Planet Hulk - Trailer

I had no idea they were doing an adaption of the excellent Planet Hulk storyline by Greg Pak, but here is the trailer and it looks fantastic.

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The Avengers and Captain America - Could the Skrulls and The Invaders feature in them?

Some interesting facts have been hinted at by Kevin Feige, over on CHUD, regarding various things that may feature in their forthcoming Marvel films.

'Will the Skrulls be the villain in The Avengers?' I asked.

Feige gave me one of those looks he's good at giving and just said, 'We do own them.'

More digging turned up the fact that Marvel Studios owns the Skrull race, while Fox own the Super Skrull.

The Skrull are a shape changing alien race who have had a hard-on for Earth for quite some time. They would make a pretty great big bad for the film for a number of reasons: first of all, there's a bunch of them, so the film wouldn't have to contain just one or two fight scenes with the main threat, and each of the team members could have their own battles at their own power level. For another, they allow Marvel Studios to do something really cool - what if it's revealed that certain characters from the previous Marvel movies have been Skrulls all along? And Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch proved in the first Ultimates series that the Skrull (called the Chitauri there) make a convincingly cinematic threat.

Of course the other possibility is that The Avengers will battle Hydra. As I mentioned in this story about The Invaders possibly appearing in The First Avenger: Captain America, Feige name-dropped Hydra as being something with which Steve Rogers had to contend. Might the truth be that Steve Rogers would just meet some of the Nazi supervillains who go on to head Hydra? And with The Avengers being a SHIELD group in the movies, it might make sense to make the villain a SHIELD villain. On top of that, like the Skrull, the sheer number of Hydra agents mean the film could contain lots of battles and that each of the Avengers could get something to do during the course of the film.

Having the Skrulls in the Avengers films throws up some interesting possibilities - the Hulk may feature but turn out to be a Skrull, other characters in Iron Man, Thor etc may turn out to have been replaced by Skrulls at some point.

What do you think of the news?
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Iron Man 2 won't end on a cliffhanger for the Avengers to resolve

At the moment we know that War Machine (check out the screenshot from the Iron Man 2 footage) will make a significant appearance, Black Widow could be good or evil, and Sam Rockwell will be reinventing the character of Justin Hammer. Director Jon Favreau weighed in as well at Comic-Con with his own details on the film, stating that the sequel won't leave an open-ended cliffhanger for Marvel's 2012 "Avengers" movie. We also know what heroes to expect in the Avengers film.

"We're working towards 'Avengers,' but by the same token we want to resolve this film and make ['Iron Man 2'] play on its own," Favreau told MTV News. "It's not a serial. It's a self-contained film."

Since Marvel Studios began planted movie crossover appearances in "The Incredible Hulk" and the first "Iron Man," continuity buffs have had a great deal to speculate about, given Marvel's ambitious calendar of releases, including "Thor" and "Captain America: The First Avenger." Favreau stressed that while the movies would all be working off of each other, his focus remains on making his film work on its own.

"It's not building towards a cliffhanger that's the next movie," he explained. "It's about wrapping up our story and making it a complete tale."

What about Iron Man 3? "There’s an Iron Man 3. Here’s how I know. When they make the option deals, they include Iron Man 3. So I know they’re planning on 3. Whether that would be before or after Avengers, they’ve announced that Avengers is next but they pushed back The Avengers once which I thought was encouraging."

