Back in
2008, when Marvel Studios released their first film Iron Man with their first post-credit scene, it spawned the dawn of
a new era in cinematic history; the Age of Superheroes & cinematic
universes never before seen (an argument can be made for the first X-Men Trilogy back in the early 2000s,
but I digress). This year, after nearly two decades of having our pallets
gradually taste the coming epoch, we have finally reached a level of comic book
stardom that everyone wants a piece of.
It wasn’t
that long ago that I wrote a piece about the emerging Shared Universe Syndrome
sweeping across Hollywood, pinpointing specifically the comic-book genre as
well as others.
Marvel have
undoubtedly set the bar extremely high with their current shared and
established line-up (of ten films!) within their shared cinematic universe,
most recently with their cosmic Avengers the Guardians of the Galaxy receiving
their first outing and origin; a review for which you can find here.
Now FOX, Sony and Warner Bros. are all slowly piecing together their attempts
at creating a cleverly intertwined cinematic network of films established in
their own particular universe.
It’s all
becoming a little complicated and over-saturated to follow with so many recent
announcements, no? So how about I expand and explain the individual universes,
their slate of films and “un-complicate” it a little:
[SCROLL DOWN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE ARTICLE FOR THE FULL LIST OF COMIC BOOK FILMS BETWEEN NOW AND 2020]
Marvel Studios
Before the
start of the San Diego Comic-Con this year, something where you can find highlights
for here,
Marvel stunned fans and studios alike by releasing a slate of nine unannounced
films up to 2020, after the official Ant-Man
property:
The Avengers: Age of Ultron – May 1, 2015
Ant-Man – July 17, 2015
Captain
America 3 – May 6, 2016
Unannounced film – July 8, 2016
Unannounced film – May 5, 2017
Guardians
of the Galaxy 2 – July 28, 2017
Unannounced film – November 3, 2017
Unannounced film – May 4, 2018
Unannounced film – July 6, 2018
Unannounced film – November 2, 2018
Unannounced film – May 3, 2019
Without any
official announcements yet regarding what the other films could be, it is
purely speculation of what the upcoming slate of films might be, something that
I have also looked into with my Marvel Phases 3-5 theories
and possible routes the conglomerate Marvel Studios might take.
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| The Avengers reunite again in 2015 |
Sony
Sony has no
doubt had an unprecedented uphill battle to contend with against fans and
critics alike. Coming off only a few years after Sam Raimi’s Spiderman trilogy, Sony decided to
reboot the classic webslinger in the form of The Amazing Spiderman, taking an alternate origin and route to the
character.
This year
saw the release of The Amazing Spiderman
2, which while being enjoyable and frankly welcoming to see Andrew Garfield
on screen with Emma Stone again, was almost butchered by critics (even with its
flaws, I personally enjoyed it). Said to be the Iron Man 2 of the Spidey-verse – as in, it sacrificed a well
thought out story/characters for world building – TAS2 at least opened the door for other Spiderman films and
spinoffs.
Trying to
stand apart from the competition at hand (as frankly, with a rather limited
scope to go into they really have no choice) Sony is now plotting the release
of a full villain team up, in the form of the Sinister Six, as well as a female lead movie (still unannounced) set
to reach our screens by 2017. Not to mention a Venom movie planned at some point down the line accompanied with
other instalments of TAS story line.
The upcoming
Spidey-verse movie dates are:
The
Sinister Six – November 11, 2016
Unannounced Female Lead Spiderman film – TBA, 2017
The
Amazing Spiderman 3 – TBA, 2018
Unannounced Venom film – TBA, 2018
FOX
FOX on the
other hand, used to hold the monopoly on Marvel superhero films back in the
early noughties with their X-Men
trilogy and their Fantastic Four
films. While rather quickly falling behind with few releases few and far
between (A few Wolverine films as
well as the X-Men: First Class) it
seems they played their biggest hand yet this summer with the release of the
epic X-Men: Days of Future Past.
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| As well as filling in some of the gaps, DOFP also raised further questions |
Undoubtedly
their biggest film to date (and the superhero film to have the largest budget
to date) FOX reunited most of the cast of the original X-Men films with the semi-reboot/remake of the First Class film, threw them altogether into one big pot, and added
a dash of time travel to make a film of epic proportions, Days of Future Past.
The scale
and scope of this film was so large and a rather complicated concept, FOX,
Singer and Co. managed to make it a success as well as coherent enough to tie
up the loose ends left from the original trilogy and connect it together with
the reboot.
With the big
bad villain Apocalypse teased at the post-credits scene of DOFP, FOX are
clearly on their way to creating a cinematic universe to rival that of Marvel’s.
