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I’m told Marvel Studios is in final negotiations for Buffy the Vampire Slayer series architect Joss Whedon to direct Marvel Studios’ The Avengers. That’s the fast-tracked film that would amount to an all-star team of Marvel superheros, including Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), as well as SHIELD leader Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson). Other signature superheros will likely be involved, but I’ve listed the actors in active superhero duty. Whedon has been rumored for this job for awhile, and is high on the fanboy wish-list. He’s an interesting choice: despite his writing/producing TV series resume, his lone feature directing effort, Serenity, was not a hit. After Iron Man 2, Marvel has three pictures left on a distribution deal with Paramount before it moves to Disney, and the studio has been churning them out. Iron Man 2 gets released in May, Captain America will begin shooting this summer in Europe, Thor is in production, and Marvel Studios just set Pete Sollett to direct Runaways, based on the comic book series created by Lost writer Brian K. Vaughan. Whedon has written installments of the latter, so he knows how to make those superheros fly. Marvel has considered all of the individual superhero movies to be an intro to The Avengers, so the wanna-see on this one will be huge. The film will be released in the first weekend of May, 2012.
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Joss Whedon is a brilliant writer and director.Just because he hasn’t received great ratings and his shows get cancelled does not reflect his work it only comments on how mindless the majority of America is. People prefer to watch indulgent dribble rather then intellectually stimulating television.Whedon is a terrific choice he has the insight and creativity to really transform this film I only wish he was involved in the writing process.
Whedon thrives on ensemble casts. Every great thing he’s done has deeply explored multiple facets of multiple characters in innovative ways. I’m happy for this news.
Folks judging Whedon on his “hit” status are misguided. All of his projects have been originals. Avengers is uber-presold. Auds will go see RDJ as Iron Man regardless.
Whedon’s cast chemistry is ways outstanding. He’s perfect.
Best news in a long time. Joss is THE person for this movie.
The man is genius at directing an ensemble cast and managing actors and their egos. He can do amazing work in a small budget, and loves the Marvel verse and comics.
On top of that, the man knows how to direct. Don’t believe me?
Go watch the Buffy episodes “Hush” or “The Body”. Watch Serenity.
If you don’t like his WRITING, that’s fine…he’s not writing this movie, so no worries for you there.
Robogeek (from Aicn? cool) – I have read ASTONISHING X-MEN and, aside from Cassadays amazing art, it really wasn’t my thing. The X-Men versus aliens never works for me.
Mostow is just a name that came to mind as the type of director Marvel might have looked for. He’s produced some great, well regarded stuff (U-571, Breakdown), is technically skilled and can handle big productions (T3), but he’s not currently in huge demand which means he’s affordable. Favreau, Branagh and Johnston had the same qualifications when Marvel hired them and I suppose it could be said that Whedon has many of the same qualities.
I’m just saying that – for me – Whedon’s instincts (talky, over the top melodrama) are wrong for what I was hoping this project could be – a serious full scale superhero crossover movie.
Maybe the best thing is to hope for the Justice League project that Geoff Johns has hinted will be revealed at San Diego.
Man, I hope this is true. Marvel is really proving to be smart with its talent decisions. Whedon will hit such a home run with this due to his vision and vast talent. The guy knows how to entertain with heart!
BEST.CHOICE.EVER!!!
Dichen Lachman to play Wasp!
This is awesome news! Finally he gets a new break! Buffy was quite simply the best show created of all time, Angel and Dollhouse not far behind, and even if Serenity was not a box-office smash, it was a cult hit. This is what he makes, cult hits – badass cult hits. The best there are.
it will never happen
If Joss directs this movie, I might actually see it. He’s done far more than just BUFFY and SERENITY. He’s done a lot of script doctoring in Hollywood — the man knows how to make a movie work. Won an Oscar for co-writing TOY STORY, too.
Joss is a genius that does on occasion miss, but I liken this decision to putting Sam Raimi at the helm of Spiderman. It’s an inspired choice. My one concern is that he’ll make Captain America a whiney angst-ridden teen, turn the Scarlett Witch into a lesbian, have Iron Man die in a tear jerking, world saving manner and make Nick Fury lose an eye in battle.
Oh wait, Nick Fury’s already missing an eye. All right, carry on then.
Some people would say that Raimi (for all that he does have quite a few hits), has several “misses” as well. However, as I mentioned in a response somewhere higher up in this thread, sometimes that can have absolutely nothing to do with the directors themselves. It’s kind of hard to make gold when all you have to work with is elephant dung…
From what I can tell, the casting choices are there with the potential for good chemistry, and Whedon is good at bringing about good cast chemistry. The major factor is going to be the script. Unless he is allowed some writing freedom (which, yes, I know… some people are for, and some are against), he will have no choice but to work with whatever he’s given. If he’s given a crap script, AT BEST he can turn it into a mediocre movie… but even if he actually improves the script via good directing, all the blame will go to him regardless. This is simply because people seem to forget that the writer(s), not the director, are the ones behind the pens (and thus the emo, overly-dramatic, snarky, or trite dialog). Yes, sometimes the director and the writer are one and the same, but everything I’ve heard so far about this movie tells me this is not the applicable case for Avengers.
WB and Fox’s loss is Marvel’s gain. Whedon had an idea for Wonder Woman that was rejected, and his recent foray in television was cut by Fox. The man has a good understanding of characters and universes –he writes the X-Men! The Avengers are in great hands.
