At San Diego Comic Con this past Saturday, major Marvel news dropped as the cast and crew of the MCU rocked Hall H. One piece of news that was theory, but has been confirmed by Marvel’s Kevin Feige, is that Valkyrie will be the first LGBTQ superhero of Marvel’s filmography so far.
In the segment of the panel focusing on Thor: Love and Thunder, most attention was directed at Natalie Portman being handed the hammer as they announced that her character Jane Foster will be taking over Thor’s powers in the next film. However, Tessa Thompson subtly dropped her own big news about the future of Valkyrie, stating “First of all, as new King [of Asgard], she needs to find her queen, so that will be her first order of business.” Feige confirmed this statement with io9, stating that her story, and Marvel’s dedication to representation, will even expand beyond Thor 4.
This is a big step for Marvel, as they will have a bisexual actress playing an openly bisexual character. Thompson has been campaigning for improvement all along, playing Valkyrie as bisexual from the beginning as stated in the tweet below.
Marvel’s dedication to diversity has been questioned lately, especially from the LGBT front, as the first gay character was supposedly a background character from Endgame (played by Joe Russo) who had one line. But one line and 2 seconds of screentime does not count as representation, as Marvel has likely learned by now. The next phase of films looks much more promising, with diversity on more accounts than one.
We’ll have to wait until November 5, 2021 to see Thor: Love and Thunder, so let’s keep our fingers crossed that everything Marvel has promised comes to fruition.
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