WonderCon Coverage: The Journey to Terra Nova

Remember when Lost debuted on ABC back in 2004 and the trees on the island were trampled by what many believed was some kind of strange creature? Well, when viewers tune in to the debut of the new FOX drama Terra Nova this fall the creatures will be clearly visible and they will definitely be dinosaurs.

Terra Nova follows Earth in the distant future – 2149 to be exact – when all the natural resources are depleted and the survivors of that time are in crisis mode: they need to find a new home. As luck would have it, an escape hatch is discovered – a super collider appears – allowing volunteers and those chosen at random to go through the wormhole with the hopes of finding a better life. On the other end of that wormhole is the distant past – 85 million years in the past where dinosaurs roam freely – and the opportunity to have a second chance at treating the Earth better.

The main focus of the show is based around the Shannon family, a seemingly ordinary family who are chosen to join a colony of humans – that includes civilians and military personnel – who build a civilization that becomes known as Terra Nova.

While the setting of the colony, at first, seems idyllic – from the trailers shown to the audience at WonderCon – it becomes clear very quickly that their second chance – since there is no way back through the wormhole to their own time – is not going to be easy at all.

Among the guests at the WonderCon panel for Terra Nova were Executive Producer Brannon Braga and Producer/Director Alex Graves as well as actors Jason O’Mara and Stephen Lang, who play the two leads in the new series: Jim Shannon, ex-cop and escaped prisoner who is also the patriarch of the Shannon Family and military man Frank Taylor.

While time travel is covered in the show, it is only a small element of the overall series despite numerous queries to the opposite by moderator Jeff Jensen from Entertainment Weekly and several audience members. Once the colonists travel through the wormhole, they will not have another opportunity to go back to their time.

Filmed on location on the Gold Coast in Australia and executive produced by Steven Spielberg, the civilization depicted in the show was literally built from the ground up, taking 12 weeks to complete. It is the intention to go back there in late May or early June to move forward with more filming.

And, while Terra Nova was to have a sneak peek next month on FOX, it was decided to postpone that early airing of the series to allow the elaborate visual effects, using new technology that encompasses motion capture, for the dinosaurs.

Be on the look-out for the season premiere of Terra Nova on FOX this fall.