Scarlett Johansson Looks Superhero Fit and Here's How

1. Putting On Muscle

Thompson put on muscle for her role as Valkyrie in Thor: Ragnarok. “I gained about 15 pounds of muscle mass, which yeah, it was a lot for me,” she says. “I like sort of bucking this conventional idea of a woman is beautiful or sexy if she’s sort of thin. She’s felt, but you can’t really see her strength. I like the idea that she can just be ripped, like Valkyrie is in the comics. Yeah, I found that sort of essential, that not really caring about how I looked, but caring more about how I felt. I felt so strong, and in my skin.”

2. Loving Those Muscles

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Thompson loved how strong the muscle made her feel. “It felt great!” she says. “Yeah, it felt great. Particularly for the five months that I was there, and I was working on the stage where did all the stunt choreography and the likes of folks like Chris Hemsworth. It felt good to be able to be on par with everyone around me.”

3. At-Home Beauty Masks

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Thompson learned how to make at-home face masks during the pandemic. “I would take goat yogurt and put turmeric in it,” she says. “It stained my fingers, which was fine because I had nowhere to go. I would use that as a mask, which was amazing. I have also newly discovered how incredible apple cider vinegar is. It's amazing for your hair, for your skin — I recently had a bunch of mosquito bites, it helped with that. I also use it as a toner sometimes.”

4. No-Makeup Makeup

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Thompson loves the no-makeup makeup look. “I think makeup should enhance what exists,” she says. “I put my foundation on with my fingers, although sometimes I'll use a sponge. I don't like to wear a ton of foundation in my everyday life. I wear so much makeup when I'm working, that it's really nice to give my skin some time to breathe. Typically, I like to use moisturizer and then mix a little foundation into it and make a little cream. That's what I'll use all over my face. Sometimes, I want to cover up areas of hyperpigmentation, so I'll go in with a little foundation. Sometimes I'll cheat and buff it in with a little blending brush, like one that you would use for eyeshadow so it's really, really blended.”

5. Reinventing Valkyrie

Thompson is proud of her reinvention of Valkyrie. “We had lots of conversations about diversity and inclusion,” she says. “It shouldn’t all be rhetorical. I think it’s important the films that we make reflect the times that we live in, to realize that big movies have the power to also shift culture. I think it’s really great that young comic book readers that look like me can see themselves in a film. I think it’s about time.”

1. Putting On Muscle

Thompson put on muscle for her role as Valkyrie in Thor: Ragnarok. “I gained about 15 pounds of muscle mass, which yeah, it was a lot for me,” she says. “I like sort of bucking this conventional idea of a woman is beautiful or sexy if she’s sort of thin. She’s felt, but you can’t really see her strength. I like the idea that she can just be ripped, like Valkyrie is in the comics. Yeah, I found that sort of essential, that not really caring about how I looked, but caring more about how I felt. I felt so strong, and in my skin.”

2. Loving Those Muscles

Shutterstock

Thompson loved how strong the muscle made her feel. “It felt great!” she says. “Yeah, it felt great. Particularly for the five months that I was there, and I was working on the stage where did all the stunt choreography and the likes of folks like Chris Hemsworth. It felt good to be able to be on par with everyone around me.”

3. At-Home Beauty Masks

Shutterstock

Thompson learned how to make at-home face masks during the pandemic. “I would take goat yogurt and put turmeric in it,” she says. “It stained my fingers, which was fine because I had nowhere to go. I would use that as a mask, which was amazing. I have also newly discovered how incredible apple cider vinegar is. It's amazing for your hair, for your skin — I recently had a bunch of mosquito bites, it helped with that. I also use it as a toner sometimes.”

4. No-Makeup Makeup

Shutterstock

Thompson loves the no-makeup makeup look. “I think makeup should enhance what exists,” she says. “I put my foundation on with my fingers, although sometimes I'll use a sponge. I don't like to wear a ton of foundation in my everyday life. I wear so much makeup when I'm working, that it's really nice to give my skin some time to breathe. Typically, I like to use moisturizer and then mix a little foundation into it and make a little cream. That's what I'll use all over my face. Sometimes, I want to cover up areas of hyperpigmentation, so I'll go in with a little foundation. Sometimes I'll cheat and buff it in with a little blending brush, like one that you would use for eyeshadow so it's really, really blended.”

