This weekend, the Marvel Cinematic Universe will explode on the screen with a culmination of ten years of films when Marvel Studios’s Avengers: Infinity War hits the screens. We will at last see all our heroes come together to face Thanos, the dark power who will finally step out of the shadows to capture the final pieces of the prize that will give him the power to rule the cosmos: the Infinity Stones.
Kevin Feige, Infinity War producer and president of Marvel Studios, has overseen the nineteen-film story arc that began with Iron Man in 2008. Connecting the universes of the various Marvel superheroes had never been done on-screen, and was considered both ambitious and probably impossible. But not only was he able to pull it off, it turned out to be the just what audiences wanted. The box office numbers don’t lie - the massive success of the films has generated an astounding $14 billion in global box office revenue.
We sat down with Feige at the Avengers: Infinity War press conference yesterday to talk about how he’s feeling about the Marvel Cinematic Universe the and what we can expect to see in the MCU’s future.
Fandango: So, let’s jump right in. Did the success of Black Panther change anything about Infinity War, or did it speed up plans for a sequel or anything?
Feige: No. It just solidified the dreams that we had for what we could do with the character. Infinity War and Panther, in many cases, were filming at the same time. As you've seen in the trailers, Wakanda itself, many of the people in the film, and, of course Chad, play a nice part in Infinity War. Had people not liked Panther and not liked those things, it would have been a much bigger concern because of how much is in this next one.
The success of it though, which certainly surpassed even our loftiest expectations, is just a very nice thing as we head into this.
Fandango: If Infinity War is the end, is the beginning of next phase is going to be Avengers 4?
Feige: I don't think it's that. I think he next phase will be after Avengers 4.
Fandango: So Avengers 4 would be an interlude?
Feige: Avengers: Infinity War and the untitled Avengers 4 are very much of a piece. They're very different movies and tonally they're very different movies, which is why we did not want to say Part 1 and Part 2, but they're very directly connected. Avengers 4 is the conclusion of all twenty-one movies before it.
Fandango: When you began to see a cut of Infinity War kind of come together, was there something that surprised you in particular?
Feige: That's a very good question. I mean, Brolin's performance as Thanos in our opinion is pretty astounding. We had high hopes for Thanos. We had high hopes for Josh. We were building this whole movie and the whole anticipation of this movie on him. Yet, he still overdelivered and still gave life to something that previously people had only seen as a big purple guy who sat in the chair.
Now he's a full amazing, strong character that as the visual effects kept coming in and getting more refined and more complete, would leave us speechless sometimes with how emotional it was. That this big purple guy who's quite mad, could give you that much emotion. Also, just the emotion of seeing all these characters interact with one another and seeing how different a lot of the characters are from where they started I found surprisingly emotional.
Fandango: How much of that was growth on the part of the actors themselves as they became more one with those characters?
Feige: I think a lot of it. Take Chris Hemsworth for instance, on the first Thor he auditioned, he did a very good job auditioning, but we had notions of what Thor is. He has blonde hair, so we dyed Chris's hair and eyebrows blonde, which I do not look back on fondly. We have his hammer and we had his big cape. The more movies you make, and the more Hemsworth grows into it you, realize 'oh, no he's Thor,' which is why in Ragnarok we cut the hair, we smashed the hammer and ripped off the cape. That only continues in Infinity War and these next few Avengers films as he grows into a very unique and fully-rounded character.
I love your Groot pin, by the way.
Fandango: Oh! Thank you!
Feige: Excellent. Awesome.
Fandango: Do you want it? I don't mind. You can wear it during the press conference?
Feige: (Laughing) No.
Fandango: Okay. In the comics, soap operas and other things, characters can die and then come back some day. If someone were to die in this, do you see that you might down the line want to bring them back or would it be just 'okay, that's it, we're done?'
