The success of Iron Man paved the way for other Avengers solo films (Thor, Captain America) and the shared universe that became the box-office smash Marvel’s The Avengers for Marvel/Disney.
Fox controls the cinematic rights to Marvel’s X-Men and Fantastic Four. Fox Creative Consultant calls Hugh Jackman’s next Wolverine the beginning of a shared universe among the Fox franchises.
“I felt like Iron Man was really the beginning of something for the Marvel Studios movies, and ‘The Wolverine’ will be a similar starting point to build a lot off of for the Fox movies,” Millar told Comic Book Resources.
That idea will roll into X-Men: Days of Future Past when it starts production in April. There was a recent change in roles behind the scenes for the upcoming film. Original X-Men director Bryan Singer will now direct and X-Men: First Class director/Millar friend Matthew Vaughn will produce.
“Bryan’s worked as a producer even on the X-Men movies that he didn’t direct — he was a producer on ‘First Class.’ So when Matthew decided he wasn’t going to do the sequel, they just switched places with Matthew producing and Bryan coming on to direct. That’s got nothing to do with me, but I’m delighted that Bryan and I will get to work together over the next few years. I’ve been working with Josh Trank on ‘Fantastic Four,’ and I have a lot of ideas of other places we can go with the characters Fox has the rights to.”
A big question for me: Will Hugh Jackman appear in Days of Future Past? The story is partly set in a dark future in which an older Logan leads the surviving X-Men (Storm, Kate Pryde, Colossus, Magneto, the daughter of Scott and Jean, the son of Fantastic Four’s Reed and Sue against the Sentinels.)
By Editor