Courtesy of a Nikki Finke exclusive, it seems Marvel has its Thor. Just days after Kenneth Branagh talked about Thor casting delays, the word is Chris Hemsworth will wield the mighty Mjolnir. That’s right, Captain Kirk’s dad in J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot is now Marvel’s God of Thunder.
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Hemsworth has had a whirlwind of a month: he was captain of a starship for 12 minutes just last week, cast as the lead in Red Dawn on Thursday, and the 25-year-old Aussie was doing an Australian TV series just last November. After 171 episodes of being “Kim Hyde” on Home and Away, he’s getting his big break with Thor - but it took two reads for him to be chosen as Odin’s son.
Finke reports Hemsworth had read for the part before but “wasn’t given a test because a casting director had nixed him early on.” Apparently his younger brother tested for the role too, but Marvel passed. William Ward, Hemsworth’s rep and partner/founder at ROAR Management, then convinced Marvel’s executive Kevin Feige to reconsider. They let Hemsworth read again and it sure sounded like director Kenneth Branagh had a choice in mind 3 days ago, but the final decision was made today.
With Asgard as the stage, Hemsworth better brush up on his Olde English and bulk-up his body, because Thor’s winged helmet isn’t anything like that feather-weight uniform handed out by the United Federation. Marvel bringing Branagh on to helm Thor was pretty ballsy, but casting a relative-unknown to be the Norse God? Marvel might have hit it’s 2011 blockbuster hat trick.
Thor is scheduled to begin production next January with a May 20, 2011 release.
The announcement of Chris Hemsworth puts to rest months and months of speculation about who would play Thor. Do you think Hemsworth can handle the magic hammer?
Source: Nikki Finke
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100 Comments
I think he’ll be just fine for the role I saw him in Star Trek as George Kirk,and has a commanding aura around him.
I’m a wait see kind of marvel fan both IronMan and Thor are my favorite characters.
Good luck Chris with the role.
Signed
Christiaan Schildt
Not exactly a perfect choice, but I can totally see him in the role. He WAS great as Kirk’s dad and I thought he would have made a better Kirk than Pine. I really thought they would have went with Skarsgard. At least they didn’t get a stupid wrestler for the role. THAT would have destroyed the credibility of the movie before it even started being filmed.
They no doubt waited till Trek debuted to announce this – good call on their part!
regardless of who they picked, the dude would have to bulk up big time. No Steroids though, im pretty sure fans would prefer a powerful thor, not an angry quick tempered one. And thor isnt a character from earth, so thats already sort of a given that playing odins son will be a challenge. But as long as marvel is making the movie, it seems like itll be good. A bunch of characters are already sold to other movie companies. As long as marvel makes it, it should be entertaining.
Good thing he’s tall. Thor after all is primarily a warrior god so it wont work unless the dude is big. Spiderman, Flash, Green Lantern, these guys dont need to be big and muscular, but Thor does. Putting on serious muscle isnt hard in the US, what with dhea being legal, so if he can act this might actually work.
On Blake, surely they cant cast the same guy for a skinny doctor and a muscly god, not without a lot of cgi getting in the way of the acting.
I think I’m not liking the idea of Donald Blake. Just make him being Thor since the beginning and that’s all.
@ Kane, didn’t really mean to cast any accusations on your statement, I was just speaking out on the subject in general.
As for not involving Thor’s alter ego in the movie, that might work for the first movie. They did abandon the Don Blake persona for a very long time in the comics. However, in the recent Thor series they’ve bought him back to nice effect.
Remember, part of the Marvel Thor mythos is that his father felt that Thor had to be punished for his pride and arrogance. He did that by banishing Thor to Earth and confining him to a crippled doctor’s body for a period of time to teach him humility. It wasn’t until later that he would find Mjolnir in the form of a stick and change himself back to Thor as long as he held the hammer.
All that would make a good story I believe, plus how else are you going to introduce Jane Foster to the movie? But well, who knows where they’re going to go with this movie? Guess we’ll have to wait and see.
I agree with Michael Claymore and Iron Knight. Someone else needs to be Donald Blake.
@ Kane…”some Swedish beefcake who no one in the broader movie-going public will take seriously.” Hugh Jackman was a British beefcake who did pretty well with Wolverine. I don’t think of the Swede as a beefcake but as a handsome man and serious actor who does have a movie-going public just not here in the United States—YET.
Hugh Jackman is Australian…..just sayin
Well all I know about Thor is that he’s like Swedish or something like that, and he’s freaking strong like no other. I’m guessing that he has around a year before they start shooting, that’s enough time to put on a good amount of muscle for the role. He’ll have a personal trainer and a nutritionist and all that so it’s definitley possible, I mean how else do all these near 40 year old actors still have abs like Brad Pitt did in Fight Club and Gerard Butler had in 300? Those guys that make sure the actors look the part are top of the line trainers, he’ll get there.