5. Reinventing Valkyrie

Thompson is proud of her reinvention of Valkyrie. “We had lots of conversations about diversity and inclusion,” she says. “It shouldn’t all be rhetorical. I think it’s important the films that we make reflect the times that we live in, to realize that big movies have the power to also shift culture. I think it’s really great that young comic book readers that look like me can see themselves in a film. I think it’s about time.”

Delve into the secrets and stories behind the impressive physiques of 20 female Marvel stars. Whether it's Ming-Na Wen's post-surgery rehabilitation or Karen Gillian's intense workout routine, these women have embraced various fitness approaches to prepare for their demanding roles. Join us as we explore their inspiring words on body positivity, wellness, and breaking new ground in the entertainment industry. Get ready to be inspired by the strength, resilience, and determination of these remarkable Marvel stars.

1. Ming-Na Wen

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Ming-Na Wen opened up about how she recovered from knee surgery in this post on her website. She says that she did a lot of squats, and made sure that she was doing them correctly. “After surgery, I had a limited ability to bend my left knee. And with the help of my physical therapist, I learned many small moves that make such a big difference. The key is to do it RIGHT. Position is super important to target the right muscles.

2. Hayley Atwell

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In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar, Hayley Atwell revealed what makes her feel beautiful. “When I feel my most beautiful is when I'm not really feeling myself; instead when I'm looking at or engaging with something beautiful, then that's lit up in my eyes or it generates a natural smile from within."

3. Karen Gillian

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Karen Gillian works with personal trainer, Scott Pearlman to get herself in shape for films. She shared this post on Instagram of the two of them. Gillian captioned the post, “Thank so much to my personal trainer Scott Pearlman who whipped me into shape for Jumanji! Sad to leave our Hawaii routine and continue my mission to swol without him!”

4. Danai Gurira

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Danai Gurira talked about her approach to fitness in an interview with Women’s Health. “As women, we’re not always encouraged to find the full extent of our physical power,” she said. “There’s something so exciting about tapping into that part of ourselves. It might be lifting weights, it might be boxing, it might be something a little less intense. There’s no need to break records tomorrow. It’s just about slowly finding what feels good and what feels rewarding.”

5. Tessa Thompson

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Tessa Thomspon talked about getting in shape to play Valkyrie to Comic Book Resources. “I gained about 15 pounds of muscle mass, which yeah, it was a lot for me,” she said. Thompson also said that she wanted to do this to change how people perceive women in movies. “I like sort of bucking this conventional idea of a woman is beautiful or sexy if she’s sort of thin. She’s felt, but you can’t really see her strength. I like the idea that she can just be ripped, like Valkyrie is in the comics. Yeah, I found that sort of essential, that not really caring about how I looked, but caring more about how I felt. I felt so strong, and in my skin."

6. Elizabeth Olsen

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Elizabeth Olsen has starred in many different Marvel projects, and she does different things to get in shape for each one. ​​“I do change it up depending on the gig,” she said to The New York Times. “For Captain America: Civil War, I was doing Muay Thai. It’s not the most comfortable thing, and I don’t do it anymore. I do love going to the gym. I love it because my brain works better, and I don’t want to think about eating restrictively.”

7. Krysten Ritter

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In 2016, Krysten Ritter shared how she got in shape to play the lead character in Jessica Jones with TrainForHer.com. “I’m big on juicing – all greens. Luckily, I don’t have a sweet tooth, so I’m more into kale, cucumber, spinach, parsley and celery. I’ve also cut out gluten, dairy and fish for the most part, and I’ve felt so much healthier and better since. Jessica Jones was an eight-month shoot so I needed the energy and my health to be on point. Also, with this. I increased my clean proteins with the working out.”

8. Adrienne Palicki

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Adrienne Palicki works with trainers Bobby and Alicia Storm to keep herself in shape. In 2013, Bobby and Alicia gave an interview to SELF, where they revealed how Palicki got in shape for G.I. Joe: Retaliation. "She did a lot of her own stunts, and much of the time it was in high heels! [The reverse lunge] works our glutes and legs and incorporates the core for a nice flat belly. And they get your heart rate up.”

