Before Iron Man, before Thor, before the Marvel Cinematic Universe as we know it, there was Edgar Wright's Ant-Man. The film has been in the works forever, and became part of the whole Marvel machine when it began to grow into a Hollywood behemoth. And finally the film seemed to be coming together nicely with a release date set for July 2015, a cast well in place, and even some test footage presented by Wright himself. And now all of that hard work has just hit a major road bump as Wright has departed the film due to "creative differences". Here's the brief statement released by Marvel....
Marvel and Edgar Wright jointly announced today that the studio and director have parted ways on ANT-MAN due to differences in their vision of the film. The decision to move on is amicable and does not impact the release date on July 17, 2015. A new director will be announced shortly.
Who knows how long this split has been in the works but it's probably not a surprise Marvel announced it during the "Friday night news dump" when most aren't paying as much attention. Still, this is a big development considering things at Marvel tend to run so smoothly. And considering Wright is such a fan-favorite director, who could Marvel be considering as a replacement? Joe Cornish, who directed Attack the Block and co-wrote Ant-Man's script has to be seen as a frontrunner. But who else? Who would you want to see as Wright's replacement?