As for whether, like many sequels, there will be too many villains in Iron Man 2 Favreau had this to say, "Well, we had to walk a fine line. I think you’re good for number two. Two seems to be the charm because you got your origin story out of the way. You can add some complexity to it and you have room, because you don’t have to tell the origin story, to introduce the characters. When you get to number three, you can get hidebound. You’re like a beached whale sometimes because you have so much, you collapse under the weight of the complexity that you’ve created. We looked at the successful sequels that we liked. I’m not talking about Two Towers or films that are chapters based on novels or Harry Potter. I’m talking about true sequels. The two that we liked the most, this was me and Kevin Feige talking, were Wrath of Kahn and Empire Strikes Back. Those were the two that we said, “They did it right. Now let’s look at what they did right.” There were so many others that didn’t feel as good as the first but for those two, what we found was that it really gave room to explore the characters and the villain plotlines were very simple but the stakes were very high. The less you get bogged down in complexity, the more you could really let the audience enjoy what they really like which are the relationships. Two years later, I know I’m a pretty savvy audience member, I don’t remember the dynamics and the subtleties of it. It’s not as precious to me as it is to the filmmakers. So it’s putting yourself in the seat of the audience and saying, “What do they want to see more but you want to go bigger.” You go from Alien to Aliens and then you want to show them the characters that they’ve invested in and how they’ve changed and change those dynamics by introducing new characters. Don’t just add to the action but throw the relationship into a little bit of a curve ball."

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The Avengers - Which heroes will make the cut?

Kevin Feige,the President of Production of Marvel Studios, spoke to Collider at the San Diego Comic Con and gave a run down as to who we will be seeing in The Avengers movie.

Kevin: I think we know. It’s going to be Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Nick Fury. I think it’s safe to assume that there will be some members of the Hulk universe in the film as well. In terms of the additional, I think Black Widow for sure. SHIELD’s organization for sure. And, again, what’s exciting to me about the Avengers movie are seeing those four characters together and interact with each other. Anywhere from the first issue of the Avengers to Civil War, the dynamic between Steve Rogers and Tony Stark is awesome and fascinating. It brings out sides of the others that won’t be brought out in their own franchises. Throwing Thor into the mix is a whole other thing and I think that will be cool. So to pile in another ten or fifteen…or frankly even four…I think will be too many.

Is the Hulk in it?

Kevin: You know Zack Penn is outlining it as we speak so we’ll see.

Looks like no Wasp or Hawkeye then. What do you think of the line up?

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Shamelessly She-Hulk - Fan Film

Fan Cinema Today did it again when they found the trailer for a new She-Hulk fan film.

Garrett Gilchrist is making Shamelessly She-Hulk, an ambitious, feature-length fan film that sports not only Jennifer Walters (AKA She-Hulk), but also Spider-Man, The Punisher, Blade, Captain America, Iron Man, Superman, Batman, Black Widow and even an animated Howard The Duck.

Here's the trailer. Let me know what you think of it.

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She-Hulk - Fan film

If they were going to make a big budget She-Hulk film who would you like to see play her?

Discuss in the forum or leave a comment below.

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Kevin Feige talks Avengers, Captain America and Thor

There is a great interview ove on Ugo with Marvel Films President Kevin Feige about the new films coming out over the next few years. He talks about the Hulk with the Avengers, Will Smith as a possible Captain America (which I think is a big mistake although he could fit into that universe as Isaiah Bradley that I've previously mentioned), Thor on Earth, the return of Blade and more. Here are some of the highlights.

Are you planning on putting The Hulk in The Avengers?

Feige: I think it'd be cool. I'd like to see The Hulk again. It will have been a number of years, four years since he was in a movie by that point, by 2012. So I'd like to see him in it. I'm not being coy. We're just starting the story. I was on the phone with Zak Penn this morning. He's coming in next week and he's going to work on the outline this summer, but because it's so intertwined with what we're doing before - I almost wanted to get done with production on Iron Man 2 [and] the scripts to Thor and Captain America well underway before we even started Avengers.

Is there any possibility of having SHIELD show up in a Spider-Man movie? Is that something you guys would like to do and is there a possibility of bringing these disparate properties back into the fold?

Feige: If we were talking about this four years ago and you asked if there was a chance to do an Avengers movie and a Marvel Cinematic Universe under one roof, I would've said that anything was possible, but that it's a long shot and I'm not sure. Now we're doing it. I'll kind of give you the same answer to that now. Anything is possible. Right now they're certainly different. What's at Fox is at Fox. What's at Sony is what's at Sony and what's at Marvel is what's at Marvel. When I say the MCU that's a goofy internal thing, but that's [how] we're referring to it.

