Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire - The Ultimate Zack Snyder Movie

Zack Snyder's Creative Involvement

Zack Snyder is a director known for putting a lot of himself into all of his movies, but Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire is the most Zack Snyder-y movie Zack Snyder has ever made.

Rebel Moon Part 1 Interview: Zack Snyder On Inspiration From Star Wars & Heavy Metal Magazines

Ever since the release of 300 in 2007, the phrase 'a Zack Snyder movie' has meant something very specific and audiences can quickly identify key traits like slow motion, desaturated and high-contrast color palettes, muscled physique, over-the-top violence, and more.

Zack Snyder Rebel Moon Set Visit

While any single movie made by Snyder bears his creative stamp, many of them differ on some level, such as the lack of slo-mo in Man of Steel or the less stylized approaches of Dawn of the Dead or Army of the Dead, but Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire checks all the boxes of what one should expect from Zack Snyder while also seeing one of the highest levels of the filmmaker's involvement at many stages of production, earning him numerous credits in addition to his role as director, including some uncredited participation in areas like art design and storyboarding.

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Zack Snyder's name is all over Rebel Moon's Credits. He is credited as writer, director, producer, and cinematographer on Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire, tied only with Army of the Dead as the director's most-credited project.

Zack Snyder Rebel Moon

In addition to his credited roles, Snyder was also highly involved with drawing Rebel Moon's concept art and storyboarding process. Snyder typically draws storyboards for every scene of his movies before entering production, and for Rebel Moon Snyder drew over 3,000 storyboards, but he also drew hundreds of concept images as he worked with the production design and art teams to flesh out the look and feel of the Rebel Moon universe.

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Zack Snyder even had a set of custom anamorphic Leica lenses created to shoot Rebel Moon.

Rebel Moon Imperium Dreadnought Travels Wormhole

Rebel Moon's Visual Style

Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire's visual style has everything you'd expect visually from a Zack Snyder movie, from its use of high-contrast monochromatic color palettes to the abundance of slow-motion, Rebel Moon includes a little bit of everything Snyder's style is known for, for better or worse.

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Of course, Snyder's visual style was established by many movies prior to Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire, so it wouldn't be a stretch to claim 300 or Watchmen or Zack Snyder's Justice League are a more accurate sample of his work; however, given Snyder's level of involvement in Rebel Moon, particularly his role as cinematographer, while the other movies mentioned were collaborations with Larry Fong and Fabian Wagner as cinematographer, makes Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire's style rise to the top as the most 'Snyder' of all Snyder's movies.

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Rebel Moon - A Totally New, Original Property

Zack Snyder's rise to fame in Hollywood came as the director of reboots and adaptations, beginning with Dawn of the Dead, before he adapted Frank Miller's 300, Kathryn Lasky's Guardians of Ga'Hoole, Alan Moore's Watchmen, and directed three DC Comics adaptations. Snyder's biggest films being adaptations make Rebel Moon all the more novel, as Snyder isn't only unrestrained by studio demands, but also has no pre-established lore or canon to which he's beholden, meaning Snyder has full creative control of Rebel Moon.

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Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire isn't Snyder's first original work, Sucker Punch and Army of the Dead were also original stories conceived by Snyder, although Sucker Punch was made as a one-off story and Army of the Dead, while it also kicked off its own universe (with tangential ties to Rebel Moon), isn't quite as expansive as Snyder's core Rebel Moon mythology.

Rebel Moon Kora Sofia Boutella Plants Flag

Rebel Moon's PG-13 Cut and the 'Snyder Cut' Tradition

Of course, with an expanded R-rated cut of Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire on the way, some might say that makes the PG-13 version of the movie 'less' Snyder-y than the full 'Snyder Cut' of the movie, which will inherently be even 'more Snyder-y' than this cut, but in an ironic twist, a cut compromised by runtime and rating requirements is another strong aspect of Snyder's Hollywood lore.

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Whether or not releasing a two-hour PG-13 cut of Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire and making audiences wait for the three-hour R-rated version was a smart strategy by Netflix remains to be seen, but it does ironically maintain Snyder's tradition of releasing shorter 'compromised' cuts of his movies first, leaving fans demanding the more pure, more 'Snyder,' version later. Regardless, Rebel Moon - Part 1: A Child of Fire and Rebel Moon - Part 2: The Scargiver are both set to provide audiences the full Snyder experience.

Staz Nair as Tarak bonding with a Bennu in Rebel Moon: Part One - A Child of Fire