Back in Business!
As it is with most of our superheroes, so is the way of this blog; Nothing stays dead and gone forever. In the spirit of that, I decided to make a second attempt at keeping this thing updated regularly. I could explain why nothing has happened here for so long, but why talk about life when we can talk about what’s really important? comics.
First of all, my latest entry here revolved around the death of Peter Parker. At that point, I predicted Parker would be back within a year or less and as it turned out I was a bit off on that. The Superior Spider-Man, with Dr. Ock’s mind in Spidey’s body, lasted for 31 issues, about 14 months. I’ll admit, it was kind of fun seeing Spider-Man acting a little more villainous and selfish. But thankfully and damn straight rightfully so, Parker is now back in the red and blue, web covered outfit. No more superior, simply your good old fashioned, friendly-neighborhood Spider-Man.
Of course, tons and tons of other things has happened both in the MU and comics in general, new movies and what not. It would be impossible to try and get it all in here, too much time with too many news and changes. So instead I decided to list some of the most important and biggest in my own opinion.
Guardians of the Galaxy came out last year and smashed everything. Of course it did, how could it not with a talking, gun slinging raccoon, voiced to perfection by Bradley Cooper. And let’s not forget Chris Pratt aka Peter Quill/Star-Lord. Easily the best casting in Marvel film history to date. There is no longer any Chris Pratt, there is only the Star-Lord. Soundtrack hit the spot, as no soundtrack has ever done for me before and I’m still muttering ooga-chaka, ooga-chaka, all the time. Even though The Avengers and Guardians are two extremely different teams and worlds, making it difficult to compare the two, I’m torn between favorite MCU directors now; Joss Whedon or James Gunn? Calling it a tie and loving them both seems to be the best solution.
Staying in the Marvel Cinematic Universe for a minute, I have to talk about their big announcement last November. At a press conference, head of studios Kevin Fiege announced their film slate, going as far ahead as 2019. Once phase 2 ends with Ant-Man in November this year and more importantly before that, Avengers: Age of Ultron in May, the final and third phase of the MCU commences in 2016. On May 6, Captain America: Civil War premieres. Fans of the comics will know that this title means Cap vs. Iron Man. How the story is handled on the big screen is yet unknown, but one thing is for sure; Only one of the two will walk away at the end of it. More than that, Cap 3 is set to introduce the long awaited arrival of the Black Panther, T'Challa, King of the fictional African nation Wakanda. A solo film is set for 2018.
Following Civil War comes the debut of the mystical and magic parts of Marvel with Doctor Strange, November 2016. Benedict Cumberbatch has been cast as the sorcerer supreme Stephen Strange.
GotG 2 is coming may 2017, nothing is known about this except the cast, crew and director returns and we can expect new characters. Perhaps that cocoon spotted in the Collectors museum was Adam Warlock’s? Wouldn’t that be something.
Thor: Ragnarok, November same year, promises to reinvent the character and franchise as a whole, same way Winter Soldier did for Cap. As we all know, at least those of us living in Scandinavia, Ragnarok means the end of everything, doomsday etc. so expect major outcome from this one.
Then the biggest thing of the whole press conference, the announcement of the culmination of everything the MCU has been building forward to. Avengers: Infinity War part 1 is released on May 4 2018 and part 2 on May 3 2019. The Infinity War subtitle means the long awaited confrontation with Thanos, whom we can expect to have collected the infinity stones and therefore wielding the infinity gauntlet. Very, very bad for everyone.
Between the two IW parts, we have aforementioned Black Panther in 17 and in 18 we get the debut of a female solo Marvel character Ms. Carol Danvers aka Captain Marvel.
Concluding the Phase 3 brings us a little something already touched upon in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s second season, the Inhumans. Blackagar Boltagon/Black Bolt, the king of the Inhumans, who’s voice can shatter mountains and leave cities in ruins, is an interesting add to the MCU, along with his wife Queen Medusa.
Lots and lots of great things happening in the MCU, but that’s not all. Marvel and Netflix together are producing four series of 13 episodes all leading to a fifth show, The Defenders. The four characters getting their own series are Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist. All of them are what you’d call the street-level kind of heroes, among other things meaning we can expect these shows to be darker, grittier and bloodier than the MCU. Daredevil recently released a first trailer and it looks good and it’s great to finally see DD portrayed in live action.
What’s that? Fox already made a theatrical release back in 2003?
Nah, can’t seem to recall that, must’ve been a fever induced nightmare. Anyways, DD’s first REAL live portrayal is coming this April, followed by JJ in November and the rest has yet to get a release date attached.
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| Manu Bennet- Slade Wilson/Deathstroke |
Staying in tv but switching to DC, I recommend both Arrow and The Flash. A funny thing they have in common; both shows has average to good lead and support actors in good guy roles, but in each show, it’s the villains that make them worth watching. From Arrow’s John Barrowman as Malcolm Merlyn/The Dark Archer, Manu Bennet as Slade Wilson/Deathstroke or the current third season’s Matt Nable as Ra’s Al Guhl and to The Flash’s Tom Cavanagh as Harrison Wells/Reverse-Flash, the supreme acting of the main antagonists, is what keeps me coming back.
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| Cavanagh is Harrison Wells/Reverse-Flash |
There’s also some sort of Batman related show going on, but somehow I didn’t care much for the idea of a Batman show not involving.. Well, Batman, imagine that.
Something that will involve Batman however, is the 2016 release of Batman VS. Superman: Dawn of Justice. This will be the first time ever they appear on live action film together and naturally it has the nerd community in a frenzy. Also because this film is set to mark the real beginning of a shared cinematic DC universe, much like Marvel’s. Difference is, the lead guy on DC’s front, Zack Snyder, is a no-talented hack. Yes, I’ll watch it, but considering the director, the mess that was Man of Steel and the fact that Ben Affleck is playing Batman, I keep my expectations low.
I could keep going on about the massive amounts of comic related stuff that’s happened the past two years, but these were a couple of the biggest I think. Lastly, I’d like to mention this summer’s big Marvel Crossover event, Secret Wars, which bring the word crossover to a whole new level. The Marvel universe is ending, this is what Jonathan Hickman’s run on the Avengers titles has been leading too. Speculation has it that this is Marvel’s attempt at a semi-reboot of their universe/continuity, similar to DC’s New 52 a couple of years back. All we can do is wait and see. In any case, Hickman’s Avengers has been some the best stories of these titles for years and years back and once it wraps up, I’ll do an entry on it here.
As usual, this ended up being longer than planned, nothing new there.
Hope you enjoyed and until next time, here’s a quote summing up well how sometimes it difficult to find the time for these looong posts:
“the older I get, the more life just seems to be all the stupid stuff, getting in between me and reading comics.” Danny Rand/Iron Fist.
Mo