You've got a lot now, but what other characters would you like to see make it onscreen?

Feige: Ant-Man. I want to make Ant-Man one of these days. I think that'll be surprising and a funny thing. I love that what Edgar [Wright] likes about it is that when he says he's doing Ant-Man people go, “Ant-Man? What the hell is that?” I think that's fun. I think Dr. Strange would kick ass. I think we've done very well at the superhero genre, if you will, this street level superhero aspect of the Marvel Universe. I think with Thor you'll see us cracking into the cosmic side of the Marvel Universe in a very good way that's never been done before in our movies and I'd love to get into that supernatural element. I think that Dr. Strange could be a good way of being the lynchpin to that universe with Werewolf By Night, with Blade again someday – that side of the Marvel Universe.

Recently it's been announced that more of the Thor story will take place on Earth. Is it a contemporary earth or Viking times?

Feige: It'll be contemporary.

How are you going to deal with the fish out of water aspect of it? Are you concerned at all about Thor dealing with the wacky modern day aspects of his life, being on a cell phone or something like that?

I am concerned about that and that's why we're not going to do that. We always think about, not in terms of “Thor,” but if you talk about fish out of water; if a character is goofy at any time he'll be goofy. If you bring in an idiot from the past he's going to come into the future and go [holding a recorder up to his face] “What is this? Hello?” That stuff is not funny and it's overdone. If Indiana Jones came to the future he's going to be cool. He's not going to be an idiot bumbling with things. There might be some fun humor out of him just getting something wrong for a minute, but he's going to play it cool and just not come off like an idiot. I think that Thor…if you look at [Jack] Kirby's Asgard, if you look at Walt Simonson's Asgard; they are technologically superior to us by far. They're not going to come and be flummoxed by much on Earth. There might be cultural differences that could be amusing or endearing, but he's not going to be talking to a lamppost for five minutes.

Is Donald Blake going to be in Thor and is he still going to be handicapped?

Feige: No.

Will Thor still be recognizable as a what we understand to be a superhero movie or is it going to be closer to fantasy?

I think it's going to be very much a Marvel superhero movie, but I think to the movie audience it's going to expand that definition more and more. Again, we've got a forty four year old guy who's going to be a superhero in a movie and he puts on an armored suit. That didn't necessarily mean superhero to people. In that same way, I think, someone who's got superpowers coming to Earth and dealing with other character from his realm will come off very much as a big ass superhero movie. But it's going to expand that definition, I hope, in a way.

QCan you talk about the casting of Chris Hemsworth and what it was ultimately about this guy after looking at all these other actors?

Feige: You couldn't take your eyes off of him. When he did his auditioned he worked for it. He put himself on tape. He put himself on tape again and then did it again and then came in and sat with Branagh and then worked again with Branagh and then ultimately did a very late in the process screen test and there was no question. It was very much like going back to 1999 when Dougray Scott got injured on Mission Impossible 2 and we had to go back to the videotapes and suddenly we saw Hugh Jackman who came in and did a screen test and it was like, “There's no question that this is our guy.” In this case it was actually even cleaner with Chris because with Hugh he was like two feet taller than the character was supposed to be which was nerve racking, but Chris is six four and looks exactly Thor.

Are you going to get a big name for “Captain” or are you looking to get another unknown?

Feige: We'll see. I do think that's something that we'll take into account, international appeal. There are only a handful of stars that mean anything here much less overseas. But I do think that will be a factor in it. As long as we have the freedom to do so at Marvel….to just cast the best actor for the part whether it's an actor who's been a great actor, but hasn't starred in marquee action movies before like Downey or somebody that came out of Australia that they've never heard of.

There's been some talk of going with a Will Smith and using the “Truth” storyline of Captain America.

Feige: I love the “Truth” storyline. I think that's very cool. I wouldn't do that as a first Captain America movie though. I think Will Smith is probably one of those handful of international stars. But I think that [arc] came about four or five hundred issues in to the “Cap” run. I don't see launching with that comic.

