Can you guess whose picture that is to the right? He might not have a winged helmet, he might not have a giant war hammer but…. ah c’mon, you know it’s Thor! Marvel released its first promo picture of the Chris Hemsworth as the thunder god to Yahoo Movies and, as I’ve been saying all along, the costume’s more or less the same as the recent Olivier Coipel redesign (the one with the chainmail sleeves). Since Marvel’s been getting more organized about branding their multi-media endeavors, you can always find clues of how the Marvel movies will shape up in recent developments in the comics. I don’t think it’s an accident that Iron Man ended up looking like the Adi Granov re-design that debuted a year or two before the first movie's release. Similarly, anybody who wants a preview of what Captain America will look like in his movie ought to peruseat the slight redesign Bryan Hitch did for the recent CAPTAIN AMERICA: REBORN mini-series. I’ll bet you dollars to donuts that Chris Evans will be sporting a helmeted cowl with wings stencil-painted on its sides.
THOR won’t be in theaters for another year (almost exactly another year, as its release date is still May 7 2011), so this is but the first of what will be 365 days of official preview photos, posters, trailers and tie-ins like those Iron Man’s currently doing with Reeses and 7/11. I’ve joked that Captain America should endorse some protein shakes (call it the special “super soldier serum” flavor), and, now, looking at this… I’d say Thor ought to court a deal with Gillette.
Anyway, the real question is what you, the mightily-bearded Comic Vine community, think of this image? Does it live up to all your Nordic fantasies? Or is it making you wish for Ragnarok?
-- Tom Pinchuk is the writer of UNIMAGINABLE for Arcana Comics and HYBRID BASTARDS! for Archaia. Pre-order the HYBRID BASTARDS! hardcover now on Amazon.com.