As you’ve likely noticed, we are fully committed to our beards and haircuts coverage here at The Mary Sue, and I am here to fulfill that content promise. Concept artist Aleksi Briclot recently posted some Thor: Ragnarok concept art on his Instagram, and one his posts revealed an alternate design for Tom Hiddleston’s Loki which would have given him this truly unreal buzzcut/sideburns combo.
The team also proposed a more classically comics-inspired look, with the fur cape and the pointed horns. It’s easy to see why the team eventually went with the looks they did; most of the Ragnarok costumes were leaner and more toned-down, so you could see more of the actors’ faces and body language. It makes sense that they kept to that aesthetic with Loki.
Briclot also shared some alternative designs for Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie. We’ve previously seen some proposed Valkyrie designs shared on Andy Park’s Twitter, and Briclot added two more to the mix. One, like the previous image from Park, looks much more like medieval plate armor and covers a lot of Thompson’s face. While I love me some extravagant armor, I can understand why they ultimately went for more open costumes that would emphasize Thompson’s face and let us focus on her performance. She gives the character more swagger than a suit of armor could.
The second design below seems to incorporate more of the indigenous Australian designs that reportedly inspired other characters and elements in the film. (However, director Taika Waititi was careful to watch the designs for harmful cultural appropriation. “I was very careful in these design meetings,” he said, “You need to follow-up by saying ‘don’t copy that, but use it as inspiration’, because the next thing you know you have 50 people who have appropriated all these like beautiful ancient designs without asking what they mean, or who owns them, or for any permission.”)
It looks like they ultimately went for a mask-less look, but it’s fascinating to see what Valkyrie’s costume could have looked like.
It’s always fun to see all the creativity that gets churned and burned in the process of making a film, and how we get from those ideas to the final product.
(Via /Film; image: Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Studios)
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