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This is the other superhero movie sneak peak making the rounds, the first look at Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Anthony Hopkins as Odin, and Tom Hiddleston as Loki. This still has met with very mixed reactions on the new costumes, looking as it does kind of .. Marvel Studios-ey, if you know what we mean. Since Norse gods don’t wear wife beaters, getting the look right is very important. Even Dan Nadel was roused to comment:

C’mon guys, you couldn’t have designed even slightly better costumes? Honestly? It’s just lazy looking. There are many cool things about circa 1960s Thor, most of them beginning and ending with Jack Kirby’s literary and visual ideas. But among the coolest were the costumes! Mind-bendingly intricate mythological armor and sets with a nearly psychedelic color palette. Where is all that? These pictures look kinda like Iron Man. Or X-Men. Or whatever. Point, is, where’s the color? The scale? The imagination? It’s a movie, natch, and things have to somewhat simplified, and it’s Hollywood and blah blah. I know it all already. But… No one thought to call Walt Simonson? Hell, if I were them I’d call CF! Or William Stout! Or Moebius! Call somebody!

Both Thor and Captain America will be in 3D, BTW.

Feige and Branagh were interviewed together in a conference call with the Times. They acknowledged a negative stigma to 3-D, at least in the eyes of savvy fans like those who attend Comic-Con.

‬‪”I’d say there’s not a great feeling out there for conversion based on some of the films that may have succeeded financially but had their artistry come under fire,” Feige said, not naming names but most likely referring to “Clash of the Titans,” the Warner Bros. release that surpassed $490 million in worldwide box office but was savaged by critics for a rushed 3-D conversion that many saw as especially clumsy, distracting and ill-advised.

1 COMMENT

  1. Any chance to tack on an extra 5-10 bucks onto a ticket price is why every “blockbuster” is now in 3D. As long as there are still theatres offering 2D I’m fine with it.

    Wouldn’t say the costumes are awful, just dull and kind of expected. At least the hammer isn’t a mystical bazooka drapped in black leather now.

  2. If the costumes were very faithful to Kirby’s designs there would be whinging about them not being realistic or gritty or whatever. Fanboys don’t know what they want, only what they don’t.

  3. @ Casey Cosker, The Captain America director reportedly didn’t like the 3-D camera when he tried it and switched back to 2-D. It will be a conversion as well.

  4. @Jay – if the costumes were very faithful to Kirby they would look awful because Kirby was not drawing for a movie, Kirby was drawing for the printed page. He didn’t care what things would look like “in real life” he cared about how they looked in the medium he was working in. And thank god for that.

    OTOH – A bit more Kirby inspiration in the “color” department might not have been a bad move. Do they really need so much black? It makes them look dull. The movie costumes also look like they came off a peg in the Toy section at Target. My kid has a “Knight and Sword” costume that looks like it’s made of the same material as Odin’s armor up there. It really screams “fake” and not in the “fantastical fake” sort of way but more in the “costumes on the cheap” sort of way.

  5. Marvel Studios-ey… There was something about Iron Man 2 that got under my skin — the look of the movie, the caddie repeatedly slamming into Mickey, the general storytelling and look that bothered me. Just something in my gut that said, “this on the verge of tipping into banality or something…” Marvel Studios-ey best describes that feeling for me so far.

    I don’t mind the Thor costumes, but they do stir up that gut feeling.

  6. @Francis,

    Watching Iron Man 2, it dawned on me… the production process of these Marvel movies is more similar to a TV Series process than your usual movie: consistency of look and tone seem more desirable values to marvel studios than a strong authoral vision in each movie.

    If you think about it, that consistency of tone was an innovation brought by Marvel to their superhero line in the sixties. Of course, then the tone was set by Lee, Kirby and Ditko, as opposed to a production comittee, so the results were brilliant as opposed to adecuate.

