Spoilers for Thunderbolts* observe.
For the comparatively brief time that the character of Taskmaster has appeared onscreen within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there have been a number of fascinating tales from the character’s offscreen growth. You may recall studying that Thunderbolts* screenwriter Eric Pearson did not know Taskmaster was set to die early within the movie till he watched a tough reduce (spoilers), and now, we have just lately realized that the character was so much nearer in a single key approach to Marvel’s comedian guide inspiration.
Particularly, Taskmaster was initially going to be a person.
The story comes out of an interview with O-T Fagbenle, who you may bear in mind from Black Widow as smuggler and Natasha Romanoff ally Rick Mason (the character additionally appeared in Disney+’s Secret Invasion). Talking to The Direct, Fagnenle revealed that when he first tried out for the MCU, he was vying for the function of Taskmaster, who in that interval’s iteration of the script, was male.
“I first auditioned for Taskmaster,” stories Fagbenle, “It was a extremely unimaginable speech, truly. It was an audition I used to be very proud of. I’ve nonetheless received it within the again someplace. And, he was this — I made him with an African accent, and he was this type of maniacal-like character.”
Nonetheless, through the “the journey of writing and issues above my pay grade” in Fagbenle’s phrases, that plan changed.
“Within the varied iterations of the film,” Fagbenle continues, “that model of Taskmaster went away, […] the Taskmaster that I used to be going to be did not exist in that iteration of Black Widow.”
this type of studio selection could be much more above our paygrade because it was Fagbenle’s, however as we stated earlier, we’d truly be capable to establish why the change was made earlier than the actor’s casting of Rick Mason.
In 2021, DiscussingFilm revealed an interview with Black Widow’s script author, Erik Pearson (hey waitasec, that is the Thunderbolts* author too!). In that dialogue, Individual reveals the rationale the movie determined to vary Taskmaster’s character got here right down to the central thriller of the Scarlett Johansson-starring movie – and likewise, the plans for Taskmaster from a script written by the flicks’ earlier writers earlier than he joined.
“We have been coping with the time interval between Captain America: Civil Battle and Avengers: Infinity Battle,” Pearson tells DiscussingFilm, “We would have liked a risk from the villains that might doubtlessly succeed, however in success would go unnoticed. In order that labored for Natasha’s spy-thriller style character, and with the concept of the Pink Room and the Widows underneath their management, we started toying round with the notion of deconstructing the human mind. We knew we had Taskmaster […] I simply began seeing the items of the puzzle I had.”
One other large piece of that puzzle, says Pearson, was the movie’s antagonist, Basic Dreykov. Dreykov, in case you forgot, was each a navy scientist with the facility to control the human thoughts and a person with a lacking daughter.
“We’ve received a darkish secret from Natasha’s previous,” Pearson continues, “one thing that she’s ashamed of, one thing that she should confront. What if that backstory got here collectively in a method the place the comic-book science appeared to work that if Natasha’s darkish secret was that she deliberately harmed a younger woman as a method to an finish […] the comic-book science is that this man [Dreykov] who has the power to rebuild the mind and what if he tries to avoid wasting his daughter and discovers the photographic reflexes in rebuilding the thoughts, and turns Antonia into this Terminator-like Taskmaster villain?”
Thus was the Antonia Dreykov model of Taskmaster (performed by Olga Kurylenko) born.
It is an fascinating window into the writers’ room of your favourite Marvel tasks, and it is a story that begs one other query for followers of the character who might really feel she was underused within the last product. That’s, with the Taskmaster title presently with out an proprietor within the MCU, will later mysteries necessitate the introduction of one other character bearing the identify?
We would ask Eric Pearson, however as current historical past proved, even he does not have all of the solutions.
Thunderbolts* is in theaters now.
