Marvel President Confirms One 'Eternals' Character Will Be Gay: 'That Is Just Part of Who He Is'

The announcement comes after Tessa Thompson revealed her Thor character Valkyrie will be searching for a "queen"

The Eternals already has the most diverse cast of any Marvel film, and now fans can expect another milestone from the superhero flick: the MCU’s first gay character.

Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige confirmed that a character in The Eternals will be gay, making him the first with an LGBTQ storyline in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

“He’s married, he’s got a family and that is just part of who he is,” Feige told Good Morning America at the D23 Expo in California.

It’s unclear to which character Feige is referring, though there are several possibilities among the star-studded cast, who appear as an immortal alien race sent to Earth by the Celestials to protect humankind from the Deviants.

Game of Thrones star Kit Harington will play Dane Whitman, while his former costar Richard Madden will play Ikaris. Other possibilities include Kumail Nanjiani as Kingo, Barry Keoghan as Druig, Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, and Dong-seok Ma as Gilgamesh.

The Eternals
Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

Feige’s announcement means that Tessa Thompson’s Thor character Valkyrie will no longer be the first with an LGBTQ storyline in a Marvel movie, as Thor 4: Love and Thunder hits screens in November 2021 and The Eternals is out in November 2020.

Thompson told the crowd at San Diego Comic-Con in July that Valkyrie, who recently inherited the crown of Asgard from Chris Hemsworth‘s Thor, was on a mission to find herself a wife.

“First of all, as new King, she needs to find her queen, so that will be her first order of business. She has some ideas. Keep you posted,” Thompson said.

Feige later confirmed that Valkyrie would have an LGBTQ storyline, telling io9, “How that impacts the story remains to be seen with that level of representation you’ll see across our films, not in just Thor 4.”

Meanwhile, The Eternals will also cover new ground with Marvel’s first deaf character, who will be played by Lauren Ridloff.

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