I know its Sunday night and I am late to the punch.
But I have had a long, busy weekend away from a computer. I feel it is time to
weigh in on Comic-Con International. Comic-Con festivals take place every year
all across the country, even the world. I am happy and blessed to be attending
my very first Comic-Con festival in Chicago this August, so be sure to check in
then to hear who I see and what I hear. But it’s Comic-Con International in San
Diego, California that is the crème of the crop, the big tamale. This time of
year, in late July, it’s one of biggest geek times of the year. I have already
read and looked into everything that was introduced over the weekend, and I
have some thoughts I wanted to share with you.
Knowing me, you probably know exactly where I want
to start.
Marvel
Panel
Avengers: Age of Ultron
I
will admit, while I was glad that people got to see footage from “Avengers: Age
of Ultron” as well as “Ant-Man” at Comic-Con this year, I was slightly disappointed
that we didn’t learn any new information about the release dates they recently
announced. We know there will be a “Thor 3,” “Captain America 3,” and “Guardians
of the Galaxy 2” and it has been pretty much guaranteed that “Doctor Strange”
is on the way. We have heard whispers of “Black Panther” and possibly another
solo “Hulk” film for Phase Three as well. Some players are set, but we just don’t
have any dates yet, and I thought we would have learned more about them after
this weekend.
Oh,
well…at least “Age of Ultron” sounds as cool as I hoped for and I am absolutely
rabid to feast my eyes on the footage myself.
Robert
Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Aaron Taylor-Johnson,
Elizabeth Olsen, James Spader, Cobie Smulders, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Renner,
Samuel L. Jackson, and Josh Brolin were among the actors who came to represent
the anticipated sequel. It seems ScarJo missed out due to being pregnant, which
is completely understandable.
The Footage Description
from Hitfix:
“As
the footage begins, the Avengers are relaxing, sitting around the main
downstairs area, all of them enjoying a little down time after the film's huge
and sure to be amazing opening sequence. Thor sets
Mjolnir down on the coffee table carefully and they all begin to discuss the
idea of "whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy," and what that
actually means, which leads to what seems inevitable: a contest to see who can
actually lift it.
This is where you see Joss Whedon's touch at work. No one
else is like him in the way he loves to take fantastic settings and characters
and then explore the mundane fun small details of what it would be like to
actually be those characters. Watching Tony Stark and Rhodey, working together
to try to lift the hammer while constantly ridiculing the idea of enchantments
and "worthiness" or seeing Bruce Banner try to lift it but
laughing as he does so, pretending to be mad but with no chance of becoming the Hulk,
all while Thor looks on laughing, is hilarious. My favorite touch was when
Captain America steps up and tries and moves the hammer about a tenth of an
inch, and for just a moment, there's a look of worry on Thor's face, followed
by a gale of relieved laughter. Great stuff, all driven by character, and a
reminder of just how well we know all of these people at this point. Thor
finally wraps things up by telling them that there's a simple explanation for
why none of them can lift it.
"You're not worthy."
As they're all still laughing, there's a strange noise,
though, and they are suddenly joined by a very creepy, half-finished, mangled
version of Ultron, who comes strolling in, voiced by James Spader, and I
like that they didn't try to over-process that very strange and alien voice
that he already has. "How could you be worthy?" he asks. "You're
murderers." He talks about how they don't belong on the planet, how they
don't deserve it. In the close-ups, it's clear that there are parts of old Iron
Man suits all incorporated into Ultron's body, which is actually sort of
disturbing and weird. Suddenly a group of Ultron drones burst into the room,
and the reel kicked into high gear.
There was some remarkable imagery in what they showed us.
