Wait a minute – did Jane Foster survive the snap? Natalie Portman, who hasn’t been in a Marvel movie since ‘Thor 2,’ walked the red carpet at the ‘Avengers: Endgame’ premiere. Is she in the new movie?
It’s been nearly six years since Natalie Portman, 37, appeared opposite Chris Hemsworth, 35, in Thor: The Dark World, so her appearance at the Avengers: Endgame premiere in Los Angeles on April 22 left some fans hyped. The Black Swan star walked the red (or in this case, the Thanos-purple) carpet in a shimmery, black dress that allowed her to show off her toned arms while flashing some leg. Overall, she looked phenomenal, as she often does. Yet, seeing Natalie at a Marvel movie raises some questions – specifically, is she in Endgame? Or was she just there in L.A. to bid farewell to Phase Three of the MCU?
Natalie, who played Jane Foster in the first two Thor movies (2001’s Thor and the sequel in 2013), was absent in the third phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. She was only briefly mentioned in 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok when a passerby expressed sympathy over Thor and Jane’s breakup. “We wanted Thor to encounter somebody that was near his equal and that his relationship with Jane may have evolved in unexpected ways in between The Dark World and Ragnarok,” Kevin Feige, head of Marvel Studios, said to Entertainment Weekly, “and we wanted to pit him against a character who was much more his equal and in many ways his superior [in Ragnarok].”
Enter Tessa Thompson’s character, Valkyrie, and exit Jane. Of course, for those who read Thor comics, Natalie’s appearance at the premiere might dictate the future of the character. In 2014, a female Thor appeared after Nick Fury whispered a secret to Odinson to make him lose the ability to weird Mjolnir (comics are weird). While her identity remained a secret for months, according to SyFy, readers discovered that a cancer-stricken Jane had taken up the hammer to become the new Thor (think of “Thor” as more of a title than a name.)
However, because the Asgardian hammer purges all toxins from her body – including the chemotherapy she was using to battle her cancer – being Thor was literally killing her. She ultimately died in 2018, but every comic nerd knows that death is never permanent when you’re a superhero. Perhaps the same applies to the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Will Natalie’s version of the character pick up Thor’s new weapon, Stormbreaker, to become the new Goddess of Thunder? Does that mean Thor doesn’t survive the final fight with Thanos? Fans will have to wait when Endgame opens worldwide on April 26 to find out.