Tag Archive: Marvel Cinematic Universe


Next Black Widow trailer arrives with Taskmaster face-off and a look back

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January 15, 2020

The second Black Widow trailer has arrived (if you missed the first, we previewed it here).  Black Widow features the return of Scarlett Johansson as Marvel’s biggest and most seen screen superheroine, plus Stranger Things and Hellboy star David Harbour as the Soviet answer to Captain America, the Red Guardian, Oscar-winning actress Rachel Weisz (The Mummy) as assassin Melina Vostokoff aka Iron Maiden, Florence Pugh (The Commuter) as Yelena Belova, and de-aged Oscar-winning actor William Hurt, who started the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe off in The Incredible Hulk, back as General Ross.

Directed by Cate Shortland, Black Widow takes place following the events of Captain America: Civil War, so it’s not really all that long ago.  The villain featured in the new trailer is Taskmaster, created in 1980 by writer David Michelinie and artist George Pérez. but the identity of the actor/actress has yet to be revealed.  Pugh’s character might be getting queued up to take over the Black Widow mantle later in this new phase (#4) of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as her character has been known to use the Black Widow title in the pages of the comics.

Along with the trailer, Marvel released a video looking back at Black Widow in the MCU so far.  Check out this new trailer and feature for Black Widow:

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Better late than never? Black Widow trailer is here with great cast, plus second official poster

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December 3, 2019

We’ll all forever scratch our heads over why it didn’t enter anyone’s mind at Marvel Studios to get Black Widow her own movie before Infinity War and Endgame.  Was it because they didn’t plan to kill off Black Widow in Endgame until the last minute?  In repeated interviews Scarlett Johansson doesn’t even seem to know why.  Captain Marvel was great fun, but wouldn’t it have made sense to have this film as the penultimate film in the decade-long, newly titled Infinity Saga?  But it looks like Disney and Marvel pulled it off.  Johansson as a younger Black Widow, and a great, fun, surprise cast gets the spotlight in the first trailer for next summer’s first likely blockbuster, which arrived this morning.

As you’ll see in the trailer below, Black Widow features the return of Johansson, plus adds Stranger Things and Hellboy star David Harbour as the Soviet answer to Captain America, the Red Guardian, Oscar-winning actress Rachel Weisz (The Mummy) as assassin Melina Vostokoff aka Iron Maiden, Florence Pugh (The Commuter) as Yelena Belova, and de-aged Oscar-winning actor William Hurt, who started the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe off in The Incredible Hulk, back as General Ross.  Directed by Cate Shortland, Black Widow takes place following the events of Captain America: Civil War, so it’s not really all that long ago.  Recall when Natasha Romanov left Steve Rogers at the cemetery at the end of the film?  This is evidently what she alluded to when she left.  The villain is Taskmaster, but the identity of that actor/actress has yet to be revealed.  And Pugh’s character might be getting queued up to take over the Black Widow mantle later in this new phase (#4) of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as her character has been known to use the title in the pages of the comic books.

 

Along with the trailer, a second poster was released Tuesday morning, following the red hourglass style of the first poster given to fans at Disney’s D23 Expo this year.

First previewed at D23 Expo, check out this first trailer for Black Widow:

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Marvel continues its old school Grand Design series with the Fantastic Four

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October 31, 2019

 

Writer/artist Ed Piskor broke new ground with his epic history of the Marvel universe in a tiny package, with his Grand Design and Second Genesis trilogy series (reviewed here at borg only last year).  A complete throwback in style to comics of the 1930s through the 1970s, Piskor’s series included small, tightly crammed panels allowing for only minimal detail, lots of content per page, bright classic colors, and good ol’ fashioned newsprint pages (mmm… just smell that newsprint!).  But Piskor covered only one segment of the Marvel universe in his books:  The X-Men.  This week writer/artist Tom Scioli enters the picture with his own take on Marvel’s Grand Design series, focusing on the Fantastic Four in the new series Fantastic Four: Grand Design.

In Issue #1 Scioli takes readers through an origin story of the Fantastic Four: Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm, as they become Mr. Fantastic, the Invisible Girl, the Human Torch, and the Thing, all in a similar style to Piskor’s series.  As expected, readers can look for a lot of history in 45 pages, including meeting one of the Watchers, Doctor Doom, Black Panther, Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner, the Mole Man, the Hulk, the Celestials, the Inhumans, Galactus, Silver Surfer, and lots of other characters tucked into the corners.  Since the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I find it difficult to separate the comics from the movies, and every comic I read pulls me into the thought of how it might be adapted for the big screen.  If you haven’t been keeping up, along with the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Silver Surfer, and Namor all moved over to Disney’s MCU, and Scioli lays out one possible way the Fantastic Four could be introduced into the reel world dominated thus far by the Avengers.  Could the first Fantastic Four movie, or a Fantastic Four sub-series of films (like the Avengers) segue moviegoers into the missing pieces never before seen on the big screen like Namor, and pull in the above heroes and villains?  We’ll know in a few years.