    BTW, I kinda like the new designs, though yes, they do feel Marvel Studios-ey…

  7. I actually think these look pretty good. You directly translate Kirby-era or Simonson-era THOR looks and it’d look like DICK TRACY. I think this does a nice job evoking the futurist/fantasy elements but isn’t enslaved by them.

    Can’t judge how the movie will turn out from a still, though. Heresy, I know.

  8. Really though I’d stress that since Burton’s Batman there hasn’t been a superhero costume design or art direction for the film that has really “popped” for me.

  9. @Guido.

    Agreed. In movies, you are use to seeing a unique vision of the world. A house style, which is historically consistent with Marvel’s approach to business, might work better in comics than in movies. Or it just takes some getting use to?

    Of all the movies they are making, I’m really curious about Thor. They’ll get my $10. But will they get more?

  10. Re: Jack Kirby “Journey Into Mystery” designs

    One look at Loki, and viewers will ask, “Why does he have those big horns on his head?”

    Set design… yeah, use Kirby.

    The costumes look fine.
    (MUCH better than the last Thor movie!)

  11. I saw 3D Despicable Me last weekend, and LOVED it.

    Before the movie, was a trailer/spoiler of some talking animal movie. It was the first example I have seen of one of those converted (ie: fake) 3D movies, and it was BAAAAD. Gimmicky, weird, cheap.

    If Thor and Cap’n America are released in fake3D, I will opt for 2D theatre or 2D DVD rental.

  12. Please Torsten – you were not making reference to that Thor guest appearance on that long forgotten Hulk tv-movie?

    You just triggered off a bad flashback.

    @ Dave Hackett – actually Deadline Hollywood did report that Captain America is also going to be converted to 3D.

    Nice touch with Odin’s eyepatch, although not keeping up with current Marvel continuity, I forgot how he got it in the first place.

    ~

    Coat

  13. Getting the X-MEN I vibe from the costumes—where the Hel‘s the colors? Don’t seem too “Nordic”, much less “original-comic-book-source”.

    And wondering if Anthony Hopkins is having at least as much fun making the movie as Laurence Olivier did in the original CLASH OF THE TITANS…

  14. @ Michael. Costume design says a lot about what to expect. Are the filmmakers trusting the source material? Do they get what the world is about? Spider-Man, spot on. X-Men, different in a smart way. Cat Woman, WTH?

    Thor’s costumes have lots of promise. It’s the house style that is different. This house style is going to run for another 3 movies too.

  15. “Are the filmmakers trusting the source material?”

    The source material is flat pencil drawings on pieces of paper!

    Heath Ledger’s Joker was nothing like any previous incarnation of the Joker, and yet everyone agreed that what he did with the character, visually and interpretively, captured THE CHARACTER.

    That’s what matters.

  16. The guy who wrote Thor is an old acquaintance of mine. He used to be a customer at the comic book store I worked at for several years. He has a passion for comics and I know he’s aware of Thor’s history and would respect it. For that alone, I’ll be there to watch this. The Odin thing does seem a little cheap (his suit looks kind of plastic), however, if you look at the design of it, it has a lot of tell-tale Kirby elements. Thor looks decent and Loki is ok (but where are the kick ass horns?!?).

    @Michael, I agree, this needs to be moving for me to judge whether I’ll like it. The only really bad costume that comes to mind from the Marvel movies is Green Goblin. Now THAT should have stayed faithful to the comics…

  17. Where are the helmets? It does seem very Norse without helmets. And I, for one, *really* hope Loki has a helmet with those big, ridiculous horns, and that it looks more like something out of a Viking movie and less like Magneto’s tiny, weird helmet in the X-Men movies.

  18. “The only really bad costume that comes to mind from the Marvel movies is Green Goblin. Now THAT should have stayed faithful to the comics…”

    I agree that the movie Green Goblin costume was bad, but not because it wasn’t exactly like the comic version. That probably would’ve been bad too. But I’m a fan of neither the character nor the costume, so were it my choice, I would’ve just started the first movie with Doc Ock.