While theMarvel Cinematic Universehas gifted the world some of themost powerful comic book heroes, none can top the franchise’s best character – Korg. The MCU took heroes like Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America and turned them into pop culture icons. The MCU even delved into the inconspicuous realm and made an unknown group like the Guardians of the Galaxy into household names. There’s something to be said about how these movies and shows have been able to make their viewers feel for characters that may only say one word or characters that may be inanimate objects. In a universe that has delivered so much, as wild as it may be to say, what the MCU has done with Korg is its greatest accomplishment.
In the comics, Korg is a C-lister, maybe even less than that, and he has little impact on the Marvel landscape as he only ever surfaces in the Incredible Hulk comics, first appearing inThe Incredible Hulk #96 (2000). The arc that Korg has carried out since his arrival in the MCU inThor: Ragnorakhas been quite impressive. He has epitomized everything that makes the MCU so exquisite and unique from its competition. The MCU took this unfamiliar figure and turned them into a popular, lovable character in a way only this universe could do. It’s because of that, that Korg is the MCU’s best character.
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Korg’s Storyline in the Comics vs. the MCU
Similar to where readers first saw him, Korg is among a group of those held in captivity and forced to fight in a gladiator arena for entertainment on the planet of Sakaar. MCU fans know this lines up with how Thor (Chris Hemsworth) meets him in the movies. Where the stories flip a bit is that it’s Silver Surfer who serves the role of the MCU’s Thor in the comics, playing a part in the Great Arena escape. How Korg is perceived today thanks to his time appearing in the MCU is totally different from his appearances in print, and he serves as a prime example of what Marvel Studios can do with its character development.
The MCU Excels at Transforming Characters for the Big Screen
What makes the MCU so successful is that it’s able to bring in characters from all walks of life and make them interesting in some way. Korg is one of the best examples of this. On the surface, he’s essentially a pile of rocks, a form known as Kronan which is a race of stone men that first debuted inJourney into Mystery #83 (1962). Korg was a forgotten character in the books and someone who seemed unlikely to ever make a leap of this prosperity into the MCU. Yet, Korg’s popularity took off from the moment he appeared on screen in the pits of the gladiator arena and first interacted with Thor. It was from this point forward that Marvel Studios flexed its muscles and showed what it can do to flesh out a character who was very one-dimensional in the comics and turn them into something memorable on screen.
There are a lot of storylines going on across the MCU, and many of them are serious in nature at least in terms of the hero’s world, so like anything else in the world of film and television, comic relief is necessary. Oftentimes these tropes can be overly gimmicky or take away from the flow of the narrative, yet Marvel found a way to use Korg as this source of humor while also helping to push the story forward. That success is credited right at the top to the director ofThor: Ragnarok,Taika Waititi, who decided to get in on the fun and voice this adaptation of Korg. What the director did was put his own influence onto the character, inserting his own New Zealand heritage and giving Korg a whole new liveliness that just wasn’t present on paper.
This has carried over through all the films he has appeared in after Ragnarok, includingAvengers: EndgameandThor: Love and Thunder. The latter saw Korg take the opening monologue to recap the story of Thor in only a way a man of his personality could. There are so many exchanges between the titular character and Korg inThor: Love and Thunder, including one interaction in New Asgard where he first meets Jane Foster, initially calling her Jodie Foster before saying, “The one that got away… that means escaped.” It’s this dry humor vocalized by Waititi that makes this character a scene-stealer whenever he’s in the picture.
Even With Less Screen Time, Korg Remains Entertaining
Korg even manages to remain not just relevant but as entertaining as ever in this movie despite spending more than half of his screen time detached from his body. Viewers see Korg’s head and nothing else of him for nearly the whole film after Zeus launches a Thunderbolt into him as his body crumbles to pieces, leaving just his head. There aren’t many characters who could continue to successfully be woven into the story with just a head and it was reminiscent of the Star Wars franchise being able to do a similar adventure with C-3PO when the robot has his head disassembled from his body inAttack of the Clones.
With all that the MCU has accomplished, what it has done with somewhat irrelevant characters from the comics and turning them into important pieces on screen is one of its biggest achievements. Korg embodies this endeavor as well as any character in the MCU. It’s not as if taking the story of Iron Man or Captain Marvel from the pages into a film is a guaranteed success, either, as plenty of superhero franchises have failed to launch despite a rich history of comic lore. So to see the MCU build a strong foundation with these well-known characters is a worthy accomplishment, but for them to reach that echelon they find themselves in, it had to take more than just nailing the heavy-hitters and bringing together acollection of side charactersand C-listers into entities that people actually care about and want to see further fleshed out. Korg is as good of an example as that, which strengthens his case as the most important figure in the MCU.
