Shakespearean English

[[A]]

Eventhough 99.9999996% of these people have never read Shakespeare

[TheCorpulent1]

Doesn't pretty much everyone in the English-speaking world have to read Shakespeare for school at some point? Granted, I doubt any of us are master scholars of Shakespeare's oeuvre or anything, but I imagine 99% of us are familiar with at least one Shakespearean work.

[Manowar]

Thor is a mix of Modern and maybe Victorian English if not Old English. I dunno, but one thing is for sure. There is nothing shakesperean in any of his comic books. He doesn't speak poetry with similes, metaphors and all that other stuff they do in Shakespeare.

[Vartha]

Yeah JMS has pretty much proven Thor sells better without the Shakespeare.
JMS based the newer Thor on Aragorn in LotR, for those who didn't know.

[Franklin Richards]

Oh please. The only thing JMS has proven is that he can't get magazines out on time.

[Ace of Knaves]

Not full on Shakespearean.

But keep the thee's and thou's and aye's in there. You take them away, you take away the possibility of some bad ass lines.

As I said in the other Hopkins thread, anyone who says they don't want to hear lines such as "I would have words with thee" or "I shall smite thee" etc cannot call themselves true Thor fans.

[Webhead2006]

and did some crazy stuff with spiderman(though Joey Q is to blam too)

[Aeltri]

As long as it they don't sound like this I'll be ok :

VIDEO-CLick to Watch!:

On a serious note, I think a somewhat archaic vocabulary and a vaguely New England-ish accent would work pretty well. British accents just tend to be overdone so that even Greek gods all sound like they attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art .

[Kurosawa]

Not full on, but elegant language definitely. Although who could have issue with a "I say thee nay!"

[Panthro]

Originally Posted by Vartha

Yeah JMS has pretty much proven Thor sells better without the Shakespeare.
JMS based the newer Thor on Aragorn in LotR, for those who didn't know.

Really? Heh. I did not know that.

I just hope they don't have Thor trying to talk "hip" at any point in the film, I hate that.

[Timstuff]

Originally Posted by [A]

Eventhough 99.9999996% of these people have never read Shakespeare

I read Othello.

[Agent 194]

Well Shakespearean, Elizabethan, King's English,....or when you just plain get down to it, Stan Lee's PT Barnum like talent of making it noticeable and different, all the while giving a great show. What ever we're going to call it (for those nitpicking the proper label - I think we all know what it means)....I still think it'd be great to have some of it.

1. Especially with the actors involved now.

2. The director at the helm.

3. And let's face it...the subject matter. In all it's over top Wagnerian operatic godly flair. I mean, really....

I'll post my initial thought on Hopkins casting now

(now in the proper thread - you sticklers for detail)

Now C'MON! You've got to have that Shakespearean English now! (I still think it's a mistake not to use it. And it's the only thing I'm disappointed with about the movie so far) It just screams for it now with the addition of Hopkins. I mean, can't you hear it?!

'Yay verily, I say unto thee'....

[Dragon]

I'm not for turning this into an organics versus mechanical webshooters debate, but I'd love to see these guys perform Shakespearean English. There's no arguing about what makes sense. There's no sense in Thor speaking English at all. This isn't the Norse myth of Thor. It's Marvel's adaptation of Thor. The style of speech is part of the presentation and certainly made Thor unique. I was 8 years old when I started reading the comic and had no trouble picking up on what they were saying. Neither did any of the other kids, and we'd never read Shakespeare or any such writing.

As for JMS, he hasn't proven that Thor is better without the dialogue, only that he writes interesting enough stories that people want to follow them regardless of the style of dialogue.

[Son of Coul]

To be honest the main thing that turned me off of Thor was the Shakespearean dialogue. Glad they're not using it. Though I have to admit, someone posted the page with that Ultron quote and it was pretty damn cool.

[TheCorpulent1]

Originally Posted by Dragon

As for JMS, he hasn't proven that Thor is better without the dialogue, only that he writes interesting enough stories that people want to follow them regardless of the style of dialogue.

I feel that's true of any of Thor's great writers. The "thees" and "thous" have come and gone and come back again and gone away again at least 3 or 4 times that I can recall, but their presence or lack has never really affected me if the writer is otherwise doing a good job. Personally, I think the dialogue tends to flow better without them (and, of course, you never have a problem with writers who have no idea how to use archaic pronouns--that's a big pet peeve of mine), but I can read and understand Thor either way.

[[A]]

http://www.mainstrike.com/mstservices/handy/insult.html

[Ace of Knaves]

haha that's great

"Thou infectious bat-fowling apple-john!"

[MikeFrost]

How bout a mix? Asgard gets the Shakespearean dialogue but Earth gets normal dialect.

For the lulz.

[TheCorpulent1]

That'd annoy me. Don Blake once told Sif to "turn off" her "Asgardian-speak" or something like that and that bugged me. The way the gods talk shouldn't be a mere affectation to be turned on and off at a whim. That makes it feel cheap to me.

[Triad]

Ya know, either way would be fine with me. From reading the comics as a kid, I am a little endeared to Thor speaking like that - just as long as they don't take it over the top with the "Thee"s & "Thou"s, etc. If they didn't have it somewhat I'd be slightly disappointed, but I admit that it probably would turn off some viewers if they go full-on Shakespearean English. A few lines here & there couldn't hurt though.

[TheCorpulent1]

Personally, I'd be happy with modern pronouns but a few antiquated words like "calumny" and "ignominy" thrown in.

[daderade]

i agree and i think that is how its going to be to keep some of the classic feel for the fans, but modern enough not to alienate anyone

[Vartha]

Originally Posted by Panthro

Really? Heh. I did not know that.

I just hope they don't have Thor trying to talk "hip" at any point in the film, I hate that.

Can't find the article any more, we had it in the Old Official Thor threads in toward the beginning, but, I'm sure those links are broken now.

[Vartha]

Originally Posted by Franklin Richards

Oh please. The only thing JMS has proven is that he can't get magazines out on time.

lol ok ok JMS can't get a book out on time but when he did it was an amazing Thor story, we Thor fans had to wait but the stories were great in MY book.

[Son of Coul]

Originally Posted by Vartha

Can't find the article any more, we had it in the Old Official Thor threads in toward the beginning, but, I'm sure those links are broken now.

I recall MTV putting up an article that was taken down within the hour that I could find any trace of for the life of me that had a list of things Feige told them at Comic-Con about Thor. There was one about Cap that coincided with it that was just as ill-fated.

But anywho, the article said a bunch of promising stuff. One was there'd be no lame goofy scene where Thor is trying to work an iPhone and Asgard will be technologically advanced in their own regard, so Thor won't be talking to a lamppost for five minutes.

Another thing I remember is them citing that it's 70% Asgard and 30% Earth, but earlier in the year they said it was primarily on Earth, so it could have changed again by now. Too bad I can't remember anything else from it really, it was a lot of stuff that was pretty informative.