What I based the Grammaton
Clerics on was sort of a cross-section of a number of the aesthetic
warriorhoods that existed throughout history like the mamluks who were
slave warriors and were often castrated, which is not to say they felt
nothing, but there were certainly some things they didn't feel. They
certainly had an altered emotional state and the Knights Templar, the
Teutonic knights – you know, people who had taken an aesthetic
religious vow and are really, purely "Warriors of God." Most
relevantly, of course, are the samurai and their Bushido code.
Obviously, the samurai were required at a moment's notice to commit
seppuku if the shogun ordered it and in order to do that, you have to
have a certain dispassionate take, I believe, on the material world.
You'd have to assume that these people looked at their weapons as
essential and integral tools of the trade.
The Grammaton Cleric is an
order that is very spare - they take the shortest distance between two
points and I think they like to optimize their efficiency in any given
situation and they did their research and figured the gunkata was the
best thing to do ... the gunkata is the focus of the Grammaton Cleric's
techniques, but they are clearly versed in other things including
swordfighting ... They can pretty much use anything that comes into
their sphere of influence, because from birth they're trained in a
Cleric monastery to be warriors.
...hopefully Preston
demonstrates that in the course of the movie that with a gun, going
down a corridor, he's infinitely more effective than a guy with
nunchucks going down the same corridor...
- Kurt Wimmer, CHUD
Interview
