So I thought maybe I might've messed up with my headline just now missing the "the" in The Avengers but looking closely at the official logo I have just noticed there is no 'the' in the title for the sequel.

eddy | July 20, 18:30 CET

Yay!

Simon | July 20, 18:32 CET

This is unexpected.Marvel just concluded the Age of Ultron story in the comics a month ago.

Buffyfantic | July 20, 18:36 CET

I do not know how they can introduce Ultron without also introducing Ant Man as well. He just has to be in the movie! Maybe the Ant Man movie is a prequel? I don't want Tony Stark to invent Ultron.

eddy | July 20, 18:37 CET

It's interesting that everyone thought Joss was going to use Thanos, but they are going instead with another classic Avengers villain Ultron.

Interesting enough, Marvel had a storyline called Age of Ultron earlier this year. Here's the wikipedia link if anyone who isn't up to date on current Marvel wants to take a peak. I wonder if Bendis or anyone else at Marvel who worked on this series had gotten a peak of Joss' script or if Marvel just liked the idea of using the title for both.

That said, if you look at the history of the character what looks like his 3rd appearance in the 1970's involved Ultron attacking the Avengers in the middle of Quicksilver's wedding to a Inhuman character, Crystal. Since this seems to be around the time that Joss was reading Avengers and Joss is adding Quicksilver, I wonder if that storyline will have influenced him at all.

Matt_Fabb | July 20, 18:46 CET

I thought this deserves to be shared as well

Video: Tom Hiddleston Appears as Loki At Marvel Comic-Con Panel

This fills me with glee. Next year SDCC!!

Mirage | July 20, 18:49 CET

So I've been hesitant to bring it up here but Vin Diesel has been talking alot lately about meeting up with Marvel and teasing that he is going to have a role in one of the Marvel films. Well, Vin Diesel already has experience voicing a robot so...what if he's voicing Ultron?

eddy | July 20, 19:12 CET

Bendis might of seen the script since he is on the committee that works with Marvel Studios on the films.

Vin Diesel voicing Ultron I could very easily see.They could also use motion capture for him to perform the role too.

[ edited by Buffyfantic on 2013-07-21 04:20 ]

Buffyfantic | July 20, 19:16 CET

Just a robot? Surely there's more within the seams.

Madhatter | July 20, 19:16 CET

"You're not afraid of the dark, are you Captain?"

Simon | July 20, 19:18 CET

Ultron is not 'just a robot'. He is one of The Avengers' most powerful foes. He has unlimited resources, makes hundreds of duplicates of himself, is protected by adamantium(I imagine in the MCU it will be vibranium instead.) shell, is extremely intelligent, and is Hank Pym's biggest failure haunting him(hopefully he'll be in the sequel). If you've never seen it then I suggest you check out the Ultron episodes of Avengers: Earth's mightiest heroes. I think they are on youtube. Those episodes showed off just how much Ultron can put this team to the test while still going 'smaller' as Joss once said. I would love it if Pym and Stark work on Ultron together and create him as a personal army for the team to deal with extraterrestial threats(or SHIELD whichever) only for the machine to turn against its masters and they have to deal with the problem that they created.

eddy | July 20, 19:29 CET

It is strange that there would be a tease for Thanos, then switch to introducing Ultron.

If they stick to Ultron having a shell of adamantium (or vibranium), along with the molecular re-arranger, then having the Scarlet Witch makes sense. During Shooter's run, she was the biggest threat to Ultron out of the Avengers.

OneTeV | July 20, 19:35 CET

eddy, they did have Hawkeye show up in Thor before the appeared in Avengers. Since Ant-Man is coming out in November 2015, Edgar Wright will have likely casted the main role by the time Avengers 2 starts filming. They could end up introducing Hank Pym without him being Ant-Man just yet.

Matt_Fabb | July 20, 19:39 CET

Back in April Joss had said the following about Thanos at the Iron Man 3 premiere:



So I guess Thanos is being saved for Avengers 3? I wonder if this might mean leaving the door open for Joss to return on and work on Avengers 3. Which while it would be cool, I really would like to see more of Joss' own projects.

Matt_Fabb | July 20, 19:47 CET

CBR seems to have taken the original story down for some reason so I replaced the link with more or less the same news at a different URL on their site.

Sunfire | July 20, 19:57 CET

Maybe Joss can write or produce Avengers 3 but not direct it?

This is Quint's description of the footage shown at Comic Con.


"The lights go down and we hear the Avengers theme.

Iron Man's helmet appears, audience cheers. Sound clips from all the Marvel movies start playing. “I am Iron Man,” “I'm always angry,”etc. I don't remember all of them, but they build to the end of the Avengers where Sam Jackson says they'll be back when they are needed.

All the while the camera sweeps in close to the Iron Man helmet. It's getting crunched, dented, misshapen. Sparks fly, crunching noises are heard. When we get that final Avengers quote the camera pulls back and the Iron Man helmet has been reforged as Ultron's helmet, an angry red light glowing out of his mouth and eye holes. Cue my eardrums being punctured by screaming fangirls (and boys, I'l be fair).
There you go. One of the best Holy **** moments of Comic-Con 2013. "

[ edited by eddy on 2013-07-21 05:24 ]

eddy | July 20, 20:00 CET

Starting to understand why machine minds could get upset with this world.

