Marvel News & Notes

Murphy has confirmation that a production company he's long believed was for Marvel Studios is, indeed, for the MCU. In addition, he believes that his theory that it's for Fantastic Four is born out (in this case, by the same logic as when he first reported it). I wouldn't have taken this as confirmation of the fact just yet, but Production Weekly listed Fantastic Four, which suggests it is indeed in the works.

Daniel says they are casting a strong supporting female lead (20-30) for Thor 4 with the codename "Artemisia" (coined, no doubt, on the Greek goddess Artemis), described as a leader type. His guess is that this is Thor's sister Angela, but if I recall correctly Murphy said Marvel has moved away from matching first letters of names to the actual characters in casting calls, which would invalidate the speculation. It's worth noting this does not appear to be the same casting call Daniel put out recently (even though the age range and gender is the same).

Christopher Marc (HN Entertainment etc) believes the production company 'Grass-Fed' is for the Nick Fury show Variety confirmed in September. Given Samuel Jackson's age pushing this forward makes sense.

Arlyn Murphy (Charles' wife? Sister? Unrelated Murphy?) writes about the possibility that production companies Disney created in October may hint at the Young Avengers. I think the logic is weak (she largely dynamites the idea herself), but what is interesting is the list of in-development projects she includes at the end (in brackets I've included when/if these were first mentioned by Charles):

[Young Avengers; May], Ghost Rider [May], Illuminati [July following Daniel], Ironheart [May], Secret Invasion [May] and Secret Warriors [no direct reflection previously, but GWW (aka Daniel) in May]

Note these are in development not in production, so don't actually have the greenlight yet. Rumours for these IP have sometimes appeared much earlier (LotLB and Sutton generally), although it's not clear the context is the same. As I said last time, I think Young Avengers is dependent on how its component parts (the team's characters) are received--on the surface it doesn't interest me.

Daniel says Mei Ling, Death Dealer, and Civil Warrior are confirmed for Shang-Chi. The latter two I haven't heard mentioned by anyone (I think there's actually a typo with the third, unless the character is enormously obscure or usually uses another name), but the former has been generally assumed by everyone.

Hill discusses a season two of Loki (Murphy mentioned in January that actors were having second season options written into their contracts). This comes up because Production Weekly notes that a second season is slated to begin filming in January, 2022. PW isn't always right about dates, although it's suggestive that a second season is planned. More interesting in the article is Hill mentioning the small window available for Hiddleston to film for Thor 4--indicating a fairly minor role if he appears.

Around the same time Daniel said Loki will have a bigger role in the next MCU movies (he doesn't say which films, but Doctor Strange 2 and Thor 4 would make sense, even if it's hard to see how his role would be bigger or when he'd have the time to portray the character in either production). He doesn't say why his role will increase--an obvious reason would be Hiddleston's popularity, but there could be more to it (if, indeed, this rumour is true).

An update on the Quicksilver story from Daniel: apparently the source for the information (never made clear) comes from a toy leak where the model looks like Aaron-Taylor Johnson. I haven't seen this leak (making it impossible to verify), but it's been referenced broadly (eg).

The casting of Egyptian actors in Moon Knight makes me reflect on a story from September where THR (Borys Kit), commenting on a Deadline story, claimed Jonathan Majors was playing Kang the Conqueror. At the time scoopers were assuming Majors would play the Rama-Tut version of Kang and I flippantly commented that, while the actor isn't Egyptian, Marvel wouldn't care about that. I no longer feel so sure about that utterance. If we're getting different variations of Kang, it appears the MCU does want authentic Egyptians, such that if we get Rama-Tut the character cannot be played by Majors. Keep in mind, nowhere does Kit say what iteration Majors is playing and the assumption of multiple versions is speculation. It could be that we're getting just one Kang and that he doesn't have Egyptian roots (or, if the MCU wants to be clever, they could attach him to the 25th dynasty--not a perfect fit, but that's the non-ethnic Egyptian ruling group they could point too).