If one of the movies doesn't do well in this run, how will that effect The Avengers? It’s the riskiest one of the bunch because you're relying on people wanting to come and see Thor again and Cap again.

Feige: I think Avengers is going to have it's own vibe. I think Avengers will feel very much like…it'll have a different tone than the other Marvel movies. I'm not talking budget level here, but it'll have a much more massive global feel to it. Our movies aren't about saving the world. Iron Man doesn't save the world. Hulk doesn't save the world. Captain America, a little bit. But it's not about these comic bookey “I will save the world” things. The Avengers is about saving the world because there's no other reason for characters that powerful to band together. So I think the scope and the scale will feel like a much bigger thing. So whatever you had seen - whether Starscream was your favorite character or Megatron is your favorite character or Soundwave is your favorite character - you're going to see the experience of that epic thing together. I think it'll be the same thing. Clearly I hope it'll all work. I hope that people will, like they've done with the comics for years and years, argue about who their favorite is and who would win in a fight and all of that fun stuff.

For Avengers,will the threat to them come from outside the Earth?

Feige: It'll be big. It'll be something that no single hero can handle.

Discuss in the forum or leave a comment below.

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The Greatest Fan Film of All Time?

Millions of superheroes gather in Metropolis to celebrate Stan Lee’s birthday, bad guys show up, chaos ensues, and good triumphs over evil.

The movie was animated and directed by Jacob Drake, and written and edited by Larry Longstreth; in total, they spent 18 months making the film, logging more than 1,300 hours of animating in the process. Voice work was recorded across six states and Canada, with assists from both fan film veterans like Aaron Schoenke and Paul Molnar (Patient J) who supplied the voices of Scarecrow and Joker respectively, and Raine Maida.

by

Source: Fan Cinema Today
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Marvel Studios to develop Nighthawk, Iron Fist, Black Panther and more

With more than 5,000 crime fighters and villains in its library, Marvel Entertainment is looking for some help in adapting those characters into films.
Comicbook giant is readying to assemble a group of scribes who will pen scripts for various properties Marvel wants to develop.

The writers group will be similar to that created by the fellowship program the Walt Disney Co. has been running since 1990. Latter enlists a dozen scribes to work with creative execs to develop films for the studio and TV shows for ABC, the Disney Channel and ABC Family.

Marvel will invite up to five writers each year to work on specific projects, said a source familiar with the deal. Those could include staffers behind Marvel's comicbooks.

The company will provide the specific pitches it wants the scribes to tackle. Those could involve certain plot points for movies already in development or characters it would like to see in its future film slate.

Gathering of scribes will help Marvel come up with creative ways to launch its lesser-known properties, such as Black Panther, Cable, Doctor Strange, Iron Fist, Nighthawk and Vision.

So far, it has focused its efforts on more popular superheroes like Iron Man, the Incredible Hulk, Thor and Captain America.

It was especially encouraged when Iron Man, who wasn't as well known as Spider-Man, Superman or Batman, was able to cross over and launch a new franchise with a $582 million haul at the worldwide B.O.

Writers will receive a salary for the year. Disney fellows receive around $50,000. Marvel's payment could double that.

A group of Marvel execs will choose the scribes, with the final decision made by Kevin Feige, Marvel Studio's prexy of production.

High-profile writers such as Justin Theroux, Mark Protosevich, Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely and Zak Penn, who are currently adapting "Iron Man 2," "Thor," "The First Avenger: Captain America" and "The Avengers," respectively, will not be part of the group.

Terms call for Marvel to own whatever the writers work on during the year. Company has the option to continue a relationship with the scribes after that period.

The group, whose first members are currently being recruited, is expected to begin tackling projects this year.

Leave a comment on this post below.

Source: Variety

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Green Lantern may be the start of a linked DC Universe on screen

Donald De Line, producer behind Green Lantern, gave fans an idea of what to expect in terms of tone and content from the next live-action superhero film to come from Warner Brothers. De Line was promoting I Love You, Man when the folks at Collider snuck a few Green Lantern questions in on him.

