The Marvel Cinematic Universe: The Avengers, etc.

[Danny Franks]

3 hours ago, Jeebus Cripes said:

I loved it, too! I thought it was borderline genius, and I nearly got chased away with pitchforks by my fellow comic fans. Oh well. 

I remember all the uproar over that, and figured that it must just be my Iron Man illiteracy that left me thinking, 'is this really that big a deal?' I thought it was a funny bait and switch, and it made more sense in the MCU for that over the top, villainous self-publicist character to be a fraud.

And I don't think I'd have minded if it had been a villain I actually did care about, either.

[Matt K]

The biggest thing in the leak that make me think its at least mostly false is Norman Osborne being the big bad.  Osborne very closely tied to the Spiderman rights and so he belongs to Sony not Disney.  There's been zero indications that Sony is even renewing their deal with Disney (which expires after next months Spiderman movie) let alone giving them one of their biggest villains.  It's possible that Sony is going to renew their deal but it seems less likely with Venom doing well.  

[Fukui San]

On 6/2/2019 at 5:16 AM, Danny Franks said:

I remember all the uproar over that, and figured that it must just be my Iron Man illiteracy that left me thinking, 'is this really that big a deal?' I thought it was a funny bait and switch, and it made more sense in the MCU for that over the top, villainous self-publicist character to be a fraud.

And I don't think I'd have minded if it had been a villain I actually did care about, either.

The funny thing for me was that I, as a reasonably well read Marvel comic fan whose comic reading sweet spot was in the 80's and 90's, have never read a panel of any comic with either Mandarin or Ancient One. Their appearances were mostly in the past of when I was reading. I knew them only through the Marvel Handbook. So I didn't really care if they did a clever twist like for the IM3 version of Mandarin. The total erasure of the Ancient One, however, stank to high heaven.

[Raja]

The last non origin story that the MCU told that I actually read the inspiration story for was Iron Man 2, touching on Stark's an alcoholic. As soon as Iron Man 2 was announced I wondered how would they do the Mandarin as he was to Iron Man what the Joker is to Batman 

[Dandesun]

Count me in as one of those who loved the Mandarin reveal. And I loved it because it was so unexpected and I do feel it dealt with a very problematic, yet major, Iron Man villain. My familiarity with the Mandarin is actually from X-Men because he was involved in some stories with Wolverine, Jubilee and the recently Siege Periloused Psylocke who was body swapped into being Asian. (Japanese specifically if I'm not mistaken.) But was going around collecting all of the ten rings and calling herself Lady Mandarin... So I really only ever recall the Mandarin going about in robes that suggest dynastic China and I really cannot see that playing on the big screen. I mean, he goes about in regular suits, too, but... yeah.

As for Cap saying 'Hail Hydra' -- okay, it was a nice play on Steve's part to get what he needed to get. He knew that Pierce, Rumlow and STRIKE team were all Hydra so he tossed that out to throw off their rhythm and make it so they wouldn't try to take the Tesseract from him. Obviously, Steve isn't Hydra at all. (Plus, he went and told his previous self that Bucky was alive... wonder if that caused a new timestream to split? More possibilities!)

That being said... I cringed a little bit because I hated Hydra!Cap and Secret Empire SO MUCH. I got the joke, I got the point, but I still kinda went... 'nooooo' really quietly because of reasons.

[GHScorpiosRule]

19 hours ago, Dandesun said:

As for Cap saying 'Hail Hydra' -- okay, it was a nice play on Steve's part to get what he needed to get. He knew that Pierce, Rumlow and STRIKE team were all Hydra so he tossed that out to throw off their rhythm and make it so they wouldn't try to take the Tesseract from him. Obviously, Steve isn't Hydra at all. (Plus, he went and told his previous self that Bucky was alive... wonder if that caused a new timestream to split? More possibilities!)

That's why I found it funny--Steve had gone back to the past, and he had the memory of all those in the elevator attacking him in Civil War. So his whispering "Hail Hydra" had me and everyone in the theater laughing.