As well as this, Josh Trank’s Fantastic
Four reboot has recently finished filming, ready for a summer 2015 release
date. With a younger cast and a different take on the FF team, perhaps a crossover between the Fantastic Four and the X-Men
is in the at some point down the line…
Fantastic
Four – June 19, 2015
X-Men: Apocalypse – May 27, 2016
The Wolverine
2 – March 3,
2017
Fantastic Four 2 – July 14, 2017
Unannounced FOX superhero film – July 7, 2018
Let’s just
hope that FOX announce another date in order to make a long awaited Deadpool movie, especially since test
footage of the character from a few years ago leaked online last week to such a
positive response from fans of the comic.
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| Deadpool approves of this post! |
The only way
for Comic book movies to stand out nowadays is that they have to be different.
Take The Guardians of The Galaxy;
that team up brought a new and interesting twist on superhero films (showing
that comedy can work) and with Sony planning to change the game a little as
well, perhaps a Deadpool film could happen. The Merc with a Mouth could be a real
game changer if it was an R-Rated movie with lots of violence. It has technically
worked with Karl Urban’s Judge Dredd film, Dredd,
which has gathered a massive cult following. The fans are there and would no
doubt pay for a true Deadpool film,
but this might just be one crazy fan who wants it to happen…
Warner Bros.
After
Comic-Con, where WB revealed the official look of Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman for
the upcoming Batman V Superman: Dawn of
Justice film, last night they also released NINE extra dates up to 2020, as
well as bumping up the release of BVS
in order to avoid a Box Office clash with Marvel’s Captain America 3.
The release
of these dates has place WB squarely into the middle of the fight for supremacy
at the Box Office and to show that they’re not messing around anymore.
Unfortunately, we still have to wait until 2016 till we get our next fill of DC
heroes.
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That being
said, it doesn’t mean that we can’t speculate. With actors like Jason Mamoa and
Dwayne Johnson teasing to fans that they might be playing the roles of Aquaman
and Shazam respectively, it almost throws the upcoming dates into a well of
confusion.
There are
countless rumours that BVS and the long
awaited Justice League movie are
planning to shoot back-to-back, meaning that the other slot in 2016 could be Justice League movie. As well as this, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has
made it clear that he wants to direct/write and perhaps star in a Sandman film only adds fuel to the fire
of what WB have up their sleeves for their expanding universe.
Moreover, WB
have more or less indicated that their film universe and their TV universe (The Flash & Arrow, The CW’s big hitters with Arrow having a huge following) will in fact be separate. This comes
as a bit of a disappointment seeing as the TV shows fit in nicely with the
current DC themes within their films and would work as an excellent platform to
bring the two into the Justice League
film without having to release an origin story for both.
Never rule
it out however; as we’ve found out in the past, it could just be smokescreens
to throw people off their scent.
The list of
titles that WB released last night are:
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice – March 25, 2016
Unannounced DC film – August 5, 2016
Unannounced DC film – June 23, 2017
Unannounced DC film – November 17, 2017
Unannounced DC film – March 23, 2018
Unannounced FOX superhero film – July 7, 2018
Unannounced DC film – July 27, 2018
Unannounced DC film – April 5, 2019
Unannounced DC film – June 14, 2019
Unannounced DC film – April 3, 2020
Unannounced DC film – June 19, 2020
This means
that by the end of 2020 we will be getting AT
LEAST 29 different superhero movies from all four studios combined, with
perhaps more unannounced dates from Sony and FOX to bring that number up even
higher. But altogether, the films look like this:
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| When an unstoppable force meets and immovable object... |
The Avengers: Age of Ultron – May 1, 2015
Fantastic
Four – June 19, 2015
Ant-Man – July 17, 2015
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice – March 25, 2016
Captain
America 3 – May 6, 2016
X-Men: Apocalypse – May 27, 2016
Unannounced Marvel film – July 8, 2016
The
Sinister Six – November 11, 2016
The Wolverine
2 – March 3,
2017
Unannounced Marvel film – May 5, 2017
Unannounced DC film – June 23, 2017
Fantastic Four 2 – July 14, 2017
Guardians
of the Galaxy 2 – July 28, 2017
Unannounced Marvel film – November 3, 2017
Unannounced Female Lead Spiderman film – TBA, 2017
Unannounced DC film – March 23, 2018
Unannounced Marvel film – May 4, 2018
Unannounced Marvel film – July 6, 2018
Unannounced DC film – July 27, 2018
Unannounced Marvel film – November 2, 2018
The
Amazing Spiderman 3 – TBA, 2018
Unannounced Venom film – TBA, 2018
Unannounced DC film – April 5, 2019
Unannounced Marvel film – May 3, 2019
Unannounced DC film – June 14, 2019
Unannounced DC film – April 3, 2020
Unannounced DC film – June 19, 2020
Is that too
many? Is the Age of the Superhero and comic book movies something you’re
looking forward to or are you fed up already? Or was this just a matter of
time?
