 Shiban originally wanted to film the sewer scenes in Los Angeles ' actual sewer system , but the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power vetoed the idea and stated that " there 's a moratorium on shooting there since September 11 " , a position that Shiban called " understandable . " In order to make up for this , series art director Corey Kaplan was tasked with building a sewer replica ; she used the blueprints from the 1952 version of Les <unk> as an inspiration . Eventually , a complete set was built on Stage 11 at the Fox studios . 