19 hours ago, Dandesun said:

That being said... I cringed a little bit because I hated Hydra!Cap and Secret Empire SO MUCH. I got the joke, I got the point, but I still kinda went... 'nooooo' really quietly because of reasons.

And since I didn't read the comic/story about this, it didn't occur to me to think, ohhh, okay, it's also a reference to this.

[VCRTracking]

This is hilarious. To be fair to Gwyneth, there are so many MCU movies and Pepper didn't interact with Peter or Spider-Man in Homecoming so I understand her confusion:

[blueray]

Wow that is kind of sad she didn't even know what movie she was filming for. To be fair she was there way less then RDJ was. So maybe she only came in for a day and didn't really think about what movie the scene was going in. Now that I think about it (I've only seen Homecoming once) she may only be  in the scene at the end.

[Danny Franks]

Honestly, I never thought that Gwyneth Paltrow cared about the MCU, or any of the characters in it except Pepper and Tony. She never struck me as being invested in the overarching narrative and strategic goals of the MCU, and I don't think there's any reason she would need to be. It's just a paying gig for her, not a career defining role or something she can put her own creative energies into.

She's not the only one. I'm sure Jeremy Renner and some of the other actors have implied that they've not watched a lot of the MCU films. I think it was Elizabeth Olsen who didn't know Rocket Raccoon's name, in some Endgame publicity interviews.

[starri]

38 minutes ago, Danny Franks said:

Honestly, I never thought that Gwyneth Paltrow cared about the MCU, or any of the characters in it except Pepper and Tony. She never struck me as being invested in the overarching narrative and strategic goals of the MCU, and I don't think there's any reason she would need to be. It's just a paying gig for her, not a career defining role or something she can put her own creative energies into.

I think I actually do remember her saying at one point that she'd be down for Pepper to get into the Rescue armor pretty early on.  So it may have been a job, but she at least had a little fun with it.

In all honestly, I'm not really a fan of hers, but I did find her extremely likable in the role.

[KatWay]

3 hours ago, blueray said:

Now that I think about it (I've only seen Homecoming once) she may only be  in the scene at the end.

yeah she was only in one very short scene at the end, kind of like a cameo. I could definitley see her thinking it was for a different film.

I don't like her much as an actress or celebrity but I liked her a lot as Pepper. Pepper & Tony were one of the best couples in the MCU for sure.

[Bruinsfan]

She's kind of like Michael Shanks in that I tend to get more annoyed by them with every interview I see, but I can't deny that they turn in really good performances. Sort of the opposite of Keanu Reeves, where he seems like a wonderful person and his interviews are always fun, but I wince every time I see him trying to act.

Edited June 8, 2019 by Bruinsfan

[blueray]

On 6/3/2019 at 12:29 PM, Danny Franks said:

The Hydra thing was a very brief gag, which made complete sense in the narrative of the movie, and poked fun at the comic book storyline. Nothing more.

While at the time I didn't know about what was in the comics. I saw the scene as a tie back to the famous elevator fight. Steve knows of the fact that all the those guys are hydra and he said it so they stopped questioning why he had the brief case.

[Kel Varnsen]

14 hours ago, blueray said:

While at the time I didn't know about what was in the comics. I saw the scene as a tie back to the famous elevator fight. Steve knows of the fact that all the those guys are hydra and he said it so they stopped questioning why he had the brief case.

It was also a nice bit of misdirection, since as soon as Steve gets in the elevator with those guys you are totally expecting him to kick their asses.

[anna0852]

Is anyone really hoping that we see Nick Fury scanned again like he was in Captain Marvel and that this time it comes back "Human Male, Threat Level: High". After the Earthlings/Terrans lead the charge to fix the Snap and take out Thanos I'd like to think the rest of the galaxy has a bit more respect for them.

