As we first reported on SFFGazette.com, a new look at Rogue Trooper's Venus Bluegenes has been revealed at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival. Duncan Jones (Warcraft) helms the upcoming 2000 AD adaptation and enlisted Agent Carter and Avengers: Doomsday star Hayley Atwell to play his Venus.
While we don't know much about her role in the Rogue Trooper movie, the comic book version of Venus was a so-called G.I. Doll and one of the female counterparts of the Genetic Infantrymen created by Milli-Com to fight the war on Nu Earth.
Like the other Dolls, Venus originally had a non-combat role at Milli-Com, but was frequently subjected to unwanted attention from her human male superiors. However, she more than proved herself a formidable fighter and was embraced by fans to the point that she got her own strip in the pages of 2000 AD.
Photorealistic CG animation is used to tell the story, and that required the movie's cast to be on "set" for an intense two-week shoot that allowed Jones to capture their facial performances.
"We weren’t recording mo-cap of their bodies, we were only recording their faces and their voices," he told Variety. "We would have an area blocked out, so we kind of knew what the what the environment was supposed to be, where a scene would take place, but we were only using that as a reference for witness cameras, and then the actual animation we would do later on, after we’d actually already kind of cut the film."
Jones added, "There was actually quite a lot of the film where the animation is done by hand, so it’s a real hybrid and way of working where we didn’t have to worry about setting up all of the motion capture for the for the actors."
Shot in the UK during the 2023 Hollywood strikes, the filmmaker was able to attract much bigger names, like Atwell, who may have otherwise been busy elsewhere.
"We were really fortunate that lots of lots of actors that would have been booked up and on other shows weren’t working, so it was like, 'Hey, have a look at this animatic. Do you want to come and play in this crazy different way of doing an animated movie with Duncan Jones?' And pretty much everyone was like, 'Hell yes,'" he recalled.
Check out this first look at Rogue Trooper's take on Venus in the X post below.
Based on the classic 2000 AD comic series created by Gerry Finley-Day and Dave Gibbons, Rogue Trooper tells the story of 19, a "Genetic Infantryman," who finds himself the sole survivor of an invasion force.
Desperate to track down the traitor who sold him and his comrades out, the super soldier is accompanied by three killed-in-action squad mates, whose personalities have been stored in his gun, helmet and backpack.
Rogue Trooper stars breakout talent Aneurin Barnard (Dunkirk) as the eponymous Rogue Trooper, alongside Hayley Atwell (Captain America: The First Avenger), Jack Lowden (Slow Horses), Daryl McCormack (Good Luck To You Leo Grande) and Reece Shearsmith (Saltburn).
Rounding out the cast are Jemaine Clement (Avatar: The Way of Water), Matt Berry (What We Do in the Shadows), Diane Morgan (Cunk on Earth), Alice Lowe (Black Mirror), Asa Butterfield (Sex Education) and Sean Bean (Game of Thrones).
A release date for Rogue Trooper has not been announced, as the movie is still seeking a distributor.