In this edition of The Week in Spandex, we look at Captain America: Civil War, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Daredevil, Spider-Man, X-Men, Fantastic Four, Suicide Squad, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Flash, Lobo, Arrow, Supergirl, Heroes Reborn and more…
We’ll get things underway this week with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and as production ramped up on Marvel Studios’ Phase Three-launching Captain America: Civil War, a whole bunch of spy photos have landed online this week, offering up a look at the likes of Cap (Chris Evans), Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Crossbones (Frank Grillo) in costume [see here and here], as well as co-stars Robert Downey Jr. (Tony Stark) and Paul Rudd (Scott Lang) visiting the Atlanta set [see here]. Meanwhile, if you’ve been wondering whose funeral Steve Rogers was visiting last week – and you don’t mind spoilers – then we have the answer for you here…
…In another piece of Cap-related news, animated storyboards for an alternate opening to Captain America: The Winter Soldier has arrived online, which you can watch here…
…It may have been knocked from the top of the box office last weekend by Pitch Perfect 2 and Mad Max: Fury Road, but Avengers: Age of Ultron has continued its march up the list of the all-time highest-grossing movies, and is currently sitting in eighth place with $1.154 billion, just behind Iron Man 3 in seventh with $1.215 billion. This week has also seen the release of animated storyboards which provide an alternate take on the Hulk vs. Hulkbuster fight [see here] and a featurette exploring the creation of the opening battle against Hydra [see here], while Flickering Myth’s Anthony Stokes has responded to the criticism against Joss Whedon for his handling of the Black Widow with the op-ed ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron, Sexism and Hollywood‘…
…With less than two months to go until its release, Marvel has given us a peek at its newest franchise Ant-Man with a TV spot offering up some new snippets of footage from the Peyton Reed-directed film, while LEGO has also unveiled its LEGO Marvel Super Heroes Ant-Man Final Battle set [check out some promo images here], and Flickering Myth’s James Garcia has posted an op-ed asking ‘Did Avengers: Age of Ultron negate the one thing that makes Ant-Man special?‘…
…We know he’ll be returning as Star-Lord for Guardians of the Galaxy 2, but it seems we’ll be seeing plenty more of Chris Pratt in the MCU, with the actor revealing this week that: “I’m tied to doing three more, or five more, Guardians of the Galaxy… you know, two more Guardians plus another couple.” So, Infinity War Part 1 and Part 2? Or a couple of post-credits scenes during Phase Three..?
…Illustrator Ryan Meinerding has given us a peek at the design process for Daredevil’s red costume in the Netflix series, releasing a piece of concept art as well as discussing the thinking behind the design [see here]…
…Matthew McConaughey revealed this week that he’s “circled” several Marvel and DC scripts, and sure enough it only took a few hours for a “scoop” to surface, with a (wild and completely unsubstantiated?) report claiming that Sony wants the Oscar winner for the role of Norman Osborn for 2017’s Spider-Man reboot…
…Despite announcing its latest X-Men expansion The New Mutants just last week in an effort to expand its superhero output, 20th Century Fox co-CCO James Murdoch has stated this week that the studio is looking beyond comic book movies for its franchise output: “We don’t want to be a place where people say ‘if it’s not a comic book movie, or something else, then I wouldn’t even take it to them’. We think that [X-Men and Fantastic Four are] a really rich part of that universe to sort of mine, but we don’t want to be a film business that’s only making one type of picture, we want to be a film business that has a real diversity of output…”
…In the meantime, Fox will launch its next superhero franchise hopeful this August with Fantastic Four, and this week has brought some new promotional artwork from the reboot featuring Marvel’s first family, as well as a TV spot which sees Reed (Miles Teller), Sue (Kate Mara), Johnny (Michael B. Jordan) and Ben (Jamie Bell) demonstrating their powers [see here]…
…With Fantastic Four almost upon us, Michael B. Jordan has posted a lengthy response to critics of his casting as Johnny Storm in the upcoming reboot: “It used to bother me, but it doesn’t anymore. I can see everybody’s perspective, and I know I can’t ask the audience to forget 50 years of comic books. But the world is a little more diverse in 2015 than when the Fantastic Four comic first came out in 1961. Plus, if Stan Lee writes an email to my director saying, “You’re good. I’m okay with this,” who am I to go against that..?”
…Click below to continue on for Suicide Squad, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Flash, Lobo, Arrow, Supergirl, Heroes Reborn and more…
Originally published May 23, 2015. Updated November 29, 2022.
