We all got a nice surprise when Harry Styles made his MCU premiere as Eros in the first post-credit sequence of Eternals. He wasn’t alone, as his character got introduced to the character of Pip the Troll, who was voiced by the always iconic Patton Oswalt. It turns out, he did quite a bit more than that to bring the computer-generated character to life, as he was also on set to play the character.
Weta Digital’s Matt Aitken revealed that he was on the sound stage performing the entire act on his knees so they’d have the right height for the character. So, he did the entire motion capture for the character to bring Pip to life for the latest Marvel Studios film. He goes on to share that
We ended up replacing Patton Oswalt with Pip and the corridor, because we needed to do all that interactive portal light and extend it. But if you’re looking at Eros, then his face will definitely be the face, but everything else is CG in those shots.
Matt Aitken
Weta Digital also shared a first look at the visual breakdown of the character that Comic Book’s Adam Barnhardt shared on Twitter:
Oswalt joined in the fun and even offered a closer look at him behind-the-scenes in the mo-cap suit.
It’s great to see his commitment to the role and might hint at him returning to play the character whenever Pip the Troll might make his grand return. James Gunn‘s brother Sean Gunn famously played Rocket Raccoon in the Guardians of the Galaxy films walking on his knees while Bradley Cooper purely voiced the character. It’s always interesting to get a look behind-the-scenes on these projects, especially how they bring these CGI-heavy characters to life. It certainly sounds like Styles had some fun with Oswalt on his knees while introducing his character.
Source: Comic Book