[clack]

On 6/3/2019 at 9:07 AM, Matt K said:

The biggest thing in the leak that make me think its at least mostly false is Norman Osborne being the big bad.  Osborne very closely tied to the Spiderman rights and so he belongs to Sony not Disney.  There's been zero indications that Sony is even renewing their deal with Disney (which expires after next months Spiderman movie) let alone giving them one of their biggest villains.  It's possible that Sony is going to renew their deal but it seems less likely with Venom doing well.  

My understanding is that the Spiderman rights issue is a little more complicated than that. It is Amy Pascal, Spider-Man's producer, not Sony itself, who gets to make the ultimate decision of whether to continue the relationship with Disney -- and that decision has already been made to renew.

The rumor that Osborne is the next Big Bad may be confirmed at the end of Far From Home. If so, Spiderman 3 is going to involve the Sinister Six.

[starri]

53 minutes ago, clack said:

My understanding is that the Spiderman rights issue is a little more complicated than that. It is Amy Pascal, Spider-Man's producer, not Sony itself, who gets to make the ultimate decision of whether to continue the relationship with Disney -- and that decision has already been made to renew.

Forget what I want to see as a fan, that just makes good business sense.  Since they decided to work with Marvel, they've created two unexpected financial successes and won an Oscar.  

[Dee]

[swanpride]

Wait...the deal with Sony expires this year? I thought it was for three Spider-Man movies plus the Avengers appearances?

In any case, though, I doubt that Sony will end it. The franchise was in a downward spiral before the deal. Now they get MCU box office money, and Into the Spider-verse as well as Venom has shown that they can play around with other characters they have and make good money off them on top of it, even if they don't use Peter Parker. After all, there are other Spider-Men. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if they do a Spider-Gwen live action movie, soon.

[Matt K]

1 hour ago, swanpride said:

Wait...the deal with Sony expires this year? I thought it was for three Spider-Man movies plus the Avengers appearances?

In any case, though, I doubt that Sony will end it. The franchise was in a downward spiral before the deal. Now they get MCU box office money, and Into the Spider-verse as well as Venom has shown that they can play around with other characters they have and make good money off them on top of it, even if they don't use Peter Parker. After all, there are other Spider-Men. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if they do a Spider-Gwen live action movie, soon.

The deal was for 2 Spiderman movies and 3 other appearances (Civil War and Avengers 3 and 4).  Tom Holland's contract is for one more Spiderman movie though.  Last year the head of Sony mentioned that they had no desire to re-up the contract which makes some sense since Venom did well.  I'd have to imagine some of this rides on whether Morbius does well (i.e. was Venon a fluke). 

The problem Sony has is that they only make money from the movies themselves.  They do not get any money from merchandising.  So each movie needs to do well.  It's worth noting that Venom did almost as well as Homecoming ($880 vs $855 million). 

Disney also might not be interested in having to introduce a new Spiderman after Holland's deal is up (so it might also depend on renewing his contract as well) plus having to worry about Sony making their own movies out of characters that the MCU wants to use or having certain characters off limits to Disney.  

Edited June 14, 2019 by Matt K

[swanpride]

Exactly because they get no merch money it makes more sense to renew the deal. Venom did well, but MCU movies are box office gold for sure. I suspect that Far from Home will ride on the wave of endgame and could possible pass the billion mark. Why should they give that up if they can have their cake and eat it too? I mean, they won't get merch money either way. In fact, there is absolutely nothing they have to give up other than the right to use Tom Holland in non-MCU movies.

[Jeebus Cripes]

11 hours ago, swanpride said:

Wait...the deal with Sony expires this year? I thought it was for three Spider-Man movies plus the Avengers appearances?

In any case, though, I doubt that Sony will end it. The franchise was in a downward spiral before the deal. Now they get MCU box office money, and Into the Spider-verse as well as Venom has shown that they can play around with other characters they have and make good money off them on top of it, even if they don't use Peter Parker. After all, there are other Spider-Men. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if they do a Spider-Gwen live action movie, soon.

Is Venom worth my time at all? The previews looked laughably bad to me. Should I actually watch this movie? 

