When Artemis Fowl first came out in 2001, the world was in its early phases of Harry Potter hysteria, and the tale of a 12-year-old criminal mastermind who gets pulled into the secret underground world of fairies, dwarves and trolls quickly followed in Potter’s footsteps to become a bestselling series. But when director Kenneth Branagh took on the daunting task of adapting the beloved Eoin Colfer novel for Disney, he didn’t look to his experience with Harry Potter to help guide him; instead, he drew heavily on his work in adapting Thor.
Despite the surface-level comparisons that are easy to draw between the popularity of Artemis Fowl and Harry Potter, the comparison to Branagh’s interpretation of Thor actually is more fitting. For his part, Colfer has always pushed back against any comparisons to the Potter stories, instead telling Publishers Weekly back in 2001 that his children’s book was “Die Hard with fairies.” Watch the first trailer for Artemis Fowl below:
Source: IGN.com How Thor Influenced Kenneth Branagh's Artemis Fowl