Summary
It’s no secret that the first season of Paramount+‘sHaloshow wasn’t really a big hit with fans of the long-running Sci-Fi gaming franchise. From some bizarre character and plot choices to a general lack of reverence for the source material and its expansive lore, many long-timeHalofans were disappointed with the first season ofHalo, but it wasn’t all bad. Some great action sequences and some equally excellent performances kept many fans watchingHalo, even despite its shortcomings, and its those elements thatHaloSeason 2’s cast and crew are really trying to hone in on.
Game Rant recently had the chance to sit down and speak with some ofHalo’s most integral figures, including cast members Bokeem Woodbine, Joseph Morgan, andthe Master Chief himself, Pablo Schreiber, along with executive producer Kiki Wolfkill and the second season’s new showrunner, David Wiener. It’s this last name that really stuck out during the interview process, with multiple cast members claiming that Wiener has been exactly what the show has needed, bringing about numerous changes that will putHaloback on course.The following interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Pablo Schreiber
Q. The Master Chief is historically a more stoic kind of character, how did you gear your performance to give him a bit more depth in Halo Season 2?
Schreiber: Yeah, I mean, the change from Season 1 to Season 2 - one of the many changes - was looking for a match for that stoicism that the Master Chief has that fit a little bit better. One of the biggest changes we have, obviously, is a new showrunner, David Wiener, who is leading the charge, and it’s his vision you’ll see on-screen forthe second season ofHalo. My job as an actor is to bring the showrunner’s vision to life and make it the best possible version of that vision it can be.
So, I’m really happy to work with David, and to say his words and to live in his world. I think he brings a sense of tonal shift that I think is really helpful to the universe. I think it feels darker, more mysterious, deeper, more interesting. A lot of the action sequences are being handled in a way that I think lends itself to a better version oftheHalouniverse, it’s more subjective, it puts you inside the battle from the character’s point of view. You don’t sit back and see it from a distance, which can be troublesome in this show. So yeah, there’s been many shifts from season 1 to season 2, trying to learn what we were effective at, what we were successful at, and what we weren’t successful at to try and get better.
Q. What’s your favorite role that you’ve ever done, and has that found its way into the Master Chief somehow?
Schreiber: My favorite role that I’ve ever done? I have a lot of, y’know, standouts. The character of “Pornstache” onOrange is the New Black, the character of Mad Sweeney onAmerican Godswere both kind of TV highlights for me as far as roles go. Being a part of the ensemble ofThe Wirewas a real honor for me back in the day. So I have many, many highlights in the TV landscape, lots of great memories making movies, but I wouldn’t say any of the other characters necessarily found their way into the Master Chief.
For me, what’s important, y’know, obviously, as actors we’re the same human beings playing all these characters so there’s going to be elements of our personality that go throughout every character we play. But, for me, it’s very important to distinguish each character and figure out what makes them tick and what makes them unique, and give each one its own color. For me, I like to change as much as I can from character to character and do something that’s quite different from what I did before, so that’s just a personal goal of mine.
Q. If I was going to sum up the Master Chief’s first season character arc in three words I’d say “Discovery,” “Betrayal,” and “Acceptance.” If you could give me three words for his character arc in season 2, what would they be?
Schreiber: Let’s see, “Examination,” “Tragedy,” and “Rising from the flames…” it’s not one word but!
Kiki Wolfkill and David Wiener
Q. [Directed to Kiki Wolfkill] You’ve worked on two Halo TV projects before, Halo: The Fall of Reach and Halo: Nightfall, have they informed your role in this show at all?
Wolfkill: Yeah I mean I think both of those were much smaller scale.Fall of Reachwas sort of two-and-a-half-D animated, and I’d also done some work on the animated anthology andForward Unto Dawn. And I think all of those teach you a little bit about what it means to bring the world to life. This was at such an exponential scale, and with that scale comes also a ton of stakeholders, a huge crew, y’know, it’s a big machine, right? It becomes its own little corporation.
But I think the biggest takeaway is that the thing that matters most is the writing, and the thing that matters most is that underlying story and how that story is told. I think we learned a lot on season 1 around that and immediately rolled that into season 2, and bringing David on for season 2 for exactly those reasons - to verify we had a story that would really uphold the season.
Q. The action sequences are obviously a major highlight for Halo, can we expect to see more action sequences in season 2 than season 1?
Wiener: Yeah I think so. Yeah, season 2 is aboutthe Covenant threatgetting closer to humanity, and you’re able to expect that collision and all it entails. Y’know, it’s a soldier’s story set against this epic galactic conquest, and we try to put as much of that in the camera as we can. It’s also, y’know, I love it too.
