The expectation is that the first trailer for “Thor” will be in front of “Tron: Legacy” next week, but Marvel has already let the first teaser poster out of the bag.The big question hovering over “Thor” has been how, exactly, they plan on selling the most bizzarely-premised superhero yet put to film (in brief: The Viking God of Thunder comes to Earth, takes up crimefighting, makes friends with Iron Man and Captain America) to a mainstream audience that generally hasn’t heard of him. Whereas Hulk and Captain America are already familiar (or recognizable, at least) and Iron Man is fairly self-explanatory (“Oh, he’s got armor. I get it.”), Thor is Lee/Kirby nerd-weirdness personified: “Wouldn’t it be awesome if creatures from Norse Mythology showed up here and now and started busting stuff up?” is an instant-win pitch… to the audience that’s already going to see this. How do you get everyone else excited? The answer appears to be: gradually.
The start black background says “whatever this is, it’s serious.” The high-contrast black and white says “hey, weren’t Sin City and 300 awesome!?” The eye-line direction from the head (beard, Jesus-hair) and armored-arm says “LOTR, Braveheart, Gladiator, 300 again” ending in the hammer that says “wait… he has a HAMMER? That’s… new.” And then the color-popped red cape says “Superman? Oh! It’s a superhero… with armor and a hammer? So… Super-Gladiator?” The hope, one assumes, is for people to be mildly intrigued enough to go “Ooooh, that’s what that was!” when they see the trailer not long afterwards.
The start black background says “whatever this is, it’s serious.” The high-contrast black and white says “hey, weren’t Sin City and 300 awesome!?” The eye-line direction from the head (beard, Jesus-hair) and armored-arm says “LOTR, Braveheart, Gladiator, 300 again” ending in the hammer that says “wait… he has a HAMMER? That’s… new.” And then the color-popped red cape says “Superman? Oh! It’s a superhero… with armor and a hammer? So… Super-Gladiator?” The hope, one assumes, is for people to be mildly intrigued enough to go “Ooooh, that’s what that was!” when they see the trailer not long afterwards.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
At least this looks promising.
Ever read New Gods? It was Kirby at his most indulgent of pagan myth.
Oh, and remember how you were saying comics are weird? Try the Fantastic Four, using a machine captured from Dr. Doom, that they had, just lying around, to go to Heaven, after The Thing died and meeting “God”, who looks like Jack Kirby, who then draws a spirit Ben Grimm back to life, as The Thing.
Yeah, Cracked did an article, recently…
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I have a feeling that since this is made by Kenneth Branagh, it will probably have a lot of over-the-top/exaggerated scenes.
I'm still interested in seeing it though.
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Considering that the last massmarket appearance of Thor was The Incredible Hulk Returns in '88, and that wasn't really the Thor of the comics, this'll either be pure gold or pure [expletive redacted].
That said, there is a larger hidden geek and borderline geek demographic than those in the mainstream realize/acknowledge and a fair proportion of the baby boomers who were in the right age bracket when The Avengers and their ilk were new do actually know all four characters, much as many of the same people knew Lord of the Rings from the same period.
Now if Marvel can ever get their IP rights back from Sony Licensing hell, it'd be nice to see them push a real Marvel Multiverse in the films 😀
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In all fairness, I feel that one of Thor's biggest problems will be competing with another comic book hero that, like him, an unlikely hero, gets his powers from elsewhere. While Thor gets it from Asgard, his competition…gets it from Oa. And, like Thor, I feel, is vastly unknown for the breadth of his powers.
Thor's biggest problem: The Green Lantern and its possible success. If you look at it, both are very fantastic in their approaches with their mythos. However, when placed near their respective heroes, they get lost in the shuffle. Also, their power sources (a Hammer, a ring) are external, yes?
Still, I might very well catch both, because I have faith in both.
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I like this Poster.
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One of the main “make or break” points of a Thor movie will be the villain. Audiences can grasp a superhero concept pretty easily. It's the villain that will either be epic or laughable. For example see Fantastic Four 2, the Silver Surfer as main baddie (onscreen) was a poor choice.
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@ezenwa
I think you have things reversed there. If anything, Thor is going to overshadow Green Lantern. It's coming out first, and has the audience draw of Natalie Portman and Anthony Hopkins. No offense to Ryan Reynalds, but in terms of raw star-power, he's just out of his league.
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I've already heard people talking about how silly Thor is with the wings on his helmet and such, and it really is a shame, because he sounds like such a badass character.
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After seeing that leaked trailer a couple months back I have come to the conclusion that it just strait up looks kinda weak.
Who knows though, could be great, but from what I have seen… not impressed.
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Such a cool poster. And I think they will be very succesful in creating hype around this. At least Empire has done its bid.
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Well, just saw a trailer on Yahoo. Not sure I like the sound of “from where I come from, what you call magic and science are the same”. Sigh.
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I remain cautiously optimistic about this one. To be sure, it at least looks better than “Green Lantern”, but the leaked trailer did not leave me with a favorable impression of this movie's story, and as much as I love all the craziness and coolness of Thor's character and world, if the story it's utilized for sucks it all winds up feeling like fancy window-dressing and little more.
Still, this is certainly a sleek, attention-grabbing poster, so at least we know the marketing team is on point.
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THis makes me sorry I didn't wear something like that for Halloween. You know, before evryone else does
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