The sequel to 2013’s Man of Steel has began to look increasingly like a straightforward Justice League film, despite the working title being Batman vs Superman. Ben Affleck is Batman, Gal Gadot is Wonder Woman, Henry Cavill is Superman and Ray Fisher was recently confirmed to play Cyborg while Grant Gustin may be to man to portray The Flash, should the upcoming TV series tie in with the film franchise. All we need for a full set would be Aquaman (who Matt Damon has been rumoured for) and Green Lantern, or maybe Hawkman or Martin Manhunter, but we’ve discovered something that my change that.
Zack Snyder (Man of Steel, Dawn of the Dead, 300, Watchmen) has been announced to direct Justice League, which we can assume is a different project to Batman vs Superman. Despite introducing many of the team members early on, we may have to till 2018 to catch of DC’s super-team fully in action. B vs S will also star Jesse Eisenberg, Amy Adams, Callan Mulvey, Jeremy Irons, Diane Lane, Tao Okamoto and Laurence Fishbourne.
Meanwhile, X-Men’s writer/producer Simon Kinberg has spoken out about the future of both X-Men and Fox’s Marvel properties. “Fox does understand that they are sitting on this massive universe with the X-Men, also with Fantastic Four obviously,” says Kinberg. “But they definitely have a sense of it and there’s a real interest and appetite for how to explore and expand that world.”
“It makes sense to tell some of these stories in TV,” he continues, “partly because there’s just not enough screens to do all these characters, and also because the serialized format of comic books is better suited for TV. Because that’s it, every week you come back to the same characters, different story, and in comic books every week it’s the same characters, different story.”
Back to the feature film side of things, Fox are trying to get into cinemas Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Apocalypse (starring James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence), Jeff Wadlow’s X-Force, Lauren Shuler Donner’s Gambit (starring Channing Tatum) and Tim Miller’s Deadpool (starring Ryan Reynolds). “It makes sense to me,” says Kinberg of a movie adaptation. “Genuinely it’s early phases, early days, but if you’re gonna do a Deadpool movie, I think you’ve gotta do a hard-R, darker movie and he is the perfect character to do it with.”
There’s been a recent announcement that The Hobbit’s final chapter will be called The Battle of the Five Armies. Richard Armitage, the portrayer of Dwarven prince Thorin Oakenshield, has elaborated about the epic finale of Peter Jackson’s sextet of Middle Earth adventures. “There’s a couple of big surprises.” He goes on to enthuse, “I think it will probably be quite a cinematic event.”
“It’s going to be quite a nostalgic event I think,” continues Armitage. “It’s going to be 15 years of seeing Middle Earth on the big screen, the culmination of Peter Jackson’s life’s work.” The Five Armies will star Martin Freeman, Luke Evans, Ian McKellen, Evangeline Lilly, Manu Bennett, Orlando Bloom, Aidan Turner, Mikael Persbrandt, Lee Pace, Cate Blanchett, Dean O’Gorman, Ken Stott, James Nesbitt, Ian Holm, Sylvester McCoy, Lawrence Makoare, Billy Connolly, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving and Benedict Cumberbatch.
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies – December 12th
Batman vs. Superman – May 6th 2016
Justice League – 2018
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