As the ramp-up for “The Avengers” movie continues with big-screen projects featuring Iron Man, Thor and Captain America, many old-school Marvel comics fan may be wondering what’s up with some of the second-tier characters who make up the Avengers.
One name that has bandied about for years is Ant Man. The movie project has been mentioned several times since Marvel announced its strategy for its movie projects, even going so far as to link director Edgar Wright to the project.
But as we’ve heard news about Thor and Captain America, there’s been little news about Ant Man.
Until now.
Talking to Super Hero Hype, Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige says that Ant Man is coming, but that it won’t happen until after “The Avengers” is done filming.
“”Ant-Man” will definitely not come out prior to “The Avengers,” but Edgar was in LA last week. We sat down. We started working on a calendar of when to get him back into it once he finishes “Scott Pilgrim” and promoting “Scott Pilgrim.” So I would think towards the end of this year, early next year we’d start looking at early prep for that, but certainly for a release date after “The Avengers,”” Feige says.
Feige was also asked when Marvel might look into making the plunge into 3-D.
“We’re only gonna do it if we can do it extremely well. We’re not gonna do it just as a overlay or just to do it. Certainly, it’s something we’re looking at for all of our movies and we’re looking at very seriously for all of our movies, but we’re not going to make a decision or an announcement until we know that they’ll improve and enhance the film and not just be an added gadget,” he replied.
Feige says that Marvel wants to take a page from Pixar Animation when it comes to developing and producing projects–start slow, offer quality films and only ramp up if you can keep the sustained quality going. Feige indicated that Marvel has a wide catalog to draw from when it comes to potential projects but that he doesn’t want to dilute the brand name with mediocre movies.
“Listen, the truth is, there’s thousands and thousands of characters. Could they all be movies? No,” he said. “But when you go and look again at the first two movies that have started sort of this new Marvel era. The first one was “Blade” which nobody knew was a Marvel character and never had his own title. It was just an interesting character in “Tomb of Dracula,” and then there was “X-Men” which was the top selling comic – not anymore, but at the time for many, many years – and that was done well. So certainly we are making a conscious effort of looking at the characters, at whether they have marquee value or not, (that they) are just interesting stories, engaging stories and continue to define, which is what I’ve been trying to do almost coming up on 10 years at Marvel, continue to push the boundaries of what a comic book movie is and the definition of a comic book movie.”
Source: Super Hero Hype: Exclusive: When Might We See Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man?
Dave in NY says
They could do an Aqua Man a la Avatar… It has the environmentalism theme that Hollywood loves, even though I dislike it. I’d still love to see Aqua man brought back.
The Flash!
Gambit has a very interesting back story which could make for a great stand-alone film, with some guest appearances by second-string X-Men.
Collossus also a very interesting character.
Magneto’s children, Quicksilver and the Scarlett Witch.
Dave in NY says
Oops, just realized that Aqua Man is a DC character… never mind.