A Comic Book Dummys Guide to the Marvel Universe Plan
On Tuesday, Disney's Marvel Studios made some major announcements about the future of its superheroes on the big screen. Studio head Kevin Feige laid out the plan through 2019, and it includes some very obscure superheroes. While comic book fans everywhere are pumped, the millions of people who paid to make the Iron Man movies blockbusters probably don't even know who Captain Marvel is, or how the big purple guy from the Guardians of the Galaxy movies relates to the Infinity Gauntlet. So for those of us who aren't comic book experts, here's a breakdown of who these new superheroes are, what the Avengers' next adventure might be, and what the next five years of summer movies will look like. Ultron The Avengers Age of Ultron, May 1, 2015, Let's start out with the core of Marvel's empire the Avengers. A quick refresher on this crew the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. which now have their own television show led by Nick Fury Samuel L. Jackson bring together the Avengers Initiative Iron Man Robert Downey Jr., Thor Chris Hemsworth, Captain America Chris Evans, the Hulk Mark Ruffalo. These superheroes are assisted by agents Black Widow Scarlett Johansson and Hawkeye Jeremy Renner. In the last movie, they saved the world from Thor's brother Loki who used an object called the Tesseract to build a wormhole and invade earth. So now that we've dispatched of the Tesseract, what's next? The titular villain in the sequel, Ultron, is a machine originally created by Dr. Hank Pym, who was once Ant-Man more on that in a second. Ultron became sentient and rebelled, as machines always tend to do in these sorts of situations. Ultron's ultimate goal is total destruction of the human race, and he's arguably the Avenger's biggest adversary in the comics. He'll be played by James Spader in the movie. Ant-Man Ant-Man, July 17, 2015, Since we're on the topic of Hank Pym, let's talk Ant-Man. The premise of the film is that a con man and electronics expert named Scott Lang Paul Rudd receives the Ant-Man costume and technology from his mentor Hank Pym Michael Douglas. Ant-Man is able to reduce himself to the size of an ant while gaining superhuman strength, and can will other objects to change size. He also has a cybernetic helmet that allows him to communicate with and control insects. Useful!, The casting of Rudd Role Models, Knocked Up and tapping of director Peyron Reed Bring It On, Yes Man indicates that the movie will have a strong comedic element. Thanos The Avengers Infinity War, Part I May 4, 2018 and Part II May 3, 2019, Yes, Age of Ultron is still half a year away, and we're already talking about the third Avengers movie. Or, rather, the third and fourth Avengers movies. Marvel announced that The Avengers Infinity War will be released in two parts because  well, why not?, The big bad in Avengers Infinity War will be Thanos Josh Brolin, first seen at the very end of The Avengers and again as an evil puppet-master in Guardians of the Galaxy who adopted and raised Gamora Zoe Saldana. This hasn't come up in the movies yet, but in comic book lore, Thanos is in love with the Mistress Death the female embodiment of death  yes, really and wants to impress her by killing everyone in the galaxy. How does Thanos plan to do this? Well, he possesses this thing called the Infinity Guantlet  basically a metal glove encrusted with a lot of powerful gems that gives him power over time, space and all living beings. Yep  that's a pretty serious weapon. Presumably Thanos doesn't have all the gems he needs otherwise, there would be no movie. Feige has said that the Tesseract from The Avengers was actually one of the Infinity Stones needed to make the gauntlet work, and so was the stone everyone's trying to get their hands on in Guardians. Given that Thanos has already appeared in two Marvel franchise, this movie is likely going to have a lot of superheroes in it. Ragnarok Thor Ragnarok, July 28, 2017