One of the most exciting casting announcements to come out of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in recent months has been that Josh Brolin is taking on the role of the incredibly powerful Thanos, a major villain who will show up here and there in Marvel movies before ultimately threatening the Avengers in Avengers 3 (or so the fan theories go). One can imagine that Brolin got a pretty hefty paycheck as part of his multi-film deal with the studio, and Marvel definitely isn’t letting the actor rest on his laurels until Avengers 3 in 2018 or ’19. In fact, Brolin appears in the (purple) flesh for the first time in this week’s Guardians of the Galaxy.
I won’t spoil the character’s role in that (amazing) movie, but suffice to say Thanos is going to be around for quite a long time, which explains why Marvel went after a high-profile actor like Brolin. Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn recently spoke about the actor in the part, noting that it wasn’t just Brolin’s skill set but his chiseled appearance that allowed the filmmaker to bring Thanos to life:
“Thanos is actually modeled on Josh. The character, if you can look at him, he looks like Josh. We motion captured Josh for the dialogue and everything.”
Marvel has been notoriously secretive when it comes to Thanos, especially regarding his role in Guardians of the Galaxy, so much so that the first official image of the actor wasn’t released until after the film. Marvel head honcho Kevin Feige articulated the studio’s approach to dealing with Thanos:
“Well I don’t know if it’s super secretive. I mean, often I don’t think there’s a reason to put out any sort of big press release for each and everything we do and every little move we make. And also in the overall context. So in other words, if we put Thanos in the middle of marketing for Guardians of the Galaxy, I don’t know if it’d make a lick of difference in terms of who goes to see the movie.
“In fact we take away from [the characters] we actually are advertising. So that wasn’t a strategy of any kind. It was just, you know, it was something in the body of the film that hopefully within the context of the film, even if you don’t know who he is, makes some sense as an over guy to Ronan, giving Ronan something [SPOILER REMOVED]. But we didn’t say don’t use any advertisements.”
Guardians of the Galaxy is out right now. If you haven’t seen it yet, remedy that immediately, and if you have, go see it again. It’s truly that good.