Marvel fans have plenty to look forward to over the next couple of years, with Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy building to the release of The Avengers 2 in 2015. However, with Iron Man 3 getting Phase Two of the MCU off to a billion dollar start, Marvel Studios is wasting little time in formulating its plans for a third cycle of movies. So far, all we know for certain is that Edgar Wright’s long-awaited Ant-Man will kick-off things off in 2015, but speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Marvel’s President of Production and super producer extraordinaire Kevin Feige has offered a few new comments on several potential projects, including… deep breath… Doctor Strange, Iron Man 4, Inhumans, Runaways, Daredevil, The Punisher, Blade, Ghost Rider and even Marvel Zombies! Here’s what he had to say…
On Doctor Strange: “I would love Strange to be a part of [Phase Three], only because he’s a great character. He’s a great standalone character. He’s got a great origin story, for the most part. And that world of pure magic, we haven’t done yet. There’s a whole supernatural/magic alternate dimension going on in the Marvel comics that we haven’t ever touched on. So I think that’s exciting [and] I think there’s any number of actors who would be chomping at the bit to play this guy.”
On Iron Man 4: “I believe there will be a fourth Iron Man film and a fifth and a sixth and a 10th and a 20th. I see no reason why Tony Stark can’t be as evergreen as James Bond. Or Batman for that matter. Or Spider-Man. I think Iron Man is a character just like that.”
On Daredevil, The Punisher, Ghost Rider and Blade: “All those characters are back. They all have potential, but I think we need to find the right time. We’re not going to say, we got it back — make it.”
On Inhumans: “Inhumans is cool, they’re really great characters. The most powerful guy is the king who doesn’t say a word and if he does — lookout. That’s awesome. And the notion of the Terrigen Mists, this notion that you go through and don’t know what you’re going to be on the other side, is incredibly compelling dramatically… All the craziness that comes with Inhumans, we’ve done in the other movies already. But this would have some of the social drama that we haven’t really done yet. [Fox’s] X-Men, obviously, has been touching on that stuff for a while.”
On Runaways: “It’s a matter of where it fits. The way the business is working now, you either have really inexpensive, sort of surprise movies that can come out and be hits, but don’t cost much. Or you have the big giant summer blockbusters that really swing for the fences. Right now, we’re just swinging for the fences every time. Runaways sort of falls in between those, in a way. We just haven’t found where or how to do it… right now.”
And finally, on a potential Marvel Zombies adaptation: “I know… Zombies is such a funny thing because its such a cool comic and it’s such a cool idea, but the bigger profile becomes what starts to happen [with fans]. Are you going to draw figures in chalk with your 3-year-old with Hulk eating someone? Or Captain America with his brains coming out of the top of his head? Probably not…”
Of course, Marvel does have several other potential Phase Three properties at its disposal, and the full article covers some other possibilities, including the long-rumoured Black Panther movie and another Incredible Hulk feature, so be sure to head on over to EW to check it out.
Originally published May 17, 2013. Updated December 13, 2019.
