In the upcoming Vancouver-as-Vancouver series Primeval: New World, primeval creatures enter our city through temporal anomolies, aka time portals, and terrorize our neighbourhoods. One such dinosaur suddenly appeared in the Olympic Village last Thursday, chasing a jogger east from the Olympic Village pedestrian bridge to the Creekside Community Centre in take after take. It was a treat to watch the guy-in-the-grey-skin-suit-carrying-a-sphere (Chuck Campbell) who will become the computer-generated-dinosaur (an Albertosauras) following this actor-jogger until the jogger suddenly stops, looks behind him, yells “Holy Shit” and leaps over a bench to try to get away. Now that’s acting. I have a feeling he doesn’t make it since the last scene of the day was a crime scene behind the green Dragon Boat portable trailers.
Like the original British series Primeval, the Vancouver spinoff has a team of smart minds and animal experts who battle these creatures. Ours is led by Niall Matter as Evan Cross, a rich Vancouver software genius, seen here with a big gun trying to break into the northeast rear doors of the Creekside Community Centre before being briefly apprehended by the police. And that’s Geoff Gustafson’s Ken on the left below int blue military uniform.
Earier in the day, Niall Matter’s Evan Cross and Sara Canning’s Dylan Weir, an expert in predatory animal attack behaviour, arrive at the Creekside Community Centre in Cross’s black jeep, along with Danny Rahim’s Mac Rendell on a motorcycle. I watched them film the scene of the trio grabbing their big guns out of the back of the jeep and then of Cross running east and Canning’s Weir and Rahim’s Rendell running north towards False Creek.
On such a perfect day, Canning and Rahim relaxed in the sun between setups.
At some point, the dinosaur must break through the glass on the northwest side of the Creekside Community Centre. Primeval New World crew briefly stopped people on the seawall to film a small charge exploding the replaced-with-plexiglass panel. It was loud.
On set to direct episode eight was none other than Stargate and Sanctuary star Amanda Tapping. I recognized her voice before I recognized her, looking like a lanky teenager instead of her usual Leo Awards glamour queen.
Primeval: New World’s first 13-episode season launches this fall on SPACE in Canada.
Update: This is episode eight and Stargate Atlantis’s Chuck Campbell is the guy in the grey skin suit playing the dinosaur.