The first season of Under the Dome created a ratings myth more surprising than the plot: the first episode of the first season of the first North American viewers as high as 13.5 million, breaking the record of the premiere of the series at the time, but also subverted Hollywood's "summer U.S. dramas do not make money," the traditional concept of Hollywood. In the face of such high ratings of the previous season, the cast and distributors must be under great pressure. After all, the first season has already pulled the storyline to a distance of 18,000 kilometers away from the original sky, how to get all the padding and details in the second season to round back? As the saying goes, Stephen King himself wrote the script for the second season, and made a guest appearance with lines, which was a big selling point for the season.
"Under the Dome" has already aired three episodes in its second season, and after the first two episodes, ratings are down 15 percent from the previous season, but it's still leading the U.S. Monday night 10 p.m. mainstream drama. Before the start of the show, the producer Neal Baer, star Rachelle Lefebvre (as Julia, the redhead with the exploding head) and Dean Norris (as bald Big Jim) flew from the filming location in North Carolina to Los Angeles to participate in the "summer media conference" hosted by CBS, which is a hit show to build momentum again. Morning Edition caught up with the producer and star of "Under the Dome" on location.
New tricks for God's Dome
In the previous season, a bare glass enclosure trapped the entire town underneath, and its divine powers included slicing fatted calf across the grain with a single slice, gathering monarch butterflies, hatching insect eggs at a godlike rate, generating a destructive magnetic field, calling in the winds and rain, and finally accompanying you to watch a pink meteor shower. It leads to the isolation of the town's inhabitants, the rapid spread of trepidation, the gradual scarcity of resources for survival and the extreme lack of medical equipment. Viewers, thoroughly confused by the almighty god-dome as a godly techno-empire, have come up with all sorts of ways to escape the dome, some of which have already been vetoed by the show: digging tunnels, blowing up the dome, finding the button to turn it off, and most desperately praying for it to inexplicably disappear.
By the end of the first season, we knew that four young characters - Junior, Angie, Angie's brother Joe Jr. and big-headed alien girl Norrie - were the "four hands" that would solve the dome's mystery, and that their combined powers would reveal Julia's true identity - the human monarch assigned by the dome. the human monarch assigned to the dome. Her mission is to protect the little black egg created by the dome's rupture, and to lead the townspeople to obey the will of the dome, which may be an alien experimental base.
Eastern Morning News: How will the dome display its mysterious power in season 2?
Bell: This season will focus on revealing all the dome's magnetic powers that are fueled by the town's special natural resources. The Monarch butterfly will be a very key magnetic vane. Viewers will meet all kinds of natural disasters that are super destructive and that the townspeople must overcome to survive. Julia will also learn how to control the energy between her and the dome.
Dean: What does the dome communicate about the aliens? That's something that will continue to be explored in the new season. I think the various marvelous phenomena that are about to be revealed are very much like the destruction and rebirth described in the Bible.
Eastern Morning News: Rebirth? Is it possible for everyone to die?
Bell: Stephen King is at his best when he eliminates certain important characters, so the audience never knows who's going and who's staying. In Season 2, the plot is still focused on how the dome is testing the townspeople, and of course we'll say goodbye to certain characters, but it also gives the story room for new characters, like a mysterious new character played by Grace Victoria Cox, who doesn't remember who she is, but her appearance will change the relationships between key players in the show. Where did she come from? Is it from outside the dome? Why did Junior's mother sketch this girl 20 years ago? Doesn't that sound like a wonderful story?
EastEnders: the first season already explained that the dome is impenetrable, so how will the story account for all sorts of new characters inexplicably falling out of the sky in this season? Do the dead come back to life, or are they all from the past?
Bell: Big Jim's brother-in-law Sam, who has been hiding out in the woods in the new season, is forced to show up; all I can say at this point is that it's possible that the mysterious girl could have come from outside the dome, but it's important for people to realize that the concept of "outside the dome" is a very broad one. In the third episode of the new season, Big Jim and Little Joe receive a text message from someone from the outside world that proves there is a hole in the dome's magnetic field, and it's not until the eighth episode that we get to meet the man who sent the text. We'll now refer to him as the show's "digital character."
Who's the lucky guy who breaks out of the dome?
Is the dome itself an object that human science can explain or not? Is it flawlessly orificed? That's what everyone wants to find out. Fans who have already seen the first two episodes of Season 2 know that a certain two important characters have been axed, but the showrunners have revealed that the two will reappear in the form of souls possessed by alien gods. On that basis, which is beyond the comprehension of science and technology emperors, the story will use the small-town school as a vehicle for the show's scientific message, and in that regard it also introduces viewers to the long-awaited Spice Girls hybrid Karla Crome, who takes on the role of the school's physics teacher, Rebecca.
