Our weekly round up of all the latest stories from the world of screen superheroes, including The Amazing Spider-Man 2, The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Carter, Aquaman, Arrow, The Flash, Teen Titans Go! and more….
Sony has certainly made up wait, but this coming week we’ll finally get our first look at The Amazing Spider-Man 2 when the first trailer arrives on Thurdsay (December 5th), but we have managed to get a sneak peek at two of the villains set to join Jamie Foxx’s Electro thanks to a poster featuring Spidey (Andrew Garfield) staring down a suited up Rhino (Paul Giamatti) and glider-flying Green Goblin (Dane DeHaan or Chris Cooper… and if you look closely at the LED screens on the poster, you’ll be able to tell which). Meanwhile, with that trio of bad guys confirmed and speculation surrounding the likes of The Vulture, Black Cat and Carnage popping up somewhere, Sony’s Daily Bugle viral site has also teased a potential appearance by Shocker with its latest article, which you can read here. Clever marketing ploy, or attempt to throw as many characters as possible into the movie in a desperate effort to replicate the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Be sure to read Anghus Houvouras’ thoughts with his feature article ‘An Orgy of Excess: How The Avengers‘ success has spoiled Spider-Man, X-Men and Batman vs. Superman‘ [see here]….
…Before we move on from Sony’s The Amazing Spider-Man franchise, Chris Cooper has spoken about his role as Norman Osborn, and how the character will be taking a bit of a back seat in the upcoming sequel before rising to prominence in The Amazing Spider-Man 3. “The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was an introduction to Norman, and — you’ll see — an extremely odd introduction, which apparently will lead to something more. They sent me some material. But they said also that this Spider-Man is its own Spider-Man. We’re just kind of starting from the beginning. I believe there’s a lot of stage-setting for the next film. There are several villains in this movie, and some of them are more foreground and important. Jamie Foxx is and stuff. A couple of us are more hanging around the background because I think there will be a bigger deal. I don’t actually know, but that seems to be what they’re doing. I’m not an idiot either, but I can’t claim hard and fast knowledge of this. I won’t. I can’t because I don’t actually know, but you and I can speculate…”
…With the availability of rights to superhero properties thin on the ground these days, it seems that Sony is taking to creating its own, with the studio linking up with Marvel legend Stan Lee and The Amazing Spider-Man producer and former Marvel Studios chief Avi Arad for an original live-action superhero movie. Details about the project are being kept firmly under wraps, with Arad refusing to even give away the title of the project: “some titles give away too much…”
…Moving on to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Marvel Studios has finally confirmed that Godzilla co-stars Elizabeth Olsen (Martha Marcy May Marlene) and Aaron Taylor-Johnson (Kick-Ass 2) are set to join Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man), Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Chris Evans (Captain America), Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), Mark Ruffalo (The Incredible Hulk) and Jeremy Renner (Hawkeye) on the roster of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes as Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch in the eagerly-anticipated 2015 sequel The Avengers: Age of Ultron, with Olsen subsequently talking about her upcoming role: “I hung out with Mr. Whedon recently. I’m really excited about this movie. I’m so excited about Scarlet Witch. I have had so much fun reading all about her and I am like learning new words that I had to look up on Wikipedia. I’m really enjoying it… I just love Scarlet Witch. I love her. It’s so funny because I’m often talking about all these psychologically damaged people, but when you talk about Scarlet Witch… She is a messed up lady. She has got more shit to deal with than anybody else I know. I’m excited to figure out what’s appropriate to use for her, because there’s so much material from all of these decades, and we’re going to tell this one story. So to be able to choose what you’re going to bring into it from all of this abundance, it’s really fun…”
…After being knocked from the top spot at the box office by The Hunger Games: Catching Fire last weekend, the Thor: The Dark World has pushed its worldwide gross to $556.6 million and should overtake Iron Man’s $585.2 million haul in the coming days to become the fourth-highest grossing instalment of the MCU. Domestically, the Alan Taylor-directed solo sequel has earned $175.6 million by close of play on Thursday and will overtake Captain America: The First Avenger ($176.6 million) and the original Thor ($181 million) this week…
…Speaking to Crave Online, Frank Grillo (Homefront) has spoken briefly about his role in next year’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, where he’s set to portray Brock Rumlow, a.k.a. Crossbones: “It’s an origin film. You meet people who are going to be around for a while, so they introduce the characters. It’s almost like it’s a series. It’s fun. I can’t say very much about it because Marvel’s very strict about what you’re allowed to say. The movie, we’ve seen bits of it, and it is spectacular… They do actually [have future plans for Brock]. We’ll see what happens. We’ll see if the fans respond to Brock and how it goes.” However, Grillo has pretty much ruled out a small screen appearance as Rumlow on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: “You know, at this point in my career, it’s something that I’m not really interested in doing. I’ve got my own thing to do on television so you can’t really do two at once. Not that I don’t want to do it, but it doesn’t get me going anymore to do something like that…”
…It seems there isn’t a week goes by without Chris Pratt (Parks and Recreation) talking about next year’s cosmic superhero ensemble Guardians of the Galaxy, and this week he’s spoken to Fandango about what attracted him to the role of Peter Quill, a.k.a. Star-Lord: “Just the fact that he was part of the Marvel brand was really exciting… I was signed up to do the movie before I was even allowed to read a script, so it wasn’t like something about this particular character that got me to do it. The fact that it was a Marvel movie is what got me to do it. Granted, once I did read it there were so many things about the character that I love, and one thing is that he’s very much a kid at heart. He’s like a man-child. And I like the idea that he’s got a false sense of bravado. Deep down inside he’s lonely and desperate. But on the outside he walks around like he’s big and tough, and I don’t think he does a great job of convincing everybody that he’s not just a scared little child…”