[swanpride]

I wouldn't recommend it. I tried thinking "okay, it will be bad, but at least it will be entertainable bad", but it isn't even that. It bored me so much I gave up half-away through.

[Bruinsfan]

I tried to watch it, but just couldn't get past Tom Hardy channeling Ratso from Midnight Cowboy.

[clack]

Thing to consider is that Holland's contract is with Marvel, not Sony. Would Sony really consider rebooting the franchise for a fourth time in 20 years?

Plus, Sony gets all the profits from the movies. Seems like an easy choice.

[swanpride]

Well, thinking again, I guess if you are really into early 2000 style superhero movies you might like Venom...it has everything from the bland love interest to the cheesy dialogue to the terrible villain. So if that's what someone likes, said person might like Venom.

[Jeebus Cripes]

Well, I'm gonna be honest, there was maybe a 5% chance of me watching it. I would have needed some major praise to seriously consider going through with it. I've never even once in my life thought, "Hey, I really need a Venom solo film to happen!" Also, Tom Hardy doesn't really do it for me. 

[Morrigan2575]

9 hours ago, clack said:

Thing to consider is that Holland's contract is with Marvel, not Sony. Would Sony really consider rebooting the franchise for a fourth time in 20 years?

Plus, Sony gets all the profits from the movies. Seems like an easy choice.

I'm not sure how it works but, I've heard that Holland has 1 extra film on his contract than what was owed to Marvel. Which means the final Spider-Man movie with Holland would be a Sony only production and, not set in the MCU. Midnight's Edge suspects Sony intends to use/trick the audience into watching a non MCU film by bringing Spider-Man back into their Sony Spider-verse. 

After that we don't know what would happen but, if Holland didn't want another contract, especially one that took him out of the MCU then Sony (not Marvel) would need to reboot Spider-man again, or at the very least re-cast him.

Disney/Marvel won't care about losing Spider-Man because they got the Fantastic Four and, the X-Men back from FOX. Only outstanding question for them is Namor (who seems in limbo).

So yeah, I think Far From Home is the last time we see Spider-Man in the MCU 😥

[swanpride]

Yeah, Midnight's Edge is nowadays just throwing out speculations and half-truths. It has become a click-bait channel, just with longer videos than usual. They don't really care to verify the sources anymore, and more than half of their videos is now guesswork.

If someone has a good source, I would be happy to read it, but as far as I know all Holland movies are supposed to be set in the MCU. In addition, I really, really doubt that there isn't some sort of rule in the contract which says that Sony can't just spin-off this version of the character.

[Morrigan2575]

Quote

The current, complicated deal that was struck between Marvel, Sony, and Disney (which owns Marvel) is at present only for Spider-Man: Homecoming, its sequel, Civil War, and the two Avengers movies. If all goes well, they’ll come back to the table and renegotiate to keep this going. Or it’s possible that Sony says “we’ll take it from here” and Peter Parker disappears from the MCU altogether.

http://collider.com/spider-man-marvel-sony-deal-explained/#mcu

 

They give you options and those could be exercised whenever. Like a cameo in Avengers," Holland says of Marvel. "I'm unclear as to which movies though. I do know I have three Spider-Man [appearances in other] movies and three solo movies contracted. But if you have another movie, Marvel is so good at working around it. They’re very respectful of your life, really. They understand that you have to work on other movies, and they try and fix it up so you can work around each other."

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/spider-man-tom-holland-how-movies-will-he-be-945566

So, as we've said Holland is contracted for 6 movies, 3 Spider-Man solos and 3 MCU appearances (Civil War, Avengers 4-5). However the Sony/MCU deal only covers 5 movies 2 Spider-Man Solos (Homecoming and Far From Home) and 3 MCU appearances.

Far From Home is the last Spider-Man movie set in the MCU unless the Sony/MCU deal is renewed. We have no idea IF Sony will renew the MCU deal but, given Venom's success it would make more sense for them to bring Spider-Man back in the fold, especially since they don't get Merchandize $$ from MCU Spider-Man and that's a lot of profit they're losing out on.

