The Avengers Options

[Evan]

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/weekend/chart/
Daaaaaaaaaamn.

[Kyle]

i heard a rumor that Sony and Marvel were in talks to lease the rights to Spiderman and such...

[Evan]

"TDKR needs at least three dead cast members to top this."
Sorry but I laughed.

[Kyle]

YO

SPOILER!!!    Click to view.

where the fuck was the red skull in the scene in between the credits?!

[Kenny]

i heard a rumor that Sony and Marvel were in talks to lease the rights to Spiderman and such...

I hope. I can't see how it would be bad for Sony. I'm sure they wouldn't have to pay anything, just sit back and collect a chunk of the gross, while Paramount and Disney pay for production and distribution.

YO

SPOILER!!!    Click to view.

where the fuck was the red skull in the scene in between the credits?!

He wasn't there. It was...

SPOILER!!!    Click to view.

Thanos

I went in spoiler free from that, and it melted my face.

[Kyle]

i didn't think he was, but this is from imdb:

SPOILER!!!    Click to view.

SPOILER: There is a scene part way through credits: Marvel Character Thanos appears with The Red Skull by his side. They are both looking down on Planet Earth with Thanos smiling, stating that they underestimated Earth.

[Kenny]

It's a false rumor, as far as I know.

SPOILER!!!    Click to view.

I didn't see any one else in that scene except Thanos and that 'Other' guy.

[Chewy]

He wasn't there. IMDB just has false information as usual.

[Ryan]

Chewy is right.


I was also hoping for some news on spiderman being a part of this franchise. It would tie in perfectly with the new spiderman series, adding him to the team in the next avengers movie

[Maxwell]

As Chewy has said before, it won't happen anytime soon because Sony owns the rights to Spiderman and has them for the next few years at least. Unless some miracle collaboration happened, I'm afraid we're stuck for the time being.

[Kenny]

As Chewy has said before, it won't happen anytime soon because Sony owns the rights to Spiderman and has them for the next few years at least. Unless some miracle collaboration happened, I'm afraid we're stuck for the time being.

I don't think it's that out of reach. Not for Spider-man. Maybe for X-men, because of all the characters involved that are either getting or rumored to get their own movies, but all you really need for a good integration of Spidey into the Avengers time-line is the one character himself. It would have made sense even if he were in this movie, considering it was mostly based in New York. I just love the thought that Spidey was probably out there fighting the Chitauri, on a smaller level than the Avengers. You know, saving an old lady here, stopping some looters there.

I remember hearing about a comic where the Avengers were fighting Thanos (I think Thanos), and then out of no where there is a panel with Daredevil sitting on a building. Spider-man swings in and says something like, lets go help. But Daredevil just says something to the extent of, "Not this time. We're out of our league in this fight." I just love that type of stuff.

[megatron]

They used to say Venom would never be the villain in a Spider-Man movie because of those "different studio"-type excuses. But eventually it all worked out and they made that terrible 2nd sequel to Raimi's Spider-Man.

So they might be willing to work it out for Avengers 2... right?

This post has been edited by megatron: May 8 2012, 01:45 AM

[Maxwell]

I don't know man. Money is a powerful thing. If Sony can make more by selfishly retaining the rights to Spidey then I really don't see anything stopping them.

[Kenny]

I don't know man. Money is a powerful thing. If Sony can make more by selfishly retaining the rights to Spidey then I really don't see anything stopping them.

Who'd say they would have to give up the rights? A company can let another use their characters. Do you think that Warner Bros sold the rights to Bugs Bunny when he was in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? No, they just let Disney use Bugs and apparently the only catch was that Mickey or any Disney Character couldn't out shine Bugs or any Warner character.

This post has been edited by Kenny: May 8 2012, 12:41 PM

[Kyle]

Stan Lee/Marvel should have the final decision on this shit

[Ryan]

When the new spider man movie doesnt make as much as The Avengers at the box office, watch them allow spiderman to be used.

[Kenny]

Yeah, I'm going to stop talking about this because, even though I'd like to hope for this type of crossover, I'm not holding my breath. Just saying it's possible.

Anyway, I'm gonna try and take my sister to see this sometime this week. Gonna try to get to an IMAX screen.

[Chewy]

This is going to make over a billion by next Sunday. Holy fuck.

