Amph "You think you're the only superhero in the world?" - The Marvel Cinematic Universe

Apparently Mark Ruffalo is in negotiations to take Norton's place as Banner.

Also, apparently both "Thor" and "Captain America" will be in 3D. The former will be converted from the 2D while the latter will be filmed for 3D.

 

Runaways, Marvel's first post-Avengers project, starts filming in January.

 

Whedon has finally confirmed he's directing, and has also confirmed that Jeremy Renner is playing Hawkeye. Perfect casting choice.

 

Looks like Ruffalo is the Hulk after all...

I like him a lot more than Norton in general, and I think that he, along with Sam Rockwell, has been Hollywood's most underrated, undervalued, and underused player for a long time. So it's nice to see Marvel throw both of them a bone.

 

WOO-HOO!! I consider this awesome news. Sure, we've suspected and heard rumors for some time, but no official word till now. I am incredibly thrilled the creator/director of my two favorite TV series (Buffy and Firefly, natch) is getting a shot at big-league filmmaking. His only theatrical film to date, the underappreciated Serenity, is an exceptional sci-fi movie, and its author has well earned the upgrade in budget, marketing and global recognition he is about to receive.

 

Has it been confirmed that Wasp and Ant-Man won't be in the film, or is it possible they simply haven't been announced yet?

 

Renner is going to steal that movie. I can already tell.

 

Bring back Tom Jane!

 

Extended Thor trailer!

 

WOW.

The Asgardian sequences shown in that 5+-minute "trailer" are breathtaking -- and not only visually, but emotionally. They resonate with an unusual power. The images are otherworldly, mythic, residing in the dream-world between science fiction and fantasy, while the character dynamics appear to be pure, archetypal, classical. Love vs. greed, peace vs. war, power vs. responsibility. I love every shot, every scene in the Asgardian setting. It looks to be the THOR movie I've dreamed about since I was 14.

The Earth-based sequences... not so much. This segment of the film looks like a sub-par Transporter sequel with a love interest. Look, I like Natalie Portman a lot; you might even say I "love" her in the sense of admiration, appreciation. But her scenes here come across as inserted, artificial, tacked on. She seems stiff and unsure of her role. Maybe her stuff will play better in the finished film. Admittedly there isn't much to go by, but what there is of her contribution to the film is begging for a re-shoot. Ouch.

Back in Asgard, my fanboy heart goes pitter-pat when I see the Norse gods as imagined and re-invented by Jack Kirby, John Buscema, Walt Simonson: There's Loki in his green, curve-horned helmet with the horsehair mane! There's the Warriors Three: Volstagg with his red beard (he should be smiling more, though)! There's Hogun the Grim with his fur trappings! And Fandral the Dashing! And is that Sif the Warrior Goddess with the black hair and combat-ready attitude? All of this stuff looks absolutely spot-on, like a live action tribute to the comics of the last 48 years.

I'm stoked, excited, intrigued, and ready to be amazed. If the corny "He's hot for a homeless guy" dialogue and unconvincing looks of concern from Natalie remain in the final cut, we may have a problem. Yet if Branagh can massage the Earth-based government-agent subplot stuff a bit, and draw the more naturalistic performance from Portman that I know she's capable of, THOR could become the smash hit and instant classic it has always deserved to be.

 

Looks dutched to hell.

Whatever happened to Branagh's directorial skills, his sense of style? He started off astonishingly well, and has just deteriorated ever since. Oh well.

Film looks OK though. Could go one way or the other, really.

 

What does "dutched" mean?

 

Yeah, I don't get that either. Urban Dictionary was no help...

I must have missed that clip.

 

Let's be fair - Branagh's never been an outstanding director, nor a particularly visual one. He's a phenomenal actor who just GETS his material, and usually a great actors' director who can coax some wonderful performances from his cast (even the Keanu-haters generally give some credit to Reeves's performance in Much Ado - whilst grumbling that he was ever cast in the role in the first place, of course, but still ). Henry V is a great example - whenever someone's delivering lines at Agincourt, it's magnificent, but then the actual battle scenes look like a TV-film.

Which is not to say his films are barren of good design choices. I get the feeling that they would look much better as plays than movies.

 

Dutch angle

 

Ah, the "Batman angle" or, as my friends and I have called it since the 80s, the "Evil Dead angle", tilted away from horizontal to create a mood of menace or tension.

So, yeah, Branagh seems to use this technique liberally in the extended THOR trailer. I don't see why this is a problem, as I find it an effective, if overt, stylistic conceit.

 

It's great if it means something - ergo, how it was used by Reed, Lean... even Abrams, I think, uses it only in moments of crisis or whatever. Maybe that's what Branagh is doing, I don't know (although the fact that even the big CG opening shot of Asgard is canted leads me to think that he's just doing it for the heck of it). I'd have been more interested if it had been demonstrated in the Earth scenes and not the Asgard ones, but it's all over the place. And considering that Sleuth featured the most nonsensical direction of Branagh's career to date, I'm not all that confident that he's going to bring the kind of weight that is needed to the material. More Henry V and Hamlet is what I ask for, and less Sleuth. And less Star Trek, actually, because a lot of it looks like he's trying to ape Abrams.

 

Matthew Vaughn on X-Men: First Class:

Director Matthew Vaughn tellsMTV News the film is not crowded, despite an ever expanding cast list. "I think it will be really cool to see all these guys doing their stuff. I'm very keen that it has a lot of heart, this movie. You understand where these characters have come from, and you obviously know where they're going, but to see that very important point of their lives where they're discovering their power and working out their ethical take on what to do with their power is a very interesting story to tell," he says. Also, the film will interconnect with the previous cycle of films, despite earlier reports the film might walk away from that history.

Also:

Director Matthew Vaughn tells The Los Angeles Times the film has already felt the influence of "Inception". Though he loved Christopher Nolan's film, he found a sequence in his script -- a battle in a dream state -- too similar to be produced. "My heart sank when I saw that a few of the ideas we had were up [on the screen]. So it's either leave it in and look as if you're copying or change things. We completely ripped out about 12 pages of the script and the storyboards," said the director. Meanwhile, Vaughn tells IGN the film will have some comparisons to the "Star Trek" reboot. "[J.J. Abrams] made a fantastically exciting reinvention of that world, with those great characters," said the director. "But we're doing some cool stuff in this movie, some really cool stuff that you haven't seen before."

 

Apparently January Jones (the wife from Mad Men) has been cast as Emma Frost in the X-Men movie.

Also, Edgar Wright on Ant-Man: "It's essentially a high-tech spy heist film with somebody with a very particular power. Trust me, it'll be much cooler than you think." Apparently the film will feature both Henry Pym, the original Ant-Man, and Scott Lang, the new Ant-Man created by Kirkman. My excitement for this picture just went up a notch.

 

If their dream battle was as unimaginative in execution as the fight scenes (JGL zero-gee excepted) in Inception, I'm GLAD the pages got ripped out.