9. Chloe Bennet

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In 2016, Chloe Bennet talked to Teen Vogue about starring in the ABC Marvel series, Agents of Shield. She said that she enjoyed representing the Asian community on the series. “I’m so proud of what the show has done, and I think we haven’t gotten enough credit for the amount of diversity we bring to our show. Our showrunner is an Asian-American woman, and our two lead females are Asian-American women. 90% of stunts and the ass-kicking and the saving on the show are from the women. I don’t think it’s talked about enough! We’ve quietly been breaking new ground.”

10. Jessica Henwick

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Jessica Henwick opened up about her acting career and her wishes for the industry in an interview with Glamour. “It's not important to me that I become anything,” she admits. “But it's important to me that we keep pushing forward and it's shocking to me that I was the first, considering it was 2009 and how long British television has existed. When I was growing up, I would've loved to have seen someone who looked like me on screen. All I got was stunning English roses. So I absorbed that and thought that was the ideal way to look. When I was a kid, I totally wanted to look like that. I was like, why can't I be blonde and have really pink cheeks and have curly hair? It would've been healthy for my self-image if I had been able to look at someone else and think, I could also look like me. So it’s definitely important. But it’s also just more interesting. I'm bored of seeing the same story told over and over again. I want to hear from new creators, something that I've never seen before. There are woman rejuvenating the industry by sharing their own stories: Michaela Coel, Phoebe Waller Bridge, Brit Marling. These are the women who inspire me and, uh, who I would love to be like one day when I grow up.”

11. Olivia Holt

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Olivia Holt’s many projects include the Marvel series, Cloak and Dagger. She shared some of her skincare routines with E! News. “If my skin is feeling extra dry or tired, I'll simply take some greek yogurt and use it as a face mask to wake up my skin. Then I'll use the Shani Darden's Facial Sculpting Wand to depuff under my eyes or around my face. Then I'll use a Sonya Dakar Blue Butterfly Balm. Then apply some SPF.”

12. Rosario Dawson

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Rosario Dawson has done a lot in her career, including starring as Claire Temple in Marvel products, specifically the Netflix show Luke Cage. Dawson shared her wellness secrets in an interview with Us Weekly. “I walk everywhere. I drink a lot of water. I try to get as much sleep as possible. Everything else about my schedule and routine is inconsistent, so if those types of things I can do, they’re really important… I can always take the stairs rather than use the elevator or the escalator.”

13. Natalia Cordova-Buckley

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In addition to being a Marvel star, Natalia Cordova-Buckley wants to be a role model and speak out about things that are important to her. “I’ve always been very politically driven in my country,” she says to People. “My father is too, and I think he unconsciously installed that in me. I’ve always been very outspoken about the injustices that the government of Mexico has distilled upon its people and country.”

14. Carrie-Anne Moss

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Carrie-Anne Moss talked to The New York Times about reprising her role in The Matrix. “It was important to me that I let go of any construct in my mind that I needed to look like I did when I was 30,” she said. “I find that thinking makes desperation as a woman, and I didn’t want any desperation. I knew I wanted to look good, but I didn’t want to do a juice cleanse, I didn’t want to do all these extreme things. I laugh because at times I would just feel so cool, I got this.”

15. Brie Larson

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To help her eat right for films, Brie Larson works with nutritionist Dr. Phillip Goglia. He told People that he has Larson eat bridge meals. "You're using fat metabolism and that will be your bridge meal to get to dinner,” Dr. Goglia explained. “So that dinner is an appetite environment that will not allow you to crave carbs because you've already eaten… you're kind of full. You're not in low blood sugar."

16. Scarlett Johansson

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To prepare for playing Black Widow in the Marvel franchise, Scarlett Johansson works with trainer Eric Johnson. Prior to starring in the 2021 film, Black Widow, Johnson opened up to Shape about Johansson’s workout routine. "She already had this great training base, this huge foundational strength base," says Johnson. "We had a big quote-unquote offseason, we had a lot of time to prepare, almost a year, so I could really get her foundational strength and condition really up to where we wanted it to be."

17. Rachael Taylor

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Rachael Taylor opened up about her body image in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. She says that she was once on a restrictive diet, but went off it. “I ate mostly salad and fresh air. I looked dreadful. It wasn’t for me.” Taylor also said that she has a better sense of self now. “I haven't always been at peace with my self-image, although in the back half of my 20s, I've become a lot more comfortable.”

