Actress Simona Zivkovska's agent Tweeted that she's in the Black Widow film, without revealing her role. This was followed by several other reveals on social media, including Yolanda Lynes, Jade Ma, and Shaina West. These are presumably other Black Widow's who likely have small parts (since Florence Pugh is the future MCU Black Widow).
GWW says a Silver Surfer film is being developed. They reference Adam McKay's comments to THR back in December about how he wanted to make such a film, so it is possible, but I find it hard to believe we'd get Silver Surfer before The Fantastic Four, so take this with a grain of salt.
The weather vane that is Charlie just parroted my theory of a gradual build-up for the X-Men (having mutant characters pop-up in other films before their own team-up). He also repeated what the Russo's have talked about (their admiration of John Byrne's X-Men and Fantastic Four work).
Mikey Sutton then offered this up this rumour:
"The X-Men film is still a few years off from in the MCU schedule. However, mutants will begin appearing in various films and TV programs with the Doctor Strange sequel looking more likely an MCU debut for one or two. But what of the movie? ... [T]he name being discussed quite often to possibly write and direct the initial X-Men film is a familiar one: Joss Whedon. ... No discussions or offers as of yet that I'm aware of, but for Marvel Studios X marks the spot for Whedon."
After Ike Perlmutter was forced out of Marvel Studios, Whedon has been around for MCU premiers and interviews--clearly his relationship with them is a good one. With that said, it seems far more likely that Whedon would helm a Disney+ show rather than a film, assuming he wants to direct at all.
A comment about Sutton as well, who I'd never heard of until recently and seemingly hadn't posted scoops in quite some time (why he uses Facebook is beyond me): he's been putting out a lot of rumours of late, to the point where more caution needs to be used about them until some have panned out.
A comment about Sutton as well, who I'd never heard of until recently and seemingly hadn't posted scoops in quite some time (why he uses Facebook is beyond me): he's been putting out a lot of rumours of late, to the point where more caution needs to be used about them until some have panned out.
Daniel says the MCU wants a Young Avengers series on Disney+ (see below). Speculation about Young Avengers goes back a long way (Charles Murphy said a script for a film was commissioned in July, 2018), but the recent rumours began in January, with both 4chan and WGTC, with a later 4channer claiming there were discussions, but nothing in active development. The idea has always been plausible, so it's safe fodder for speculators (eg, Charlie started making videos about them in June, 2018).
In the wake of the WGTC Magneto Disney+ show rumour, an even less reputable site (Full Circle Cinema, who have zero MCU scoops) put up a clickbait story about how POC actors were being considered for Charles Xavier and Magneto. The reason why this idea is ridiculous is the timing--if they aren't casting for She-Hulk, Ms. Marvel, etc, why would they be casting for a show that occurs after them? Jeremy Conrad jumped on this rumour (he likes clickbait too) and this brought all the usual suspects chiming in on social media (Charles Murphy repeatedly said that the Holocaust is just another tragedy and easily replaced, an idea I find astonishing). Surprisingly, the various fan sites ignored this story, presumably because of just how preposterous it is.
To address the idea itself: the claim is that the MCU wants to do something different with the characters, so to be different they'll make these characters POC. This, to me, misses the point entirely. Something different means not leaning on Magneto as the primary threat and not leaning on Xavier to be the prominent head of the X-Men. As I mentioned in my X-Men article, there are plenty of other options for villains and mentor characters--Emma Frost, Moira MacTaggert, or even someone like Storm if you want to age her up. It also ignores toy sales--X-Men characters sell even when the movies bomb, so because of that I think we'll get far fewer race-swaps (there are plenty of POC mutants to choose from regardless--I keep asking for Thunderbird even though I know we'll never get him). You have to ask yourself: has Marvel swapped any popular characters thus far? No. Playing around with The Eternals or the support characters in Spider-Man (where Amy Pascal has a lot of influence) isn't even a blip on the radar. There's been no serious pushback from fans about swaps thus far other than Zendaya as MJ (but only because they didn't want her to be Mary Jane Watson, which she's not). That aside, abstractly race-swapping Xavier makes no difference, but I think there's no chance whatsoever that they change Magneto.
Sutton says the MCU is trying to lure director Jon Watts to do a Nova film (which, if true, would be a shot at Sony). Within that post Sutton claims there will be a Young Avengers film (see above) and that the plan for Nova is to build up to an Annihilation storyline involving Galactus and the Silver Surfer. Nova rumours go back a long way, but before LotLB started talking about it a 4chan post in May claimed a movie was in active development (something Redittor TMSM echoes). The general consensus has always been that it will be the Richard Ryder version of the character, but this may simply be an expectation based on what's popular.
