Gorr

At the rate the movies are adapting comics, they're going to be out of material by the end of the year. Wielding a strange and terrifying weapon, Gorr will let nothing stand in his way. It's going to be really interesting to see how Love and Thunder treats Gorr. In the comics, his origin was revealed only after the fact, so if it's supposed to be a mystery, here's your spoiler warning: born on a planet plagued by constant drought and famine, Gorr prayed to the gods regularly for salvation, but was never answered; one by one his family died, and he wandered into the desert hoping to die himself. Instead, he found two actual gods fighting. Pissed that deities actually did exist and just didn't care about mortals, he took the weapon from one of them and began slaying gods across the entire universe. Movie Gorr definitely looks like someone who hails from a barren desert world: his skin is dry and cracked, and he wears loose, billowing robes. In the comics he looked kind of silly, being a nearly nude guy with blank white skin, wearing a hooded black cape and a few modesty tendrils. Kind of dumb, and overtly villainous. The movie's look suggests he's more of a prophet than a supervillain, so maybe he simply sees himself as someone spreading the good word. Of misotheism. The clothing here is white (or at least a super pale gray), rather than black. There's less contrast, obviously, but this design is better for a live-action version. And if the movie does make his personality that of a proselytizer, leaning into the tale the clothes suggest, the design will be better from a storytelling perspective as well. Instead of white, his flaky skin is grey; still light, but darker than his clothes. His fingertips are black, which until now in the MCU has been an indicator of using dark magic (see Wandavision for an example). Comics Gorr was an alien, so he didn't necessarily look human - he had head-tendrils like a Twi'lek, but no nose (just two nostrils right near the corners of his eyes). Movie Gorr is played by Christian Bale, who looks like a dusty old mummy. Was he too good for prosthetics or CGI makeup? Were they afraid he'd flip out on an innocent worker who dared wander into his eyeline, or be visibly condescending toward the corniness of deigning to appear in a comicbook movie? We know the Grandmaster had his design changed because of an old movie no one remembers - did Christian Bale once star as an octopus-man and we all forgot about it? Gorr's cape just rests on his shoulders, so you can take that off if you want. His long robes do restrict the legs, even with splits up the sides of the PVC, but all the usual Marvel Legends joints are here and they all move just fine. Hasbro even gave him the "pinless" arms and legs, to keep the limbs looking smooth. And of course, he comes with his sword - more comic spoilers ahoy! Gorr the God Butcher wields All-Black the Necrosword. The god he took it from was, unknown at the time, Knull, the God of the Symbiotes. Yes, as in "Venom" symbiotes. All-Black was the first symbiote Knull ever created, forged from his own shadow and capable of decapitating a Celestial. You know the Guardians of the Galaxy's hangout, Knowhere? The big floating head? Yeah, like we said: this sword can decapitate a Celestial. The design is different than in the comics, because its comic appearance was already used by someone else in the MCU. Here it's more of a normal sword, though with a jagged, rippling blade. It's going to be interesting to see how much (if any) of this makes it into the movie. Will it be made of living shadow? Some inky liquid? Will there be any direct connection to the blades Hela formed? There are lots of ways they could portray it as symbiote without directly naming it a symbiote, leaving things vague until the next time they stop standing on their own dicks and work together with Sony. He's also got the right leg of this series' Korg Build-A-Figure. Jason Aaron's Thor run is possibly the best ever done with the character, so it's no surprise it's being used as inspiration for the movies. Gorr and his sword may look drastically different, but they both suggest great potential for a sinister threat. -- 05/11/22

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