'Black Adam': Pierce Brosnan's Doctor Fate Costume Will Be Brought To Life With Motion Capture
Pierce Brosnan is set to play Doctor Fate in the upcoming Jaume Collet-Serra movie Black Adam, which stars Dwayne Johnson as the titular DC Comics antihero. Doctor Fate is one of the members of the Justice Society, a team of superheroes that comes together to stop Black Adam when he's unleashed after being imprisoned for 5000 years. While concept art for Black Adam has been released, much of the film remains shrouded in secrecy. But Brosnan dropped a little insight into the production when he recently revealed his Doctor Fate costume was being created via motion capture.
Doctor Fate's Costume and Motion Capture
For reference's sake, take a look above this sentence to see how Doctor Fate's costume looks in the comics.
Now, I'm no Hollywood filmmaker. But if you ask me, it would be pretty easy for a costume designer to put together an actual costume that looks like that. But Black Adam isn't doing that. During a video appearance for People, Doctor Fate himself, Pierce Brosnan, revealed that he'll be wearing a motion capture suit when he plays the character.
"I do have to put the motion-capture suit on, which is an acting challenge in itself, but luckily I was brought up in the theater, so I know how to get into tights," Brosnan said.
This is a method becoming more and more prevalent in comic book movies. And sometimes it works! Whenever you see behind-the-scenes images from Marvel movies these days, you're likely to see actors in mo-cap suits rather than full-blown superhero costumes. Images like this.
Most of the modern Marvel movies have found a way to master this approach, and most of the time you can't really tell a costume has been created digitally. However, sometimes that backfires. You know what I'm talking about.
Hopefully, Brosnan's digital Doctor Fate costume will look great in its final form. But I still can't help wondering why the production doesn't put together an actual, physical costume.
Who is Doctor Fate?
Doctor Fate is sort of like DC's answer to Doctor Strange. In the comics, the character is described as "a powerful sorcerer and agent for the Lords of Order who fights evil alongside his wife Inza. His amulet, cloak and helmet are creations of the ancient Nabu who acts as his mentor and spiritual guide. He is a founding member of the Justice Society of America."
While exploring the Valley of Ur in Mesopotamia with his archeologist father in the 1920s, Kent Nelson unleashed Nabu, an ancient immortal from the planet Cilia who had been held in suspended animation for thousands of years. This accidentally killed Kent's father, but he gained a surrogate dad in Nabu, who "decided to mentor the young boy in the secrets of the universe, giving him incredible powers through total molecular control and taking his grief away from him." These powers turned Kent into Doctor Fate – and the character is now played by Pierce Brosnan in the upcoming film Black Adam.
Black Adam opens July 29, 2022.