 

Look for two covers by Scioli for the first issue of Fantastic Four: Grand Design, and one variant, a very cool homage to Frank Miller’s second issue of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns featuring the Thing in place of Batman, re-created by Ed Piskor (shown above with Miller’s original).  Want to have a look inside the first issue?  Here’s a preview of #1, and a sneak peek at Issue #2:

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All the Marvel Cinematic Universe news from SDCC 2019

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July 22, 2019

Instead of what has been done at past panels at San Diego Comic-Con–having a panel for each or just a few major projects–Marvel Studios exec Kevin Feige was on-hand to get several announcements out the door and as many key cast members in and out of his single panel as possible.  For the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Phase IV, that means tying in Disney’s (pay) streaming service with the movies.  The big takeaway?  New logos are pretty much all there is so far to share, plus key casting and timing announcements.  And although the last Phase had some changes along the way, it looks as if these ten projects will round out the entirety of Marvel over the next few years.  The biggest frustration for fans of the X-Men and Fantastic Four is why nobody at Marvel has been getting a head start on these two massively popular teams of characters–money is definitely going to be left on the table for the duration of Phase IV by pushing out these projects.  Why aren’t these Priority #1 with someone at Disney in light of the long lead-time the corporation had for the Fox acquisition?

The new time table is straightforward: Black Widow movie (May 1, 2020), The Falcon and the Winter Soldier TV series (Fall 2020), Eternals movie (November 6, 2020), Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings movie (February 12, 2021), WandaVision TV series (Spring 2021), Loki TV series (Spring 2021), Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness movie (May 7, 2021), What If…? animated series (Summer 2021), Hawkeye TV series (Fall 2021), and Thor: Love and Thunder movie (November 5, 2021).  The most eagerly awaited film after this year’s Avengers: Endgame was the hinted-at Guardians of the Galaxy/Thor or Asgardians of the Galaxy team-up movie, but Marvel still has not confirmed that project, unless it’s tied into the 2021 film.  Also relegated to “in development” status: Black Panther 2, Captain Marvel 2, Fantastic Four, X-Men, and the next Tom Holland Spider-Man movie (Spider-Man is Iron Man’s replacement, right?).  Silence seems to confirm the death of the Marvel Netflix universe of Luke Cage, The Punisher, Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Iron Fist, and maybe even Disney+ projects Runaways, Ghost Rider, and Helstrom.  FX’s Legion was already announced as canceled, and we lost track of how many times The New Mutants movie has been pushed back.  Even bigger unknowns are the next Ant-Man and The Wasp, which had Hank Pym actor Michael Douglas already discussing it as a prequel, and if anyone is thinking about Prince Namor the Submariner, nobody is talking.  It begs the question:  Does Disney have too much to handle now?

As a beginning Disney’s Marvel side seems to be taking a lead from its Star Wars division, with its offerings targeting a mix of fans old, new, and in-between.  For the fans of the MCU so far you have plenty, a Black Widow (presumably prequel) and Thor movie as bookends for Phase IV, and TV series to keep alive Falcon, Winter Soldier, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Loki, Doctor Strange, and Hawkeye.  For new audiences (and possibly much older comic book readers) there is Shang-Chi and the Eternals to get to know, along with the announcement that Luke Cage’s Mahershala Ali will be playing Blade in a reboot movie at the beginning of Phase V, the vampire hunter who, like Spider-Man, has already seen an entire series of movies outside of the MCU.

The details are an eclectic mix of things you might want, things you didn’t know you want, and things you won’t know what to make of:

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Next trailer arrives for Spider-Man: Far from Home

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May 6, 2019

We’ve known from the first trailer released January 15–well before the premiere of Avengers: Endgame–that Spider-Man: Far from Home would find Spider-Man and all his teenaged friends get out of Avengers: Endgame in one piece.  The biggest reveal then was that “Far from Home” in the title doesn’t mean Spider-Man is left stuck on the planet Titan–where he turned to dust.  Nope.  It’s a school trip from his home in NYC to Europe–not all that far away for this Spidey.  But now that Avengers: Endgame arrived and the Russo Brothers “officially” released everyone from the spoiler-free zone via Twitter effective today, Marvel Studios and Sony followed up with the very Avengers: Endgame spoiler-filled, next trailer for the film.