De Line confirmed that the film would feature the Hal Jordan version of Green Lantern, and also said that the film would be an action/adventure piece with a good deal of character based humor. He also said that it isn't "dark", and said that the tone will probably be similar to that of Marvel's recent Iron Man. This news will undoubtedly be a comfort to fans who worried that Warner Brothers was going to put a The Dark Knight-style veil of darkness over all of their future superhero films.

It was also confirmed that Martin Campbell would direct the film, and he said that they had a production designer and a costume designer on the film already, as well as a date on the release calendar. De Line went on to say that they were going to Australia to scout in the next week.

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, De Line suggested that with Green Lantern, Warner Brothers may be taking a page out of Marvel's book and integrating their films, similar to how this past summer's The Incredible Hulk and Iron Man tied together, loosely. De Line specifically said "I haven't gone there because I'm just doing Green Lantern, but DC Comic is a part of Warner Bros. and they both have a very large agenda with that. So I think they've got all kinds of things in the works. Yeah, definitely."

Source: Movieweb

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The Marvel Universe Steam Punked

Left to right, from the top: Nightcrawler, the Hulk, Wolverine, Dardevil, Spider-man, Falcon, and Cyclops; bottom row: Jean Grey, Black Widow, Ant-Man, Captain America, Iron Man, Nick Fury, Red Skull, Doctor Doom, Arnim Zola.

There are lots more photos and info on the characters that were modified by Bruce Ross and Josh Izzo.

Source: Topless Robot

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Black Panther animated series - could it result in a live action movie?

Reggie Hudlin, who will writes the Black Panther comic book and now is helping guide the Black Panther animated series, is also a successful filmmaker, having directed House Party and Boomerang, and also episodes of Everybody Hates Chris and The Bernie Mac Show. On top of that, the voice cast for the Black Panther series boasts several film actors, including Djimon Hounsou as the Black Panther, along with Alfre Woodard as the Panther's mother and Kerry Washington as his sister.

Today, at New York Comic Con's panel for Black Panther, a fan asked Hudlin if he'd like the opportunity to direct a Black Panther movie, should such a project come to fruition. This caused Hudlin's fellow panelist John Romita Jr. to turn and ask Hudlin if he was casting the series with thoughts of a film in mind, noting that the actors all seemed like naturals to appear in a live-action version. Hudlin said that when it came to the character of Black Panther, "I'd like to be involved in it in every medium," but added, "I don't know if they'll ever be a movie that I'll be involved in," saying the decision was not in his hands.

Marvel Comics' Axel Alonso noted that it was thanks to the Spider-Man animated series and the live-action Hulk series that many non-comics readers came to know those characters, and said he could see how excited Hudlin was by the character, and that if a film came about, Hudlin has "put himself into the running for top consideration." He added that when it came to Hudlin's writing of the comic book, "Black Panther is where Black Panther is because of Reggie" and that he hopes the new TV series "is the oxygen for the explosion of the movie."

Marvel Animation's Eric Rollman brought up that before the highly successful 1990s X-Men series, those characters were "mostly unknown" outside of comic book readers, and that they saw the Black Panther series as an opportunity to introduce this character to a wider audience. Based on how successful the show is, Rollman said "Then we'll look at it very seriously for the next evolution" and that he thought there was a good chance "Reggie would be a part of that." Hudlin smiled and remarked, "We'll see."

Source: IGN

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Iron Man, Spider-Man and The Hulk vs a Robot

Thanks to Jinja for sending me this cool animated clip.

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Robert Downey Jr hopes the Avengers doesn't suck

MTV caught up with Robert Downey Jr and asked what he hoped for in the Avengers movie.

“If we don’t get it right it’s really, really going to suck,” said Downey. “It has to be the crowning blow of Marvel’s best and brightest because it’s the hardest thing to get right. It’s tough to spin all the plates for one of these characters.”