Madhatter | July 20, 20:27 CET

Clearly some misdirect from Joss with his "death, death and more death!" comment from an event a few months back when asked about Avengers 2. I think we all assumed Thanos would be introduced in Guardians to be the big bad for A2 but they've got a better overall plan in mind apparently, which is great. Can't wait to see what Joss has cooked up for us!

MrArg | July 20, 21:02 CET

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I'm sorry, Ultron is one of my favorite Avengers' villains bar none. In fact the first Avengers comics I was introduced to was the Perez/Busic run in the 90's Ultron story line. It was just fantastic (George Perez's jaw dropping art helped a lot for that), and the threat of Ultron was something real and terrifying.

So this is not just me being happy as a Whedon Fangirl, but this is me being freaking ecstatic for a Comic Fangirl.

Elf | July 20, 21:36 CET

As of the time of posting this news has made the front page of Reddit. Kinda noteworthy. Shows how much reddit users are into the Avengers (and know who Joss is).

insistondoubt | July 21, 01:22 CET

(Sigh!) I really hope Joss's story has absolutely nothing to do with the mess that was Bendis's tale. Though even if it doesn't..still a bit annoyed. As this totally seems like a Kevin Feige thing to do, to drum up sales on what was a truly awful story in trade, that doesn't deserve the attention at all.

I'm guessing though that Joss's story will be that of the government wanting to create maybe some sort of robot army as a reaction to the alien invasion in the first movie. Their own army of 'Iron Men' so to speak. And I suppose they'll either have Pym on the payroll for the contract or maybe somebody's going to steal/hack some of Tony's tech?

Bit annoying that they won't be able to mention adamantium, as that's what made Ultron so fearsome in the first place, but yeah as others have mentioned they'll probably swap in Vibranium for it.

But I guess what annoys me most, is that given the time it takes to make one of these, Joss probably isn't going to stick around for number 3, and I soooo wanted to see him write & direct an Avengers-Thanos movie. As being the fan of Jim Starlin's classic work that he is, that would have been really amazing to behold.

Jas | July 21, 01:58 CET

@Jas: Imagine if a more experienced Drew Goddard were to pick up the directorial reins? If he could handle doing a blockbuster-sized movie, Goddard-Whedon magic could be rekindled for A3.

I am also guessing (hoping?) that this is "Age of Ultron" in name only. No way a complicated time-jumping story like that could be compressed into a 2-hour movie, while introducing new brother-sister characters, still give all the mains time to shine, and be comprehensible to a wide audience.

I've noticed that Joss has managed to touch on vital moments in Avengers history, without doing a direct copy. The first Avengers comic had Loki as the villain trying to start a fight between the Hulk and the other heroes. The film had those elements, but used in a very different story. A2 might split the team into two groups, which would let us see Joss's version of "Cap's Kooky Quartet" from the very early comics.

[ edited by OneTeV on 2013-07-21 13:17 ]

OneTeV | July 21, 04:09 CET

Yeah, I sincerely hope you're right OneTeV!

And also now that I think about it Drew Goddard wouldn't be a bad choice at all to take over the reins there. Good choice!

Jas | July 21, 04:18 CET

It's cool to hear the title, but as someone who doesn't know the Marvel universe, it had me saying "What does it mean? What does it meeaan?" before looking at the comments here. Clearly after two years of marketing everyone will know who Ultron is, but in itself it's not the most compelling title.

Bluelark | July 21, 05:01 CET

@Bluelark: The Terminator metallic skull is a very powerful image. I'm assuming that Marvel will use the Ultron head in the teasers, which should be almost as potent. (The design screams "evil robot".)

OneTeV | July 21, 07:36 CET

Really excited for this, Joss has confirmed that the story is NOT based on the recent comic series.

banner | July 21, 10:00 CET

Drew would be a great choice for director of A3.

eddy | July 21, 10:19 CET

I may have missed something, why would Joss not direct Avengers 3? Just because his contract is up in two years doesn't mean they won't renew it or bring him back for at least one feature. Plus I wonder if he was setting up Thanos for a long game/end of a trilogy, after building up the universe a bit more with more powerful players?

orangewaxlion | July 21, 14:40 CET

I don't think anyone's saying he definitely won't, but given how much he's discussed the time and effort that goes into making these films, and the toll that takes on him, it wouldn't be shocking if he decided not to come back for 3. Of course, the same could've been said after the first Avengers, but yeah.

sumogrip | July 21, 15:47 CET

I agree that you'd think Joss would want some stake in an A3 with Thanos, it seems silly to jump ship just before that! However he's already dedicated many years to Marvel and he constantly says he wants to get back to original work sometime soon. Perhaps he could just help produce it. I'd bet money that he doesn't direct A3 though.

SuperScuba | July 22, 19:15 CET