“The first thing I had to do was get the game Candyland, but then James showed me his design for the imps. He has these very interesting sketches that he does, they’re really scratches, but they’re very evocative. He said, ‘It’s a six inch creature and I want it to run through the grass. You don’t see it at first, but when you do, it’s cute at first and suddenly it’s awful.”
Based on those two sources of inspiration, Ivanov and her team created the imp world by building a practical set and augmenting it with CGI. “We had a lot of samples of grass for James, and we went through a lot of pinks to find the exact shade of pink he wanted,” she pointed out.
As much she emphasizes Gunn’s involvement and control in the creation of Peacemaker, Ivanov also points out that he’s open to collaborating with his team. For example, when the script for episode three required Chris to enter a building by jumping from a rooftop, Ivanov pitched the idea of having him jump off of a nearby billboard. “James loved it, and he made it a rock band [The Mighty Crabjoys from Superman]. It was a tiny detail, but it was really personal.”
Likewise, the zombie world that the ARGUS agents find was “originally designed to be an open road,” Ivanov points out. “But then we found an old village modeled after the 16th century that was built for another movie, so we made that the zombieland.” Although the change required her to throw out everything she had initially designed, Ivanov insists that it’s “always a joy” to go through the creative process. “As long as we end up with the right decision, everything is up for grabs.”
It’s that type of openness to experimentation that makes Ivanov such a good fit for Gunn’s universe. But it also allowed her to bring to life another corner of the DC world, one not part of the mainline universe.
Opposed to the open greens and well-lit office buildings of Peacemaker is the Gotham City of The Penguin, which Ivanov designed for the spinoff of The Batman. Set after the Riddler’s attack in that film, The Penguin features a particularly run-down version of Gotham City. Drawing from her own memories of living in New York City after Hurricane Sandy, Ivanov grounded the comic book metropolis in real destruction.