However, in taking on the role of a key member of the Avengers to such digital fanfare, Downey has in a sense become the face of the operation — at least until other Marvel films such as “Captain America” and “Thor” get made (and, likewise, until Marvel figures out how to handle the Hulk). To a lesser actor, this seems like an insurmountable amount of pressure, but Downey remains level-headed, and like any good soldier, knows he’s got a job to do, knows he’s already got a solid team at his side, and looks forward to seeing how the other films will play into the “Avengers.”

“I think its important that I do what I’m supposed to do which is keep my side of the street clean,” said Downey. “The danger you run with colliding all these worlds is [director] Jon [Favreau] was very certain that ‘Iron Man’ should be set in a very realistic world. Nothing that happened in ‘Iron Man’ is really outside the realm of possibility. Once you start talking about Valhalla and supersized super soldiers and jolly green giants it warrants much further discussion.”

How do you think they'll integrate Thor into the Avengers? Will they go the peace loving hippy Ultimates version or the "I say thee nay" version of the original Marvel Universe? Who should play Thor? Should they follow the original Ultimates storyline where they fight the Hulk in the opening scenes and then stash Banner in the vaults, before taking on the shape shifting Skrulls? Will Hawkeye be in it?
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The Incredible Hulk 2 should be happening. Tim Blake Nelson is in as the Leader but he's not sure if Ed Norton will be there.

MTV have been speaking to Tim Blake Nelson (Dr. Samel Stern) about his reappearance in The Incredible Hulk sequel as the villainous Leader.

Fans of this past summer’s “The Incredible Hulk” had a smile put on their faces recently when producer Gale Anne Hurd revealed to MTV News that a proper sequel for the big green guy was very much in the works. As it turns out, they weren’t the only ones.

“I know Gale Ann was talking to you guys about that recently, and I liked hearing it,” beamed an enthusiastic Tim Blake Nelson when MTV spoke with him recently, telling us that he’s on board with Hurd’s plan to have him play the villainous Leader in the next film.

These days, the talented writer/director/actor is in a dark editing bay assembling “Leaves of Grass,” a quirky 2009 drama that features Edward Norton in a dual performance. Nelson told us that during the shooting of “Leaves,” he and Norton sometimes spoke about their recent blockbuster experience, but he still can’t say with confidence that Norton will return following his rumored falling-out with Marvel Studios.

“We talked about [‘Hulk’] a little bit, yeah; we made some jokes about it,” Nelson remembered. “It’s all good, and I really do hope [the sequel] happens, for all sorts of reasons. But yeah, we did, we had a great time on ‘Hulk’ together. I’m eager to do ‘Hulk 2’ if they make it.”

But with stars like Robert Downey Jr. and Samuel L. Jackson continuing to talk themselves up for 2011’s epic “Avengers” flick, and Hulk expected to be a character in that film, Norton has become suspiciously tight-lipped on the topic of future adventures as Bruce Banner. So, with each passing month, it seems more likely that the next Hulk appearance will replace him with another actor just as he did with Eric Bana.

“I feel Edward and I are well-suited for one another. It’s really fun collaborating with him, and he made these characters [in ‘Hulk’ and ‘Leaves’] better,” explained Nelson, revealing that although he’d prefer not to, he would return even if Norton is removed from the series.

“Well, I’m signed on to do ‘Hulk 2’ and ‘3’ whether Edward’s there or not, so it’s not even up to me,” he explained. “When I agreed to do ‘Hulk,’ I signed off for two sequels, so it’s a moot question. I certainly hope Edward is on the sequel — but that’s up to Marvel and Edward.”

Either way, whenever Marvel and Gale Ann Hurd come calling for the “Hulk” sequel, Tim Blake Nelson says he’s fully prepared to show off his great big brain. “Oh, I already did [research into The Leader] when I was doing [Dr. Samuel] Sterns, because I felt that it would be helpful to lay in stuff as Sterns for what The Leader would be,” he explained of the super-intelligent baddie with a desire to take over the world. “So, that was all part of doing Sterns.”

If Ed Norton didn't return who would you like to see play Banner? Should Norton return?
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The Real Incredible Hulk!

