Idris Elba Says Heimdall Is Still Alive, Could Be in 'Thor: Love and Thunder'

By Mike Redmond | Film | August 14, 2019 |

By Mike Redmond | Film | August 14, 2019 |

Before Avengers: Endgame hit theaters, I joked way too many times that it’s going to reverse Infinity War so hard that every single character who died in a Marvel movie will come back to life. And once again my Psychic Jesus powers revealed themselves, because here’s Idris Elba all but announcing that Heimdall will probably be in Thor: Love and Thunder despite getting stomped to sh*t by Thanos.

Via KTSA:

He does know is that he’d love to play Heimdall again, whether it be in an origin story, or as part of Disney+’s upcoming Loki series. “Of course!” He enthuses. “Listen, Heimdall is essentially part of the god family. So you know, he essentially could be alive. I’m just saying! I’m just putting it out there!

“The Heimdall character goes way back into, you know, the Thor mythology…And I’m sure there will be an interesting way to bring that alive. Of course I would. Yes.”

This is an incredible about-face for Elba because just like Natalie Portman — who’s also making a surprise return to the Marvel fold — Elba absolutely hated the MCU after filming Thor: The Dark World, and he wasn’t shy about it either.

Via ScreenCrush:

“I’d just done eight months in South Africa [filming ‘Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom’]. I came to England and the day I came back I had to do reshoots on Thor 2. And in the actual scene my hair was different, my…[sighs]. I was like, ‘This is torture, man. I don’t want to do this.’ My agent said: ‘You have to, it’s part of the deal.’

…

I’m actually falling down from a spaceship, so they had to put me in harness in this green-screen studio. And in between takes I was stuck there, fake hair stuck on to my head with glue, this f—-ing helmet, while they reset. And I’m thinking: ‘24 hours ago, I was Mandela’…I was literally walking in this man’s boots. [Within] six months, the crew, we were all so in love with this film we had made. I was Mandela, practically. Then there I was, in this stupid harness, with this wig and this sword and these contact lenses. It ripped my heart out.

What changed? Clearly Taika Waititi, who transformed the Thor movies from the weakest link in the MCU to a goddamn showstopper at last month’s Comic-Con. Waititi spun what was easily the most boring franchise into action-comedy gold, so it’s a good thing Disney brought him back and isn’t doing something spectacularly stupid like freaking out over his anti-Nazi satire. *sees Knava’s article* Sonofabitch.

Anyway, as for how Heimdall could still be alive in Love and Thunder, Elba said it himself: The character is a literal god. After 20+ movies, Marvel is long past the point where they need to explain things. People know who these characters are, and more importantly, they know this is a fantastical world where characters time travel to stop a Murder Grape and his magic glove. Having an all-seeing Norse deity show up after being choked out by said Murder Grape isn’t going to grind things to a halt, and I think audiences are prepared for that being Marvel’s answer for everything going forward.

How do we explain there are vampires now? F*ck it, they just show up.
How do we explain the X-Men? F*ck it, they just show up.
Fantastic Four? I’m gonna say… f*ck it, they just show up?
And what the hell is an Eternal? Not one clue. Good talk!