Feige: Well, certainly the intention of this movie and of the next Avengers film, the decisions we make will be final and will be given emotional conclusion to the story at hand. Who's making decisions three years from now, five years from now, ten years from now, who knows? I always go back to the comics. You’re right, in the comics sometimes a character will die and then come back in the next page. We've done that in some of the movies. Sometimes a character will die and be gone for years and then come back in a way that is disappointing or come back in a way that is amazing, as the case of Bucky Barnes, who died in the early Captain America comics and was gone for 50 years or so, and who for years people said, "Bucky Barnes is never coming back to life." Then somebody had the idea to bring him back as The Winter Soldier and it was the greatest thing ever.
Fandango: No kidding!
Feige: You never know. (laughs) Yeah. Yeah.
Fandango: Somebody's described Infinity War as a heist movie. I don't know, because I actually have avoided seeing trailers on purpose. I want to be totally blown away.
Feige: Wow. Great!
Fandango: But if that is the case, I mean, how would you describe Ant-Man and the Wasp and Captain Marvel?
Feige: I think it all varies. I mean, certainly Ant-Man 1 was most like a heist movie. Infinity War is more of a smash & grab of a jewelry store. It always varies. I mean, without giving too much away, Ant-Man and the Wasp continues the story of family, of fathers and daughters, in a much deeper way than any of our other films, so to that extent we love the notion of Ant-Man and Wasp being a family adventure film, a family action comedy.
Captain Marvel has a lot of different things going for it. One of the most unique things, the things I've talked about before is it's set in the 90's and there is certainly an homage to the 90's action film that many of us grew up with.
Fandango: That's going to be fun.
Feige: Yeah.
Fandango: Okay. Did you have an actual vision for the connected universes when this whole thing started or did it just evolve?
Feige: It was both. It certainly has evolved, as I presume the comics did over the years. Every time you make a creative choice it builds upward to the next creative choice. But certainly, while we were in production of the first Iron Man film and we were responsible for the first time for the delivery of a film and really putting everything we had into that film, it did occur to us that one of the things we could do that no other studio could do was have a connected universe. That we had access to Iron Man and Thor and Cap and every other character that wasn't the X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man at the time, which is why we have the Sam Jackson tag at the end of that movie saying, "You think you're the only superhero in the world."
So, early on we knew that that could be one of the things that helps set us apart from the other studios making other Marvel movies, was we could do what the comics had always done. What honestly was one of the most important things about the DNA of Marvel was the interconnected universe. It had never been done on a movie before. So, that was always the idea to start. The specifics of where we've gone certainly evolved and continue to evolve.
Fandango: Have you started prepping for the kind of Disney/Fox deal in terms of utilizing those characters? Have you even gone there yet in your mind?
Feige: Not at all. Yeah. Not at all.
Fandango: I imagine it’s like, “Let me just do this first.”
Feige: Exactly right.
Fandango: Okay, last quick question.
Feige: Sure.
Fandango: You were a fanboy for years, before you did this. During the course of the films, what's the most fanboy thing you did that you just wouldn't have told anybody but you're going to confess to me right now?
Feige: (laughing) Oh jeez. I don't know.
Fandango: There's something. Come on.
Feige: That's a good question. That's a very good question. I wear it on my sleeve honestly. And when I see it, it is seeing the actors in costumes for the first time. Not just in a costume test or anything, but standing in front of them for the first time, much less standing in front of five of them or ten of them in costume for the first time, it is usually the most geek out. Like, I really have to control myself in those situations and remember “I'm supposed to be in charge here. I can't look like an idiot.”
Fandango: I have to say though, I think your fanboy-ness is one of reasons why these films are so wonderful. You think like us. We appreciate it.
Feige: Well, thank you.
Avengers: Infinity War opens April 26, 2018 arrives at theaters March 9. Get your tickets here today!
DaVette lives in Inglewood, CA and can’t name a single sports team. She is a filmmaker, writer, wife, daughter, and mom to seven (yes seven) cats. When not covered in fur, she’s a regular contributor to Black Girl Nerds because she is one, and she is the producer/star of the upcoming web-based talk show, Afro Bites! Follow her on Twitter and IG @mariavah
