Marvel just dropped Thor: Love and Thunder's second trailer, and it gives fans some insane new footage and context for Chris Hemsworth’s upcoming sequel. Thor Odinson gets to put his abs on display, Jane Foster shows off some awesome new moves, and audiences around the world get their first glimpse of the terrifying Gorr the God Butcher.
The movie continues to showcase director Taika Watiti’s zany visual style and sense of humor and seems to promise a crazy ride—one that might even one-up Thor: Ragnarok. With a new trailer, however, also comes newly spotted Easter eggs.
With this new teaser, there’s one pretty big Easter egg, in particular, hiding in the background. It's an image that could potentially signal the first step in seeing the cosmic Uatu the Watcher from What If...? making his way onto the big screen.
The Watcher in Thor 4
In the new trailer for Thor: Love and Thunder, Jane Foster's God of Thunder can be seen raising her hammer to the sky, as she summons lighting.
Behind her are statues of various larger-than-life figures, who make up some of the Cosmic entities of the Marvel Universe––the people who represent existence itself. There's Death, The Living Tribunal, Infinity, and Eon.
However, there's one who sticks out the most: The Watcher, Uatu.
Yes, this is the very same Watcher as seen in What If...?, played by Jeffery Wright:
The statue bares an exact likeness to the character, as fans can see in the zoomed-in shot below:
Will The Watcher Participate?
While The Watchers did technically make an appearance during Stan Lee’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 cameo, it never felt like an actual introduction to that race. It certainly comes across as a silly-fun scene where not much thought was put into including The Watchers (something potentially backed up by their absence from Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame).
However, it was clear that with What If…?, The Watchers, and Uatu in particular, were clearly meant to be put into the spotlight—setting them up for a far more involved role in the MCU’s future.
So, what are the odds Uatu actually makes a physical appearance? Given his duty to never interfere, the stakes would have to get pretty damn big for that to happen - possibly Infinity Ultron big. So, while possible, this statue is likely the biggest nod fans will get.
Though, if the next big Avengers or event film is the rumored Secret Wars, that would be a big enough set of circumstances for Jeffery Wright’s avid observer to properly cross over from animation into live-action
Thor: Love and Thunder hits theaters on July 8.
