New Eternals Set Photos Reveal The MCU’s First Openly Gay Hero

For any other studio in Hollywood, The Eternals would be considered a pretty risky project. It’s a mega-budget sci-fi flick based on an obscure comic book that most people probably aren’t familiar with. It also comes from a director whose only two previous feature-length films were critically-acclaimed independent dramas that didn’t make much of a dent at the box office. In other words, The Eternals is the type of ambitious blockbuster that only Marvel Studios could pull off.

Of course, Kevin Feige and his team are in a rare position to take risks that most other studios would never attempt, and The Eternals is no different. The twenty-fifth installment in the MCU follows a group of immortal aliens fighting an intergalactic war against their evolutionary counterparts and looks to feature one of the most impressive cast lists we’ve seen from any film in the franchise.

Boasting a mix of established stars, rising up-and-comers and relative unknowns, The Eternals will also give us the cinematic universe’s first openly gay hero in the form of Ikaris, played by Richard Madden. And you can now get your very first look at him thanks to the set photos below, which show Madden shooting some scenes.

Though the character is seen in civilian clothing here, you can be sure that he’ll be getting a more elaborate outfit at some point in the film. And while it’s unclear what exactly’s going on in these pics, it’s still nice to get another look at the in-development blockbuster, which is starting to generate a lot of buzz.

Currently, not much is known about the plot other than the official synopsis that we got earlier this year, but from what we do know, The Eternals will probably be the most out-there cosmic entry in the franchise yet. And when you consider the fact that it’s also set to plant the seeds for mutants in the MCU, it’s looking to be one of the most important entries as well.