…Moving on to the Marvel Cinematic Universe now and while it may not have shattered box office records like its predecessor, Avengers: Age of Ultron has continued its climb up the all-time box office chart this week and is now sitting in sixth place with $1.281 billion, having overtaken Iron Man 3 ($1.215 billion) and Frozen ($1.274 billion). Age of Ultron is closing in fast on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 ($1.341 billion), but it remains to be seen whether it’s got enough steam to catch the year’s biggest earner to date Fast & Furious 7 ($1.500 billion) or the first Avengers ($1.518 billion)…
…Marvel has stepped up promotion on its next release – July’s Ant-Man – this week, debuting a new poster and a selection of stills, while director Peyton Reed has spoken about taking over from Edgar Wright following his shock departure: “Was it a strange situation? Absolutely. One of my concerns upfront was, ‘Someone else has developed this movie for a really long time. Can I come in and make it my own?’ And that has absolutely been the case. For one thing Marvel have let me explore the dark side of Hank Pym – this tortured, guilt-ridden guy. I love that this is a mentor/pupil story, but with a fucked up pupil and a really fucked up mentor. [Edgar and I] both acknowledged the general weirdness of the situation. It’s all very odd but it’s been really nice to communicate with him… I think the most defining difference between the two scripts was that Edgar’s didn’t take itself as seriously. It was fun and silly and brilliant[ly] irreverent – a romp from beginning to end, in classic English fashion. Whereas where we’ve gotten to is so much more American. There’s tons of levity, but just as much emotion…”
…Frank Grillo has been speaking about his return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Crossbones in Captain America: Civil War, and the reaction to the set photos of him fully suited up as the masked villain: “It’s funny because people really responded to it – it went viral, trended [like crazy], so I’ve been getting phone calls. Crossbones is a violent, violent villain in this series, and I finally feel I’ve been understood now. I feel complete; [people] get me. “[These movies] film for months and months and there’s a lot of characters, so It’s great fun. And everybody down here gets along real well. Me, Chris Evans, Anthony Mackie, and Jeremy Renner were hanging out last night, having some food. Just a bunch of cool guys getting a chance to be eight-year-olds for a little while…”
…Earlier this year there were rumours that Marvel was looking at the likes of Morgan Freeman (The Dark Knight Rises), Ken Watanabe (Godzilla) and Bill Nighy (Pride) for the role of the Ancient One in Doctor Strange, but it appears the character has now swapped genders, with Tilda Swinton (Snowpiercer) entering negotiations to play Dr. Stephen Strange’s (Benedict Cumberbatch) mentor in the Phase Three franchise-launcher…
…In a few other bits of Marvel-related news, a Guardians of the Galaxy VFX breakdown reel has arrived online showcasing the work that went into bringing Thanos to life; Daredevil has officially become the highest-rated show on Netflix with viewer ratings of 4.6, which puts it 0.1 points ahead of House of Cards, Breaking Bad and Sherlock; some new set photos from A.K.A. Jessica Jones have arrived online showing Krysten Ritter as the title character; and Disney XD has released a clip from this Sunday’s episode of Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H., entitled ‘Days of Future Smash: Part 4 – Year of the Hydra’, which you can watch here…
…Over at Fox and Bryan Singer has revealed the latest mutant to join the ever-expanding roster of X-Men: Apocalypse, posting a set photo in Caliban’s lair (for those not in the know, Caliban is a Morlock, and also one of Apocalypse’s Four Horseman… in the comics, at least), while some new concept art has arrived online, featuring Cyclops (Tye Sheridan) and Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) battling Storm (Alexandra Shipp), complete with mohawk. Danger Room, perhaps..?
…Ryan Reynolds took to Twitter yesterday to announce that filming on February’s Deadpool movie is complete, as well as thanking fans for their help in dragging the project out of development hell, while he also teased a possible cameo appearance by Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine, stating that: “God, I hope so. That would be really nice. I dunno, we’ll see. It seems like he’s open to it, but it’s gonna be more of a scheduling issue than anything else…”
…Fox’s other 2016 X-Men spin-off Gambit is yet to secure a director (and if reports are to be believed, several big names have already passed, including Bennett Miller and Darren Aronofsky), but that hasn’t stopped leading man Channing Tatum from expressing his excitement over the project: “I love Gambit. I grew up in the South. My father’s from Louisiana. We’d go to New Orleans and I heard all the dialects. It felt so different from the rest of America; it has its own ancient culture. So I identified with that. And Gambit always felt the most real of the X-Men to me. He’s kind of a tortured soul and he’s not a good guy. But he’s not a bad guy, either. He walks his own path. And of course he plays cards and drinks and is a martial-arts badass! Josh Zetumer just turned in the first draft of the script and it’s killer,” he continues. “None of us were sure how he was going to deal with the X-Men world. But we’re going to be changing some of the tropes of these movies. It’s always about saving the world, but maybe we’re going to shift things a little bit. There’s so many ways you can take it. You could do it like Batman Begins, or a different take and go the Guardians of the Galaxy route. All I can say is, I’m super excited…”
…With Fox’s various X-Men projects grabbing most of the headlines, it’s easy to forget the studio has another Marvel movie coming out in just over two months, and so to remind us we got a new international trailer for Josh Trank’s Fantastic Four this week, which offers up some previously unseen footage from the reboot. Check it out here…
…And finally, as well as a first look image of Ryan Guzman as his as-yet-unrevealed character, NBC’s Heroes revival Heroes Reborn has picked up another couple of recurring guest stars this week, with Dylan Bruce (Orphan Black) signing on for a mystery role, and Nazneen Contractor (24) set to play Farah, “a mysterious character who is militant, tough and stoic.” Look for the event series to get underway on NBC in the fall.
Gary Collinson is a writer and lecturer from the North East of England. He is the editor-in-chief of FlickeringMyth.com and the author of Holy Franchise, Batman! Bringing the Caped Crusader to the Screen.