Thank God! I’ve always wanted to see what Joss Whedon could do with a big blockbuster budget. I’ve been going through some of his comics, and this guy clearly needs a budget to match his imagination for once.
Oh no. And I wanted to see this movie too and they hire this burned out jerk whose never going to work well with RDJ, not after the fights he’s had with other Oscar winners with minds of their own over his over-rated dialogue and rotten plotting.
Poor Black Widow. Doomed to be punished for being an adult sexual woman.
Everyone here seems to have forgotten one very important, innovative project that most likely served as the deciding factor – Dr. Horrible. In 40 minutes, with a limited budget, Joss gave us a new troupe of “heroes” and proved that the internet is a viable platform for new entertainment.
Give him a little credit.
I don’t know this franchise but if there is a sweet woman love interest, I’d advise people not to get too emotionally invested in her given Whedon’s favorite tropes.
Whedon couldn’t be better choice. As a major Firefly/Serenity fan,he may the only one in Hollywood that could bring real justice to an Avengers film. Fingers crossed…
Meh, I’m on the fence about Whedon. I think the only creative and engaging thing to come from him was Firefly, and alas, that one got killed off far too soon. The movie was a forgettably-directed, halfhearted attempt to conclude the series but just felt like an overlong TV episode which still left too many loose threads dangling. His awful script for Alien Resurrection left that series a rotting corpse, and I thought his Buffy and Angel series were too campy to qualify as entertaining in even a sit-and-laugh-at-it kind of way. Firefly proved that he is capable of some degree of genius, I’ll grant that, but he would be far from my first choice to helm something as big as The Avengers, and while I respect him and the successful career he’s had, I really don’t understand why he’s adored as much as he is. Most of his work has ranged from lousy to forgettable, if you ask me.
One might say, he had a good script for “Alien 4″, but it was spoiled by its director Jean-Pierre Jeunet.
If you read his A4 script, you know that Joss spoiled it first.
Actually, no – Jean-Pierre Jeunet admits to spoiling it. Joss Whedon wrote a script for an ALIEN movie that is pretty decent (it’s actually got a lot of FIREFLY in it, to be honest). Was it groundbreaking? No, but it would have been fun.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet came to the franchise wanting to make a big budget American action movie. He literally watched the big dumb action movies of America and counted how many times the camera cut, wanting to cut at least that many times in ALIEN RESURRECTION. The man was making a satire – unfortunately, Joss Whedon didn’t write one. So we’re left with what we’re left with.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet admits that it probably wasn’t the best decision on the feature length RESURRECTION documentary on the QUAD boxed set.
Yeah, I’m not much of a Whedon fan. I think he may be a good choice for this particular project, given his kind of fanbase and the fact he writes comics so he gets the genre. But I don’t really understand the rabid obsession with the guy. I never got into Buffy. Firefly is highly praised for originality, but really owes a huge debt to the anime Outlaw Star. To me, he’s overrated and the only projects of his I give him any credit for are Toy Story (and how much of that is Whedon I don’t know), and Dr. Horrible which is a little hit-or-miss, but mostly works. Though I think that Dr. Horrible owes as much to the charisma of NPH as it does to Joss and his brothers. And I should point out that Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog is mostly not a blog (it’s a vlog if anything, and much of the onscreen action is NOT the vlog), nor is it a “sing-along” in the traditional sense.
RE: “And I should point out that Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog is mostly not a blog (it’s a vlog if anything, and much of the onscreen action is NOT the vlog), nor is it a “sing-along” in the traditional sense.”
Oh, wow. That’s hilarious. Thanks for that, that was really funny.
I love how people equate a successful film with a film of high quality. Remember when the Wayans bros “Little Man” was the no 1 movie in america? Yea so do I and it still baffles me to this day. Just cause it’s a box office hit does not make it a good film. Some of the best movies out there did little to no biz in theaters but became cult classics later.
Much as I love Whedon’s work (excepting Dollhouse – that was just a bad idea) I’m not looking forward to the Avenges, whether he’s involved or not.
I just can’t believe there’s any way at all to make that movie work.
I’ll be surprised if Thor can be made to work at all, and interested to find out if they succeed with Captain America.
But trying to crowbar the easy suspension of disbelief from comics into a movie that tries to fit all those disparate elements together?
It’s likely possible to make any super hero movie work by making the movie that’s right for the charatcer, but trying to make one movie work for a number of disparate characters?
I’ll be really, really impressed if anyone could do it.
I suspect Whedon is considered exactly because he excels at ensemble work.
YES !
Hope we get to see Amy Acker as the Wasp !
Wrong move Marvel.
Joss Whedon has done nothing but make failure after failure.
Are you really going to entrust the Avengers movie, the biggest movie you have been planning for years, to the so-called “creative genius” behind the colossal failures that were Firefly, Serenity, and Dollhouse?
Granted he does have experience writing for the superhero comic Runaways, but if you ask any fan of that comic book, they’ll tell you that the issues he wrote rank among the worst of the entire series.
Get a clue Marvel. Dump this over-glorified “genius” and hire somebody who actually knows how to make a successful movie or TV show.
Marvel has been planning an AVENGERS movie for literally four years – don’t act like this is “decades in the making.” Realistically, IRON MAN was their opening salvo. That’s all we’re talking about here. Don’t over-dramatize anything.