Unless Sony/MCU renew the deal (which seems unlikely given Venom's success) the final Holland Spider-Man movie will be a Sony production and most likely set in the Song Spider-Verse, not the MCU

Edited June 16, 2019 by Morrigan2575

[swanpride]

I really don't follow the logic that Venom success would convince Sony to end the game. I fare to suggest that the success of Far from Home will be a way more important factor. One could even argue that Venom's success will lead to Sony being less inclined to yank Spider-Man out of the MCU, because why should they if they can get their cake and eat it to. If nothing else, it would be smarter to wait how well the sequel does. You know, proof of concept and all. Especially since we are currently in the summer of failing sequels. You know whose sequels did well, though? Yeah, that's right, Disney's.

[clack]

Rumors are just the opposite -- that Sony is trying to get the Hardy Venom incorporated into the MCU, maybe as part of the Sinister Six in Spiderman #3, and that Marvel is so far resisting.

[Bruinsfan]

14 hours ago, Morrigan2575 said:

Disney/Marvel won't care about losing Spider-Man because they got the Fantastic Four and, the X-Men back from FOX. Only outstanding question for them is Namor (who seems in limbo).

I don't think Marvel would be that quick to give up on their most historically popular character just because they now have the rights to franchises that have either failed multiple times in movie adaptations or have been largely played out with diminishing returns for years. Spider-Man has pulled in about twice the box office of the solo Iron Man movies, and the actor is a proven success in the role, as opposed to having to recast and hope for the best with the properties that have been recently regained.

[swanpride]

Marvel has a wasted interest in Spider-Man doing well and staying popular, because he is their best merch seller by a large margin. In: The sell more Spider-Man merch than DC does for their whole Trinity.

[Danny Franks]

While I haven't seen Venom (and don't intend to), I'm not sure what advantage Sony would have in setting Spider-Man in that universe. One movie, with a couple of characters that comic book fans recognise does not make a universe. Additionally, their Venom is an anti-hero with no connection whatsoever to Spider-Man, so it doesn't make any kind of sense to connect the characters after the fact.

It seems to me that Sony would do much better if they managed to get more MCU characters to guest in Spider-Man. Hell, if the MCU kept their Netflix shows as canon, then appearances by Daredevil or Jessica Jones would be a lot of fun.

And on Marvel's side of things, why lose access to your most popular character, when you don't have to? The money is vast enough that they can give Sony a nice share of anything Spider-Man related and still make eye-watering profits.

Edited June 18, 2019 by Danny Franks

[Jeebus Cripes]

Y'all are scaring a bitch... 

I can't pretend to understand the business side of things, but damn it to hell, if I lose Tom Holland as Spidey, I will revolt! 

[Danny Franks]

41 minutes ago, Jeebus Cripes said:

Y'all are scaring a bitch... 

I can't pretend to understand the business side of things, but damn it to hell, if I lose Tom Holland as Spidey, I will revolt! 

Well, Tom Holland has signed on to play Nathan Drake, and I'm sure that's envisaged by all involved as the start of a franchise. All things going well, he may be stretched trying to play both Spider-Man and Drake, over the next few years. And he seems to be in high demand for non-franchise projects too.

This young man could be the biggest star in the world, if he makes wise choices.

[swanpride]

Well, theoretically this is possible. Being in the MCU has never been a commitment that big that the actors were prevented from doing anything else.

[ChromaKelly]

7 hours ago, Jeebus Cripes said:

Y'all are scaring a bitch... 

I can't pretend to understand the business side of things, but damn it to hell, if I lose Tom Holland as Spidey, I will revolt! 

Me too! I also gotta say, having two teen daughters, Tom Holland has done a lot to bring in that segment of the population to the Marvel fandom.

