First up is Ant-Man, and after Feige publicly praised new director Peyton Reed to the moon, he's now talking to The Guardian about the specific circumstances that led to Edgar Wright's departure...
Feige: "We sat round a table and we realised it was not working. A part of me wishes we could have figured that out in the eight years we were working on it. But better for us and for Edgar that we figure it out then, and not move it through production," Feige explained, adding: "The Marvel movies are very collaborative, and I think they are more collaborative than what he had been used to. And I totally respect that....[But] the notion that Marvel was scared, the vision was too good, too far out for Marvel is not true. And I don't want to talk too much about that because I think our movies speak to that. Go look at Iron Man 3; go look at The Winter Soldier; go see Guardians of the Galaxy later this month. It would have to be really out there to be too out there for us."
Hard to argue that Marvel hasn't taken some daring risks in the past, and Feige is right to note the films he did as examples. We'll see what Peyton Reed ultimately does when Ant-Man opens on July 17th 2015.
While everyone knows other studios other than Marvel control the cinematic fate of characters like Spider-Man and the X-men, one that has mostly escaped is attention is Namor the Sub-Mariner. Universal has long held the rights to the king of Atlantis (and frequent shit-starter in the Marvel Universe), and a few months ago a rumor surfaced they were finally moving on a solo film. In an interview with IGN, Feige denied that to be the case and said that if there's a movie it would have to involve Marvel...Feige: "Let’s put it this way – there are entanglements that make it less easy. There are older contracts that still involve other parties that mean we need to work things out before we move forward on it. As opposed to an Iron Man or any of the Avengers or any of the other Marvel characters where we could just put them in."
In other words, it may happen but it's going to involve a lot of deal-making with Universal. It also goes to show just how these contracts Marvel entered into years ago are still causing problems. Unlike Punisher, Blade, and Ghost Rider which were at other studios but have since returned, Namor has been in Universal's hands forever and they've done nothing with it. And yet the rights have yet to revert back to Marvel where he would be a natural fit for the Avengers.
Fortunately, Feige has plenty of characters to choose from, and many of them will be seen in next month's Guardians of the Galaxy and next year's Avengers: Age of Ultron. The teams share a common enemy in Thanos (voiced by Josh Brolin), and even though the teams are separated by light years it makes for a natural thread if Marvel plans some kind of major crossover...Feige: "I don’t know. Part of the fun of the comics is that could happen. Any character could interact with any other character because they inhabit the same time period and the same universe. And certainly it is the inclusion of Thanos most specifically that is a declaration to audiences who are paying attention that this is connected to those other universes. Part of the fun is that it could happen someday. I don’t know when that would be. Or maybe I know and I’m not going to tell you!"
So there you have it. Expect to learn a lot more during Comic-Con next week. Avengers: Age of Ultron opens May 1st 2015, Guardians of the Galaxy in a couple of weeks on August 1st.
