Commuters shocked as horse-drawn gladiators storm London landmarks | Movies

A group of twenty ancient warriors, fully clothed, appeared in Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus and even boarded a bus past Big Ben as commuters and tourists looked on.

The stunt comes ahead of the release of the blockbuster Gladiator II on November 15 and was accompanied by a colossal collaboration for world-famous Piccadilly Lights, transforming adverts for Gladiator II, Lego, Trainline, TK-MAX and Samsung into Roman-inspired stone.

The costumes spotted on the streets of London are real outfits from the production of the new film. More than 2,000 costumes were made for the Hollywood blockbuster from lead designer Dave Crossman and his team, including Paul Mescal’s Lucius.

They also designed the Roman army’s outfits and 150 gladiator costumes, the latter of which all have their own unique, individual design in the film.

Creating the costumes required a variety of cutters, makers, leather workers, metal workers, jewelers and embroiderers to bring the outfits to life.

Dave Crossman said: “I wanted to make nice looking gladiators. I looked at mosaics and contemporary references from that time. They usually wore padded padding on their arms and legs for protection, as armor was too expensive. The Roman army consists of basic soldiers, centurions, and supervisory officers. Senior officers wore expensive armor or chain mail, and the rest of the troops fought in segmented armor.”