Red Faction TV Movie is a "Family Drama"

The cast and creators of Red Faction: Origins tell us what to expect.

This June, the TV Movie Red Faction: Origins airs on Syfy, and today some of the cast and creative team spoke about the project with the press. The film takes place in-between the events of Red Faction: Guerrilla and Red Faction: Armageddon, and Stargate Universe's Brian J. Smith noted Robert Patrick is playing Alec Mason, "The hero of Red Faction: Guerrilla, who's not so much the hero in our film. He's fallen a little bit."

Smith plays Alec's son, Jake, and he explained, "The thing that really hooked me about Jake is this idea of redemption. His mom being killed, his sister being kidnapped - he kind of stopped at a certain point in his life. He's got survivor's guilt and feels he should have done something. His journey's not only about getting his sister back but trying to redeem himself in his father's eyes. I found that so moving. His drive and his willpower and his damn the torpedoes approach."

Comparing the games to the movie, director Michael Nankin (who directed several episodes of Battlestar Galactica and Caprica, among other series) said, "What attracted me to the film is it's not really a film about the game, it's about the core elements that inspire the game. It's a family drama about redemption, sacrifice. Those juicy, archetypical, dramatic, emotional elements are what the movie is about and also what the game is about. They get to blow up more things than we can, because they don't have to build [it all], but both are about the same things."

Noting the "epic scale" of the game, Nankin remarked, "We weren't able to go in that direction, so we crafted a much more emotional story." Though he said that in terms of the production design for the film's Mars settings, "We really worked a lot from design concept sketches we had from the game." Nankin admitted, "People who are very, very loyal to the game will spend time going, 'That's not quite right,' but we had a different goal. We're a movie."

Explaining what he thought Red Faction: Origins brought to the franchise, THQ Vice President, Danny Bilson, said, "It's a story about a family, which I think anyone can relate to. You can get deeper and get to know the characters behind this." As for the value in this project to THQ, Bilson said, "From a business perspective, it's brand extension. It's a great marketing piece for the game and the IP and it's something we can build upon."

Kate Vernon, known to Battlestar Galactica fans as Ellen Tigh, explained that she plays, "The Matriarch of the marauders. We live out in the desert and our weapons are of the planet - stones, knives we've made, sticks. We're trained killing machines. She represents a level of honest integrity in terms of their idea of warfare. They don't use guns or machines. It's a much more primal idea of fighting."

Vernon said she enjoyed the conflict her character has as a woman who, as part of a matriarchal society, "Had to give up her son. It's a horrendous whole in her heart and her soul. I love that aspect. She's not just a hard-nosed, linear fighting machine, she's a full character; a full woman. Her son comes back and she's confronted with these incredible emotions and she has to keep it together, because she's the ruled." Vernon smiled, noting The Matriarch would rather not go to war, "But she will bury you alive if she has to save her people."

Bear McCreary (Battlestar Galactica, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) is composing the score for Red Faction: Origins, which is not being produced by the division of Syfy usually responsible for their Saturday night movies, but by the network's main scripted programming division. So could it continue as an ongoing series? Admitted Syfy president Mark Stern, "The potential is for it to be a backdoor pilot." He said there were no concrete plans yet to continue the story, "But I wouldn't mind having this talent in a series."

Red Faction: Origins airs June 4th on Syfy.

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