SHAUN THE SHEEP: FARMAGEDDON

Taking a dip into Aardman’s stop-motion sci-fi.

From Wallace & Gromit supporting player to leading lamb, Shaun the Sheep has become globally recognisable thanks to short films, a long-running TV series, and a 2015 film spin-off. Now his escapades are taking on an extra-terrestrial dimension, as film sequel Farmageddon sees him befriend an adorable alien who has inadvertently landed on Earth. Teasers spent the day at Aardman Studios in Bristol, poking around the sets with directors Will Becher and Richard Phelan and their miniature stars. “We really embrace the fact that it’s stop-motion,” says Becher. “Every frame has that handprint of a craftsperson behind it.”

CHARACTER bUIlDING

The characters start as 2D sketches before they’re made and modelled in 3D and eventually refined into the puppets we see on screen. Newbie alien Lu-La is part silicone, part clay (Teasers is given a floppy Lu-La to hold) – the clay head allows her to be expressive, while the silicone body can be robustly handled by animators. “We haven’t really had a character like that before, and she hasn’t really got legs,” says Becher. “So it was a real challenge when we started developing how she was going to move.”

OOH lU-lA

Purple-floating alien Lu-La – who lands on the farm after being separated from her parents – is set to win the audience’s affections as well as Shaun’s. “She’s the heart of the film,” says Phelan. “She really is. We’ve all fallen in love with her.” But don’t let those cute looks deceive you, as she’s capable of causing a lot of chaos, as in the supermarket set we witness, which has been destroyed after a sugar rush.

DIGITAl UPGRADE

For all of Aardman’s commitment to clay, CGI trickery is still required for some effects. “Lu-La is a really good fusion of both because we need her to feel magical,” says Becher. “So the first time we meet her, we’re making her do things which would be impossible, like glowing from the inside, and floating around. But at the same time, we’ve got to keep her in the world. So most of the stuff that she does is all with the animators in the studio.”

THINkING bIG

The sci-fi backdrop gives Farmageddon a bigger scope than the previous film. In the Bristol studio, Teasers gets right up close to several sets, including an enormous underground base for MAD (Ministry of Alien Detection), full of hazmat-suited bods. “We’re trying to make it feel really big, and to make it feel bigger than all the other films in terms of Shaun’s world,” says Becher. “We’re taking it into outer space.”

SCI-FI HI-jINkS

It wouldn’t be an Aardman movie without countless sight gags and puns sneaking in under the radar.

As well as some near-unrepeatable product names in the aforementioned supermarket, Farmageddon allows the team to cut loose with sci-fi references. “For our references, we’ve gone everywhere,” beams Phelan. “We’ve bought sci-fi books, and then there’s Ray Harryhausen and the old ’50s B-movies, and then from my own [era], John Carpenter and James Cameron and Steven Spielberg. And then we’ve got references to Christopher Nolan films and Arrival. They’re spread out. And then all the other departments [add ideas].

I think everyone’s geeking out a bit.”

ETA | 18 OCTOBER / A SHAUN THE SHEEP MOVIE: FARMAGEDDON OPENS THIS AUTUMN.