[afterworld12a]

saw The Avengers a couple days ago. going to see it again this weekend.

i'm always excited for a new Marvel release. whether its The Amazing Spider-Man, Iron Man 3, Thor 2, ANT-MAN, The Wolverine, Guardians Of The Galaxy, The Inhumans, or many other that are speculated such as Captain America 2, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, and i'm pretty sure many others. out of all of them, i would very much like to see a Marvel Civil War movie (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Chewy]

Kevin Fiege has said that Avengers 3 could possibly be Civil War inspired. I personally hope not but I guess with significant changes to the original story + Whedon, it could work.

[sinktheunderground]

I could see a Civil War story working, but it would either have to incorporate all of the other characters in the universe (Which is definitely possible, as discussed above) or yeah, they'd have to change the story a bit. Which wouldn't make me too happy, I LOVED Civil War, it's what got me back into reading comics again.

[Austin]

Saw this Monday night and man, it was awesome! Great action, cool CGI, acting was good and some funny moments. Fun, entertaining movie all around!

I almost enjoyed seeing them fight each other more than them fighting Loki and his army. I don't know much about the Civil War comics but I think that would be a kick ass idea to build towards.

[cKyIsYourFuture]

When the new spider man movie doesnt make as much as The Avengers at the box office, watch them allow spiderman to be used.

the "new" spiderman looks exactly like the old one with more expensive cgi judging by the trailer

i liked the avengers. didn't have any expectations for it and i think if i did, i would've hated it, but it was a decent film

[Damion]

You guys don't seem to understand how the rights to these characters in film work. Sony wouldn't just allow Marvel Studios to use Spider-Man because they don't stand to make any money from that deal. Marvel would need to pay for the rights for Spider-Man to appear (if such a deal is even a possibility, contractually), and Sony wouldn't give him up cheap. Bugs and Mickey appeared in Roger Rabbit under specific circumstances. Both studios agreed, there were contractual clauses, and the film wasn't in direct competition with anything those studios were producing. Marvel is a direct rival to Sony, and Sony doesn't gain any promotional advantages by allowing Spider-Man in the film; everyone associates the character with Marvel, not Sony, and any film he'd appear in would be a direct competitor to Sony's films/best interests.

Marvel doesn't have the final decision on these scenarios because they were the ones that optioned the rights to the individual characters/series to different studios, all before deciding to start their own studio. They also didn't know at the time that the company would be purchased by Disney. Had they the foresight, they would have kept all of the characters in-house and made the films themselves. At this point, the most they can do is wait for the contracts to expire with the various other studios (Sony with SM, Fox with X-Men and Fantastic Four), forgo renewing contracts, and allow the rights to lapse back to them. The problem is that this isn't going to happen anytime soon.

Sony rebooted the Spider-Man franchise with this film as a way of retaining the rights. Had they not pumped out another film, the contract would have expired earlier, and they didn't want that to happen. They obviously wouldn't willingly let their property be used in a rival studio's film if they're making it a point to keep producing films as a means to retain the rights. Same reason we got First Class. Fantastic Four is a lot closer to expiring, as I believe Fox needed to have a film in production within the last couple of years to retain the rights. Marvel Studios has already expressed that they intend to reboot the franchise and do it "the right way" once the rights are reverted.

The main characters themselves aren't the only things held up contractually. For instance, should Marvel go the route they tease at the end of The Avengers, they can't use The Silver Surfer in the story (which seems blasphemous), as the character is tied up in the Fantastic Four deal with Fox. The rights would need to expire prior to production of the next Avengers beginning for that character to have any hope of appearing. Same goes for Dr. Doom, Galactus, etc. The Venom scenario brought up above was never a question of whether or not the character could be used in a Spider-Man film; he was available from the beginning to Sony. The rights were questioned when talk of a Venom spin-off began, as Sony's rights to that property aren't definitive.

Stan Lee doesn't and wouldn't have any say over any of these characters or deals whatsoever. He doesn't currently maintain a position at Marvel beyond that of a public figurehead. He makes no decisions, and all of the properties are owned by Marvel (and moreover, Disney). He hasn't had a say in these properties in decades.

And no, The Amazing Spider-Man doesn't look or feel like the Raimi films.

[Kenny]

I'm sure we all understand it quite well, thank you.

But like I said, I'm sure there could be a deal worked out. The only thing is if Marvel wants to make a deal, and if it's sweet enough for Sony to take. You can talk about competition all you want, but if Sony is making money off of their spidey, and the sequel to the movie with the current highest grossing opening of all time, I just don't see a down side.