The Ronin can confirm that veteran cinematographer Larry Fong is indeed finally returning to the superhero genre with Paramount Pictures’ Secret Headquarters, which is currently in-production and is produced by Jerry Bruckheimer via Bruckheimer Films.
A high-concept family action movie about a kid who discovers the secret headquarters of the world’s most powerful superhero hidden beneath his home and must defend it with his group of friends when villains attack.
Fong’s list of credits include big studio projects such as Watchmen, 300, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Kong: Skull Island, The Predator, Sucker Punch, Super 8, and the upcoming Chris Pratt sci-fi action flick The Tomorrow War.
If you kept your eyes peeled during Zack Snyder’s latest effort, Army of The Dead, you would have noticed a cheeky not to his longtime cinematographer, who happened to have worked on the magician franchise Now You See Me. Snyder decided to be his own director of photography on the action-packed zombie movie.
Secret Headquarters stars comedic actor Owen Wilson (Loki, The Life Aquatic, Wedding Crashers) and will be directed by Project Power’s Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman. The directing duo is also attached to helm a feature film adaptation of the Mark Millar comic book, Nemesis, for Warner Bros. with a script penned by Oscar-winning screenwriter Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman).
It has an original story and script from Christopher Yost (The Mandalorian, Thor: Ragnarok), the latest draft was worked on by Joost, Schulman, and Josh Koenigsberg.
Owen Wilson can be seen next starring alongside Tom Hiddleston in the highly-anticipated Marvel Studios series Loki, set to debut on Disney+ tomorrow.
Back in December, Senior Entertainment Reporter Brandon Katz of the Observer dropped a juicy rumor on the Post Cred Podcast that Jonathan Majors (Da 5 Bloods, Lovecraft Country), who had been recently cast as Kang The Conqueror in Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania, was going to be showing-up first in Tom Hiddleston’s Loki series in June.
Well, The Ronin has recently come across similar information independently of Katz/Observer, which would bolster his original claim that we’ll see Jonathan’s MCU introduction in the Disney+ show before the release of Ant-Man 3. However, the size or scope of the appearance has yet to be determined but given the character’s connection to the Time Variance Agency, it could have plot importance to future MCU projects beyond the Ant-Man sequel set to shoot this summer at Pinewood Studios UK.
KC Walsh from Geeks Worldwide also backed up Brandon’s claim back in December.
Last month, Katz outlined in a piece for the Observer how Kang could be introduced in Loki.
The visually-striking show is said to help establish some of the ground rules of The Multiverse, which will be explored again in future releases such as Sam Raimi’s Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness and possibly even more. I personally hope that Marvel Studios doesn’t overuse the Multiverse too much as the sci-fi narrative tool could become a storytelling crutch similar to time-travel.
It’s head writer is Michael Waldron (Doctor Strange 2, Rick & Morty) with Kate Herron (Sex Education) directing the episodes as production took place in Atlanta, Georgia.
Loki will debut June 9 on Disney+ with subsequent episodes dropping regularly on Wednesdays.
LOKI – Picking up immediately after Loki steals the Tesseract (again), he finds himself called before the Time Variance Authority, a bureaucratic organization that exists outside of time and space, forced to answer for his crimes against the timeline and given a choice: face deletion from reality or assist in catching an even greater threat.
The Ronin can confirm that Canadian stunt coordinator Monique Ganderton is indeed currently working on Marvel’s She-Hulk series that is actively shooting in Atlanta with Emmy-winner Tatiana Malsany (Orphan Black) starring as Jennifer Walters aka She-Hulk. Monique isn’t new to the world of Marvel Studios with credits such as Loki, Avengers: Endgame, Captain Marvel, Avengers: Infinity War, and Thor: Ragnarok.
In the comics, Jennifer Walters is a defense lawyer, who is given Hulk powers after she needs a blood transfusion from her cousin Bruce Banner. It’ll be interesting to see how she’ll get her powers in the MCU incarnation and how closely they’ll be sticking to comic book lore as this will be the first time we’re getting a live-action She-Hulk.
UPDATE: Monique Ganderton has now confirmed her involvement on She-Hulk on her Instagram bio backing up our confirmation from May.
It’s assumed that Ganderton will be doing the motion-capture/stunt work for She-Hulk given that she already filled a similar role for the Avengers villain Proxima Midnight (voiced by Carrie Coons) and seemingly played a motion-capture character for the Loki series as well.
We can also confirm that Godzilla Vs. Kong costume designer Ann Foley is officially working on the Marvel show as well. Ann’s credits include Netflix’s Altered Carbon, ABC’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Sony’s Masters of The Universe remake (seemingly stuck in limbo).
The 10-episode series will be directed by Kat Coiro and Anu Valia.
Joining Tatiana in the Disney+ show will be Mark Ruffalo officially returning to play Jennifer’s cousin Bruce Banner aka Hulk, Tim Roth is finally back as Incredible Hulk villain Emil Blonsky aka Abomination, Renee Elise Goldsberry as Amelia, and Ginger Gonzaga.
