TV/STREAMING
SOLAR OPPOSITES: ONE SCI-FI ANIMATED SITCOM AND TWO WORLDS By CHRIS McGOWAN
All images courtesy of Hulu. TOP: The pupa is a cross between a child and a pet with the power to evolve into a super-computer that can rebuild Earth into the image of doomed planet Schlorp. BOTTOM LEFT: David Marshall, Technical Director. BOTTOM RIGHT: Yaoyao Ma Van As, Art Director.
82 • VFXVOICE.COM FALL 2020
PG 82-85 SOLAR OPPOSITES.indd 82-83
The artists and animators of Solar Opposites – Hulu’s hit animated comedy series about a warped alien family that has crash-landed in suburban America – had the unusual challenge of having to create two distinct realities for each episode. One is the world of a sci-fi sitcom that balances lighthearted zaniness with boundary-pushing crudity and violence. The other is “the wall,” the dog-eat-dog setting of a dystopian story within the main story. Solar Opposites, which bowed in May, was created by Justin Roiland (animator/actor/co-creator of Rick and Morty) and writer Mike McMahan (creator of Star Trek: Lower Decks for CBS All Access). It concerns five aliens who have fled their destroyed home world of Schlorp and find themselves stuck on Earth. Korvo (voiced by Roiland) and Terry (Thomas Middleditch of Silicon Valley fame) are the adults, acting sometimes like brothers and other times like a same-sex couple. Korvo hates Earth (i.e., American) culture and Terry likes it. They have two replicant offspring: innocent Jesse (Mary Mack) who loves humans, junk food and pop, and irascible Yumyulack (Sean Giambrone), who uses a shrink-ray gun to zap humans who annoy him and keeps them in a multi-level vivarium set into his bedroom wall. The latter, stuffed with a host of desperate, miniaturized people, has become a post-apocalyptic microcosm of society, a brutal hierarchy lorded over by the Duke (Alfred Molina). Meanwhile, the fifth member of the team – the pupa – is a cute child/pet that will one day end life as we know it by remaking the Earth in the image of Schlorp. The aliens seek to fit into their new home – especially Jesse and Yumyulack in high school – yet lack all empathy for the earthlings around them. Inevitably, someone in the family unleashes something from alien biology or sci-fi tech that kills lots of people in a gruesome fashion. Yet, the show maintains a “fun above all” spirit. Indeed, Solar Opposites – which has a similar animation style to that of Rick and Morty – is lighthearted despite the carnage, and the bright and colorful look contrasts with the often-harrowing action. “We like to play with the juxtaposition of those two things,” comments Technical Director David Marshall. “The show can be gory at times, but it is still extremely silly. I think blending the two gives you a broader range of styles than you’d have otherwise.” “Sometimes we use bright colors to enhance the drama,” explains Art Director Yaoyao Ma Van As. “Other times they were there to show contrast. For example, I wanted the scenes in Episode 7, where the rebels are being drowned by the Duke, to have a kind of serene beauty to really contrast with all of the death and horror.” Prior to working on Solar Opposites, Marshall worked as a technical director and animation supervisor for Rick and Morty. Ma Van As was also involved with that show as a background painter for Season 2. “Once the season wrapped, I had the opportunity to help Justin with his pitch for a new show. I painted some concepts and colored some characters for what would come to be Solar Opposites,” she recalls. Solar Opposites was initially put into development by 20th Century Fox Television, which then shelved the project. In 2018,
Hulu took an interest and gave Roiland and McMahan an initial order of two seasons with eight episodes each. At that point, Ma Van As came aboard as Art Director. In June of this year, the show was renewed for a third season with 12 episodes. The show’s main designs were generated in-house. “Everything is animated and comped using Harmony by Toon Boom,” explains Marshall. “We also used Adobe After Effects for some scenes. Animation was done by our amazing Canadian partners, Bardel Entertainment, with technical or creative retakes and revisions all being done in-house [Bardel also handles Rick and Morty]. I’m always impressed by the quality of work they produce on some extremely daunting projects.”
TOP: Solar Opposites’ Earthbound alien family: the pupa (in bed), Yumyulack, Korvo, Jesse and Terry. BOTTOM: A cinematic style of storytelling was used to set the wall storyline apart from the “real world” of Solar Opposites.
FALL 2020 VFXVOICE.COM • 83
8/27/20 3:30 PM
