Eternals: Angelina Jolie Teases Deeper Avengers History

Eternals is finally hitting theaters next week, and it will feature a star-studded cast of MCU newcomers, including Angelina Jolie. Originally, Jolie was only meant to have a cameo in the Marvel film, but her role as Thena the Eternal expanded. With the ability to manifest weapons with her hands, Thena is now one of the many powerful beings in the MCU. The Eternals were not allowed to interfere when Thanos threatened Earth, but there have been some hints that the immortal beings have had encounters with the Avengers in the past.  During a recent chat with ComicBook.com‘s Brandon Davis, Jolie teased a possible history with Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. 

“I think we’re assuming that we know everybody because we’ve been around forever,” Jolie explained. “So we definitely had the opportunity to be everywhere in every… We’ve been, I think that’s the fun, now, if you watch the other ones, we’ve been there. The question is, are there certain things that Phastos’s [Brian Tyree Henry] created that you’ve been watching and thinking it came from something else? Was it actually Phastosor has somebody else been doing? You know, did you heal something, did something happen that you haven’t realized we’ve been there?” 

In another ComicBook.com interview, Kumail Nanjiani (Kingo) teased his own character’s history with other MCU characters.

“Yes,”  Nanjiani replied when asked if they had developed Kingo’s history to include encounters with known characters. “Chloe [Zhao] had it all mapped out, and she had a very specific sense of… Because the thing is, Eternals have sort of been in hiding, right? So they haven’t been going around talking to Iron-Man and Captain America and all those people. They’ve been pretending to be normal human beings. But it makes sense that my character would have met another character who’s not from Earth either. I’m trying to be vague. I don’t know what I’m allowed to say or not. So I think that was all part of the stuff, so that even though Eternals really is a standalone movie, you want to feel the presence, and the reality of, the rest of the MCU around it. And Chloe is such a nerd with an encyclopedic knowledge of Marvel and the MCU. So she was really excited about dropping these references in.”

Eternals, which was helmed by Academy Award-winning director Chloé Zhao, stars Gemma Chan as Sersi, Angelina Jolie as Thena, Richard Madden as Ikaris, Kumail Nanjiani as Kingo, Lia McHugh as Sprite, Lauren Ridloff as Makkari, Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, Barry Keoghan as Druig, Don Lee as Gilgamesh, Salma Hayek as Ajak, and Kit Harington as Dane Whitman.

Eternals is scheduled to hit on theatres on November 5th.