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Ten minutes after the grand finale of Comic-Con is supposed to start in the 6,100-seat Hall H tonight, a chant begins: We want Marvel! We want Marvel! We want Marvel!
The lights go down. The panel begins with a flashback reel of highlights from all the past Marvel movies plays,
leading into a new trailer for Guardians of the Galaxy (out next Friday.) It ends with a long look at Josh Brolin as the cosmic villain Thanos in a throne that is free-floating in space.“It always starts with you guys in this room,” says Kevin Feige, chief of Marvel Studios. “What we’re going to talk about today is 2015. We have a movie called Avengers: Age of Ultron coming out. Then we have something new — Ant-Man is finally coming out.”
Feige introduces the cast: Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas, Corey Stoll, and Evangeline Lilly, along with director Peyton Reed, who started by giving his Comic-Con bona fides (an important part of this presentation, since the
Yes Man and
Bring It On director is taking over for beloved geek-icon Edgar Wright, who dropped out of the film in May after eight years of development.)
Reed said it was his 20th anniversary for Comic-Con, and that the first year he attended was the year iconic Marvel comic book artist Jack Kirby died. “I’ve been every year since then, minus a couple years where I was shooting,” he said.
Rudd and Douglas, however, have never been to Comic-Con before. “I’m popping my Comic-Con cherry,” Rudd said.
“I’ve popped enough cherries,” Douglas added.
Hall H is getting a little R-rated.
ANT-MAN
Marvel zoomed in on the upcoming
Ant-Man movie at Comic-Con, revealing the very first details about this new story about the incredible shrinking hero.
Stoll will be donning the costume of the villain Yellowjacket. It’s also a fair bet that Lilly will sport a pair of tiny wings and do a shrinking act of her own as Wasp — although that wasn’t confirmed in the panel. (Lilly’s participation, although widely rumored, was never made official before now.)
First, you need to know that spoilers await. Second, remember that the movie actually features two Ant-Men from comic book lore: Douglas as Dr. Henry Pym, a physicist and entomologist who in the 1970s took Steve Martin’s catchphrase “Let’s get small” a little too seriously.
He discovered the particle that makes shrinking possible, built a suit that harnessed the ability to miniaturize, and also devised technology that allowed the teeny-tiny to communicate with creepy-crawlies.But … like many geniuses,
Hank Pym is a troubled soul, prone to outbursts and hot-tempered. In the comics, he is infamous for once slapping his wife – Janet Van Dyne, a.k.a. The Wasp. Marvel revealed that
a ugly history with his wife has led to estrangement from his daughter, Hope (played by Lilly.)“Hi, I’m in it!” Lilly said. “Glad to be here. Thanks, guys!” She can’t say more, because she says she hasn’t seen the script. So here’s a little background, courtesy of Douglas:
In the film, the business Pym’s research helped create has been taken away from him, operating under control of the villain, Darren Cross (played by Corey Stoll of
Midnight in Paris and
House of Cards.) In the original backstory,
Cross created a high-tech pacemaker that mutated him, leading to numerous heart transplants – often performed by doctors he had kidnapped.“I was Hank Pym’s mentee, a genius scientist as well. I’ve taken over the company, and some judgmental people may think it’s going in an evil direction, but I’m just taking it into the future,” Stoll said.
“He obtains some Pym particles and obtains a suit called the Yellowjacket suit, and ends up causing a lot of havoc,” Feige added.
This leads to an inevitable clash with Scott Lang, the Ant-Man played by Rudd in the film. Lang is a thief who partners with Pym to steal back the tech Pym created. But Lang is also the hero of this story, so there is a noble reason behind his decision to pull off the heist. (In the comics, it was to rescue one of the doctors taken by Cross so that she could help treat his ailing daughter.)
The panel ended with a clip (something made special for Comic-Con, since the film doesn’t start shooting until next month.)
It’s a lingering shot of a laboratory with voiceover of Douglas and Rudd arguing. Pym is trying to convince Lang to do the heist, but Lang is reluctant. “Jesus Christ,” Douglas’ character says. “I think somebody already shrunk your balls. Don’t worry, Scott. It’s a small job.”AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON
Now most of the cast of
Avengers: Age of Ultron has taken the stage, starting with returning members: Robert Downey Jr., Jeremy Renner, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Evans, Samuel L. Jackson, and Cobie Smulders. (Not present: Scarlett Johansson, who is in the late stage of pregnancy and probably not traveling, and writer-director Joss Whedon, who is also pregnant and not traveling.)
