Captain America To Be Set During World War II
Marvel Studios President of Production Kevin Feige revealed today that the Captain America movie will be a period film, set during World War II. I’ve never read any Captain America, but some of my friends who are really into the series have insisted that a WWII period setting would be the only way to do the story justice.
This basically confirms that Marvel will be sticking close to the original origin story which involved Steve Rogers volunteering to be a test subject in Operation: Rebirth, a top-secret defense project for the U.S. Army. Rogers took a Super-Soldier serum which altered his physiology, turning him into a “nearly perfect human being”. Unable to duplicate the process, the United States government turned Rogers into a superhero who served as “both a counter-intelligence agent and a propaganda symbol to counter Nazi Germany’s head of terrorist operations, the Red Skull.”
The First Avenger: Captain America (and not Captain America: The First Avenger, which sounds infinitely better) is scheduled to hit theaters in May 6th 2011, just weeks before Marvel’s superhero team-up film The Avengers hits screens in July. It’s assumed that the film will likely end with a cliffhanger. In the comic series The Avengers discovered Steve Rogers’ body in a block of ice in the North Atlantic years after his supposed death, and were able to revive him. It’s assumed that a similar situation will probably happen to bridge the two movies, especially considering that The Avengers takes place in modern day. But Feige promises that you won’t need to see any of the other films to understand The Avengers:
“Each of them have to stand on their own,” Feige said. “You won’t have to have seen any of the films to understand The Avengers… but it will help.”
Feige also confirmed that Matthew McConaughey is not in consideration for the film adaptation as was rumored on CinemaBlend weeks back. That should make fans happy. You can read more about Feige’s “State of the Marvel Address” on CHUD.
The Green Lantern Gets a Director
Yesterday we reported that David Dobkin (Fred Claus) had signed on to direct a big screen adaptation of The Flash comic book. Dobkin revealed that his film would be set in the same universe as the Justice League of America movie which is now being cast. This brought us to the conclusion that Warner Bros is hoping to quickly capitalize on the success of the superhero team-up film, with a new solo franchise. Well it now appears that The Flash is not the only film getting a fast track into production.
Greg Berlanti (The Broken Hearts Club) has signed on to direct a live-action big screen adaptation of The Green Lantern. Berlanti is penning the script with Marc Guggenheim and Michael Green. So what else has Berlanti done? He executive produced Dirty Sexy Money, Everwood, and Brothers & Sisters. But Warner Bros is saying “Who cares if his only experience is a $1 million indie romantic comedy, he could probably handle a big screen superhero film!” Are they on crack? I was a little miffed when David Dobkin announced his Flash plans yesterday, but at least he has a filmography. Sure they were comedies, but he can make a movie, if anything, I know that. But the Berlanti is very perplexing to me. Variety sheds some light on how Berlanti may have earned this gig:
“Guggenheim, who works with Berlanti as a writer-producer on Brothers & Sisters, wrote the Marvel comicbooks Amazing Spider-Man, Wolverine and Blade. Green, the “Heroes” co-exec producer who worked with Berlanti on Everwood and Jack & Bobby, wrote the Marvel Comics title Superman/Batman and was a writer-producer on Smallville.”
Networking (Who you know) trumps talent or experience in Hollywood. Apparently, Berlanti met with DC Comics senior vice president Gregory Noveck a year ago about bringing Green Lantern to the big screen.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against Warner Bros making a Green Lantern film, or a Flash movie for that matter, I just want them to be done right. Because if a film like Daredevil teaches us anything, it is that a movie studio will only give a franchise one chance (Of course, The Incredible Hulk and The Fantastic Four might be the only exceptions).
The Hollywood Reporter has the following quote from Greg:
“To me, this was on the last great comic book movie that hasn’t been made,” said Berlanti, who grew up reading comics in the 1980s. “It was a comic book with a real mythology that you would see in a lot of the space operas and the sci-fi books. The best part about it, anybody can be become one of the Green Lanterns because anyone can end up with that ring.” “The danger and the fear from a lot of people is that it would be silly. In these post-’Harry Potter’ and ‘Lord of the Rings’ days, it’s not any more fantastical than that. It’s taken movies like that to make it feel as if a Green Lantern film is possible.”
With The Flash and The Green Lantern spin-off movies in the works, it makes me seriously wonder if Warner Bros will announce that the Bryan Singer’s Superman sequel, The Man of Steel, is no more. It seems to me that the studio sees more benefit in a Superman film, which is an offshoot of the Justice League movie.
The Green Lantern character was created by writer Bill Finger and artist Martin Nodell in All-American Comics #16, published in July 1940. The Green Lantern possesses a power ring that gives him control over the physical world as long as the wielder has sufficient willpower and strength to wield it.
JLA Casting Begins Next Week, Batman and Superman to be Recast?
Just when I think I’ve convinced myself that the Justice League of America movie isn’t coming anytime soon, another contradicting news report is posted which makes me reconsider my position.
Yesterday, Christian Bale told IESB that not only has he not been contacted about the JLA movie, but he is not involved what-so-ever. This lead me to speculate that a Batman-less JLA movie was probably not probable. Could all these JLA movie rumors just be rumors after all?
Today Clint from Moviehole is reporting that casting for the film begins next week. That’s right - NEXT WEEK. Christian Bale and Brandon Routh will not be featured in this project, and the current plan is to recast the parts of Batman and Superman for the superhero team-up film. This makes a little more sense, and seems so much more probable than Bryan Singer pushing back The Man of Steel, and Christopher Nolan giving up Bale’s option for a third Batman film. And with new faces in the roles, this movie can stand alone apart from the single hero franchise films. This also means that if, for some reason, JLA fails, the stigma will be kept seperate from the stand-alone franchise films.
Hulk and Iron Man to Appear in The Avengers Movie?
In the past I’ve viciously bashed Zak Penn as an overrated hack. He gets a lot of credit for being one of the writers on Bryan Singer’s X2, which many consider to be one of the best comic book adaptations of all time. But truth be told, he’s written a lot of crap, including the Elektra movie, X-Men: The Last Stand and an early draft of Fantastic Four. Anyway, when it comes to comic book movies, Penn is Hollywood’s golden boy of the moment. Not only is he writing the script for The Incredible Hulk do-over, but also a young X-Men spinoff and a film based on Marvel’s The Avengers. Penn now tells MTV that he hopes to bring both Hulk and Iron Man on screen together in the superhero team-up.
“‘Avengers’ is definitely going to happen; the idea was always to do a crossover with multiple superheros,” Penn revealed of the superhero tag team group, Marvel’s answer to DC’s Justice League. “I’m waiting to let ‘Iron Man’ and ‘Hulk’ come out because those are two characters that could appear in it. I used to think that movie would be impossible to make but now I feel like it’s not.”
Tagged by Marvel as “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”, the Avengers originally consisted of Ant-Man, Wasp, Thor, Iron Man, and the Hulk. But The Hulk departed very early on (The Avengers vol. 1, #2) allowing Captain America to join. But the roster has always been fluid, allowing a rotating group of super-heroes to partake in the team. But most people assumed that Hulk and Iron Man would not be included in the film, especially since high profile actors (Edward Norton and Robert Downey Jr) are playing the characters in their own big blockbuster releases. One of the big problems of doing another X-Men movie is getting all the stars to sign on. With huge actors it’s harder to schedule and way more expensive. But does Paramount believe they could secure both Norton and Downey to a team-up movie?