There’s something Cronenbergian about this new Tomb Raider poster

Tomorrow the trailer for the new Tomb Raider is set to drop, and today the filmmakers released a trailer for the trailer, because that’s how we do things these days. Accompanying it is a poster for the movie, giving the world their first look of new star Alicia Vikander suited up as the iconic Lara Croft. Let’s see how she’s looking!

Most Popular

• Michael Sheen breaks silence on making Good Omens after Neil Gaiman accusations
• 28 movies that owe it all to 28 Days Later
• Coming of age means embracing death in the wild world of 28 Years Later

Yeah, Vikander seems to have gone through some transdimensional portal and come out slightly different, as if she absorbed a second Alicia Vikander and now has it surging out of her freakishly long neck. This is barely an exaggeration:

Related Content

• Firebrand review: Alicia Vikander and Jude Law reign over a familiar historical narrative
• Alicia Vikander is no longer your Tomb Raider

As is this:

Here, to wit, is what the Ex Machina star actually looks like, sans Photoshop monstrosity:

There were a lot of possible explanations for the bizarre Frankenstein look to the whole thing.

Alternately, maybe the powers that be just wanted to present the historically sexualized character in the weird butt-forward pose of so many other movie posters, and then digitally grafted her head onto a 9-inch neck and hoped we wouldn’t notice. Or maybe Vikander really just beefed up for the role and added an extra couple of inches to her neck. With the right diet, who knows? Maybe any of us could develop sinewy appendages giving us the ability to turn our heads around 180 degrees and also eat leafy foliage from nearby trees.