Tangentially, we're getting a sense of the ethnic groups that matter to MCU casting director Sarah Finn. For standard diversity purposes, Caucasian is superfluous unless it significantly impacts merchandizing, but with the casting for Moon Knight it seems like Jewish is also unimportant, as is Iraqi (Gilgamesh), and seemingly Japanese (Kingo/Wiz Kid). The Jewish angle I get (plenty have been cast in non-Jewish roles), and Iraq is economically trivial. It's less clear to me why Japanese characters have been swapped out (for Indian/Chinese actors, respectively)--it's likely down to the minimal importance of the roles. Egypt isn't important economically, but I see the casting intended to stop media criticism about cultural appropriation. There must be clearly defined guidelines, but it's unlikely we'll ever learn what they are. How much this matters to you really depends on your feelings on adaptations--for some its irrelevant, for others its untenable. Anecdotally, it seems like if the product is good changes are forgiven, but if the product is mediocre to bad those changes become unforgiveable (therefore, high risk/high reward).

Daniel claims Marvel wants Joaquin Phoenix to appear in Doctor Strange 2 as another iteration of Doctor Strange. As many know, Phoenix was up for the role of Doctor Strange originally, but passed on it because he didn't want to commit to more than one movie. I have no idea if there's any substance behind this--Daniel has been spewing rumours out faster than WGTC, so time will tell.

About a week ago Google listed Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, and Ryan Reynolds in Doctor Strange 2. This has been ignored by the big scoopers, but has fueled others (like Small Screen--see below) to claim this is a leak. I've assumed that the listing is no different than similar IMDB listings (which is to say, unreliable), given that the heavies have not weighed in on it. However, cameos (as Edward Lauder suggests) are what's plausible if we see such characters in the MCU.

I've been quite cynical regarding the idea of Feige referencing IP from other creative hands because of how hard he's ignored both Marvel Entertainment and Universal (the two he could most easily touch on). However, it's possible he see's the multiverse as the ultimate wash my hands moment where he can acknowledge other Marvel iterations while keeping them far away from the MCU (not colouring it with dreck like Electra, Fan4stic, Spider-Man 3, etc). This is possible, but we'll need something much firmer than the evidence above to take it seriously.

Sutton says Marvel is considering a villain role for Wesley Snipes. This echoes a very old LotLB rumour from July, 2019, and I believe that's ultimately his source for the information.

Sutton has slightly changed his tune regarding the Iron Fist IP. Let's first look at the antecedents: last November he said the character would appear in Shang-Chi 2 as the Chuck Norris to Shang-Chi's Bruce Lee ala Way of the Dragon, and then be spun off into his own Disney+ show; in May he repeated the Disney+ idea, where Shang-Chi would presumably appear, but there was no mention of Shang-Chi 2 (this appears to be an unintended slip). In both cases Sutton said the show would follow Fraction/Brubaker, which always seemed impossible because Shang-Chi is already doing the tournament of champions from that run. His latest theory:

If Shang-Chi is the massive success Disney is hoping for, Iron Fist is waiting in the wings to be their next martial arts blockbuster. Keeping the character on Disney+, Hulu, or FX would leave money on the table if the market is hungry enough for martial arts IPs.

Shang-Chi 2 is looking increasingly like the movie for Iron Fist to make his cinematic debut. … I'm told that Marvel Studios is visualizing a Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris fight recalling 1972's Return of the Dragon (or Way of the Dragon). … For Iron Fist's solo movies, if they are greenlit, Marvel Studios is heavily interested in adapting the acclaimed run by writers Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction with artist David Aja

We can see that the essentials of what he said a year ago have only changed in that instead of Iron Fist transitioning to Disney+, Sutton now thinks films could be on the table. There are a few key elements here. The comment about 'if the market is hungry for martial arts IP' is particularly pertinent, because as I discussed in 2018, martial arts films aren't in demand--there hasn't been a hit in over twenty years, despite the popularity of MMA. More importantly, reading Sutton's phrasing, most of this is his surmise--it 'looks like' he'll appear in Shang-Chi 2, and 'if' it's successful then we get spinoffs. The actual scoop element seems to be that they are considering Iron Fist and want to use the Brubaker/Fraction run (which is the sort of thing most people would speculate regardless).

This brings me to The Immortal Iron Fist run and its limitations. As lauded as it is, for those who have not read it, it's important to understand its limited scope. What the storyline does, primarily, is firm up the lore of the Iron Fist, introduce the tournament of champions, and contextualize Iron Fist in an Asian setting. The run is broken up by clunky, one-issue visits to prior Iron Fist's which are so hamfisted none have had any resonance (the problem with successor characters also afflicts past representations when they are introduced late). While many fans like the Seven Cities of Heaven, they aren't well-developed or that interesting--even K'un-Lun isn't that interesting--Danny Rand only works when he's on Earth dealing with the issues here (which is why Marvel comics has never repeated the IIF run). This doesn't mean the MCU couldn't spruce this up, but since Shang-Chi is borrowing so many of its beats, you can't repeat them with yet another martial arts character. Let me reiterate what I've said before about the IP: the only way we see Danny Rand again is via his classic portrayal, and I don't see a rush from Marvel to bring him back (however much I'd enjoy a Heroes for Hire Disney+ series).

