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Growing up, the scariest alien of them all on our television was the Daleks from Doctor Who.  Daleks are organisms from the planet Skaro, integrated within a tank-like mechanical casing. The resulting creatures are a powerful race bent on universal conquest and domination, utterly without pity, compassion or remorse. Their ruthless conquest was the constant battle of the Doctor and his various companions.

Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme follows the adventures of a mysterious traveller known as “the Doctor” who travels through time in a TARDIS, a 1950s style blue Police Phone Box.

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The series is the longest-running science fiction television show in the world, running from 1963 until 1996. The series was resurrected in 2005 and still runs today with the eleventh Doctor, Matt Smith.

The trademark DALEK is owned by the BBC, who with clever foresight secured the rights in 1964 and continues to this day to be a revenue earner for the corporation.

Weta Workshop is a licensee for the Doctor Who since 2008. They produce a range of very high quality Doctor Who replicas. Dave Tremont is a Senior Workshop Artist at Weta remembers being scared to death:

Having the crap scared out of me watching a Dalek approaching the terrified Barbara, actually it was just the sucker arm that was approaching Barbara. I don’t remember anything from the caveman story but remember a lot from ‘The Dead Planet’. I would watch the stories in absolute terror and fits of shaking but could not stop watching. I was mortified if we had to go out and would miss an episode or would go and bug the neighbors if our TV broke down (which was often).

You can see one of the their Dalek replicas here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoPc_jGgHD0

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Kiwi company Weta Workshop, the multiple Academy Award-winning leader in motion capture, special makeup, creature and visual effects (The Lord of the Rings trilogy, King Kong and Chronicles of Narina etc), will design and provide the practical alien creature effects for the movie Skyrunners on Disney’s XD channel.

“Skyrunners” stars Joey Pollari and Kelly Blatz as teenage brothers Tyler and Nick Burns who command a small UFO that crashed near their town.  The brothers uncover a plot to take over earth by aliens and the battle is on to save the planet.

“Skyrunners” is directed by Ralph Hemecker (”Numb3rs”) and written by Richard C. Okie (”Quantum Leap” and “Earth: Final Conflict”) along with Adam Wilson & Melanie Wilson. Disney XD is an American digital cable television channel owned by The Walt Disney Company that mostly airs children’s animated television series.

This comes right on the heels of success of Richard Taylor business awards, the children’s show The Wot Wots,  the start of the Motion Capture for Tintin, the work on the Hobbit series and many other projects. According to the government, Peter Jackson related projects have bought over $NZ 2 Billion worth of work to Wellington.

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Award Winning Director Guillermo del Toro and Kiwi Director Peter Jackson are being roundly praised as they embark on a remarkable story telling adventure with not only the The Hobbit, the fourth in the series of Lord of the Rings series, but a production which will deal with the 59-year period between “The Hobbit” and “The Fellowship of the Ring,” the first of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy.

According to David Bentley:

Spider-Man director Raimi told Empire magazine: “I thought that The Hobbit was just a fantastic icon of fantasy literature. I love that book and I’m a giant fan of the Lord of the Rings movies.

The Hobbit itself follows the quest of hobbit Bilbo Baggins to win his share of the treasure guarded by the dragon Smaug. Bilbo returns from that quest in year 2942 of the Third Age, and leaves the Shire in 3001 after passing on to Frodo the ring he had obtained in 2941. It’s his leaving The Shire that is the start of The Fellowship of the Ring movie, the first of the trilogy helmed by Peter Jackson.

Del Toro moved New Zealand for four years to work with Jackson and his Wingnut and WETA production teams. He will helm the two films back to back – telling the story of “The Hobbit,”

New Line is overseeing development and will manage the production. “The Hobbit” and its sequel are being co-produced and co-financed by New Line Cinema and MGM, with Warner Brothers distributing domestically and MGM distributing internationally. Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh are executive producing the films.

The Oscar®-winning, critically acclaimed “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy grossed nearly $3 billion worldwide at the box office. In 2003, “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” swept the Academy Awards®, winning all of the 11 categories in which it was nominated, including Best Picture – the first ever Best Picture win for a fantasy film. The trilogy’s production was also unprecedented at the time.

Here is some youtube goodnews on Del Toro:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5wjKkLh-rY

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