18. Gwyneth Paltrow

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Gwyneth Paltrow shared some of her wellness tips in an interview with Shape. "I notice that the older I get, the more drawn I am toward monitoring my health,” she revealed. “Doing blood work, and collecting data about inflammation levels, blood sugar levels, sleep, vitamins, etc. Your body rebounds a little less quickly from overindulging — staying healthy takes a little more intentionality."

19. Lupita Nyong’o

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While filming Black Panther, Lupita Nyong’o and her cast members ate healthy on set. Marvel hired personal chef, Brandi Patten, for the cast. “It was only once we wrapped that I realized I was on a sugar-free diet,” Nyong’o tells ESSENCE. “We could have fruit, which is a good sugar, but no fructose or refined sugar. But we could have carbs, which are good when you work out as much as we did, and we weren’t eating less. We actually had to eat smaller meals every three hours. I never got bored. I’ve never worked on a project like this where there is a diet and a workout plan.”

20. Zoe Saldana

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Zoe Saldana works with trainer, Jason Walsh to help her stay in shape. Walsh opened up about working with the actress to Shape. "Zoe is always willing to put in the work," says Walsh. "She stays motivated by her own goals and understands what she needs from her body. It is not about motivation with Zoe; it is always there."

Angelina Jolie is an eternal beauty. So it’s no surprise she’s starring in the new movie, Eternals. At the red carpet premiere for the film yesterday in Los Angeles, she was draped in brown fabric with a silver lip-piece. Read on to see 5 ways Angelina Jolie approaches her health and the photos that prove they work—and to get beach-ready yourself, don't miss these essential 30 Best-Ever Celebrity Bathing Suit Photos!

1. She Has Worked Out Like This

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Jolie’s one time personal trailer has said that "he gets more intensity out of his clients when he has them do three different machines for 15 minutes, rather than the same machine for the same 45 minutes." Says the Mayo Clinic: “High-intensity interval training (HIIT) is not just for the young and healthy. Researchers have found that HIIT can improve health and fitness for just about everyone and has even bigger benefits for older adults. The concept of ‘HIIT’ is pretty simple. You can do anything for 30 seconds or even a couple of minutes. And then, given a chance to catch your breath, you'll be able to do it again. During a HIIT workout, you alternate between exerting a high and low level effort of exercise.”

2. She Has Embraced Early Menopause

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“I actually love being in menopause,” Jolie told the Daily Telegraph when she was 40 years old. “I haven’t had a terrible reaction to it, so I’m very fortunate. I feel older, and I feel settled being older. I feel happy that I’ve grown up. I don’t want to be young again.” At the time, she said of then-husband Brad Pitt: “[He] made it very, very clear to me that what he loved and what was a woman to him was somebody who was smart, and capable, and cared about her family, that it’s not about your physical body,” she said. “So I knew through the surgeries that this wasn’t going to be something that made me feel like less of a woman, because my husband wouldn’t let that happen.”

3. She Wrote About Having a Mastectomy

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Jolie has the BRCA1 genetic mutation. "The decision to have a mastectomy was not easy," Jolie wrote in the first New York Times essay explaining her decision. "But it is one I am very happy that I made. My chances of developing breast cancer have dropped from 87 percent to under 5 percent. I can tell my children that they don’t need to fear they will lose me to breast cancer."

4. She Has Done a Mixture of Krav Maga and Muay Thai

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Trainer Gunnar Peterson got Jolie ready for some of her action films. "We got her learning a combination of Muay Thai and Krav Maga very early on. We would then pick the moves she was best at and combine them into a sequence," Peterson told SELF. “Krav Maga helps you focus your senses and be more aware of the environment around you. Once you begin training, you’ll learn to tune into your surroundings and be able to evaluate threatening situations. With this newfound perception, you can remove yourself from a potentially hostile situation before it escalates,” says Billy Macagnone, owner of Body Evolution.

5. She Reportedly Has Eaten Ancient Grains

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“All types of grains are good sources of complex carbohydrates and some key vitamins and minerals, but whole grains — the healthiest kinds of grains — in particular are an important part of a healthy diet. Grains are naturally high in fiber, helping you feel full and satisfied — which makes it easier to maintain a healthy body weight. Whole grains are also linked to a lower risk of heart disease, diabetes, certain cancers and other health problems,” says the Mayo Clinic.