The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a brilliant movie franchise. It has some of the greatest stories we have ever had the chance to view in the terms of Superhero moviemaking. More than that, Marvel Studios has managed to create an entire Universe around their characters. The heroes now feel like they live and breathe among us and are just as real as your next-door neighbor. A lot of the credit for this goes to the people working behind the scenes on the CGI for the movies. We may think that we know what is CGI and what is not but the MCU’s visual department is proficient. So proficient in fact that they regularly slip in things you did not know were CGI in the MCU movies. Don’t believe us? Check out this list.
Black Panther (Civil War)
The hero was introduced to us in Civil War and we got to witness T’challa do some amazing things, such as take helicopter fire head-on. The man is a beast but his costume is almost completely CGI. It is interesting to see, but the entire thing requires a lot of post-production flair before it looks the way it does onscreen.
Ant-Man’s Visor
The Ant-Man costume like many others is an iconic part of the heroes’ personality and aura. Scott Lang is a goofy quick-witted individual who reforms his ways and is pushed into the limelight of being a giant superhero. Most of Ant-Man’s power involves a lot of CGI as the man keeps shrinking and growing. But the most sneaky CGI on him is the visor he uses. Ant-Man’s helmet’s visor is CGI and we could have never guessed it. The red glass looks so real and yet in most of the scenes it is not.
Thor’s Eyepatch
When Hela attacked Thor in the Throne Room we got to see just how powerful she is. The goddess of death completely incapacitated our hero and gouged out one of his eyes, signifying the difference in their powers. This accentuated the fact that Thor had lost yet another thing. So the filmmakers thought it prudent to give the man an eye patch, however, things did not work out as intended. The eyepatch kept falling off because it did not have a strap and eventually the decision was made to add it in post-production CGI, which is a smart decision if you ask me.
Quantum Realm Suits (Endgame)
The quantum suits worn in Endgame were completely CGI, and this is one of those things on the list that is as surprising to us as it is to you. But it has a perfectly logical explanation. You see, Endgame was mostly shot in 2017 and 2018 but did not release until 2019. So the filmmakers were not sure as to what the suits looked like when the shoot was going on. So they had the actors wear their regular clothes and added in the CGI suits later when the design was finalized.
Loki’s Crotch (Thor)
I don’t want to dwell on this longer than we have to, but the thing is that Loki’s Costume in Thor was a little weird, to say the least. His crotch area was more visible than future versions of the costume and this led to a weird visual. Tom Hiddleston was given a codpiece to combat the situation to no avail. The team had to eventually correct the discrepancy in post-production with the help of CGI.
Thor’s Sleeves (Infinity War)
Thor is a very interesting character with a very interesting and comic-accurate costume. The most interesting part of the armor is that almost some part of it is CGI on screen. His sleeves, for example, are almost always CGI, maybe this is to aid the look that they get or to ensure that electrical surges can be shown on them, we don’t know but it is still some sneaky bit of CGI.
Cap’s Helmet (Endgame)
The fight in Endgame between two Captain Americas could get incredibly confusing, but thankfully one was wearing a helmet so we could track what was happening quite easily. Although this was not always the case, the shot was originally shot with both versions not having a helmet on. The helmet was added to past Captain America to aid viewers in differentiating who’s who.
Captain Marvel’s Hair (Endgame)
The thing with hair and a powerful superhero capable of interstellar travel is that both things don’t go together while making movies. Captain Marvel’s hair had to be processed separately to make it look like she was actually floating in space and not shooting on a set. Brie Larson actually wore a bald cap for shooting the initial scenes to help post-production CGI artists make the correction later.
Tony Stark (Iron Man 3)
This one is quite interesting since not many know this happened. During the shooting of the third Iron Man film there came a point that RDJ had an ankle injury. He was out of commission for several weeks and production was severely delayed. To combat this and to shoot the final sequence of the movie the filmmakers used a body double and put Downey’s face in as CGI. Quite extraordinary if you ask me, and almost impossible to spot.
All OG Avengers (Endgame)
A lot of characters were de-aged in Endgame. Even more so than you could guess. The OG Avengers were made to look like their younger selves and it resonated with everyone. We can’t identify the changes that easily but they are there. It is quite prudent of Marvel to do this because it enables us to subconsciously differentiate between the different versions of the characters.
So these were the things you did not know were CGI. Which of them surprised you? Let us know.
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