Marvel Hopes to Conjure Up Streaming Magic With ‘WandaVision’
More than a decade ago, Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige and filmmaker Jon Favreau were sitting in a Beverly Hills conference room, deep into preproduction on the first Iron Man film. Feige remarked they’d be working together a lot over the next few years on the film. Favreau had a more expansive perspective on their relationship. “He goes, ‘No, if this goes well, we’ll be together for the next 10 years,'” recalls Feige. “That was about 13 years ago, so he was right.” However many later, The Mandalorian creator Favreau and Feige are not only behind giant films, they are also key to Disney+’s strategy of bringing big-budget projects from the worlds of Star Wars and Marvel to the small screen. On Friday, Favreau’s friend and former boss Feige is following in his footsteps by debuting WandaVision, Marvel’s first scripted series for Disney+. WandaVision comes 14 months after Disney+ launched with The Mandalorian, the hit Star Wars series that has helped power the streaming service to 86.8 million paid subscribers.
Kevin Feige Confirms ‘Deadpool 3’ Is an MCU Movie; Teases R-Rating and When It’s Filming
There were a lot of questions that arose when Disney bought 20th Century Fox, but one big question Marvel fans had was about the future of the Deadpool franchise. Only just a few short years ago, the low-budget, R-rated superhero movie paid off for Fox in a big way, becoming its most prized superhero property. A sequel was immediately greenlit, but the victory lap was short-lived as Disney swooped in and Fox’s future Deadpool plans were put on hold. Clearly Disney wouldn’t throw away a franchise and character as valuable as Deadpool, but questions remained regarding how the R-rated property would fit into the exclusively PG-13 box of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Well as it turns out, pretty neatly. Collider’s own Steve Weintraub recently spoke with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige in anticipation of Marvel’s first Disney+ series WandaVision, and during their conversation Feige gave a promising update on Deadpool 3, revealed when filming will begin, and most importantly, confirmed the sequel will be part of the MCU.
How Disney Will Approach Black Panther 2 Without Chadwick Boseman
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been on pause for longer than expected, as the delay of Black Widow and Eternals has made the wait for Phase Four even longer. But Kevin Feige and the powers that be at Marvel Studios are still working on a number of exciting projects, including the development of Black Panther 2. And now Feige has explained how Wakanda is being approached in the wake of Chadwick Boseman’s unexpected death. Black Panther was a massive success when it hit theaters, catapulting Chadwick Boseman into superstardom and making him a real-life hero for countless young people. Director Ryan Coogler will return for the previously announced sequel, although Boseman’s death to colon cancer back in August resulted in a ton of questions about the franchise’s future.
A fair and democratic election will decide the X-Men’s future
ItIt might be a new year in the real world, but on the mutant nation of Krakoa, everything’s new all the time. What’s the newest news? The X-Men — the team —is coming back, after being formally disbanded as unnecessary (and maybe even politically dangerous) when Krakoa was formed. But there’s a twist! All the members of Krakoa’s first official X-Men team will be democratically elected by all mutants! So that’ll be an interesting toy for the X-Men writers to play around with. What else is happening in the pages of our favorite comics? We’ll tell you. Welcome to a Giant-Size edition of Monday Funnies, Polygon’s usually-weekly list of the books that our comics editor enjoyed. She was off recently for the holidays and so you’re getting three weeks in one! It’s part society pages of superhero lives, part reading recommendations, part “look at this cool art.” There may be some spoilers. There may not be enough context. But there will be great comics.
Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man 3 Return Can Setup MCU’s Venom Crossover
Tobey Maguire looks set to reprise his earlier iteration of Peter Parker in the MCU’s Spider-Man 3 — which could actually fuel the eventual clash between Tom Holland’s web-slinger and Tom Hardy’s titular antihero from Venom. Following an unprecedented deal between Sony and Marvel Studios, custody of Spider-Man has been shared. Holland debuted within the Marvel Cinematic Universe back in 2016 and has since fought (and battled alongside) such heroes as Iron Man, Captain America, and the Guardians of the Galaxy multiple times. Meanwhile, Sony established its own pocket cinematic universe centered around classic Spider-Man allies and adversaries. The endeavor was officially kicked off in 2018 with Venom. Despite mixed critical reception, the film was a box office success. As a result, a sequel titled Venom: Let There Be Carnage was rapidly greenlit. Officially dubbed the Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel characters, 2021 was also confirmed to mark the release of Morbius.
Kevin Feige Explains Why ‘Secret Invasion’ Is Headed To Disney+ As A Series, Instead Of The Big Screen
This week, an entirely new storytelling avenue opens for the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the launch of its first live-action Disney+ series, WandaVision. Though we’ve seen small-screen tie-ins to the MCU before in the form of series like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige has been clear that the Disney+ era will feature streaming series with much more direct ties to the big-screen future of the universe, as the shows feed into the films and the films feed into the shows. With that in mind, how do Feige and his team figure out what goes where? One of the biggest Marvel Studios Disney+ announcements so far — even with things like WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, and more in mind — came during Disney’s Investor Day presentation in December when Feige revealed that a series inspired by the comic book epic Secret Invasion would arrive on the streaming service in the future. Secret Invasion, as you may have heard, is a 2008 comic book storyline that features the shapeshifting aliens known as the Skrulls infiltrating Earth by abducting various Marvel heroes and taking their place, destablizing the entire superhero community and, by extension, the Earth itself. It’s a massive, massive story, and fans have been speculating about its inclusion ever since Captain Marvel introduced the Skrulls to the MCU. So, why is that happening on the small-screen, and not in some massive blockbuster movie epic five years from now?
Ubisoft is making an open-world Star Wars game
The studio behind The Division is making a game set in a galaxy far, far away, according to a report from Wired. Today, Ubisoft announced that its Swedish studio Massive Entertainment is making an open-world video game that’s set in the Star Wars universe. There are no details on when the game will launch, on what platforms, or what slice of the Star Wars universe it will explore. The game will be built using Ubisoft’s own Snowdrop engine, which is best known as the tech behind The Division series. Earlier this week, Disney rebranded its game division to Lucasfilm Games for what it described as “a new era.” Since then, the company announced not only Ubisoft’s Star Wars game, but also an Indiana Jones title from Bethesda studio MachineGames. Previously, EA was the main developer behind blockbuster Star Wars titles, which resulted in games like the Battlefront reboots, open-world adventure Jedi: Fallen Order, and last year’s space combat game Squadrons. Disney says that relationship will continue even as other developers work on Star Wars games as well.