This is the "Incredible Hulk" or the Samson of our times. He got married 28 times and has fathered 35 sons and daughters. The eldest, Sameh, is 24 years old, while the youngest, Sayyed, is only three. Medical tests have proven that his strength equals 260 horsepower. He can bend a metal coin with his eye socket or his tongue. Then he breaks it in two with his bare hands. Sayyed Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah is a gifted man. You daren't call him anything else!

A big hello to all the people who found this site on the RONNIE.cz Forum. Hope you like the site and thanks for visiting (Thanks to Starik for mentioning this article on the forum). If you get a chance let me know what you think of the site and sign the guestbook.

Hi Starik, in response to your question on your forum (hope I translated it right as I had to use an internet translation doohickey) it's not an automated response above. It's just little old me seeing people visiting my site, having a look where they are coming from and saying a big thank you and welcome to all new visitors to the site. Cheers from LFF.

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Is Thor in the Incredible Hulk? Not really

After Captain America was spotted in the blink and you miss it bit of the deleted opening of the Incredible Hulk, now someone reckons they have seen Thor. They let Film School Rejects know and, like me, they think it is all wishful thinking. I can't really see what they are getting at to be honest. Maybe in the Thor movie they could have a Hulk cameo with the same scene with Hulk roaring at the Thunder and Thor's perspective on the matter. Anyhoo, here is the screenshot. Do you see Thor, dead people, Galactus or just a load of clouds? If you squint it looks a little like Jack Skellington from Nightmare Before Christmas!
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Samuel L Jackson to be Nick Fury in lots of Marvel Films

Actor Samuel L. Jackson is preparing for a busy 2009 - he's aiming to feature in a whole host of movie comics after he was revealed as comic superspy Nick Fury at the end of Iron Man.

The Pulp Fiction star will play a key part in the sequel to this summer's Marvel blockbuster - but he's also hoping his character will appear in the forthcoming big-screen adaptations of Captain America, Thor and The Avengers.

He tells MTV.com, "Should be some little piece of all of that. I should kinda pass through Iron Man 2, Captain America, Thor - all those things - and eventually get to that Avengers space, yeah.

"They sorta gave me a master plan about how they want it to work... (But) I'll do every movie they wanna do. I'm down."
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Favreau talks Stark's alcohol addiction, Branagh doing Thor and how Captain America fits in

AICN have got the second part of their interview with Jon Favreau posted. He goes into immense detail about the making of Iron Man and what will be in the sequels. What interested me was what he had to say about Tony Stark's alcohol addiction from the Demon in a Bottle storyline.

Jon Favreau: We’re definitely going to use alcohol, but alcohol isn’t a shadow, I don’t think. I think addiction is something you use to anesthetize yourself when you’re dealing with something deeper. And if you look at twelve step programs, that are probably the most effective way of dealing with an addiction, you’ll see that they spend very little time dealing with the actual thing you’re addicted to: substance. Most of the steps become about dealing with your spiritual health and delving deeper into what’s underneath the addiction.

And I think in that respect it’s very telling as to what… it’s a matter of discovering what Tony Stark’s issues are that he’s dealing with that’s causing him to drink, causing him to womanize, causing him to escape and run in whatever way he does. And that’s what’s compelling especially when you have a guy like Robert, who can really handle this kind of a storyline. Of course you don’t want to overwhelm the film. I want to maintain the tone we had with the first one, for the most part. Nolan has cornered the market on that tone and does it well. It’s not what I do well or what I want to see in IRON MAN.

And so you have to have enough of it to inform the story and I think that EMPIRE STRIKES BACK really walked that line very well. I wouldn’t call it a dark movie but it definitely was for real, it definitely had some emotional resonance to it. It wasn’t just a videogame. So, we try to study who did it right.