Q. What’s your favorite part about doing the action sequences?
Wolfkill: All of it!
Wiener: Yeah, I think the thing that surprised me is I really got a thrill from the pyro and having stuff blown up. I’ve done that before on other shows but never quite like this. Our SFX people were incredible, and y’know it’s loud and it is big, and there are a lot of people and a lot of moving parts, and if you can do all that and keep people safe, it’s a blast. There’s nobody that wouldn’t have fun with that.
Wolfkill: And stunts, obviously, are amazing.Coming from a game dev backgroundand working so much in character animation, like, the storytelling of movement and the choreography of this action and these fights is so good and so intriguing to work through…it’s incredible to build these sequences.
Bokeem Woodbine
Q. Soren came to the Rubble at a young age and he eventually found himself as one of the station’s top bosses. Now, is there any chance that we get to see that backstory? Maybe in a flashback in future seasons, or maybe in a spin-off?
Woodbine: You never know, those decisions are above my pay grade right?
Q. Would you like to see his backstory get fleshed out a bit more?
Woodbine: I wouldn’t be against it. If it’s something that the audience wants.
Q. Soren uses his tough exterior to keep up his reputation on the Rubble, but season 1 showed that he might actually have a heart of gold. Are we going to get more spots of vulnerability for your character in season 2?
Woodbine: Yeah, they really wanted to take some time to peel some of the layers of who Soren is, and I was really taken aback - in a pleasant way - by, y’know, when I’m reading the scripts I was taken aback by how much more - for lack of a better word - intimate it was in terms ofSoren’s characterand what they wanted to discuss and reveal, if you will. He’s a very complex person, and you really get a sense of all the different layers that make him up to be who he is. It was a big surprise for me. I didn’t anticipate that going into season 2. But as I get through more and more scripts, I’m like wow, this is really giving him an opportunity to be fully realized.
Q. Do you have a favorite moment from season 1?
Woodbine: A favorite moment of season 1? It was the stuff that I did with Yerin (Ha) in episode 7. Pretty much all of those moments where it seems it’s almost a little adversarial between the two of us, and then we decide to start trying to work together. Those were really challenging beats, and I was pleased with what we were able to pull off when it was all said and done.
Joseph Morgan
Q. The character of James Ackerson has appeared in quite a few Halo novels. Would you say that your character leans closely to that, or goes his separate way?
Morgan: I think there’s aspects of the graphic novels that I took, y’know, to a certain extent. And then there’s some little tidbits that I kind of stole for his backstory that only I would know, likeThe Key of Osanalan, things like that, like he and his brother had this imaginary key and, y’know, this idea of being the hero as a kid in those stories that he then carried into his adult life.
But I think ultimately, yknow, the main sources of inspiration for me was what was on the page, the writing. You know we have a new showrunner this season, my first season, his first season -David Wiener- and I worked with him before onBrave New World. His vision for the show is just much more in line with the canon and it’s much grittier and grimier, sort of a reimagining really. I think, as far as I’m concerned, it was theHaloI wanted to see. So that was what I drew on. The quality of the writing is so high, and all of the subtext and the political element which is so prevalent inHalowas all there for me to draw on.
Q. What’s your personal history with Halo?
Morgan: So, you know, I played it as a teenager when it came out and loved it - always the campaigns though, I’m not really a massive multiplayer/online guy - but I played through thecampaigns co-opwith my mates. Like me and my best mate played throughHalo 1,2,3, I played4on my own, I playedHalo: Reachjust before joining the season to get back into that world.
So I was very aware of the world and the props that I came to see on set, andthe Warthog and Mongoose, and all of that. And then I dived into - online they have this huge database created by fans of the dense mythology of theHaloworld and lore and everything - so I kind of dived into that to investigate stuff about Ackerson.
Q. It seems fair to say that Halsey and Ackerson have a bit of a rivalry going on in season 2. Are you able to shed any light on how that started?
Morgan: I think, y’know, I mean look there is a backstory there definitely. And it’s no secret, you’ll see it, you’ll sense it when you watch the scenes that there is… they both are highly intelligent manipulators, right? So there’s one scene that’s going on with them in the room and they’re bantering back and forth, being quite polite about it, and there’s another scene underneath that scene that’s playing out.
This seething pot of animosity that’s bubbling over, I think. So that was just kind of a joy to play with Natasha (McElhone) who’s such a talented actor. But yeah it was definitely important to us to show that there was this whole history that they shared behind this scene, and this real competitiveness between them, this real petty competitiveness.
[END]
