In 2006, Marvel Studios made their first official appearance at Comic-Con in San Diego ready to announce new movies based on Marvel Comics characters Iron Man and the Hulk, to be directed by Jon Favreau and Louis Letterier. For Kevin Feige, who had already been involved with most of the Marvel movies going back to X-Men, he knew they had a lot of bad and disappointing previous Marvel movies to get past, including an earlier Hulk movie by Ang Lee. Could the director of Elf turn things around and deliver a movie that lives up to the adventures of Marvel’s characters in comic book form?
Now it’s nearly six years later and Marvel Studios has already proven itself with global hits like Iron Man, which grossed $582 million worldwide, its even more successful sequel and last year’s Thor ($450 million globally) and Captain America: The First Avenger ($368 million). It’s been fairly well known for some time and by almost everyone that all of these characters were being introduced to finally come together for Marvel’s The Avengers and that movie has now come to fruition, directed by “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” creator Joss Whedon (another unlikely candidate to direct a big action movie!), and so far, it’s gotten some of the best reviews of any Marvel Studios movie to date. (Our own Scott Chitwood gave it a 9.5 out of 10!)
This seemed like a perfectly good time to get back on the phone with Feige and find out a little more about what goes into making a huge superteam movie like The Avengers work. You can read the interview at SuperHeroHype!
