Summary
- Twisted Metal's live-action adaptation stays faithful to the original game franchise while adding heart and humor to the series.
- Costume designer Liz Vastola carefully designed looks for both classic and new characters, paying attention to realism in the real world.
- The show successfully balances the brightness and heightened reality of the games with emotional storytelling, creating a visually poppy, post-apocalyptic world.
Warning: Some character SPOILERS for Twisted Metal
Twisted Metal has sped its way into live action with a surprising amount of heart and humor to go with the video game series’ signature carnage. Developed by Michael Jonathan Smith and executive produced by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, Twisted Metal is both a faithful adaptation of the original PlayStation game franchise and an evolution of the franchise’s world. The series stars Anthony Mackie as John Doe, Stephanie Beatriz as Quiet, Thomas Haden Church as Agent Stone, and Samoa Joe and Will Arnett as Sweet Tooth.
The Twisted Metal games are known for their cast of over-the-top characters, and care was taken to not only represent those characters well in the series, but also place them believably in the real world. For help with this, the filmmakers enlisted costume designer Liz Vastola, who artfully created looks for classic and new characters alike. Vastola is no stranger to adapting characters from one format to another, as she previously worked on Netflix’s Daredevil and Jessica Jones.
Liz Vastola spoke with Screen Rant about Sweet Tooth, what she’d like to work on in a Twisted Metal season 2, and more.
Note: This interview was conducted during the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, and the show covered here would not exist without the work of writers and actors in both unions.
Liz Vastola on Twisted Metal
Screen Rant: Did you have any knowledge of Twisted Metal and before you got the project, and if not, was there anything that you did to prepare?
Liz Vastola: I’m—what do they call them?—an elder millennial; I grew up in the ‘80s and ‘90s and was definitely, and still am, a gamer. But we only had one gaming system, and it was not the one of the hour, so I was aware of Twisted Metal; I never played it. I am also very aware, and have always been very aware, of video game design, and the way costumes function in video games and in a digital environment. When I heard about this project and I was in the beginning stages of talking with Michael Jonathan and everybody about it, I was just on the tear to be a part of it. It’s such a juicy series, and there's so many larger-than-life characters attached to the cars.
Twisted Metal has a very loyal fan base and there are so many resources online to be able to research the series and see all the different iterations of a lot of the in-game characters. That's what we did; we dove in. And [while] we’re bringing the series to life on the screen, we’re augmenting it, adding to it, [and even] departing from it in some places. One of the first things we all talked about together was who we wanted to [keep] very visually close to the game, and which game, and which iteration of them, and then who would serve us better in terms of the story and the narrative to take a little bit of a departure. That's really how we started.
You’ve kind of done that before, I imagine, since you did Netflix’s Daredevil and Jessica Jones. Is adapting a video game character different from adapting a comic character?
Liz Vastola: In a way it is, because a comic book character that's born on the page in a two-dimensional form is a work of art in its own right, and operates to a different nexus of parameters. When you're reading a character that's been realized in two dimensions, you have to fill in the blanks in terms of, “How does a three-dimensional real life body operate in that costume?” You have to add where that element is missing, because it didn't need to operate under those kinds of physics in the more three-dimensional space.
[With] video game costume design, I think fans have asked for much more realism in terms of how costumes operate on the body, even with the most recent Unreal Engine. I think of games like Horizon Zero Dawn and The Last of Us, and the way in which costume is draped on what we are meant to believe is a human body is just totally different. That being said, when I take those kinds of references and pull them into a film and television space, the most important element is the cast, is the human body, is the characterization, is the actor. In video game costume design, I would argue that one of the most important elements is the environment, and how the costume operates in that landscape.
I really want to ask about Sweet Tooth specifically because he's just awesome. Somehow, I feel like he looks even more unhinged in the show than in the games. He’s dirtier, the mask is messed up, the hair is a whole thing. Where did those decisions come from? Was that just about putting him in a real world and imagining who this person would actually be?
