Grammar Makes a Superhero

Than or Then?

Use than to make a comparison. Today is a lot warmer than yesterday. It’s more than 15 degrees hotter.

Then means “next” or “at that time.” Maya fried an egg, then she made toast.

Black Panther is the king and defender of Wakanda, a fictional country in Africa. He wears a suit that looks cooler than/then any other superhero outfit in the Marvel universe. (That’s our humble opinion anyway. Sorry, Captain America.) The suit is sleek and shimmery, thanks to costume designer Ruth E. Carter, who decorated it with a triangle pattern inspired by art from the (real) African country of Botswana.

The costume itself is made of two layers of stretchy, skin-tight material. But the suit was a little too tight. When actor Chadwick Boseman put it on, he could barely breathe. Luckily, he got used to it. Wakanda forever!

One character that couldn’t be created with makeup and costumes is Thanos, the 8-foot-tall, 700-pound space monster who wipes out half of all life in the universe in Avengers: Infinity War. This giant purple supervillain was played by actor Josh Brolin, but what we see on-screen is entirely digital.

During filming, Brolin wore sensors all over his face and body. The sensors captured every move he made. Digital effects teams than/then reproduced Brolin’s performance using computer graphics. This was no easy job. For Infinity War, it took more than/then 300 people nearly two years to bring Thanos to life.

Question: How do you turn someone into a bald, blue-skinned cyborg space pirate? Answer: Very slowly. For the Guardians of the Galaxy movie, transforming actress Karen Gillan into the alien Nebula took makeup artists more than/then four hours a day. (In later films, the process was faster than/then that— about 2.5 hours.)

Step one was to cover Gillan’s hair with a tight cap. Next, pieces of artificial blue skin were glued to her face and head. Makeup was than/then used to cover the parts of her skin that were still exposed. Finally, Gillan popped in a pair of creepy black contact lenses, and BOOM! Nebula was born.