Daniel: Feige wants a majority female Avengers (my emphasis); this is a very different claim from the A-Force rumours we've heard in the past (eg) and makes much more sense--again, the problem with this idea has always been: what happened to the male heroes? You could have a story where, for whatever reason, the men are incapacitated or away, but that has limited utility. I think the reason a lot of 'Girl Power' films fail financially is by eliminating competent male participation (making them villains and fumbling side characters)--it misses the point entirely and alienates half the audience (or, for this genre, two-thirds of the audience). One of the reasons Captain Marvel succeeded (and it's not a particularly good film), is that Nick Fury was still an important and useful character.

Sutton repeats a Small Screen (Edward Lauder) rumour about Deadpool and before I get into that I want to talk about Lauder as a serious source: he recently used YTer The Cosmic Wonder as a source for a scoop and TCW's theory is based on an MCU fluff book The Wakanda Files (the idea boiling down to Shuri is really important in that book, therefore she's the next Black Panther, cf). Given that Lauder thinks he's a quality source, his word has very limited weight (particularly as he's not had a scoop that I'm aware of). That aside, Lauder's claim is that Deadpool will have a cameo in Doctor Strange 2 (as indicated by the Google result mentioned above). This is a plausible idea, but we need more evidence before accepting it.

Daniel continues to make odd claims: he says Feige wants Spider-Man to be the face of the MCU even with Sony's involvement--either Peter Parker or Miles Morales. The latter assertion makes me disbelieve him. Economically it's a bad idea to lean heavily on IP you don't control, but that aside, why on earth would it not matter which iteration of Spider-Man? This idea, that Miles is interchangeable with Peter, is absurd and seems part of the general push from the scooper gang that they are equally popular with the public. Miles is very much Peter 2.0 (he even has the relationship with Gwen Stacey), making him less distinctive as a different Spider-Man (this isn't just my opinion, it's born out by comparative sales from the comics--after a couple of years of sustained hype for Miles barely reaches 35% of the sales for Peter; his animated film barely registers in comparative box office). Other than the Flash, copy-pasting a popular character with a new iteration just doesn't seem to work.

Interestingly, Small Screen (link above) bucks the trend of claiming Maguire/Garfield will appear in this film, saying Sony wants them for Spider-Man 4 (a film that has no pre-existing MCU-deal), and that their appearance in the MCU is via cameos in Doctor Strange 2 (see above). This makes much more sense to me, but despite plausibility it still lacks the punch of strong evidence.

Speaking of odd, Daniel claims Shia LaBeouf is interested in a Marvel project--I'm sure he is, but I have no idea why Marvel would want him. I can't take him seriously, so the only thing I could see him as is a comedic side character (but really, why bother?).

Speaking of casting, I wanted to re-visit my discussion from a month ago because something occurred to me related to The Eternals (an expansion on thoughts I had in February). I'm underwhelmed by that cast, as I've gone over before, and couldn't figure out what the MCU was trying to accomplish with it. I now have a theory of sorts. There's a lot of comparisons of this IP to Guardians of the Galaxy--another obscure group with a none-blockbuster cast. Both groups are introducing (or, rather, expanding) bits of MCU lore (the cosmic side with Guardians, the past with Eternals), and both are seen as big gambles. That aside, I think the reason we don't see a Benedict Cumberbatch, Oscar Isaac, Brie Larson, etc leading these films is so that if they fail the MCU isn't losing out on talent it wants long term. If Guardians had failed (and therefore Chris Pratt's career doesn't take off), Marvel isn't losing anything by washing their hands of the film (the one big star, Vin Diesel, was simply VO, so could have been re-cast as something else). I believe that's why The Eternals is filled with actors who have either never had box office appeal or haven't in a long time (eg Kit Harrington's film career is infamously atrocious; Angelina Jolie's last hit as a lead was in 2014 and that's the only blockbuster where that was the case). Should The Eternals underperform, it's very easy for Marvel to walk away--there's a through line for Black Knight, but he's not dependent on that IP and doesn't need to shoulder his own films. Food for thought.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)