It’s official: Christian Bale is entering the Marvel Cinematic Universe. As revealed by Tessa Thompson in a recent interview with Entertainment Tonight, the former Batman actor and Oscar-winner is set to play the villain in Thor: Love and Thunder. The question now becomes, who will Bale bring to life on the big screen?
“Christian Bale is going to play our villain, which is going to be fantastic,” Thompson, who will be reprising her role as Valkyrie in the Marvel sequel, said. I’ve read the script. I can’t tell you much. Lots of exciting text messages exchanged between Natalie [Portman] and I. We’re going to have fun. Taika [Waititi] is writing [and] directing. Some familiar faces. Some new people coming into the mix.”
It has previously been reported that Bale had been in negotiations to star. This is quite the big confirmation though. Bale previously portrayed Batman in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy. While Bale hasn’t shied away from bigger movies in the time since he left the role of Bruce Wayne behind, this does represent his first trip back to the comic book movie world.
There is no word yet on what villain Bale will be playing. There has been speculation the villain will be the God Butcher from Jason Aaron’s run, which Thor: Love and Thunder will be taking inspiration from. Aside from Chris Hemsworth coming back as the God of Thunder, Natalie Portman’s Jane Foster will become our new Thor.
“Lots of love and lots of thunder. You can expect that,” Hemsworth said at Tokyo Comic Con last year. “I haven’t seen the script yet. I know they’re working very hard on it and pretty excited to bring you something pretty fresh and new again. But having left Endgame, where Thor was, we have a lot of room to move there and drastically change again, which is very, very exciting. But we start shooting that sort of mid-next year.”
When last we saw Thor, he was still on the heavy side at the end of Avengers: Endgame and was heading off to unknown destinations with the Guardians of the Galaxy. Whether or not they pop up in this movie, or if Thor pops up in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, remains to be seen. Plot details remain scarce, but Waititi, who previously directed Thor: Ragnarok, is returning to write and direct. Waititi will also be reprising his role as Korg, who became a fan-favorite rather quickly.
Thor: Love and Thunder is set to hit theaters on November 5, 2021.
So what do you think? Are you excited for Bale to be joining the MCU? What villain do you think he’s going to play? Join in on the conversation over on Facebook or Twitter!
