Well, here’s a sign that Thor could be really, really good: they fired Stuart Townsend from it. You’ll remember that Townsend also got sacked from The Lord of the Rings trilogy, where he had actually played Aragorn for a couple of days of shooting. That fantasy film went on to be pretty darn good, so maybe Thor will be just as good.

The official story is that Townsend left over creative differences, but how different could his creative take be on one of the members of The Warriors Three, a truly tertiary group of Thor characters? Ain’t It Cool says that Townsend got fired after arriving to a screen test late. SIX HOURS late. Yeah, that’ll do it. Even in Hollywood (assuming you’re not the star).

Townsend has been replaced by an almost complete unknown, Joshua Dallas, whose offspring will one day be captain of a freighter known as the Nostromo.

Thor starts shooting Monday. What’s the over/under on leaked photos showing up? My thought is that the first official pic is released to USA Today. I’m really itching to get a look at the vision for this character, one whose transition to the modern cinema world seems so fraught with the perils of being silly.