Eternals Wasn’t Just a Historical Epic, It Was a Global One, Too

Eternals Wasn’t Just a Historical Epic, It Was a Global One, Too

Eternals certainly had its issues, but you can’t argue it didn’t bring a multitude of diversity into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After a great many movies starring heterosexual white dudes, it was great to see a group of heroes from different cultures, ethnicities, ages, sexual orientations, and more, even if they were playing characters from whatever corner of the galaxy the Celestials hail from. In this behind-the-scenes clip, the cast and crew get into the reasons the Eternals are so diverse, and it’s not just “it was overdue.”

I’m a little embarrassed to admit I didn’t think of the very obvious explanation that producer Nate Moore offers, which is this: “What is interesting about the Eternals, even narratively, is that the Celestials and the Eternals themselves wanted to recruit a group of people who could integrate themselves into the Earth. And the truth about Earth is that there are people from all walks of life, there are people who look different from each other, there are people of all ages, and that allowed us to sort of build a cast of a lot of talented people that aren’t from the same place.”

Given the Eternals’ mission to quietly protect the entirety of humanity for 7,000 or so years, it makes perfect sense that the Celestials would send a group that would be able to blend into a variety of cultures (although Lord knows the Celestials of the comics didn’t have this idea). But of course more than that, the opportunity to bring diversity to the MCU was exciting to director Chloe Zhao and the film’s stars, as they explain in this video, which also features some behind-the-scenes footage of Eternals:

Eternals starred Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Salma Hayek, Angelina Jolie, Don Lee, Kumail Nanjiani, Brian Tyree Henry, Lauren Ridloff, Barry Keoghan, Lia McHugh, and Jon Snow, and is now available on Blu-ray and Ultra 4K, as well as digitally.