I hope you know that steroids probably come into play with a lot of celebrities that need to bulk up…
@ bessie
I was actually saying that they should leave out the Donald Black persona out of the film. Sorry if didn’t specified that.
**Donald Blake** that is – not Black -.
@ ken J
Ahhh I’m sure some do that but not everyone does and everyone bulks up for the role when they need to, so either with or without the help of steroids he’ll get enough muscle. It’s been done plenty of times without steroids, I’m sure some just choose to use that instead.
@ Matt K
Yeah and he’s also 41
@Stephen, I never said they all do, I’m just saying that some stars go that route. Celebrities and drugs are not exactly strangers you know. And I’m sorry if I’m going to get flamed for this, but Heath Ledger was able to start making another movie, breaking from his Joker role, so that kind of throws a wrench in the whole “the role drove him insane” idea. To me, a more likely situation is simply another celebrity with a substance abuse problem. Not exactly a far fetched idea… I’m sure Robert Downey Jr. has almost killed himself a few times when he was at his worst…
@ Ken J
Yeah I know you weren’t saying all of the actors do that, but I’ve heard recently that most people think they all do.
I meant a lot of people think they all do steroids, not most people think they do.
@Ken J
it’s nice to see someone else in this world that doesn’t equate Heath Ledger with Jesus Christ. He was a great actor, but he was an addict. Anyone who justifies an addiction as “method acting” is going through some serious denial. The guy screwed up and killed himself in the process…. good joker though.
As for Thor here, I think he could pull it off… as long as he has a better accent than the whiny little englishman who did Thor in “Wolverine vs.”
….I mean “Hulk VS.” …. shows what I remember from stuff… Deadpool.
@ Darthmalnu
IDK, I think he either was an addict or genuinely mixed up his pill combination and it was a total accident that had horrible results. Too bad we’ll never know 100% for sure. I think more people than we think actually agree with that, they just don’t want to talk about it because it was a sad thing that he had to die at 28 and no one wants to say anything bad about him.
I think this will work. He is 6′3″ and should be able to bulk up a good bit before they start shooting (hell, look at Hugh Jackman as Wolverine or even RDJ in Iron Man). They could have done better, but they also could have done much, much worse…
@Marshall, I know that last comment is referring to this pick for Thor, but just speaking about RDJ, after seeing him as Tony Stark, it’s hard to imagine anyone being better for the role…
I TRUST IN BRANNAGH, HE’LL DO WITH THOR WHAT FAVREAU DID WITH IRON MAN…PERFECT CHOICE, YOU DONT WANT A WELL KNOWN ANYWAY..NO NAMES ARE BEST,WHERE DO THE BIG NAMES COME FROM? WHEN NO NAMES BREAK OUT.THIS GUY WILL BE AN AWSOME THOR..AND PLEASE NO DONALD BLAKE..JUST KEEP HIM THOR AND START IT ALL IN ASGARD, MAYBE INTRO EARTH AT THE END OF THE MOVIE…
Thank you Matt K. for telling me. I did not know that. Iron Knight, I understand now and I agree with you. I, too was hoping to hear the name Skarsgard.
I am assuming with this taking place in Asgard, this was a pure Thor casting, nothing with Blake. I would guess that the end of the movie will have Odin banishing Thor to earth and thats when Blake will show up, just so they can tie it into Iron Man at that point…..that is unless they go with the Ultimates version to tie into Iron Man, then there is no need for a Donald Blake.
Look at the Ultimate Avengers movie, it had all the players that are going to be in the Live Action Avengers film, maybe they are going that route with it?
I think this could be a very good choice though, I mean we have all been pleasantly surprised with some of the odd casting choices as of late, most notable being Heath obviously, but even Schreiber as Sabretooth had a lot of people complaining and I think he is the best part of the Wolverine movie (he nailed Creed).
Um… uh… ok? -Stark
The Ultimate or “Hippie” Thor may be a more feasible movie script, but I’m not a big Ultimates fan so I’m hoping they don’t go that route.
Still, I’ll see the movie either way. And I certainly hope Hemsworth WON’T use steroids as a last resort… yeesh. Take a lesson from the wrestler that killed his family, folks.
GET THE HGH READY! still cant believe Kevin mckidd did not get this role….
@Bessie – Clearly missing my point if you think Hugh Jackman is in any way whatsoever similar to the “Swedish beefcake”-looking type/s I was referring to. In fact… correct me if I’m wrong… but Hugh Jackman has far, faaaaaar more in common with Chris Hemsworth in terms of background and general physical appearance. Or maybe you aren’t quite sure what “Swedish beefcake”-looking actually means.
Think Dolph Lundgren…
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