Rebecca's presence in the movie has caused a tangle in the relationship between Julia, a redhead, and "Barbie," her new favorite leading man. Obviously, Barbie is a good kid who respects science, and although he knows that his girlfriend Julia is here to save the town at the behest of the dome, he is also impressed by Rebecca's rigorous physics research. Rebecca believes that the center of the town's school embodies the frequency of the dome's energy release and is the only safe place in town, and possibly the place to find the dome's vulnerability.
EastEnders:Rebecca is a huge admirer of Big Jim, will her scientific ideas help the villain take control of the dome once and for all?
Dean: The villain? Thank goodness Big Jim finally has a fan. The ensuing struggle between the characters is primarily between Big Jim and Julia; Big Jim has always believed that the dome came down to make him ruler of the town, but soon in season two, he'll learn that Julia is the monarch chosen by the dome. This not only destroys his ambition, but also burns up his desire to leave town. Rebecca is definitely a source of motivation that encourages Big Jim to rule the town and rebel against Julia, but I'm not sure if Big Jim will manage to break through the dome loophole and leave town after his meeting with the mysterious Digimon. The crew hasn't given me the script for that episode yet, haha.
EastEnders:Rachel, your character is the dome's new favorite and the town's monarch, will she be the first to escape the town?
Rachel: I'm sure the character of Julia herself is searching for a lot of answers, after all, she doesn't know what powers the dome has given her. What I do know now is that she can attract the Monarch butterflies, suggesting that Julia has her own magnetic field just like the dome. And I don't think she has any thoughts of leaving town, she's honorable and wants to **** the residents in trouble. The writers of Under the Dome also took into account the emotional plausibility of the characters when arranging the various details of the dome's "can-do" and "can't-do" scenarios, so Julia won't change her mind all of a sudden, and if she wants to leave, she'll definitely take everyone with her. to go.
Oriental Morning News: If someone goes out or someone comes in, what opportunities will that bring to the town?
Bell: For the townspeople, they would immediately face two big problems: lack of food and breathing problems (caused by the diffuse smoke from Rebecca's burning of monarch butterfly eggs). Big Jim, Barbie and Julia must all find a solution to the food supply and smoke removal. If the mysterious figurehead can come in from the outside world, then the townspeople will be saved. But, as you know, most of the show's troubles have been caused by the selfishness of the townspeople. Chaos is inevitable.
Rachel: I think it's hard for the writers because they can't rewrite the natural disasters that happened in the first season, haha, so that it's fresh enough for the Nerdist fanbase.
Bell: Don't forget that we're also going to have the prophet that is Junior's mother show up in Season 2, and it's revealed in the second episode that she's a character that exists outside of the dome. But the town is sure she's dead. Her paintings will all be viewers' way of finding out.
Same Story Principles, Different Playbook
Bell revealed that Season 2 will continue the same story principles from the previous season, which is that "the dome is variously tormented and the residents are variously played." The dead will reappear in Season 2 with a message from the aliens: Big Jim doesn't have to die, but he must sacrifice his interests for the town. It seems that the dome is sensitizing the trapped humans, and by the time the alien force destroys the planet, these people will be able to come to their senses and live in harmony.
Oriental Morning News: Does the dome's harmony theme dilute the original's strong sci-fi overtones?
Bell: Viewers may feel that the dome is trying to sensitize the townspeople through various trials, but no one knows if that's the dome's purpose. Every episode of our script had to go through two major executive producers, Stephen King and Spielberg, who repeatedly emphasized the need to keep adding to the sci-fi elements of the show. So, there's no shortage of more visual wonders for us to see in Season Two. As you've already learned through the trailer, the town's metalwork is attached to the dome walls, which is more than a Hollywood blockbuster.
Dean: Maybe we'll even see Big Jim in tight swimming trunks, since it's a summer show, haha.
EastEnders: Haha, that's got to be awesome. The original "Under the Dome" story had an ending; is the TV show going in the same direction?
Bell: We're hoping to go all the way to the original ending, or at least that's how Stephen King envisioned it. The original spanned a week, and our first season was already more than a couple months, so for the second season, to enhance the sense of compactness, we're spanning a day per episode. That makes it a one-year story under the dome, and 15 years for the TV show. It's not the story inspiration we're missing, it's the TV schedule.
Eastern Morning News: in the original, there were only 26 survivors at the end, will the TV series change that number and the characters included?
Bell: As I'm sure you've seen, we've adapted some of the very small characters from the original into very important roles, and like Alice, the survivor, we're instead going to kill her off very early on and bring her back to life as a ghost, which is going to be a very varied way to play the story. What won't change is , we'll keep teenage characters like Xiao Qiao (one of the original survivors) because the original's exploration of politics, education and environmental issues can be well represented by young people, and we hope that the audience can see them grow up.