[VCRTracking]

[Morrigan2575]

9 hours ago, Danny Franks said:

While I haven't seen Venom (and don't intend to), I'm not sure what advantage Sony would have in setting Spider-Man in that universe. One movie, with a couple of characters that comic book fans recognise does not make a universe. Additionally, their Venom is an anti-hero with no connection whatsoever to Spider-Man, so it doesn't make any kind of sense to connect the characters after the fact.

They had planned Venom and, then Black & Silver (Black Cat and Silver Sable team up).  After the success of Venom they split the team up into solo movies.  Sony now has Black Cat, Silver Sable and Venom 2 lined up, plus Morbius is being filmed (set to release 2020).  Basically they're building a Spider-Verse around Anti-Heroes/Villains.  

We'll no doubt get an answer after Far From Home, probably at D23 about the final movie on Holland's contract and if Pascal/Fiege have had discussions about a new Sony/Marvel deal.  

Edited June 18, 2019 by Morrigan2575

[BetterButter]

[Dee]

Donnie Yen, Ludi Lin On Marvel Studios ‘SHANG-CHI’ Short List

Quote

It appears that Marvel Studios has begun its search for Shang-Chi. According to our source, Ludi Lin (Power Rangers, Aquaman and Black Mirror) is among the actors with whom the studio is interested in meeting to discuss the role. Though Lin’s name is the first to emerge, there is no indication at this point that he is a favorite to land the role. In fact, our source tells us that we should expect to hear more names emerge over the next couple of weeks.

Lin’s career trajectory has led him to this opportunity. He lobbied for the role of Shang-Chi last December. Further, his recent turns in Aquaman and, most recently, Black Mirror Season 5, have gained him notoriety. His desire to lead Marvel Studios’ first Asian-centric superhero film, coupled with his extensive martial arts training have put him on Feige’s radar. It seems that he’ll soon have his chance to impress the man with the plan. We have also heard that one time Disney kid, Ross Butler, may have a chance to sit down with Feige as well.

[AimingforYoko]

1 hour ago, Dee said:

Donnie Yen, Ludi Lin On Marvel Studios ‘SHANG-CHI’ Short List

I was gonna say, Donnie's a little old for Shang-Chi, but it looks like he's up for a mentor role.

[swanpride]

I suspect they will end up casting pretty much every talented Asian actor in Hollywood they can get they hands on anyway.

[Danny Franks]

15 hours ago, swanpride said:

I suspect they will end up casting pretty much every talented Asian actor in Hollywood they can get they hands on anyway.

Hopefully including Gemma Chan. Even though she played Minn-Erva in Captain Marvel, it was under makeup and they killed the character off.

[Jeebus Cripes]

10 hours ago, Danny Franks said:

Hopefully including Gemma Chan. Even though she played Minn-Erva in Captain Marvel, it was under makeup and they killed the character off.

Lee Pace would have made for a far better Namor than Ronan. 

[cambridgeguy]

Watching that honest trailer makes me feel bad for the MCU movie that breaks the streak and ends up being both a financial and critical failure.  There have certainly been crappy ones but I think only the Incredible Hulk qualifies on both counts (I thought Thor 2 and Iron Man 2 were pretty mediocre but they both did well at the box office) and that was very early. 

[swanpride]

Quote

Lee Pace would have made for a far better Namor than Ronan. 

But he was great as Ronan. (I really like Ronan as a character).

Quote

Watching that honest trailer makes me feel bad for the MCU movie that breaks the streak and ends up being both a financial and critical failure

A financial failure won't happen anytime soon. A critical failure...possible. But I wouldn't bet on the next phase bringing the downfall of the MCU. Why should it? I know it feels as if they built for 10 years towards endgame but as the honest trailer pointed out, not really. And if anything they have gotten better in keeping the balance of letting directors have their own voice while still fitting everything into the universe.

[Jeebus Cripes]

1 hour ago, swanpride said:

But he was great as Ronan. (I really like Ronan as a character).

I almost always find Lee Pace compelling and very charismatic, but his Ronan did nothing for me at all. Well, not entirely true, he made me cringe a little. His acting was... not great here.