Propaganda Strikes!

The interweb is like a curious kid in an arid field and the only toy he or she has is a match.

Well on Friday, February 26, the match struck at 7:30 AM and the fire began to consume your web browsers around the world thanks to Analee Newitziz of io9.com.

“The Alternate History of Gundam in WWII” headline was the spark and the community of Sci-Fi and Anime fanatics were the field.  You clicked in search of 3 story tall mecha-action and you found something a bit different… The backdrop was not outer space and the soldier was not controlling a refined exo-suit.  To the contrary, you found a single soldier who gears-up in a science-meets-metal prototype invisibility suit.

Some of you loved this, some of you still want this to be a robot-harnessed adventure, and some of you are still confused due to the misleading headline – but hey that’s the media for ya… I mean, its not like we went through the trouble of creating a website that features a detailed synopsis and a blog post about the creation of the trailer… ha, that would be way too informative and hard to access… Wait a second, we did and the text above links this time.

But no worries; why?  Because you’re here and you’re intrigued by what you saw.

Project Arbiter IS…

1. set in 1943 Northern Europe at the height of WWII
2. historically accurate and not set in an alternate universe
3. based on actual events, conspiracy theories like the Philadelphia Experiment, and Nikola Tesla’s research
4. about a group of special operatives comprised of the Allies best from both the United States OSS and the British SOE
5. about a prototype suit that renders its occupant invisible
6. a short film… With aspirations for something larger
7. filming in May and is targeted at 25 minutes in length
8. depends on your support and donations

Over the past 3 days there have been over 10 thousand hits to the io9 post alone with more than 100 comments and counting, including a few of my favorites from both sides – Allies and Axis…

Allies:

• “Looks like super-awesome diesel-punk Nazi killin’.   If it makes it to theaters they can have my 8 bucks.” – ChicagoDog




• “Props for including the XP-61 Black Widow plane in the trailer.” – Jeb_Hoge




• What is it about WWII that can make old, overused ideas seem cool once again.  One man in power armor = Meh.  One man in crappy 40s era armor fighting Nazi tanks = I’m sold.  How does this happen? – Razoky

• “This movie NEEDS to be made now!” – Shokract

Axis:

• “I would have definitely been interested in an era-specific story about WWII mecha. But unless this has more than just a guy in a suit who will take on the Nazi forces alone, meh.” – Althestane

• “What’s next? A freed slave in a steam-powered mobile suit protecting Abraham Lincoln from assassination?” – SkaHimself (I would actually watch that, well as long as it doesn’t star Will Smith)

My vote and the reason why I wrote Project Arbiter as the story that it is:

• I am most interested with the soldier, the specific man, who has the ability to become invisible and the choices he makes as a result.

• Robots and mechs are definitely fun but from a realistic perspective you’re hiding behind 10 feet of reinforced mechanics with laser beams and energy swords and I personally feel that realism is jettisoned at that point.  Doesn’t mean I don’t geek out over that stuff just like the next fanboy, but its simply not the film I seek to make with Project Arbiter. This is a WWII epic noir-drama with Sci-Fi flare.

• The same argument could be made about invisibility; however, what peaked my interest two years ago was the advancements in the technology around invisibility so this science seemed within reach.

• And why WWII?  Two reasons: 1) its the last great war where politics went out the window to defeat a serious evil in the world and 2) technology of present is so advanced that for an origin story about a technology like invisibility, we really need to step back and say where could all of this have started – V2 rockets, radar, stealth technology – its all in WWII.

What do you think? Become a part of the Project Arbiter community on Twitter and Facebook to get all the latest updates as we gear up to shoot in May, 2010.  If you like what we’re doing, please support the cause and DONATE now.

See you on the battlefield!

Mike Chance

[Writer / Director]

The real question you should be asking is:

“What is Mischung 9.”

Whoever figures that out, well…

They will get a prize.

More will be revealed in the coming weeks.

Read what others are saying – click here.

Tags: Gundam, io9, Michael Chance, Project Arbiter, Propaganda [News], trailer, WWII