But what will be the fifth appearance Tom Holland as Spider-Man (since this takes place right after his fourth appearance in Avengers: Endgame) looks like it has the potential of being as fun as his past appearances, more Marisa Tomei as Aunt May, more Jon Favreau as Happy, and all his school friends returning.  And audiences meet Jake Gyllenhaal′s Mysterio, a comic villain straight out of the pages of Amazing Spider-Man #212.

We had a good dose of Samuel L. Jackson playing Nick Fury again in Captain Marvel, but not so much in Avengers: Endgame, so it’s nice to see he will be integral to the story again in this next film.  But how will the studio deal with Spidey’s friends and the five-year age shift, presumably for some of them, like Peter Parker?  We’ll have to wait for that answer.

Take a look at the second trailer for Spider-Man: Far from Home:

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Dark Phoenix–Ten character posters arrive for penultimate film in the longest running superhero film series

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April 30, 2019

 

Does every hero have a dark side?  It’s impossible Quicksilver has a dark side.  But we’ll find out in five weeks as the 12th film in the longest running superhero movie series sees its second-to-last film with the theatrical premiere of Dark Phoenix.  The series that started with X-Men in 2000 began as a knockout with the stellar casting of Patrick Stewart as Professor X, Ian McKellen as Magneto, and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, ultimately interweaving two separate casts that would include the likes of Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique, Michael Fassbender as a younger Magneto, and James McElvoy as a younger Professor X.  With eleven films across 19 years we’d meet our favorite (or second favorite) Marvel superheroes and supervillains shine in X-Men 2: X-Men United, X-Men: The Last Stand, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, X-Men: First Class, The Wolverine, X-Men: Days of Future Past, Deadpool, X-Men: Apocalypse, Logan, and Deadpool 2.

Every hero has a dark side.

This week post-merger Fox released ten new character posters for the new film spreading that message.

 

Dark Phoenix was written and directed by Simon Kinberg, and stars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Sophie Turner, Tye Sheridan, Alexandra Shipp, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Evan Peters, and Jessica Chastain.  Kinberg has promised Dark Phoenix will be a more faithful adaptation of Chris Claremont and John Byrne’s Dark Phoenix Saga than seen in X-Men: The Last Stand.

Here are all ten posters:

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New book digs into the creation of Marvel Studios’ 100 biggest heroes and villains

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Movies, Superheroes — Leave a comment
April 29, 2019

Review by C.J. Bunce

Following up on its successful look behind the entire Star Wars saga in The Moviemaking Magic of Star Wars: Creatures and Aliens (reviewed earlier here at borg), Abrams Books is bringing home the characters of Avengers: Endgame and the Marvel Studios long journey to get there in its new release The Moviemaking Magic of Marvel Studios: Heroes and Villains.  Incorporating its trademark interactive Cinemagic features, including booklets, interactive flaps, and accordion fold-out images of the concept art behind every major Marvel Studios superhero, Abrams has nicely timed this book for fans of the franchise who can’t get enough of the latest MCU film.  Full of color photographs and interviews with the producers, directors, art designers, costume and prop makers, and special effects magic makers behind the 21 films leading up to Avengers: Endgame, writer Eleni Roussos (The Art of Black Panther, The Art of Thor: Ragnarok) has pulled together behind the scenes insights that offer something new for even the most diehard fan.

Which characters wore practical, real-life costumes and armor, and which required motion capture and/or CGI effects?  What was the key element included in Marvel’s Avengers that Joss Whedon required to be added before he agreed to direct the film?  What do the contributors agree was the smartest strategic decision made for the Marvel films?  How did each artist convert the character from the comic book page to the finally constructed costume that appeared on the big screen?  What effects were the most challenging for each film?

Altogether The Moviemaking Magic of Marvel Studios: Heroes and Villains spotlights more than 100 individual superheroes, on-screen support crew, and the most colorful and memorable villains from the series, with significant creative and visionary contributions from Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige, directors Anthony Russo, Joss Whedon, and Peyton Reed, visual development executive Ryan Meinerding and artist Andy Park, and costume designers Rebecca Gregg, Laura Jean Shannon, Mayes Rubeo, Alexandra Byrne, Anna B. Sheppard, Judianna Makovsky, Sheldon Differ, Louise Frogley, and Ruth Carter.