First and foremost, we got a taste of the fight between Iron Man in his full
Hulkbuster armor and the Hulk, who is on a full rampage. They were very careful
not to show why or how that's happening, though, simply giving us a taste of
the combat and the scale of the mayhem. There was an amazing glimpse at the Scarlet
Witch and Quicksilver in action, and it looks like Whedon's
found a very different way to handle Quicksilver's powers visually. I love that
when the Scarlet Witch starts to use her power, her face grows pale and her
eyes glow red. They didn't show any footage of The Vision,
which surprised me, but they did use this crazy creepy slow vocal version of
the song "I've Got No Strings" from Disney's "Pinocchio,"
thematically appropriate since much of this movie deals with Tony Stark's guilt
over his creations and how they get away from him.
"This
is the end," Tony says at one point in the footage. "The end of the
path that I started us on." Cars flip. Things explode. Heroes take a
savage beating. And in the end, there is an eerie shot of Tony, looking down at
Captain America's broken shield and, all around him, the dead bodies of the
other Avengers strewn over a shattered landscape.”
Well that just sounds
epic. I love that Whedon seems to be making this more of a character piece, and
I think our heroes will really be put under the wringer. I am not quite sure if
our heroes will gingerly eat Sharma after defeated Ultron at the end of this
film and they will be in a much different place as Phase Three begins. I
figured Spader would be awesome as Ultron and that seems all but proven. I can’t
wait to see this footage for myself and Marvel might have another winner on
their hands.
Ant-Man
Well, the road to “Ant-Man”
has been troublesome to say the least. We know that director Edgar Wright left
the film in the middle of production due to differences he had with Marvel.
Now, this week we learned that actors Patrick Wilson, Kevin Wiseman and Matt
Gerald all left the film as well. Some people think the actors departure had to
do with Wright’s departure. But nobody will probably ever know for sure. So it’s
been tough for Marvel getting this movie on its feet. They found a new director
in Peyton Reed and he seems energized to take on the task. What makes me
nervous is that the film still plans to meet its summer 2015 release date. With
all of these set-backs, can Marvel still pull a good movie out of the wreckage?
Michael Douglas and Paul
Rudd were present at the Comic-Con promoting the film. We learned that Corey
Stoll will play Darren Cross, the film’s villain and that Evangeline Lilly will
indeed be playing Janet who will eventually become The Wasp.
The Footage Description from Hitfix
“It
starts with a long tracking shot through Pym's personal lab. We hear the
conversation between Scott Lang (Rudd) and Hank Pym (Douglas). Pym is trying to
convince Lang to help him steal something. Lang protests that he's not a
superhero and Pym tells him that's exactly the point. "You're not an
egomaniac." Lang keeps trying to wiggle out of it, and Pym growls at him,
"Jesus Christ, Scott, it's like you already shrank your balls." In
the end, it sounds like he talks him into it, promising, "It's just a small
job," just as the camera stops on a shot of the Ant-Man helmet.
What
followed was a really lovely little glimpse at the actual suit in effect. It's
just after Lang breaks in to steal some of the tech that Darren Cross managed
to take from Pym in his business take-over. He's running from the building,
shrunk down to ant size, and he can hear Pym talking to him through the
earpiece in the helmet. Pym tells him that he's got to get to the edge of the
building, where there will be a ride waiting. That ride turns out to be a
flying ant, and Pym tells him to just use the helmet to command it.
Good
advice, but then Lang trips and falls, and the helmet starts to sputter and
spark. As security starts to close in, Pym tells Lang to just jump off the edge
of the building, and when he does, a group of ants swoop in beneath him. He
manages to saddle up, get some control, and then fly directly into an air vent
in a building, as the title treatment came up.”
Well one thing “Ant-Man” has going for it is
that it won’t feel like any other superhero film in the MCU. I love that this
is a heist film at its heart and that will be a fun direction to take it. Even
though Wright is absent at this point, I think his presence will still be felt
in every frame. I think “Ant-Man” will either be the first misfire from the MCU
or it will be their little engine that could, I am so hoping for the latter.
Check back here in a little bit and write-up my
thoughts on the other side of the river…aka the DC panel!
SOURCES: