How Malekith, the Next ‘Thor’ Supervillain, Makes the Avengers Universe Make Sense
As reported late yesterday, Christopher Eccleston will play Malekith The Accursed, the big bad in Game of Thrones director Alan Taylor’s first forary into the Marvel universe, Thor: The Dark World . Though he’s been eclipsed by David Tennant and Matt Smith, Eccleston’s melancholy turn as the Doctor was terrific, with a sense of brooding, cosmic scale that should fit supervillainy nicely. Both the character, a shape-shifting dark elf, and one of the most important arcs he’s associated with, an attempted coup by secrecy of the throne of Asgard, seem like an excellent fit for the world Marvel’s building, and to leverage Taylor’s Game of Thrones experience. In that arc that sounds most promising, Malekith has Loki switch places with him in prison, something that might be easy to accomplish if Loki’s going to get thrown in Asgard Jail after Thor brings him home after the events of The Avengers . He then disguises himself as Balder, an ally of the Warriors Three (Thor’s main men), who was...