Image Clipped from Comic Alliance: Clipped from Wikipedia:
In 2005, Variety reported that Marvel Studios would start producing its own films and distribute them through Paramount Pictures. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige in 2009 initially referred to the shared narrative continuity of these films as the "Marvel Cinema Universe",but later used the term "Marvel Cinematic Universe".
Iron Man, Marvel Studios' first self-produced film, was released in May 2008. The film ended with a post-credits scene featuring Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury.
Director Jon Favreau said that he included the scene because, "We wanted something for the fans" and detailed how the scene was made. "I turned to [Marvel Studios President] Kevin Feige and said, 'You know what would blow their minds? Should we do this?' Kevin was like, 'Let's try.' And then we actually pulled it together. It was just a little scene, just a little tip of the hat for the fans that we were paying attention to what had been established, and a way to sort of tee up The Avengers. We brought [Jackson] in on a secret day of shooting, we had a skeleton crew so that the secret wouldn't get out."
Captain America's shield was also visible in the film. Favreau explained the shield's origin, stating, "An ILM artist put it in there as a joke to us for our cineSync sessions, when we're approving visual effects. They got a laugh out of it, and I said, "Leave it in, that's pretty cool — let's see if anybody sees it."
Robert Downey, Jr. followed up his role as Tony Stark by making a cameo appearance in Louis Leterrier's 2008 film, The Incredible Hulk. Downey described it by stating, "We were just cross-pollinating our superheroes. It happens to be a scene where I basically approach his (William Hurt's) character, General Ross, and we may be considering going into some sort of limited partnership together. The great thing is he — and I don't want to give too much away — but he's in disrepair at the time I find him. It was really fun seeing him play this really powerful character who's half in the bag."
Captain America appears frozen in ice in an alternate opening of the film included in the DVD release. Leterrier confirmed it, stating, "You will see a man! You'll see it. You'll like it."
Fiege said in April 2010 that constructing a "Marvel Film Universe"
is daunting but it's fun. It's never been done before and that's kind of the spirit everybody's taking it in. The other filmmakers aren't used to getting actors from other movies that other filmmakers have cast, certain plot lines that are connected or certain locations that are connected, but I think ... everyone was on board for it and thinks that it's fun. Primarily because we've always remained consistent saying that the movie that we are making comes first. All of the connective tissue, all of that stuff is fun and is going to be very important if you want it to be. If the fans want to look further and find connections, then they're there. There are a few big ones obviously, that hopefully the mainstream audience will able to follow as well. But ... the reason that all the filmmakers are on board is that their movies need to stand on their own. They need to have a fresh vision, a unique tone, and the fact that they can interconnect if you want to follow those breadcrumbs is a bonus.
Iron Man 2 continued to cross reference other Marvel movies by again including Captain America's shield. Favreau explained, "We introduced Captain America's shield briefly in one shot in the last film. So now it really was in his room, so we had figure out how to deal with the reality that the shield was in his workshop."
Iron Man 2 also contains several easter eggs that appear toward the end of the movie, particularly in a scene in the S.H.I.E.L.D. safe house. In a conversation between Nick Fury and Tony Stark, one of several large television screens in the background shows destruction on a college campus, another displays a crater in a desert, while another shows a world map pinpointing seven ambiguous locations. Favreau revealed, "[The first is] from The Incredible Hulk, which means Iron Man 2 took place before The Incredible Hulk. If you look you see the the crater on the other monitor, that's the Thor thing. That's where the hammer was recovered. ... If you look at those maps, each one of those locations corresponds to something in the Marvel Universe. And if you look on each one ...two of them relate to Captain America: The First Avenger, one of them relates to Thor. The one in Africa relates to the Black Panther."
Clark Gregg reprised his role as Agent Phil Coulson in Thor (2011). He stated, "Agent Coulson was one of the guys who wasn't really in the comic books, and he [had] a very kind of small role in Iron Man. And I was just very lucky that they chose to expand that character and [chose] to put him more into the universe of it."
A few characters who first appeared in Thor appear again in The Avengers directed by Joss Whedon including Thor, Loki, Erik Selvig and Hawkeye.
Thor director Kenneth Branagh explained, "We had Joss see it pretty early on in post-production. I think that affected both the way he presented Thor in The Avengers and also Loki’s involvement in that story as well". Loki was also included in a post-credits scene with Erik Selvig in Thor after his supposed demise. Branagh expounded, "When he [Loki] falls into that wormhole, a rip in the fabric of space at the end of our picture, and then shows up in an unknown location, possibly with the idea of a new and cunning plan, I think it's a interesting way to indicate how he might be involved in another story from another part of the Marvel Universe".
