For Nigerian-American director Julius Onah (“The Cloverfield Paradox”), entering the MCU with “Captain Marvel: Brave New World” provided the opportunity to make a paranoid thriller, one in which Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson, the new, untraditional Captain America, must stop a global threat involving the powerful substance adamantium.
However, Onah was especially attracted to exploring Harrison Ford’s Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, in many ways the driving force of “Brave New World.” He’s the newly elected President of the United States, who wants to reform his extreme militaristic reputation and obsession with hunting Hulks, who becomes what he hates when he transforms into Red Hulk.
”When we meet him in the story, he’s estranged from his daughter, Betty [Liv Tyler],” Onah told IndieWire. “Yet now he’s trying to be an elder statesman, he’s trying to be a diplomat, he wants to turn a new leaf. And he wants to use the discovery of this new resource, adamantium, as a way to distribute this resource around the world, improve lives, and create a sense of more equality and balance.
“So that emotional trajectory for this character was important to him,” the director continued. “And the thing that the Red Hulk ended up representing was his backsliding into the guy he doesn’t want to be anymore. Because if he becomes that guy again, he can’t go back to his daughter and say, ‘I’m changed, I’m a new man, and I deserve a second chance.’
“So that really became the emotional arc for his character,” added Onah. “And then when you put him opposite Sam, who also doesn’t trust him because he tore apart the Avengers and put [him] in prison, now he’s pushed and pulled from multiple directions. And that just gave Harrison some great dramatic fodder to play with.”
Onah admitted that he learned a lot working with the legendary Harrison, whose casting was inspirational, given Ford’s association with paranoid or political thrillers via his small role in “The Conversation” and starring role as Jack Ryan in “Patriot Games” and “Clear and Present Danger.”
“One of the first things he said is that one of the most important relationships for him is with the camera operator and the key grip because he’s so conscientious and aware in the best way of how a camera movement works…and how he’s going to pitch his performance,” Onah said. “Watching him work with so much specificity and so much care was so inspiring. But it also set the tone for all the other cast members because you’re watching a guy who’s a true pro in the most classic sense of what it means to be a movie star.”
The first time Onah met Ford at his place, he poured him a drink and they talked about the emotional journey of Thunderbolt Ross and his angry, temperamental nature, which would be unleashed when he becomes Red Hulk. He’s incredibly strong, like the Hulk, but keeps his intelligence, emanates heat, and even sometimes bursts into flame. In addition, he’s got a healing power.
The visual development team at Marvel, led by Ryan Meinerding, prepared some early renderings that made Ford smile. After further renderings, Wētā FX became involved in creating the CG character (under the VFX supervision of Dan Cox) in pursuit of the desired look with likeness to Ford, along with the right shade of red.
Ford was already experienced with the de-aging performance capture shoot for “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” but these mo-cap sessions at Trilith Studios in Atlanta involved an angry performance by the actor.
“Ross was a military man, so I wanted to think about more tactical animals,” said Onah. “Previous Hulks, the Green Hulk, was based more on an ape. This one I based more on a bear. I wanted him to have a slightly different posture, and different center of gravity, different way he held his chest out. So then the Weta artist started using that, to build a framework for how he would move.
“But then you want to incorporate Harrison into it,” he added. “So then we would mo-cap Harrison, getting his body language, his facial features. They worked in great details of Harrison, too. The scar on his chin, the shape of his nose. His scream becomes a huge part of it, too.”
The process of animating Red Hulk was an evolution of previous Weta approaches. It included modeling a new high-resolution muscle set and using the improved simulation engine called Loki. From there, Weta utilized a complex multi-layered approach to muscle activation and a new methodology for adding fine detail to skin. Weta also worked through the complexities of transforming Ross into Red Hulk, including bones breaking, reforming, driving under the skin, vein detail, and clothes ripping and disintegrating.
“A key inspiration for this was looking at ‘An American Werewolf in London’ to lean into some of the body horror of transforming into Hulk, and, from a character standpoint, to lean into the angry id that Thaddeus Ross has been trying to suppress the whole movie,” Onah said.
“This was very important for me to help illustrate the emotional arc for Ross seeking to reconnect with his daughter and run away from being the volatile ‘Thunderbolt,’ who once hunted Bruce Banner’s Hulk. This was also central to Sam Willson’s challenge as Captain America to maintain empathy for a man with real demons, and it dovetailed with the overall thematic idea of the film.”
