Last month, CraveOnline broke the news that the upcoming Marvel Studios reboot of Spider-Man would not be an origin story, and that Peter Parker was already swinging around the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That information came from the following interview with Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, who knows what lies ahead in “Phase Three,” and shared several other intriguing pieces of information with me in a sit down we had a Disney Studios several weeks ago.
Feige knows how to stay coy, and only teased that the cast of Captain America: Civil War would probably include a whole team of Avengers, and that the events currently taking place in the TV series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. would only partially tie into the upcoming Inhumans movie, and that the Kingpin from the popular new Daredevil TV show was “fair game” for use in the upcoming movies. But he did confirm which two Infinity Stones we haven’t seen yet in the MCU, which may be a hint about future storylines. If the Time Gem is unaccounted for, could that mean a time travel movie is on the horizon? (Eh, maybe.)
So don’t waste any more time. Check out our exclusive interview with Kevin Feige about the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe!
Related: All 50 Live-Action Marvel Movies: From Worst to Best
CraveOnline: Let’s start with the most obvious question… when are we going to see Squirrel Girl in one of these movies?
Kevin Feige: [Laughs.] Somebody made a logo for Squirrel Girl online. It was pretty cool.
Did it get you thinking?
Yes. [Laughs.]
So no? No? Oh well, I still think she could fit into Guardians somewhere. Anyway, Avengers: Age of Ultron. I think a lot of people are looking at this movie as a potential game changer for the Marvel Universe. Are you worried about overhype?
Yes. I’m always worried about overhype. I love underhype. I love people going, “It’s a raccoon and a tree, what is this movie? He shrinks, what is this movie?” I like that much more than “It’s going to be the biggest thing of all time!”
Are you actively trying to combat that by making it the biggest thing of all time? What’s the plan?
[Laughs.] We just try to make it the best movie we can make it.
This movie does amount to, in some respects, all of the heroes are back together, they fight a really cool bad guy, and in the end that was a fun movie.
Right, right.
It wasn’t like the entire universe changed and an alternate reality popped up and the X-Men popped in. Do you worry about escalation, that you have to keep making them bigger and crazier?
Well, no, and even with this one it was a rallying cry early on that we didn’t have to top the spectacle. I think we did end up topping the spectacle, but that was sort of a side effect to the story that was being told. It was about continuing and deepening the conflicts between the characters, the relationships between the characters, because that was ultimately what the goal was and what the plan was, from Joss [Whedon]’s end, from Joss’s point of view as he put it together.
Does the movie not do enough? Is that what you mean?
Definitely not. I’m just worried because I think the sort of interaction that we have between the fan base and the people who make films nowadays, specifically for that fan base, can be very intense sometimes. I think there’s a lot of expectation and I think that can very often backfire, sometimes on purpose because publicity departments go nuts, and sometimes the fans do it to themselves.
Right, right.
And you’ve got some of the most anticipated motion pictures, so obviously you’re just trying to make the best film possible but they also have to keep getting bigger. I mean, you’ve got a two-part Avengers next time? That has to be bigger in some respects, right?
Yeah, I mean, again, “bigger” is an interesting term. Does that mean more complex, does more characters…?
Let’s say “grander sweep.”
Yeah, I think so. Oftentimes it’s the way… you look at some of the great television that’s happening today. Are the season enders bigger than the other episodes in the show? Sometimes they are, and sometimes they’re not in terms of scale, but they are in terms of [emotions], sort of sticking the landing in terms of the emotional payoffs to things that have come before.
