show’s grim and detailed vision of the apocalypse. Awards Radar sat down with VFX Supervisor John Weckworth and CG Supervisor Evan Underwood to unpack their hard work on the hit series.
“Season one was spent building paradise, and in season two, we get to bring it all down,” says Weckworth. That approach involved weathering this new post-apocalyptic landscape, covering it all in layers of dust and dirt.
“All of the world-building was to reinforce that time has passed, and it’s a rough world now.”
That sense of world-building extends far beneath the Earth’s surface, where some of Weckworth and Underwood’s favorite sequences from season two play out.
“We wanted to stay within the world we’ve established with Paradise, but have it feel like an underground version that the average resident doesn’t know exists,” says Underwood. “We knew that the deeper beneath the Earth we went, the grungier and more abandoned the floors would become.”
The result is a sprawling complex that features not only an underground prison, but a control room, a boiler room, and a sewer. The Onyx team was grateful to be so directly involved in the ideation behind Paradise and its constantly evolving world.
“Paradise is a VFX artist’s dream project,” says Weckworth. “The variety of things we are tasked with for the show is constantly keeping it fresh and new. And our work is often the climax of the most important sequences.”
Check out our full conversation with the Onyx VFX team below, as we dive deeper into some of Paradise season two’s most shocking moments!
Hey John and Evan! Paradise S2 is obviously quite different from S1. Could you talk about navigating that transition in the show’s setting and tone from a VFX standpoint?
John Weckworth: In season 1, we only got a small look at the world outside of the Paradise bunker. In season 2, we are out in the world and following a new bunch of characters in a post-cataclysm world. In Season 2, the VFX has a layer of dirt and weathering on everything. All of the world-building was to reinforce that time has passed, and it’s a rough world now.
What were the key considerations in designing Paradise‘s unique vision for the apocalypse?
JW: We knew from the beginning we wanted to show the apocalypse through the eyes of our characters. How it affected their lives from their perspective. In episode 1, we have this vantage point from the Graceland balcony that looks out over a few square miles of Memphis that we keep coming back to. We see this same view before, during, and after the apocalypse. Visually, the viewer can see how bad the outside world is getting and how rapidly the change takes place.
Can you walk us through your work on that plane crash and hailstorm during S2E2?
JW: The plane was shot on a green screen. The fuselage and cockpit were practical, but the wings, engine, and propeller were CG. The directors found a great clip of a small plane flying through a hail storm. We used it as the reference for our FX hail particles. It was such a specific look; we knew we just needed to refine it until it matched 1-to-1. Once we had a match for reality, we amped it up to make it believable that it could dent the wings, bend the propellers, and finally blow out the engine, setting it on fire.
Do you each have a sequence of which you are most proud in Paradise S2?
Evan Underwood: My favorite shot in the season was from episode 3, after Bane’s murder, the camera drops down below Earth, and we pass by the various subterranean floors until we eventually reach the underground prison at the bottom.
We were working with two plates from production, the A-side, which was the Bane murder and the start of the camera moving down, then there was the B-side, which contained the resolve of the camera moving down and landing on the prison elevator where Jeremy Braddock and the prison guards emerge from. There were about 20 seconds in between these two plates that we had to fill in with our CG of the subterranean floors.
We started with concept designs to come up with ideas for what each floor should look like. We wanted to stay within the world we’ve established with Paradise, but have it feel like an underground version that the average resident doesn’t know exists. We knew that the deeper beneath the Earth we went, the grungier and more abandoned the floors would become. Eventually, we landed on the ideas of a control room, a boiler room and a sewer. We then needed to find the right balance of lighting and moodiness for the shot, which was grim and eerie. I was really happy with the final product as it felt like a seamless transition from practical footage to full CG and back to practical footage. The chef’s kiss was the amazingly dark cover of the song “The Final Countdown” that the editing team chose to overlay on the shot.
JW: For me, it’s a series of sequences. Season 1 was spent building paradise, and in season 2, we get to bring it all down. The last act of the season finally has three scenes that all lead to the fall of paradise. It starts inside the bunker with Sinatra’s last walk and the city collapsing around her. Outside of the bunker, we get to watch the whole mountain that housed Paradise explode and collapse. It all concludes with a bird ‘s-eye view of the cratered remains of Paradise. They all build on each other, and I feel it was a fitting end to Paradise City.
How did you use the VFX to support the “time hallucinations” that grow increasingly relevant throughout the show’s second season?
JW: In the first season, the DP Yasu Tanida has a prism that he would hold in front of the lens, which created a very cool in-camera effect that stretched the image and distorted the color channels in random ways. They liked the look so much that we recreated the look in VFX and could apply it anywhere that the editors wanted. It eventually became the look for the time hallucinations.
John, having served as VFX supervisor on several feature films, how does your creative approach differ on a TV series like Paradise?
JW: For a TV show like Paradise, my creative approach is very similar, just very condensed. You’ve got to trust your gut; the ideas don’t get much time to marinate. So you need to make definitive decisions quickly and commit to them. In the edit, I might only get a shot or two to drive home an idea, so I’ve really got to make the most of it. Logistically, you have to be very prepared; things move very quickly, and you may only have access to a set or location for a day or less. I’m sure people on set think I’m a lunatic because I’m constantly photographing or capturing everything on set. You never know what photo or element will save you or be that thing that makes a shot great.
Evan, can you help our readers better understand the difference between a VFX Supervisor and a CG Supervisor?
EU: The VFX Supervisor is responsible for the overall VFX vision and execution of the show. They’re the bridge between the director, production, editorial, and the 3D and 2D Supervisors, ensuring the work supports the story creatively, technically, and within budget. The CG Supervisor is mostly focused on the 3D side of the pipeline, overseeing areas like assets, animation, environments, and FX.
Is there anything else you guys would like to add about Paradise or Onyx VFX?
JW: Paradise is a VFX artist’s dream project. The variety of things we are tasked with for the show is constantly keeping it fresh and new. And our work is often the climax of the most important sequences. Onyx, being the sole VFX vendor for the season, maintains continuity and a unified vision that is sometimes hard to achieve when the work is fractured. Also, the ownership of the VFX department has all of the artists heavily invested in the project. We always get so excited when a new script comes out; we can’t wait to see what they have cooked up for us.
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