It’s been a year since a concept art piece teased Surtur's appearance in Thor: Ragnarok. After all that time, the new trailer screened during Marvel Studios' Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con International provided attendees with a first look at the fire demon.
At the red carpet event following the SDCC panel, director Taika Waititi confirmed to Comic Book that veteran actor Clancy Brown will lend his voice to Surtur in the upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe installment. However, Brown didn't perform the character’s motion capture sequences; that task fell to Waititi:
I did a little of the mo-cap stuff for Surtur, body-wise, but then we have Clancy Brown doing the voice of Surtur.
Over the years, Brown has voiced a long list of comic book baddies – including Lex Luthor, Parallax, Red Hulk, Task Master, and Mister Sinister - in various animated ventures. He also portrayed General Wade Eiling in The CW's The Flash and Colonel Schoonover in Netflix's Daredevil.
One of the Thor: Ragnarok screenwriters may have recently criticized Marvel over some issues related to credits, but there's apparently a little kid out there who might be doing the same. During a discussion with Entertainment Weekly about funny moments from the record-breaking first trailer, Chris Hemsworth revealed that the popular He's a friend from work! line actually originated with a kid who visited the set:
We had a young kid, a Make-A-Wish kid, on set that day. He goes, “You know, you should say, ‘He's a friend from work!'”
