I pretty much hate doing Rumor Du Jour type of articles, because if it’s bullshit (which is quite often the case), then you’ve got chicken ova on your grill and you’ve helped foster yet another wild internet speculation that’s based on someone’s hearsay or tomfoolery. But on the other hand, if it pans out, and you don’t cover it, then that’s a pretty big oops hanging out there?
Be that as it may, there’s a story over at Pajiba that you may have already heard about. And that is that Joss Whedon is not only directing The Avengers, but he’ll be rewriting it…as well as The First Avenger: Captain America. For the first half of that headline, that’s not so much a surprise. Any director worth his salt is either going to do some reworking of the script to suit his vision, or work with his own guy(s) to get it done. But if Whedon takes a machete to the thing from Page 1, that is significant. And when that writer is Zak Penn, who’s been paying his mortgage with superhero franchise scripts the last few years, it’s even more so.
For Cap, word is that, at this point, Whedon’s role on Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely’s script will be at the polish level. Markus and McFeeley’s most significant work to date has been on the three Narnia films, as well as the teleplay for The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. Pajiba is claiming an exclusive source on this particular tidbit, and it may very well pan out to be true. I’ve already seen a couple of other sources reference the article. Still, never hurts to be wary until the deal is written in blood.
So, to play Devil’s Advocate here, if it’s legit, this would make a certain amount of sense, as Whedon may need to do some tweaking on Cap to get it to line up with his plans for Avengers. Cap, Thor and Iron Man are big, but Avengers is where it all has to really come together or all the planning, crossovers and the like have been for naught. But then again, there are also inherent dangers in giving so much of the Marvel theatrical universe over to one guy. Even if that guy is Joss Whedon.
So we’ll see how it all goes pretty soon I suspect. Consider yourself in the loop.
18 comments
Line. Crossed. When he was just directing, it's like fine, whatever. I don't really know who I would have direct the juggling act of the Avengers anyway so I guess Whedon is , while not an amzing choice, maybe at least a decent shot int he dark. But the LAST thing classic comic characters need is smirkng post modernism and Whedons brand of shitty cleverness spewing from their mouths every 30 seconds. I would say he had it in him to curb himself, but he certainly didn't do that with his terrible and pathetically overrated Astonishing X-Men run. I believe an actual line Wolverine says in that is "When is Colossus gonna throw me at something?" Absolutely pathetic.
Fine, Cap should dovetail into the avengers properly, frankly someone should be doing it with all the marvel movies so they are cohesive, give the man a sharpie and a thor script.
TWO WORDS…… Alien Resurection…. and yes, I read his script, and yes… the shot almost everything he wrote… minus a few awful ideas like the forest in the ship, and the fight ontop a mountian…
That Wolverine is so cool! Im gonna have to go out and get that book now. THANKS!
Love this news. Marvel is getting a little too big for it's britches and needs a major failure like this to make room for some more interesting ideas instead of just pumping out films to sell more toys and comics. I am looking forward to this more than ever, if only to watch this clusterfuck devolve into one of the worst cinematic foibles in history. I can't believe I just used the word "foible"…
Considering the fact that Penn isn't even in the same league as Whedon, I say "thank god!"
Yeah; I have to agree with Mut…..and this really sounds kind of inevitable and necessary anyway…..
And we can't have anything written for the gender that makes up more than half the country. No, that would be equitable!
A cornerstone of Marvel lore when the whole thing got off the ground was social justice. I think if they are going to make any sort of meaningful movie beyond 'selling more toys' Whedon can do just that.
I agree he will need to curb the dialogue and not pull from his normal casting options for this one.
FYI, though, the wolverine that has evolved from fox is WAY worse than anything in astonishing xmen. WAY WORSE.
Thank God…love him or hate him,I think a Whedon script will be a helluva lot more watchable than a Zach Penn script directed by Joe Johnston. Settle down fanboys…we're in good hands with Whedon.
Best news I've read today.
Fuck the whiny haters.
"But the LAST thing classic comic characters need is smirkng post modernism and Whedons brand of shitty cleverness spewing from their mouths every 30 seconds."
I always wonder if people who say things like this have ever read a superhero comic in their lives. Read a superhero comic from the 40s. It's wall-to-wall quips and tough-guy wisecracks. Ditto the majority of the stuff Stan Lee wrote in the 60s, when he wasn't tackling over-the-top "archaic" or "cosmic" dialogue. Since those are pretty much the two modes Whedon's known for writing in, I'm baffled by people who complain that he's somehow not suited for writing Marvel superheroes. That's EXACTLY what he's suited for.
Considering the fact that the only good script Zak Penn is PCU, I fail to see how this is much of a loss. And that one guy is named McFeely, so he can't be any good.
I heard he's a pretty good masseuse, actually.
I'm not a big fan of everything he's done (dialogue in Firefly killed the show for me), but I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. I don't think Marvel would let him go too stylized with this script, anyway.
I have avengers #1. Think it'll go up in price when this comes out?
I can't see how this is bad news. Even if you're not a big Whedon fan, you have to admit its a big step up from the writer of Inspector Gadget, X-Men 3 and Elektra
Head over to IMDB and look at the quotes for Serenity. It's even worse than I remember: "No, now that she's a killer woman, we ought to be bringing her tea and dumplings." Someone said that most comics in the last 40 years have been full of cheesy one-liners and eye-rolling quips. Probably has a lot to do with people not putting any hope in comic book movies up until the last few years. You CAN make a movie about magical super heroes and not fill it with ridiculous, silly dialogue. Well, so far Whedon can't. This is terrible news if it's a total rewrite. Terrible.
Thaimyshu, way to go with picking a single quote, out of context and even managing to totally not get who is saying it and what that character is like. Had you actually watched Serenity or even Firefly, you'd know that Jayne, the character who's line is in question, is a totally un-eloquent, obtuse and somewhat dim person who's idea of an insult is childish and lame. That's writing for character, that's a character having a voice.
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