Then come the newcomers — all of them bad guys: James Spader (Ultron), Elizabeth Olsen (Scarlet Witch), Paul Bettany (The Vision), and Aaron Taylor-Johnson (Quicksilver.)
“I become a little less significant each time,” Downey said, noting all his previous appearances at this Comic-Con showcase.Ruffalo adds, “They sure don’t treat me like this at home,”
which leads to audience chants of HULK! HULK! HULK! HULK!Hemsworth made note a new change in the Marvel comic-book universe: Thor is now a woman.
“I don’t want to speak too early and jinx it, but I think that could be my Oscar,” the actor said.Bettany discusses making the transition from the voice of Iron Man’s mechanical butler J.A.R.V.I.S. to the super powered synthezoid The Vision. “I used to show up at a dark room for 45 minutes and get a bag of cash,” Bettany said. “Now I have to work.”
Spader had this to reveal about Ultron: It’s weird.
“I play an 8-foot robot in this movie,” Spader said. “I’ve always played humans up until now.” Playing the blood-thirsty bot was “surprising and challenging and exciting,” he added.
Olsen drew deep “oooohs” from the audience for describing the Scarlet Witch in the film: “There are mutated people …”“You can’t say that!” someone from the audience called out. (“Mutant” is a term from the Marvel Comics that is licensed to Fox for its X-Men films, and can’t be used in the separate Avengers-verse.)
The absent
Johansson sent a cell phone video to introduce the clip: “Hey guys I don’t mean to cramp your style but I’m running out of time here. Hey Kev, you want to be a doll and roll that video footage?”The footage comes from a scene described recently in Entertainment Weekly:
A post-battle party where the Avengers are gathered for food, drink, and fellowship in the penthouse of Tony Stark’s Manhattan skyscraper. A party game is underway: Who can lift Thor’s hammer?“If I lift it, do a I get to rule Asgard?” Stark asks before straining mightily – and fruitlessly – to lift it from a table. “I’ll be right back,” Stark says, and returns with a rocket-powered Iron Man glove on his forearm.
Still no luck. Don Cheadle appears as War Machine, also wearing a booster glove (pulling on the Iron Man glove Stark is wearing.) Even the two of them can’t lift it.
Bruce Banner: nope, he falls away (although, to be fair, he didn’t Hulk-out to try.)
Then Captain America reaches down and … the hammer budges a little, and Thor comes into focus in the background, his smile dropping. But then, no, the hammer moves no further, and the worried look blossoms back into a grin.
Black Widow doesn’t try. “That’s not a question I need to answer,” she says.Stark tries to understand the magical logic. “What is it … Who is carrying Thor’s fingerprint?”
“That’s a very interesting theory,” Thor says.
“I have simpler one: You’re all not worthy.”That’s where the fun and games end as an electronic wail fills the penthouse.
A staggering, horrific robot staggers out of the shadows: Ultron, in a rough, terrifying, crippled “first edition.”He is an artificial intelligence designed to help the Avengers battle global threats, but his hyper-intelligence and ability to self-teach has led him to a grim conclusion:
Human beings are the ones who must go.“You want to protect the world, but you don’t want it to change,” Spader’s electric-razor voice intones.
“There’s only one path to peace: Your extinction.”Ultron will no longer be a puppet of the Avengers, and the
ensuing flashes of devastation play out over a creepy rendition of the Pinocchio song “I’ve Got No Strings.”We also see an enraged,
out-of-control Hulk facing down with Stark in his towering Hulkbuster armor, fighting it out in the street with cars as bludgeons.
“I have a vision,” Ultron’s voice continues. “The whole world screaming for mercy. Everyone tangled up in strings.”
The footage ends with Tony Stark standing beside Captain America’s shield, which has been torn in half. He looks up, and all the Avengers are sprawled in the rubble around him, seemingly dead.It’s a grim image, but … that can’t be.
The good guys always, always win. Just like in real life.
As soon as it ends,
Josh Brolin emerges wearing a toy Infinity Gauntlet and waving to the crowd as Thanos. It’s a little more Guardians promotion — but not the last.THE BIG FINISH
Feige says: “Now one more thing…”
Chris Pratt and
Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn appear in a video clip to announce that next week’s movie already has a sequel. “I really wish we could announce
Guardians 2,” Gunn says.
“How much trouble would I get in?” Pratt asked.
“They already told us we’re greenlit, so let’s just say July 28, 2017,” Gunn said.So there you have it.
“That would be awesome …” Pratt says, hanging his head.
“I wish we had the balls,” Gunn concludes.
And so does the Marvel Studios panel for Comic-Con 2014.
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