Marvel producer Nate Moore explains why the cosmic Eternals film takes place on Earth. Chloé Zhao won Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director for Nomadland. She co-wrote and directed the next film in the Phase Four release schedule. The Rome Film Fest wraps up later this month. After that, Eternals will become the first Marvel film to premiere at a festival. It will then release wide on November 5.
Zhao’s film takes place in both the past and the present. Thus, tracing the 7,000-year history of the titular alien race on Earth, which they have been assigned with defending from their Deviant counterparts. The restoration of the universe in Avengers: Endgame generated enough energy for their enemies to rise. The dispersed team must regroup for a long-awaited battle to protect humanity’s future, according to trailers. Salma Hayek, Kumail Nanjiani, Kit Harrington, and Angelina Jolie are among the cast members of Eternals. However, Gemma Chan’s Sersi is the film’s protagonist.
Moore discussed the decision to set the picture on Earth, despite the fact that this was an opportunity to lean into the franchise’s increasingly cosmic scope, at a January 2020 press visit to the Eternals set attended by SR. He begins by pointing out that the film makes the heroes more cosmic than their comic book equivalents; because they developed from human beings in the source material. However, the filmmakers saw a huge opportunity in the capacity to juxtaposition ordinary life with spectacular vistas of space.
According to Moore
Even in the books, I would argue they’re actually more earthbound because they’re actually created from mankind… so we’re actually pushing them a bit more cosmic even than they traditionally are in comics, frankly. But narratively, I think that juxtaposition is really powerful because the film is set on Earth, it doesn’t mean the whole film takes place on Earth. It allows us to juxtapose things that are very modern-day and normal to people with things like Celestials and spaceships that are super, super sci-fi without having to commit to either. I think you kind of get the best of both worlds and it gets to make the movie distinct from other things because it doesn’t have to be just one thing.
The majority of the film takes place on Earth. But Eternals is likely to go deeper into the Celestials than any other MCU effort to date. The all-powerful, enigmatic beings that created the Eternals have largely featured on the periphery of the films, first as the place Knowhere. It formed in the severed head of a dead Celestial. Then as the Eternals themselves in the space-set Guardians of the Galaxy flicks. Then, in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, protagonist Peter Quill discovers that his biological father, Ego, is a Celestial; albeit Quill eventually kills him, sacrificing this magnificent inheritance.
Marvel fans may be sad if the picture exclusively takes place on Earth. But Moore has confirmed that Eternals will travel to other worlds. He certainly believes in the advantages of a cosmic-terrestrial approach. It makes sense, considering Zhao’s genuinely humanist filmmaking style, and the titular group’s relationship with the human race is a key element of promotional material that is out so far. Eternals should be able to create the awe of an immortal entity living and breathing in today’s world; if the filmmakers can strike the appropriate balance. That viewing experience could prove transfixing for MCU viewers in a series that has generally aimed to legitimize the existence of superheroes.
