A Marvel fan used deepfake technology to put Chris Hemsworth's face on What If...?'s Party Thor, making the animated version of the Avenger look a little closer to his live-action counterpart.
The most recent episode of What If...?, "What If...Thor Were An Only Child?," delivers a retelling of the God of Thunder's arrival to Earth. The comedy-fueled episode, starring live-action Thor star Chris Hemsworth in the lead voice role, explores a timeline in which Thor grows up without Loki as his adopted brother. A fan quickly took the abundance of animated Thor footage from the episode and used deepfake technology to apply Hemsworth's actual face to his animated avatar.
The deepfake puts Hemsworth's face into many of the episode's major story beats, from the moment he decides to throw Midgard a party of terrifying proportions to his bombastic faceoff with Captain Marvel to his eventual decision to clean up his mess and potentially forge a rejuvenated romance with Natalie Portman's Jane Foster.
In many cases, both versions of the footage are shown side-by-side, allowing viewers to compare the altered animation with the untouched original. While the effect is fairly simple, applied to only a small portion of the total animation, it provides enough detail to Thor's face to make him resemble Hemsworth more closely than Marvel's initial animation style.
Following Thor's redemption and his asking Jane on a date, the What If...? episode introduces a major cosmic threat: an alternate timeline's Ultron, wielding all six of the Infinity Stones. The episode then ends on a cliffhanger, teasing that Party Thor's story might not be concluded just yet.
While the plots of the final two episodes of the season are still under wraps, Party Thor appeared in more scenes in What If...?'s midseason trailer, indicating he likely still has a part to play in the overarching story. In one scene, Thor is shown speaking with the villainous Doctor Strange from the season's fourth episode. In another, he briefly appears as part of a team of multiversal Avengers alongside Captain Peggy Carter, Star-Lord T'Challa, Black Widow and Gamora.
Marvel's What If...? airs new episodes Wednesdays on Disney+.
Source: YouTube