In an interview with Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl directors Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, they reveal Feathers McGraw was a solution to a story problem.
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl marks the return of fan favorite villain, Feathers McGraw.
In an interview with directors Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, they revealed that when they started working on this film, their intent was never to bring Feathers back. In fact, this is the first time they have done something like this in Wallace & Gromit history.
Vengeance Most Fowl Started Out As A Short… Without Feathers McGraw
“It structurally seemed to work much better once we freed ourselves from that and just admitted this is a one-story, three-act, 75-minute film.”
Back while they were filming Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, they were already thinking of what would come next for this beloved duo. Nick Park says they were playing around with the idea of a half hour film, and they were kicking around the thought that Wallace was going to invent a smart gnome to help Gromit with his garden chores.
Of course, everything would inevitably go wrong. But the more they dug into this premise, the more they realized that something was missing. There needed to be a darker incentive behind the gnome. Years later, it dawned on the team. Feathers McGraw was the perfect villain to bring back.
Nick Park: We’ve been spellbound by the reaction that he’s coming back. It’s been incredible since that day, really. It was such a big lightning strike. It maybe seems obvious now that he should be in a movie again, but it’s funny how it took a while to reach that. Suddenly when he came back in, the whole thing went up a few gears and the chill factor came in when it was pitched.
Nick Park: We tried it as two short films for a while and then that wasn’t working structurally. It structurally seemed to work much better once we freed ourselves from that and just admitted this is a one-story, three-act, 75-minute film. We found a lot of freedom then, in terms of how we structure a three-act structure, story, arc sort of thing.
Nick Park & Merlin Crossingham Reveal Feathers McGraw Was Not Originally Planned To Be In Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
“It wasn’t our intention, from the beginning, to bring him back. He was a solution to a big story problem, which was an answer to prayer really.”
Feathers McGraw was kept a secret from fans around the world for quite a while, but his return was also kept a secret at Aardman Animation, for fear that it would be leaked and ruin the surprise. They were also nervous that Feathers McGraw was not liked, and that viewers would not be happy about him coming back to antagonize Wallace and Gromit.
Merlin Crossingham: People working on the production knew, but we tried to really keep a hat on it. We were very worried it would get out. Even the idea of making it the first thing that we announced, we were worried about. Mainly because we weren’t sure that people liked him that much, but actually we were totally wrong about that. The team behind the publicity and marketing were absolutely right. It was the right thing to announce and goodness me, people love to hate him. That’s been an amazing thing with social media, getting that feedback and that response. When the last big Wallace and Gromit productions happened, social media wasn’t a thing. So to get that feedback off the fans out there, who were engaging us, it’s just astonishing.
Nick Park: Completely, as Merlin says. Suddenly we had announced something that everyone was expecting and thinking, why the hell haven’t you done it before? How did it take you so long? People in Aardman had mentioned it from time to time, but there had never been a good reason, or a good context, or a story where it didn’t seem like needed to exploit a previous character, which we had never done before in a Wallace and Gromit film. It wasn’t our intention from the beginning to bring him back. He was a solution to a big story problem, which was an answer to prayer really. He worked wonders for the story. We weren’t planning to do a sequel. He was just the perfect solution for what we needed, and we’ve never regretted it.
Be sure to watch our full interview with Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl directors Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham where they reveal the secrets behind the film’s humor, heart, and heartwarming charm. They also discuss the legacy of these beloved characters and what the future holds for their adventures.
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl will have a limited theatrical run in December, before being released on Netflix globally (except in the UK/IE) on January 3, 2025.
NEXT: Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl Review: It’s Charming!
About Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
Aardman’s four-time Academy Award®-winning director Nick Park and Emmy Award-nominated Merlin Crossingham return with a brand new epic adventure, Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl.
In this next installment, Gromit’s concern that Wallace is becoming too dependent on his inventions proves justified, when Wallace invents a “smart” gnome that seems to develop a mind of its own. When it emerges that a vengeful figure from the past might be masterminding things, it falls to Gromit to battle sinister forces and save his master… or Wallace may never be able to invent again!
WALLACE & GROMIT: VENGEANCE MOST FOWL will be released on Netflix globally (except in the UK/IE) on January 3, 2025. The film will also have a limited theatrical release in December.
Tessa Smith is a Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer-approved Film and TV Critic. She is also a Freelance Writer. Tessa has been in the Entertainment writing business for ten years and is a member of several Critics Associations including the Critics Choice Association and the Greater Western New York Film Critics Association.