Considering that Jennifer has a strong comic book connection to the Fantastic Four, I’m curious if the series will plant the seeds to her involvement with Marvel’s reboot directed by Jon Watts as She-Hulk at one time had become a member of the team. Watts is currently busy finishing-up Spider-Man: No Way Home due in theaters on December 17.
Given the extensive visual effects involved with bringing She-Hulk, Hulk, and Abomination to life it’s expected that She-Hulk won’t debut until later in 2022.
The Ronin has learned that Marvel Studios is expected to shoot something related to the upcoming Loki series in the United Kingdom in the near future. However, it’s unknown if this will be for the first season of the Disney+ series, brief reshoot, shooting a simple end credit scene as seen in the last two Marvel series or if Season 2 will be moving from Atlanta to London.
Unlike the previous two projects, WandaVision and Falcon & The Winter Soldier, there have been reports that Season 1 writer Michael Waldron would be returning for a second season in some capacity and would suggest we are indeed getting Season 2 of Loki. It’s unknown if director Kate Herron would be returning. If Marvel moved Season 2 to the United Kingdom, it would be a slightly more comfortable situation and accommodating as a lot of the people working on the show are British.
Marvel Studios has recently made a big push to have many of their projects film in the United Kingdom including Black Widow, Eternals, and Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness. The studio is also planning to have Moon Knight, Secret Invasion, Captain Marvel 2, Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania, and Guardians of The Galaxy 3 shoot in the United Kingdom as well.
Tom Hiddleston is currently in the United Kingdom shooting another series for Apple TV+ called The Essex Serpent.
Season 1 of Loki will debut on Disney+ on June 11, 2021.
LOKI – Picking up immediately after Loki steals the Tesseract (again), he finds himself called before the Time Variance Authority, a bureaucratic organization that exists outside of time and space, forced to answer for his crimes against the timeline and given a choice: face deletion from reality or assist in catching an even greater threat.
Today, it was announced that Marvel Studios’ third live-action series, Loki, will debut on the streaming service Disney+ starting on June 11th, a month later than previously expected.
It’s cast directed by Kate Herron includes Tom Hiddleston, Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Sophia Di Martino, Wunmi Mosaku and Richard E. Grant. The showrunner, Michael Waldron, is also working on Sam Raimi’s Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness.
The series is said to have direct connections to the Doctor Strange and Thor sequels as it will focus on the Multiverse along with the introduction of the Time Variance Agency, the force that polices those that tinker with the timelines. Loki, after the events of Avengers: Endgame starts playing around in different eras in Earth’s history which lands him on TVA’s radar.
WandaVision is going to wrap-up soon with The Falcon & The Winter Soldier starting to air on March 19th.
There had been a previous report of Jaimie Alexander returning to the role of Lady Sif for Thor: Love & Thunder and the Loki series, this was seemingly telegraphed as the actress flew to Atlanta prior to that announcement.
Well, Jaimie is posting another picture of herself on Instagram flying from New York City to Sydney, Australia. This would suggest that Jaimie is indeed joining the cast of Thor: Love & Thunder as other MCU cohorts are in the city quarantining ahead of their scenes being shot at Fox Studios Australia in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Actors flying to Sydney would suggest that they’re going there because of the Marvel film as it’s the biggest thing shooting there and it made headlines in the Australian news when both Christian Bale and Matt Damon arrived on planes.
Marvel has yet to confirm Alexander is in the film.
Bale is playing the main villain Gorr The God Butcher with returning cast members Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Natalie Portman as Lady Thor aka Jane Foster, Tessa Thompson as King Valkyrie, and director Taika Waititi as the lovable lug Korg. It’s unknown if Matt will be reprising the role from Thor: Ragnarok or something completely new.
We’ll also see actors from the Guardians of The Galaxy such as Chris Pratt, Karen Gillan, and Dave Bautista. The reasoning behind this is because Thor joins the team at the end of Avengers: Endgame and he maybe spend some time with them during the sequel this could explain how Bale’s alien baddie Gorr is introduced into the story.
There is a strong possibility we might see Tom Hiddleston‘s Loki make a triumphant return in the film as well given the likelihood the film will connect to the series, a second season of Loki is in the works as well. The Multiverse is going to playing a large role in a bulk of the films and there is assumption this will continue into things like Thor: Love & Thunder.
It’s release date is currently set for May 6th, 2022, however, it is subject to change as Disney continues to adjust their 2021-2022 theatrical slate.
Another tidbit mentioned in a report from Deadline revealing that screenwriter Michael Waldron is expected to return in some capacity for Season 2 of Loki after making a deal with Disney that includes working on Kevin Feige‘s untitled Star Wars movie for Lucasfilm.
We’ve known even before the Disney+ series set in the Multiverse began shooting that there were plans at Marvel to give the Tom Hiddleston series multiple seasons. It’s unclear if Kate Herron will return to direct Season 2 as they’re just about to complete filming Season 1 but there is a really good shot that her return will be announced in the near future.