Liz Vastola: It is the very difficult marriage [of taking] this out-of-control crazy, but also very purposeful and [self-serious] type of character and putting it in a real world. [It’s about] believing that he really is living in this casino and has been there for 20 years. A big through line in the show with costume was always, “Who has access to being able to launder their clothes?” and “Who cares about laundering their clothes, versus who doesn't?” I think the dirt and the grime and the sort of busted-ness of Sweet Tooth is a way to situate him in our environment and our world, and what he would prioritize in that moment.
There’s a lot of action in this series. How many copies of everything did you need?
Liz Vastola: A lot! Sweet Tooth is his own thing because Samoa Joe [is] an incredible wrestler, and of course he did a lot of his own stunts because that's who he is. You have to balance that with not wanting him to put himself in harm's way, and wanting to have people who work professionally in film and television stunts--not to put them in harm's way, but they just have the experience of that under their belt. You also have to realize that his costume is basically shirtless, so every inch of his body is important to the look of the character and it's harder to hide a double.
The other element to this show is not only the stunt doubles, but the driving doubles. We had quite a few professional drivers who could do a lot of the driving stunts. For that, you could have a bunch of different filming units going at once, with one person in one iteration of the car, another person in another iteration of the car, and you want to dress those people head to toe just in case. So we had quite a few [costume copies], especially for all the characters that get behind the wheel. The driving double of it all was definitely a challenge to figure out.
And the thing I think the show does insanely well is take the brightness and the heightened reality of the games and still make everything emotional, with a story that we care about. Did you have to strike a balance between making these characters pop as if they're in a video game, but also making everything feel real and grounded?
Liz Vastola: Yes. Very early on, one of the design mantras that came from Michael Jonathan and everybody involved at the top was that this was not a Mad Max beige world. By the way, that movie is incredible and those costumes are iconic--all the iterations of them--but this post-apocalyptic landscape was going to be bright and going to be colorful, and [be] something really poppy to look at, much like video games are. Especially one like this where there's, humor, it's fun, [and] it’s bombastic.
In order to do that and not just have it feel like a parade of costumes out of context, we really wanted to make sure [that] elements of what people wore and all the ensembles felt grounded [in the sense] of, “Where are people getting these clothes?” It couldn't feel like everybody in this world was an incredible tailor and could sit at the machine making their rubber suits. It couldn't feel like everybody got together, and they just decided that they were all going to wear tones of brown. There had to be some sort of grounding element of, “Okay, it's post-apocalyptic, but we've got what we've got, and some people are more creative in what they're wearing, and some people are grabbing stuff and doing the best they can.”
The other thing we thought a lot about is that in this world where people are so cordoned off into their own communities and the ability to drive [and] have cars and gas and tune up your vehicle was one of the most important currencies, people [were] going to need to wear something that expresses who they are in order to immediately telegraph their strength. With Bloody Mary's costume, for example, [we were] flipping that whole narrative and thinking, “After she's become this jilted bridesmaid,” which is her game lore, “what would she wear to express herself as her version of a milkman, that also looks kind of scary, kind of ****ed up, and kind of cool, but still feminine and rough?” That kind of thing was at the front of our minds: “How would these people want to express themselves in the world?” because they don't have many other ways in which to do that. Some of these people are nomadic and often traveling, and need to telegraph who they are and what they're about with what they wear.
Did you have a character who was your favorite to design a look for, or someone who was the most challenging?
Liz Vastola: They were all equally exciting and challenging, because they were all so different from one another and represented something very different. I think that Dollface at the end of the series was a really fun process, but also [something that] took a while to get to. We knew we wanted to use that mask, but we knew we didn't want to go game accurate with that. We [still] wanted to preserve the essence of it in a way, and so I think that character and that group felt really gratifying.
Was there any character that you would really like to work on for season 2?
Liz Vastola: I think getting more into Calypso would be really wonderful. I love getting into the more suited, tailoring world, and bringing that into this world I think would be really fresh. And I think everybody's curious to know how we’d realize Axel and what that would look like. I just want to know what that would potentially be.
About Twisted Metal
John Doe is a fast-talking outsider with no memories of his past but hopes for a better future. When an opportunity presents itself in the form of a new mission, delivering a mystery package across a post-apocalyptic wasteland, he'll face off against countless dangers to complete his task.
Check out our other Twisted Metal interviews here:
New episodes of Twisted Metal release on Thursdays on Peacock.