Take a look at this giant preview of The Moviemaking Magic of Marvel Studios: Heroes and Villains below, courtesy of Abrams Books:

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Final trailer arrives for X-Men: Dark Phoenix

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April 18, 2019

Dark Phoenix represents one of X-Men fans’ favorite classic X-Men stories.  We have already seen one take on the Dark Phoenix story, as Famke Janssen’s Jane Grey destroyed everyone she cares about in X-Men: The Last Stand, but after the timeline manipulation in X-Men Days of Future Past we learned again the lesson of the Terminator movies: The future’s not set—There’s no fate but what we make for ourselves–A common theme of comics, too, as characters are killed and reborn again and again.  Dark Phoenix was written and directed by Simon Kinberg, and stars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Sophie Turner, Tye Sheridan, Alexandra Shipp, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Evan Peters, and Jessica Chastain.  Kinberg has promised Dark Phoenix to be a more faithful adaptation of Chris Claremont and John Byrne’s Dark Phoenix Saga.

For those of us who loved the X-Men movies, this is the winding down of a great era, highlighted by the casting of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Patrick Stewart as Professor X, and Ian McKellen as Magneto.  Who will ever forget one of the finest adaptations to film of any superhero from any comic book as Evan Peters became Quicksilver, defending his fellow mutants in the Pentagon?  And the high point of any superhero movie (from Marvel Comics, DC Comics, or anyone else) must be the Academy Award nomination for best screenplay for Logan last year.  Like the competing films in the Avengers films, there were as many high as low points, but some greatness happened throughout X-Men, X-Men 2: X-Men United, X-Men: The Last Stand, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, X-Men: First Class, The Wolverine, X-Men: Days of Future Past, Deadpool, X-Men: Apocalypse, Logan, and Deadpool 2.

For Fox’s long string of connected X-Men films, this is the end.  Check out this final trailer for Dark Phoenix:

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Make Mine Mega-Marvel–Whatever it takes… the ultimate movie marathon is coming to AMC theaters

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April 7, 2019

Remember how epic the “ultimate” eleven-movie Marvel marathon sounded back in 2015, or the 20-movie Marvel film festival last year where participating theaters screened only four movies per day?  Yeah, not so much after this next marathon arrives.

At only three theaters (so far?) AMC Lincoln Square 13 (New York), AMC River East 21 (Illinois) and AMC Metreon 16 (California), fans will have the opportunity to experience a movie marathon like no other–AMC and Marvel Studios’ 22 Movie Marathon.  Beginning Tuesday, April 23, this marathon has it all: Watch all 21 films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe all leading up to and including the latest, film #22, Avengers: Endgame.

We have no doubt that this will quickly sell out in any theater they decide to hold it.  This is how good the franchise is, how much the best Marvel Cinematic Universe movies outweigh the worst, how crazy and devoted Marvel fans are, and how epic this could be.

The event will include marathon-only collectibles, and some sort of to-be-determined concessions offer.  Plus Avengers: Endgame will be screened at 5 p.m. local time April 25, about 55 hours after Iron Man begins on April 23, and one hour earlier than regular public show times.  Do you have what it takes to survive 58 hours in a theater?

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Captain Marvel–Two tie-in books arrive as latest MCU film hits theaters

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March 10, 2019

 

As the last Marvel Cinematic Universe film arrives in theaters before the climactic conclusion to the decade-long journey culminates in Avengers: Endgame, one new book celebrates Captain Marvel, the film (reviewed here at borg), and another provides a new adventure for the superheroine expanding from the pages of Marvel Comics.  Captain Marvel: The Official Movie Special is the film’s official “souvenir book” full of photographs behind the scenes as well as screen images tied together with interviews from the cast and crew.  It’s the kind of book fans of the film can go to to find details of the production process, and learn more about the actors and how they approached the characters.

Also now in print is Tess Sharpe’s novel Captain Marvel: Liberation Run, which is not related to the film, but provides a new story bringing together Carol Danvers, Mantis, Medusa, Ant-Man, and more, as the Captain goes to a distant planet to save a group of women aliens from an oppressive autocracy.  Readers will find the novel closer to the most recent comic book series than past comics or the character as seen in the film.  Captain Marvel: The Official Movie Special is available now for pre-order here at Amazon (shipping Tuesday), and Captain Marvel: Liberation Run is available here.

Readers of Captain Marvel: The Official Movie Special will get a sense in the cast interviews (Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Jude Law, Annette Bening, Clark Gregg, Djimon Hounsou, Lashana Lynch, Gemma Chan, Algenis Perez Soto, and Rune Temte) of the approach each actor took for their characters, how they worked with the directors and other actors, and share their thoughts on the Marvel Cinematic Universe in general.

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