Oscar winner Cate Blanchett revealed during my visit to the set of Thor: Ragnarok last year that Hela has "a lot of unresolved issues" with Asgard, a grudge that she's nursed for eons. More details on that -- as well as details on Quentin Tarantino veteran Zoe Bell's role working with Blanchett on the film -- follow.

Immortals Facing Death

Loading

Hela and Valkyrie

"Playing the goddess of death has been really interesting," Blanchett said. Death is an unsettling notion for the Western world where, as the actress put it, "death has been banished" as a topic of consideration. Hela has likewise been banished by Asgard. "She’s been banished for a very long time, and I think if you’re locked under the Asgardian stairs for five thousand years, you’d be a little bit cross," Blanchett said. "But I think it’s very interesting to bring the concept of death into a world that’s ostensibly immortal."Blanchett said that for Hela "there’s a lot of unresolved issues that she has with Asgard.... Each step of the way, she doesn’t meet people who are receptive to her. And I think she’s quite bewildered as to why people are frightened of her. But the more havoc she wreaks, the stronger she becomes."

Thor: Ragnarok depicts the Valkyires as essentially Odin's special forces unit. Some of the most gripping images in the trailers are the painterly shots of the Valkyries, astride their winged horses, battling Hela. Blanchett raved about this sequence, which she said takes place in the past. "Val and Hela have a rather problematic history," Blanchett said, referring to Tessa Thompson's Valkyrie.

Differentiating Hela's Look From Loki's

Loading

With Great Power ...

Loading

Zoe Bell Gave Up Her (Stunt) Retirement

Thor: Ragnarok Behind the Scenes Set Visit 8 IMAGES

Loading

"I’ve never seen anything like it, that particular flashback that Val has," Blanchett said. The actress recalled that for the filming of this "amazing" sequence "they had a horse, a real horse, galloping through the studio. ... It really did capture that feeling of - you know when you have a dream that’s also borderline nightmare, that it has both lightness and incredible weight? It’s that strange. It really captured that dreamlike sensation."With her antler headdress and green garb, Hela is among the most striking looking Marvel villains. But Blanchett only wore the actual horns and costumes for tests and in certain scenes. Otherwise, she wore a performance-capture suit covered in sensors, with Hela's look digitally augmented as the character grows in power throughout the course of the story.Blanchett said she also wanted to have Hela's look differentiated from that other Thor baddie known for sporting horned helmets and green clothes. "Hela looked very similar to Loki. So I said, okay, how can we either make that a virtue, or be a little bit more creative with that?," Blanchett recalled. "And they were really receptive to it. ... I’ve tried, with the makeup and hair people, and all of the different departments, to give her kind of a visual journey, so that she’s got somewhere to go as she becomes increasingly powerful. That look evolves and calcifies a little bit."Blanchett spoke of Hela's "great" powers, which she also described as "varied and evolving" during the film. The actress, who previously ventured into fantasy films with Peter Jackson's Middle-earth trilogies, was pleasantly surprised at how receptive the Marvel movie machinery was to her contributions of how to bring Hela's powers to life onscreen."Very early on, I threw a lot of ideas into the ring with Taika [Waititi, the director] and with the motion-capture people and the special effects crew. And they took that and ran with it. So it’s been evolving," Blanchett said. "So it’s like, well, what if I shot this out, what would happen if that happened? And what if I played with my cape, could stuff come out of that? And then it’s been an organic thing where Ben [Cooke], the stunt coordinator, would say, you know that move that you did there? We could make a weapon fly out that way. So it’s been very quite loose, actually. But just a lot of power, she’s got a lot of power."New Zealand native Zoe Bell began her career as a stuntwoman on such projects as Xena: Warrior Princess and Kill Bill before venturing full-time into acting in such films as Death Proof, Whip It, and The Hateful Eight. Although she had retired from stunts, the prospect of working with her old pal and mentor, stunt coordinator Ben Cooke, and fellow Kiwi Taika Waititi was enough to draw Bell back into stuntwork as Blanchett's double on Ragnarok."It just feels like a massive family affair for me," Bell said during a break in filming the climactic bridge battle scene . "I haven’t shot this close to home in over 15 years and working with Cate was just, I was like look, even as an actor just to sit and watch her would be -- people would pay money to do that and to be a part of the Marvel family."Bell, who was wearing the same performance-capture leotard as Blanchett during our interview, added, "I just couldn’t say no. I’ve sort of loads of reasons to question it and be dedicated to my other stuff and it was just like this is a good life choice."For her part, Blanchett praised Bell as "not only an extraordinary stunt woman, beyond compare really, but she’s a fantastic actor. So to kind of work with that and have her as a resource and a partner in creating this whole thing has been great. And I think as a result, under her tutelage I’ve been able to do a lot more of that physical stuff than I thought possible."For more of what I learned on the set of Thor: Ragnarok, check out what I can (and can't) tell you about the final battle , learn these 9 new details about the Hulk , and discover what Odin didn't tell his sons . Plus, be sure to check out our explainer piece on the Marvel Comics history of Hela

Jim Vejvoda is the Executive Editor of Movies for IGN.com. Follow him on Twitter: @JimVejvoda