Karen: Last Tuesday (March 18) ABC aired a special called "Marvel Studios: Assembling A Universe" which looked at past Marvel films and provided a few glimpses at upcoming productions. This included some concept art for the second Avengers film, "Avengers: Age of Ultron." Among the images displayed was one sure to get every Marvel geek excited: it features the green goliath, the Hulk, squaring off against the Hulkbuster! You can see it below:
Karen: Now who knows what the story behind this is. Does Hulk go bananas and Iron Man has to bring him down? Or is it the other way around? Or does Ultron take over the Hulkbuster armor? I guess we'll just have to wait until the film comes out in 2015. In any case, it should make for a pretty heart-pounding sequence!
Karen: Today is also the 83rd birthday of The Man, William Shatner. May he keep on trekkin'.
Happy birthday, Captain Kirk!
ReplyDeleteHulkbuster armor, Mandroids, Quintronic Man-- nah, they always looked darned cool (well the Q-Man looked ridiculous, actually, and was logistically untenable even to a very indulgent youthful fan), but they were never really the bread & butter, get-the-adrenaline-pumping type of threat for ol' Greenskin. For the most part,he would dispatch these guys pretty quickly, and as often as not it became more about the guy(s) inside the suit trying to not get killed. Glenn Talbot utlimately met his fate in one of these contraptions. But. . . on-screen might prove to be a better venue for these suits. Sound and kinetics will certainly carry the day for them, since they don't have any particular character to be conveyed.
ReplyDeleteOr. . . could it prove somehow unsatisfying? Like the Destroyer in the first Thor film? Ah, I'm just delighted to see my Hulkie pal gettin' some screen time, o'course!
Heh- that Bill Shatner. I still enjoy his couple of pre-Trek outings in TWIIGHT ZONE. I wonder if he could possibly ever. . . EVER. . . portray a conventional, quiet, "old-guy" role at this point? Heck, does he even consider himself 83, do you suppose?
HB
Hulkbuster Iron Man!! I saw that too the other night. That should be awesome. I wonder, is Hulk going to have a falling out with the Avengers in the second movie, like he did in the second issue of the comic?
ReplyDeleteWilliam Shatner looks amazing for a man his age. And he still has his original hair... (that he bought back in 1968).
Sorry, at first without reading the text, I thought the 'Shat-man' was coming on board as the 'buster... Whew.
ReplyDeleteIsaw the initial images for Wanda, but I'm not sure I'm ready for her and Pietro. I'm kinda happy w the group as is, perhaps adding Antman.
Wow, 83yrs old. Despite the puffy cheeks (facelift..?, botox..?), he's looking better than most 83yr olds I grew up with..
David -
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on the concept art for Quicksilver and Wanda. The Avengers films, along with the Spidey films, haven't been afraid to make our heroes closely resemble their comic book counterparts (excluding Spidey villains, of course). However, seeing those initial images of the Maximoff twins just tosses this in the direction of the X-films, where it seems embarrassing to come close to the comic depictions. Hopefully they'll come up with something for Pietro that has some integrity. Perez's "gypsy" costume that Wanda wore in Avengers, volume 3 seems a good place to start.
Has anyone else seen the photo of the Hulkbuster gauntlet on a rack next to a (what looks to be) a production assistant? That glove is almost as large as she is!!
Doug
Doug, you bring up a good point. Just how would they come up with a 'faithful representation' of Pietro..? After seeing images of the current & previous Flash productions, I'd be curious.
ReplyDeleteDavid, I guess they did start the non-faithful trend with Hawkeye. Shoot, they don't even call him Hawkeye, do they? But I'm not sure if he started to go without a mask in the comics before the Avengers was in theaters.
ReplyDeleteI think for Quicksilver, they could start with a wetsuit-looking get-up, then add some teched-up running shoes/boots to it. Keeping it with the latter-day blue/silver scheme would be best.
Doug
Happy birthday Wild Bill Shatner.
ReplyDeleteMaybe somewhere there's a green girl popping out of a cake.
I just saw a link to this article about Bob Haney and thought I'd bring it over here. Two of the stories mentioned have been reviewed here in our irregular "That Zany Bob Haney" feature. Enjoy!
ReplyDeleteDoug
Happy Birthday Mr. Shatner, boldy going where many men (and his toupee) have gone before ... into his 80s.
ReplyDeleteAs for the Hulkbuster unit, well, it is conceptual art, isn't it? I'm a bit sceptical about this - is this really gonna be in the movie, or is it just a marketing concept the art department drew up?
I'm with David_b - for a second there, I thought ol' Shatner was gonna don the Hulkbuster suit. Now THAT would be worth the price of admission!
- Mike 'Shatner should play the Leader' from Trinidad & Tobago.
William Shatner does look good for his age.
ReplyDeleteHe doesn't look like an 83-year old, he looks like a 50-year old after three days in the corn jug.
First things first - david_b, how many 83 year olds did you grow up with? Ballpark? Double digits? Over/under 11 and a half? (Why is there no cents or half key?)
ReplyDeleteKaren, I DVRed the special and watched it Wednesday after work. I think it was Kevin Feige that talked about Marvel seeing what characters they still had control of and then working to layer them into the Avengers. And also to take the little layers of the Marvel Universe to tie the movies together. Not only introducing the characters ie Black Widow in Iron Man, Hawkeye in Thor but the others, Fury, Coulson, Sitwell, SHIELD. Hydra in Capt America. Using tidbits in the movies to open doors to other places. Guardians of the Galaxy is the first fruit others soon to follow.
Doug, I was trying to think the other day if the was something I cling to because of brand loyalty and I kept thinking I'm not that hard core about anything. I might ask for Pepsi but if they don't have it I drink Coke. Whatevs. But the Marvel special started me thinking about New Marvel V Old Marvel. I appreciate that they are trying very hard to make good quality movies that bring these characters to life. I've expressed many times that I want a good FF movie because they deserve a good movie. What would be a good FF movie? The first 100 issues would make 4 or 5 good movies. But not all in the same movie. Would it kill me it they tried to put them all in one movie? No. I would adjust.
But that brings me to my touchstone - Spider-Man. In the 90s, during the Fox cartoon run, I remember TPTB made MJ the girl and virtually wiped out Gwen Stacy. Heck, MJ was a clone!?! I just couldn't get past that hurdle. Now spring forward to the Spider-Man reboot. I loved the fight scenes. The movie was good and Gwen was back. But now in high school and they're BF GF? That's not right, Gwen was college. Betty was his high school crush. All the elements are there just make the movie....... Jesus Mary and Joseph, why mess with success. I don't think they will ever be a great Spider-Man movie, they're just to scared to tell the story. I think they think it's outdated.
Shat. Shat! SSSSHHHHAAAATTTTT!!!! Happy Birthday.
The Prowler (stuck in Old Marvel).
Thanks for the Bob Haney link Doug! I haven't read Metamorpho, but I'd give it a try to check out lighthearted stories like this Galactus spoof. I had no idea Haney was still writing in 2004 for that Titans story. I have read that Blackhawks story with the JLA and the new costumes--Dick Dillin did some good art on that title. Nice choices for Brave and Bold stories, especially the mind-blowing issue #124 with Sgt. Rock. But pretty much every issue of B+B from 100-125 is fantastic!
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday to Shatner. He's entertained us in one way or another for many years.