Stellan Skarsgård, who played Erik Selvig, stated the scene was not included when he first read the screenplay for Thor, revealing, "No, it was not because I don’t think they had the final story for The Avengers ready at that time. So that developed last fall when they contacted me and asked me if I wanted to be in The Avengers. Then they started sending me pages and stuff."
Regarding Hawkeye's appearance, Branagh stated, "Frankly we were always going to have a guy in a basket above the action where Thor breaks in the S.H.I.E.L.D. camp and when they told me maybe it could be Hawkeye and maybe Hawkeye was going to be Jeremy Renner, 'Are you kidding!', I said. I was jumping up and down. I was thrilled. I get somebody like that to come and do something as cool as that!"
Short films
Marvel One Shots In August 2011, Marvel announced a couple of direct-to-video short films called "Marvel One-Shots".The first short film entitled Marvel One-Shot: The Consultant is included with the Thor Blu-ray and Blu-ray 3D on September 13, 2011.
A second short film titled Marvel One-Shot: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor’s Hammer, was released on the Captain America: The First Avenger Blu-ray on October 25, 2011.
The “Marvel One-Shots” both star Clark Gregg as Phil Coulson, offering up two self-contained stories about the day in the life of a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.
Future
Samuel Sterns, played by Tim Blake Nelson in The Incredible Hulk (2008), was introduced to set him up as a villain in a future Hulk film, where he would become the Leader. Nelson hopes Marvel will ask him to reprise the role. Cast-member Tim Roth was contracted to return for any possible sequel. While Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige said in 2008 that The Incredible Hulk met Marvel's expectations and that Hulk would return after The Avengers, he amended in April 2012 that "with the Hulk we're gonna play it very carefully. We had varying degrees of success on those first two movies, so we're not gonna say, 'Oh we did it! Another one!' We’re gonna be smart about it and play it out. There are no plans right now to do another Hulk [movie]. Hulk might be just the special guest in Avengers movies; who knows?" However Marvel later suggested a possible 2015 release for a sequel due to the positive reception towards Mark Ruffalo's portrayal of the character in The Avengers.
Edgar Wright plans to direct a live-action Ant-Man film. The script has been written by Wright and Joe Cornish, who plan to include Henry Pym and Scott Lang as major characters, with Pym as Ant-Man in the 1960s in Tales to Astonish style, and a flash forward to Lang as Ant-Man's successor in the 1980s/1990s.
In 2009, Marvel attempted to hire a team of writers to help come up with creative ways to launch its lesser-known properties, such as Black Panther, Cable, Iron Fist, Nighthawk, and Vision.
In April 2010, Marvel Studios began meeting with filmmakers to discuss small-scale, $20–40 million movies based on lesser-known characters. Properties including Dr. Strange, Ka-Zar, Luke Cage, Dazzler, and Power Pack are among those being considered for development.
In May 2010, Samuel L. Jackson said that a S.H.I.E.L.D. movie is likely to be released after The Avengers.
In July 2010, at the San Diego Comic-Con International, company head Kevin Feige revealed that another Punisher reboot is in the works. Feige said that the rights to the character have reverted back to Marvel Studios, and they want to take their own shot at it. He also said that he is aiming for a "Frank Castle" movie rather than a Punisher film.
In September 2010, during a press conference for the Iron Man 2 Blu-ray and DVD release, Kevin Feige confirmed that discussions about the possibility of a Black Widow solo film have taken place. "We've already started discussions with Scarlett [Johansson] about the idea of a solo movie and have begun putting together concepts," said Feige. "But The Avengers comes first."
In January 2011, Marvel Studios hired documentary filmmaker Mark Bailey to write a script for a Black Panther film with Marvel's Kevin Feige producing.
Also in January, Iron Man 2 actor Don Cheadle, confirmed that a War Machine spin-off film was in development.
A trade report in March 2011 said Marvel Entertainment is developing an Inhumans film and described it as "in the vein of 'X-Men' about aliens who were put on Earth as a sleeper cell to eventually call back their race to take over the planet."
Feige said in April 2011 that Marvel Studios planned to do sequels for its Thor and Captain America movies, and said he hoped that Black Widow, Hawkeye and S.H.I.E.L.D. films could follow, adding, "[W]e've got a lot of other characters we're prepping and getting ready for film debuts: the world of martial arts, these great cosmic space fantasies, Dr. Strange, and the magic side of the Marvel Universe."
In September 2011, actor Chris Evans outlined he was contracted for six movies, which he believed would be split between a Captain America trilogy and an Avengers trilogy. Feige said in mid-April 2012 that Iron Man 3 would start filming "in five weeks" in North Carolina, and Thor 2 "in three months" in London.
Dork Note: Can't wait for the massive Avengers Box Set!
No comments:
Post a Comment