EXCLUSIVE: The Sentinels sees a new breed of French super-soldier take to the WW1 battlefield. Deadline can share a new image from the Canal+ series, which Studiocanal is bringing to international buyers at the London TV screenings.
Here’s the set-up: On a WW1 battlefield French Private Gabriel (Louis Peres) is wounded. His family is told he is dead. In fact, he has been chosen to be part of a secret research program to create a new kind of soldier. Inoculated with a mysterious serum, when he awakens, Gabriel is stronger and faster than a normal human. He is recruited into The Sentinels, a band of elite fighters.
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Based on the Xavier Dorison and Enrique Breccia graphic novels, the French-language drama launches on Canal+ in France later this year.
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The show is over eight years in the making, Delphine Clot, tells Deadline. She is Co-Founder of Esprits Frappeurs, which produces alongside Federation Studios France.
“It was a great opportunity to produce a genre series, but one rooted in the French culture. In this graphic novel series there were ingredients that were very interesting for us including the mix of the war setting and the sci-fi touch.”
“What is unique is the combination of genres,” Clot adds. “You have the story about augmented soldiers, you have a spy story, and you have the setting of Paris. Also, you have a very strong love story between Gabriel and his wife. At the very beginning he’s reported dead, but his wife refuses to accept that and in Season 1 she is looking for him.”
Federation co-founder Lionel Uzan explains that the team have tweaked the source material for the screen but sought to keep what made it special.
“What we love in the graphic novel is this idea of another First World War, which is part of the potential tagline for the series: ‘You don’t know everything about the First World War’. There’s a juxtaposition of something that feels real, but with an ingredient of something futuristic, or retro futuristic.”
Clot picks up the thread: “There is a kind of glow, a light, and a style and aesthetic that is very special. Our two directors [Thierry Poiraud and Edouard Salier] and DOP worked on that with the intention of making it simultaneously realistic and magical.”
The super soldier set-up will be familiar to fans of Captain America or comic characters like Rogue Trooper. A key difference here is the serum-enhanced warriors are French. “We’ve seen a lot of superhero or retro-futuristic stories, but none of them were rooted in French culture or French history,” Uzan notes.
Given the period setting, the team went to great lengths to ensure the materials used for the Sentinels’ outfits looked like they were from the era. That speaks to the producers’ aim to make something fantastic, but grounded.
“We need to believe it’s possible,” Uzan says. “That guided all of the creatives on the show, especially with the question of the design of the Sentinels, the masks, the armor, the weapons: what if it was real?”
The action in Season 1 is concentrated on the earlier part of WW1. With more war years to play out the plan is for The Sentinels to become a returning series. Uzan and Clot judiciously avoid spoilers, but hint that it isn’t just the French developing a force of augmented fighters, the Germans have designs on creating their own force.
“It’s the World War and the premise means this is something that can go wider, it can go in many directions,” Uzan says, adding work has already started on Season 2 scripts.
Studiocanal is distributing and firing up sales at the London TV Screenings.