Sutton followed this up with the following:
"There will not be a next Big Bad in the MCU. Instead, there will be [two] Big Bads. ... According to my sources, the MCU is planning on having two major villains as part of its new Endgame. In the next couple of phases, all roads lead to Doctor Doom and Galactus. [N]either character will debut on Disney+. ... These are A-list characters that fans and general audiences will flock to see in theaters.... Noah Hawley's Doom movie, as publicly reported, is dead [cf] and will not be tweaked as a Disney+ TV show. ... [Doom] will be Easter Egg'd until he debuts on The Big Screen. He is going to have links to other Marvel foes, either politically, mystically, or through business. Both characters are in the "embryo" stage in terms of MCU development but the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby and John Byrne runs on The Fantastic Four will provide the skeleton and soul. ... What they'll be leading towards is an epic battle fought on the ground and in space, a secret wars if you will. No casting as of yet. I am told Viggo Mortensen has been tossed around as a potential Doctor Doom [presumably referring to July LotLB rumour]. But, to my knowledge, he hasn't been approached."LotLB added to this saying that the Mandarin and Doom will know each other and be rivals to some degree, but in the future will team-up to fight Doctor Strange. The idea of more than one major villain in Phase Four goes back at least to a 4chan post in May, although it proclaimed Norman Osborn as one of those villains (something TMSM and others echoed), which is clearly wrong. Sutton's idea is plausible, although I can't imagine either character would appear any time soon.
WGTC is reporting that the MCU is considering Rhonda Rousey for She-Hulk. I haven't seen any of her acting, but I frankly don't believe this. While she has the body of a fighter, given that the character is going to be CGI, that doesn't seem relevant. For those with good memories, Rousey pushed to be Captain Marvel back in 2015, but the MCU went with an established, well-regarded actress instead and I think they'll follow-suit here.
LotLB
Before I go into their rumours I wanted to clarify something: back in August they said an animated Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends was in development and this is partially true, as Disney+ is putting the original (1981) show back on-air. I feel like a lot of Tim's rumours are broadly correct, with the specifics often way off.
- Young Avengers will be on Disney+ (see above); when I asked Tim to clarify between it being a film and on TV he said this: "Our report had it as a film originally too but I haven't heard anything official yet and Daniel Rictman reported a few days ago that it would be on Disney+, so it could end up on either really. My guess is most of the the team will make solo appearances in MCU and Disney+ and eventually come together as Young Avengers on the big screen." This is a fascinating answer since he's directly contradicting his prediction in the video (it does, however, make sense).
- Sutton says Moon Knight will be the MCU-version of The Dark Knight, but with more mysticism; villains being discussed are Dormammu (which seems unlikely given his appearance in Doctor Strange), Bush Man (a classic villain for the character, who won't be called by this name--that's my expectation at least), Morpheus (a minor character, but another villain from the IP), and Stained Glass Scarlet (aka Scarlet Fasinera, another minor character from the IP who Tim thinks will be a love interest). They also claim the focus of the character won't be multiple personalities, but mysticism (which would imply borrowing more from the early version of the character, Doug Moench's run, rather than his later depictions--this would run counter to all the older rumours about him).
- Makes the strange claim that Hugh Jackman hasn't turned down the Wolverine role yet so it hasn't been cast (?)--this notion seems to be debunked by Jackman himself, who has repeatedly said he's done with the character
- Characters put on the reserve list:
- Super Skrull (acquired via Fox as part of the Fantastic Four IP)--I've never found this character interesting, so I'm not excited by him
- Wiccan (son of Wanda, LGBT, and a member of the Young Avengers)--I don't know the character at all, so my response to him is muted
- Black Bolt (leader of the Inhumans, whose people have been floating about in the rumour mill since Adam McKay brought them up in December--most prominently WGTC in June, which Conrad happily copied in August, using the logic of Ms. Marvel=Inhumans); I actually like the Inhumans, but I'm not sure if the MCU will go back to them
- New Warriors (the group whose show has been sitting in limbo for a couple of years ever since Freeform cut it loose in 2017--this wouldn't be salvation for it, but rather the group put aside for future development)
- Dominic Fortune (a minor character for Marvel Entertainment; they believe this is for the Dakota North show on ABC)
I want to follow-up on something John Campea said back in August about the Marvel-Sony deal. At the time he asserted that the rights situation was tied to who funded the films and he did so without caveats. Less than a month later, he's backpeddled on the assertive and added the disclaimer "as far as I understand it," from having talked to a few people. Those people can't be firm sources or he'd have no need to add the qualifier, which means what he said definitively earlier about the deal has to be taken with a pretty large grain of salt.
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
No comments:
Post a Comment