ETERNALS Director Chloé Zhao Discusses Casting Harry Styles as Surprise Character in Film

In a recent interview with Deadline, Eternals director Chloé Zhao opens up about casting Harry Styles (Dunkirk) as a Marvel character who makes a surprise appearance in the film. If you haven’t seen Eternals yet, You might want to skip out on this because… spoilers!

In the first post credits scene of the film we see Harry Styles pop up in the role of Thanos’ brother Eros a.k.a. Starfox. After seeing hi in the role, I can see why she wanted to cast him, he actually seems to perfectly fit the character!

The scene features Eros and Pip the Troll (voiced by Patton Oswald) present themselves to Thena (Angelina Jolie), Druig (Barry Keoghan), and Makkari (Lauren Ridloff) who are left confused and needing assistance after Arishem the Judge (David Kaye) takes Sersi (Gemma Chan), Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani), and Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry) to pay for their actions of killing a Celestial and saving Earth.

When talking about casting Styles, the director said, “Harry as Eros was very much a package deal for me. I pitched the idea of Pip the Troll [voiced by Patton Oswald in Eternals] and Eros to Kevin awhile back and I love the idea of exploring an Eternal who is beyond Titan and who may have influenced Thanos throughout the years the same way Eternals influenced us, earthlings.”

She went on to say, “And then, it wasn’t like I suggested Eros, and let’s go find actors. I kept tabs on Harry since Dunkirk, I thought he was very interesting. After meeting him I realized he is that character—the same way I cast the rest of my cast. There’s so much of Eros in him. For me, if he says yes and Kevin says yes then it’s a go. And I’m very happy they both did.”

She barely got a chance to play with these characters in the film, but Marvel obviously has big future plans for them and I can’t wait to see what those plans are. Eros is a very interesting character and I’m interested to see how his story arc is going to play out in the MCU.

What do you think about Styles in the role of Eros?