Editor’s note: The below article contains spoilers for Army of the Dead.
Netflix has released a new featurette forZack Snyder’sArmy of the Dead, diving into how breakout star Valentine the zombie tiger was brought to decaying and decomposing life in the apocalyptic zombie heist thriller.
Snyder is hardly a director who thrives on subtlety, so when the first trailer forArmy of the Deadarrived and introduced Valentine to the masses, nobody was really surprised. Of course the bombastic filmmaker would turn a Las Vegas staple into a bloodthirsty feral beast, but it took a lot of work to bring the big cat to animated life.
VFX supervisorMarcus Taorminadetails the process, which involved finding a real-life tiger that would match the dimensions they had in mind for Valentine to use for CGI modeling, movement and all-around inspiration. As you may have heard, the chosen feline Sapphire happened to belong toCarole Baskin, with Taormina admitting his surprise that the sanctuary ownerbecame a global phenomenonshortly after he’d worked with her, thanks to her involvement inTiger King.
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We also see starGarrett Dillahuntrather amusingly admit thatArmy of the Deadisn’t even the first time in his career that he’s been killed onscreen by a tiger, and then we get to see the truly bizarre sight of the actor being slammed into cars and thrown around on wires while being stalked by a man in a green unitard. Dillahunt’s demise in the movie is grisly, to put it mildly, and you have to credit him for his willingness to be launched into the air repeatedly, only to have his entire face bitten clean off in the aftermath.
Clearly, Valentine had been at the top of Snyder’sArmy of the Deadwishlist since the earliest days of the project, and it was a complicated and collaborative process between the director and the effects team to ensure thatSiegfried & Roy’s former partner lived up to the expectations audiences had in their minds when hearing the words ‘ zombie tiger’. You can check out the behind-the-scenes video below, andArmy of the Deadis now streaming on Netflix.
