Turns Out Benedict Cumberbatch Helped Josh Brolin Pursue Avengers: Infinity War

Between Deadpool 2, Avengers: Infinity War and Sicario: Day of the Soldado, 2018 is shaping up to be a pretty busy year for Josh Brolin.

Not that it shows, as the actor has completely vanished into all three projects – though the jury’s still out on Soldado, as the cartel drama isn’t expected to hit theaters until next week. But it seems Josh Brolin had a helping hand in deciding whether to put himself forward for the role of Thanos, the purple-skinned space tyrant who rules over Avengers: Infinity War with an iron fist. And a shiny Infinity Gauntlet.

As Brolin tells SiriusXM (h/t ComicBook.com), watching Benedict Cumberbatch wholly commit himself to the part of Smaug was enough to convince him that CGI and motion capture technology had progressed to such an extent that he could still bring an element of nuance to the role of Marvel’s Mad Titan.

I saw Benedict Cumberbatch do, I think it was for The Hobbit and I looked on YouTube when I was deciding whether I wanted to do it or not, and he was in this mo-cap suit on and he’s in this big warehouse,” the actor said. “He’s crawling around like a snake, snapping his tongue, doing this incredible performance. I saw that and I was like, ‘Okay, that’s the bar. This is not bulls—. This is something you have to sink your teeth into. Conviction. Embarrassment.’ All that kind of stuff and I decided.

Signing on for not one, but two big-budget Marvel movies is undoubtedly a big commitment, though it seems Josh Brolin always had one goal in his mind: to help fix the perception that all MCU villains were half-baked nobodies. And to his credit, Thanos was able to change that narrative at the snap of his fingers.

He continued:

Marvel did this thing always where, the critics actually, were always talking about Marvel villains being the weak point. So, you have that pressure when you started to hear that. I never really knew that. The way that people are reacting to this character as if he truly exists is kind of phenomenal. It’s a phenomenal… I had never done anything like that. Mo-cap. I thought I was gonna be behind a bunch of lights and a bunch of cameras and it wasn’t like that. I was working with people. It’s a phenomenal process.

It’s broke $2 billion worldwide and earned enough to secure its place among the top five highest-grossing domestic releases of the year, but Avengers: Infinity War is merely the beginning of a two-part saga. As such, you can expect Josh Brolin to reprise his role as Thanos when Avengers 4 smashes into theaters next summer.