And I feel pretty at ease because typically the number two movies are… you sort of the best of both worlds, where you know what you’re doing, you’ve got your team together, and you’ve got your cast, and you have your basic things, and it’s how do you expand out from that? And the audience is ready and accepting, you don’t have to prove yourself to them, they’re coming expecting a good time. And you could really do stuff that you can’t do in the first one, now that the origin story is out of the way. And with the villains and the playfulness and the dialogue we have between us and the fans of the books where you start to pick through forty years of books and try to find villains and storylines that apply to both the Cold War context in which IRON MAN was presented, as well as what could work with the headlines today. What pays homage to the tradition of this storyline and what does not seem ridiculous when it hits film.

So it’s preserving the soul of the experience while having enough reference, so that there are moments where the fans are rewarded for having followed his stories are so long and not frustrated by that. Often times people who are fans of comic books go see the movie and enjoy it less than people who don’t know anything about the heroes because they’re so frustrated by how many leaps and liberties they took with the source material.

In IRON MAN I think the fans actually enjoyed the movie more than the people who didn’t know what was going on and I think that should be it, you should have stuff in the margins for people who have dedicated themselves to following this and were excited when they heard it got made and they’re the first ones in line to see it. You don’t want them to be disappointed, you want them to have an even richer experience. And then have their friends turn to them and say “I don’t understand who’s that guy with the eye patch” you know what I mean? That’s when it becomes fun. When I saw LORD OF THE RINGS I felt good that I had read the book LORD OF THE RINGS. It enriched the experience for me...

... we named like the pilots’ call sign was Whiplash One and Two. There are little things here and there… and the Ten Rings and if you look at the flag of the Ten Rings, you’ll see that the writing… it looks like it’s Arabic but it’s actually Mongolian writing on the flags.

So, we were really paying attention, of course now it becomes more and more difficult because we’re weaving… it has to culminate in the AVENGERS. Which, although I won’t be directing it, I’ll be involved with it as an executive producer and I would feel really disappointed if what good will we’ve curried from IRON MAN 1 and hopefully 2, is not lived up to in the AVENGERS.

Then he goes on to confirm that Kenneth Branagh is going to be directing Thor and how all of the Marvel Studios movies will tie together.

Jon Favreau: And I’m going to get a little more involved now with what goes on with the other movies. I’m very excited about Kenneth Branagh, I can’t wait to see his take on THOR and we’re really looking at the Cap stuff, very closely.

For one because we put the shield in there and Tony’s legacy… Howard Stark’s legacy somehow is related to… there’s some relationship between Tony’s father and what was going on in World War II, in the Marvel Universe, and Shield, so we’re trying to lay some pipe here so that when it all happens it feels somewhat inevitable.

But there are a lot of tonal challenges that are going to take place, more so in the other films I think. THOR has a tremendously… that’s going to be the most difficult one to integrate into this reality. And if it can be properly done then you get a great version of AVENGERS. If not, AVENGERS is going to seem like ROGER RABBIT with different cartoon characters from different worlds, you have Betty Boop next to Daffy Duck next to Donald Duck you know. (laughs)

And I don’t know that’s the experience it should feel like, it should feel like a unified Marvel Universe. And I know that the Marvel guys are very, very vigilant about that.

What do you think of all that?

Iron Man will definitely be in the Avengers movie.

Marvel has announced today (the full press release can be found on SuperHeroHype) that Robert Downey Jr. will appear in both Iron Man 2 and The Avengers as Tony Stark, with Jon Favreau set to direct Iron Man 2 and executive produce The Avengers. Additionally, Marvel confirms the announcement made a few weeks ago surrounding Don Cheadle replacing Terrence Howard as Col. James "Rhodey" Rhodes. Cheadle is officially signed on to appear in Iron Man 2 and other Iron Man sequels (and presumably spin-offs) as well as The Avengers. Additionally, Marvel confirms that the full line-up will include: Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk and more.

It's happening. It has begun. After years of waiting, we're finally going to get the ultimate crossover movie that we've all been dreaming of! Jon Favreau will be directing this, as initially rumored. Marvel also said, "In a movie event, The Avengers will bring together the super hero team of Marvel Comics characters for the first time ever, including Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk and more, as they are forced to band together to battle the biggest foe they've ever faced."

Who do you think the big bad could be? Who could play Cap and Thor?
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