…Looking slightly further ahead to Phase Three and it’s been reported that Paul Rudd (Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues) has emerged as the front-runner for the role of Hank Pym in Edgar Wright’s long-awaited Ant-Man, while Wright has also responded to the casting speculation surrounding the film: “None of [the rumours] are completely way off, but I don’t know where they come from. I think sometimes, occasionally…I don’t know where they come from. I think sometimes it’s actually someone themselves starting the rumors because then…yeah. The rumor becomes kind of fact…I don’t know. Some of them are way off. But the truth is we don’t start filming until the end of May, so people on Twitter need to stop asking me, ‘When are you going to announce casting?’ Like they’re angry! It’s like, ‘The film comes out in 2015. Chill out…'” Alongside Rudd, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (The Dark Knight Rises) has been linked to Hank Pym, while Rudd’s I Love You, Man co-star Rashida Jones has been tipped for the role of Janet van Dyne (and if I had to pick one rumour to be “completely way off”, I’d go for this one)…
…Shifting to the small screen and with Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. taking a week’s break before its midseason finale, Collider caught up with showrunners Maurissa Tancharoen and Jed Whedon to discuss the series, during which they discussed Clark Gregg’s Phil Coulson, developing the core roster in just 20 minutes, tying in with future Marvel movies, the chances of Cobie Smulders returning after wrapping How I Met Your Mother, and having a two-year plan for the show mapped out. Meanwhile, be sure to check out Anghus Houvouras’ latest review, where he weighs up the pros and cons of the series so far [see here]…
…We know that Marvel is busy developing the Netflix miniseries for Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist and The Defenders, but it seems they haven’t forgotten about the rumoured Agent Carter series, which – judging by the way that Captain America: The First Avenger star Neal McDonough is talking – is actually way more concrete than just a rumour: “I’ll be going into the office next week and take a peek at it with the guys, ’cause they were talking about…I mean what a perfect series this would be,” said McDonough, when asked if there was any chance of him reprising the role of Dum Dum Dugan alongside Hayley Atwell’s Peggy Carter. “You’ve got Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. on now, and this would be like a 1940s S.H.I.E.L.D. It’s pretty great stuff. I would love to do it. Dum Dum’s one of my favorite characters I’ve ever played. He’s just so much fun. You know he’s just another barrel-chested, beer drinking, good guy. And I really like that. I’d have to go gain 20 pounds again. But, hey, what are you gonna do..?”
…20th Century Fox marked the 50th anniversary of the assassination of JFK with a new viral marketing campaign for X-Men: Days of Future Past called ‘The Bent Bullet’, posting secret evidence implicating Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) in the events at Dealey Plaza on November 22nd, 1963; check out the video report and a couple of new stills of Fassbender’s Magneto here…
…In shock news this past week, there were absolutely no new rumours about Zack Snyder’s forthcoming Man of Steel sequel Batman vs. Superman; instead, we got renewed speculation about a potential Aquaman movie, stemming from the latest comments from DC Entertainment’s chief creative officer and comic book writer Geoff Johns, who called the Atlantean “a priority character for the company… He became a little bit of a joke… Suddenly, he was nobody’s favorite super hero… He’s a character that we talk quite a bit about… There is no doubt in my mind that this is one of the most well-known characters among super-heroes, and in popular culture…”
…And some bad news for DC fans hoping that Warner Bros.’ Cinematic Universe might be linked to the world of Arrow and the other upcoming DC small screen ventures, with Arrow executive producer Greg Berlanti revealing that no such discussions have taken place: “We haven’t had any of those conversations other than to say, what characters are we allowed to use this year and advocate or request certain ones that are of interest to us. And every now and then, they’ll say, ‘You can’t have that guy.’ They don’t say why, and we figure out why later on.” Still, DC fans do have the expansion of the Television Universe to look forward to, beginning with Grant Gustin’s (Glee) introduction as Barry Allen on this Wednesday’s visit to Starling City…
…Cartoon Network has released its Holiday-themed schedule for December, which includes a new episode of Teen Titans Go! entitled ‘Second Christmas’; the episode is due to air on Christmas Eve and sees The Titans trick Starfire into believing in second Christmas with second Santa…
…And finally, legendary comic book writer Alan Moore has offered up some choice words for “emotionally subnormal” fans of the superhero genre, seemingly forgetting his own role in expanding the genre beyond the “nine-to-13-year-old audience” with his seminal graphic novel Watchmen: I haven’t read any superhero comics since I finished with Watchmen. I hate superheroes. I think they’re abominations. They don’t mean what they used to mean. They were originally in the hands of writers who would actively expand the imagination of their nine-to-13-year-old audience. That was completely what they were meant to do and they were doing it excellently. These days, superhero comics think the audience is certainly not nine to 13, it’s nothing to do with them. It’s an audience largely of 30-, 40-, 50-, 60-year old men, usually men. Someone came up with the term graphic novel. These readers latched on to it; they were simply interested in a way that could validate their continued love of Green Lantern or Spider-Man without appearing in some way emotionally subnormal. This is a significant rump of the superhero-addicted, mainstream-addicted audience. I don’t think the superhero stands for anything good. I think it’s a rather alarming sign if we’ve got audiences of adults going to see the Avengers movie and delighting in concepts and characters meant to entertain the 12-year-old boys of the 1950s.”
Holy Franchise, Batman! Bringing the Caped Crusader to the Screen – Available now via Amazon.co.uk
