British actor Dan Stevens dives head first into the role of the Marvel comics character
David Haller, whose diagnosis of schizophrenia may actually be masking his mutant abilities,
in the TV show Legion.
Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers, it's Jan here, and in this video I'm going to be revealing
some fascinating facts (you might not know) about the making of the mind-bending new series
from Fargo showrunner Noah Hawley.
Legion the TV series didn't start out as we know it today.
Back in 2014, following the success of the first season of Fargo, the producers behind
the X-Men film franchise approached Fargo showrunner Noah Hawley about making an X-Men
TV series.
But at that stage, the story of David Haller, aka Legion, was not the one on the table.
The original idea put forward to Hawley was a show about the Hellfire Club, which previously
appeared on the big screen in X-Men: First Class.
However, Hawley, who grew up reading X-Men comics, wasn't keen on bringing that world
to the small screen or in making a straightforward comic-book adaptation.
Instead, he wanted to add something fresh, playful, and unexpected to the genre so he
chose the character of David Haller which allowed him to explore identity, question
reality, and make a show where the audience would do the same.
In Marvel's comics, David Haller has multiple personalities and is the super-powerful mutant
son of Professor X.
The character was created in the mid-1980s by Chris Claremont and Bill Sienkiewicz.
By the way, Fox did start developing another TV show about the Hellfire Club with different
showrunners, but that particular idea was shut down when Fox decided the draft Hellfire
script worked better as a feature film than a TV series/didn't work as a TV series, and
the showrunners began work on the new series 24 Legacy instead.
When it came to developing Legion, Noah Hawley was inspired by a variety of British films
from the 60s and 70s including Quadrophenia and Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange.
In fact, he wanted the series to have a similar vibe to the kind of movies British actor Terence
Stamp made in the 1960s.
However, because Hawley views his new show as a kind of fable, and because it focuses
on protagonist David Haller's very subjective and fractured experience of the world, Legion
isn't set in one particular time period or location.
So, its surreal look ranges from the past to present-day right into the future.
Another major influence on the series was British rock band Pink Floyd and their classic
1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon, which Hawley describes as the 'soundscape of mental
illness'.
In fact, the character that actress Rachel Keller plays is named after one of Pink Floyd's
founding members, Syd Barrett, who, like David Haller, may have been schizophrenic.
The band also inspired the show's music, which is a mix of electronic, orchestral, and atonal
sounds, tape effects, and music playing backwards.
Indeed, composer Jeff Russo told The Marvel Report and Nerdophiles blog that he bought
the kind of synthesizer used on Dark Side of the Moon in order to channel the right
sound.
Russo, who's a fan of Pink Floyd and 80s X-Men comics, knew his music needed to capture David
Haller's sense of uncertainty about what's real and what isn't, while moving perfectly
between those two worlds.
And he found that reading neurologist Oliver Sacks' book Hallucinations helped him understand
how people like David Haller, who hear voices, perceive reality during auditory hallucinations.
Speaking of music, to help Dan Stevens get into the right headspace to play Haller, showrunner
Noah Hawley put together a special playlist for him.
The 160 tracks that Hawley chose were an extremely eclectic mix ranging from music such as Pink
Floyd to The Muppets, 'people screaming into bins', and 'experimental French sound art'!
Legion may be its own standalone show at the moment, but you should still look out for
X-Men nods in the series.
In fact, a bunch of props that featured in the X-Men movies and which are normally kept
in storage, were shipped to the sound stage in Vancouver where Legion was filming.
Showrunner Noah Hawley has pretty much had carte blanche in bringing the character of
Legion to the small screen, so, keep your eyes peeled throughout season one's eight
episodes to see which X-Men movie props he snuck into the show!
So guys, what did you think of Legion?
And what other X-Men characters would you like to see get their own show?
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Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers!