If you want to be able to know what's gonna happen in the future, you just look back at what happened in the past. "We really look back at the ancient world. It's a sci-fi love story, it's an epic love story, and for what it's worth, Ryan and I are both lovers of history," Kaz added. "We love science fiction this is a sci-fi movie. We were just like, 'Yeah, they're space gods and they're here for 7,000 years, and they're in love. The short answer is basically that we were just younger in our careers and didn't really see this as being such a crazy story at the beginning. We really approached it as, 'This is just a space epic.' It's its own thing and so then it's about, 'What's the story about?' Very early on, we hooked into this idea of doing this epic love story between Sersi and Ikaris as the center point and then having everything build off of that. We obviously understood that it's part of the MCU and this is a Marvel property, but it's so siloed off from everything. But we always pictured it as being this original movie. He continued: "If you're deep in the MCU and you're doing Thor 4, then you have a lot to build on. "I would say that the fact that they were obscure to the public wasn't really a factor for us because we're storytellers and we create a lot of original IP and we have a lot of original ideas," Ryan said. While the prospect of introducing little-known characters to a global moviegoing audience might have seemed incredibly daunting to some, the Firpos were excited. Like the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Eternals were an obscure group of heroes that didn't have the instant brand recognition of, say, Spider-Man or the X-Men. And so, it was both an honor to try do something different in Hollywood in 2021, but it was also this great challenge to sit up and say, 'How do we make this story work for everyone and try to do something different?'" "There wasn't an immortal space god love story that we could literally watch and be like, 'Oh, that's how they did that before.' Eternals is its own thing, it's its own universe, it's its own beast. The end result was a sprawling cosmic tale "unlike any other" Kaz continued. They're also great metaphors for creation - they're also great, mysterious cosmic forces and I think that's a big part of what we're looking forward to exploring with the cosmic universe with Eternals 2 and everywhere else that we might go." We knew from the beginning that if you're dealing with the Eternals, you are gonna have to bring the Celestials front and center. They're gods in space that are larger than planets that create suns and galaxies. "That sort of crazy idea of, 'If the planet was a gestating place for a space god.?' That's the kind of question that only Marvel gets to ask themselves. "We really love Lovecraft, but I think the Celestials are a uniquely Kirby invention," Kaz explained. "We sort of mixed all those things together and then put in our own spin, put some gender flipping of the characters, and just played a little bit with their dynamics of the family and made it our own." This book in particular provided the origin of Earth serving as a Celestial incubator, which the Firpos thought was "super cool," Ryan admitted. Rounding out the creative stew was 1999's Earth X storyline conceived by the triumvirate of Alex Ross, Jim Krueger, and John Paul Leon. So, this really is a love letter to him and his universe." He's really the godfather for everything that we're seeing in the MCU. He's tapping into thousands of years of human history and crazy ideas. "We wanted to do justice to the truly gonzo nature of 'King' Kirby's work. "You have this incredible foundation from which to draw from," Kaz continued. So, that was just about getting us in the world or in the mindset of talking about immortal space gods." "But clearly, there very strong narrative elements from the Kirby stuff. "I think for the Kirby stuff, it was more about the overall vibe and tone and sort of no holds barred, 'Let's just put all the ideas in there and nothing is too wild,'" Ryan recalled. The first ingredient, of course, was the Jack Kirby title from 1976 that originally introduced the immortal race of alien beings into the Marvel mix.
I love stories that take me somewhere new."
"It's so ambitious, it's so big, and that's what I love. Recently chatting with SYFY WIRE over Zoom, two of the film's screenwriters - Kaz and Ryan Firpo - revealed they were influenced by three distinct comic book runs, which helped them craft "the craziest movie of the year," according to Kaz.
Lovecraft had nothing to do with the central problem plaguing the titular heroes in Marvel Studios' Eternals. The concept of an ancient god bursting out of the center of our planet sounds like something ripped straight from the Cthulhu mythos, but if you can believe it, the cosmic terror of H.P. "That is not dead which can eternal lie / And with strange aeons even death may die."