More Marvel Movie Updates

Just a lot of Marvel movie news has come up, so I thought I'd share.

 

First, the big one on the next X-Men film, the prequel tale X-Men: First Class.  Matthew Vaughn, the director of Kick-Ass, has just signed on to direct this one.  And, 20th Century Fox has already locked in a release date:  June 3, 2011.

 

Fun trivia bit:  Vaughn was actually the original director of X-Men 3 for about one month of pre-production.  He left the project after constant creative differences with the head of Fox.  We can thank Vaughn for giving us Vinnie Jones as the Juggernaut and Kelsey Grammer as Beast, because that all happened on his watch.  Vaughn went and gave us Stardust instead.

 

Another fun trivia bit:  Bryan Singer, the director of the first two X-Men films, was originally going to return to the franchise to direct First Class, and he was announced as the director back at Christmastime.  However, Singer realized that the scheduling conflicted too much with the production of his next film, Jack the Giant Killer, which begins filming in another month or so.  Singer, however, is still involved as a producer on First Class, and has already been deeply involved in the casting. 

 

While the title has remained the same, the plot of First Class has changed quite a bit.  Originally, it was going to be a New Mutants tale, focusing on some of those other mutants we saw in the background of the trilogy.  Then, it was going to mirror the First Class comic, be kind of a "Year One" tale focusing on the original line-up and their first adventure.  Now, it's a prequel tale, showing how Xavier and Magneto founded the School for the Gifted, and how their big bromance eventually disolved into them being arch-enemies. 

 

Meanwhile, another big Marvel movie in development, Captain America.

 

We learned this a few months ago, but yesterday, Marvel finally made the official announcement:  Hugo Weaving, still best remembered to nerds as Agent Smith in the Matrix trilogy and Elrond in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, will be playing the Red Skull!

 

To recap:  Chris Evans is playing Steve Rogers/Captain America, Sebastian Stan is playing Bucky Barnes, Hayley Atwell is playing Peggy Carter, and this is one of the  nine films where Samuel L. Jackson is playing Nick Fury.  Director Joe Johnson has said that Cap's old WW2 superteam, the Invaders, show up for the second half of the film, and head of Marvel Studios Kevin Feige has said that Nick Fury's old WW2 unit, the Howling Commandos, also make an appearance. 

 

The start filming next month for a July 2011 release.