Set photos have confirmed that we will be seeing Multiverse versions of Loki such as Lady Loki and it remains to be seen if Hiddleston’s Loki will be showing up in upcoming films that has the Multiverse connected to plots such as Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness or Thor: Love & Thunder.
There are plenty of other shows on the horizon for Marvel Studios and when they’ll want to begin shooting on a second season has yet to be confirmed.
Ms. Marvel and Hawkeye are currently in production with She-Hulk and Moon Knight said to begin filming in March. Other MCU shows that are in the works includes Armor Wars, Ironheart, and the crossover Skrull event Secret Invasion.
The first season will begin airing on the streaming service in May.
Another big update concerning the Star Wars franchise as Deadline reports that the Kevin Feige-produced project has hired screenwriter Michael Waldron (Rick & Morty) to pen a script. Waldron recently working with Feige at Marvel Studios on both Loki and Sam Raimi’s Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness
Feige is the head of Marvel Studios and Marvel’s chief creative officer, which would make this his first non-MCU project as producer since leading the studio. Lucasfilm hasn’t revealed any details about the new film or even what era within the timeline it will take place.
I’m sure people are curious if this means that Kevin will attempt to produce more films within the Star Wars Universe alongside the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
It had been previously announced that the next feature film will be Patty Jenkins’ StarWars: Rogue Squadron coming out on December 22nd, 2023. Taika Waititi is also developing another film which could go into production once he finishes Thor: Love &Thunder for Marvel and Rian Johnson had been announced to be working on an original trilogy for the studio.
There is a wave of Disney+ shows on the way with Andor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, The Book of Boba Fett, Season 3 of The Mandalorian, Rangers of The New Republic, Ahsoka, Lando, and The High Republic era series The Acolyte.
The Multiverse is going to be a huge part of the upcoming MCU projects and one of the more interesting one so far is the Loki series starring franchise-favorite actor Tom Hiddleston time-hopping after getting his hands on the Tesseract in Avengers: Endgame leading to him getting on the radar of the Time Variance Agency. A group of people that police the Multiverse in Marvel Comics and it looks like at some point Loki is recruited by them.
Loki is set to debut on Disney+ in May 2021 featuring the God of Mischief as he steps out of his brother’s shadow in a new series that takes place after the events of Avengers: Endgame. Tom Hiddleston returns as the title character, joined by Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Sophia Di Martino, Wunmi Mosaku and Richard E. Grant. Kate Herron directs Loki, and Michael Waldron is head writer.
One of the highlight of the news concerning the series seems to be Marvel’s confirmation that Lovecraft Country actress Wunmi Mosaku will be in the Multiverse show.
The trailer teases that Idris Elba‘s Heimdall could be appearing during the 1970s segment with Loki as the infamous criminal D.B. Cooper. Seeing Asgard again wouldn’t be shocking after a report from Deadline has suggested that Jaimie Alexander might be showing up in the Disney+ series as Lady Sif alongside Taika Waititi’s Thor: Love & Thunder.
After watching the series trailer, I’m really looking forward to the show as it feels like live-action version of Rick & Morty, the popular sci-fi animated series at Adult Swim.
As mentioned above Loki will begin airing on Disney+ starting in May.
Marvel Studios had a rather large presentation at last week’s Disney Investor Day event and Kevin Feige had a lot of information to share in such a short period. Below is a rundown of most of the new information and adjusted release dates.
What seemed like the biggest announcement made during the massive amount of information was that director Jon Watts has been selected by the studio to reboot The Fantastic Four for them. Watts having worked with Marvel Studios to reboot the Spider-Man franchise with Spider-Man: Homecoming, Spider-Man: Far From Home, and the untitled Spider-Man 3 (currently filming in Atlanta as The November Project).
When Fantastic Four will begin shooting is unknown as Jon will be busy with Spider-Man 3 until it’s release in 12 months and they failed to mention any screenwriters. This will mark the first Marvel film for Watts that won’t have Sony Pictures’ involvement and might suggest that he won’t be coming back for Spider-Man 4.
Fandom has collectively chosen to campaign for John Krasinski and Emily Blunt to play the roles of Mister Fantastic and The Invisible Woman, however, there hasn’t been any concrete casting news concerning the project as it only just got confirmed.
Feige had telegraphed back at San Diego Comic-Con 2019 that Fantastic Four was the priority former Fox property they were aiming to reboot ahead of the X-Men. There is a possibility that Dr. Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm could appear in other films first.
One of the more frustrating things concerning Shang-Chi & The Legend of The Ten Rings is that they kept most of the cast unofficial for the entirety of the shoot but they’ve now announced a good chunk of the cast, while not all of them. The cast so far includes actors Simu Liu as Shang-Chi, Tony Leung as Wenwu aka The Mandarian, Awkwafina as Katy, Meng’er Zhang as Xialing, Michelle Yeoh as Jiang Nan, Ronny Chieng as Jon Jon, Fala Chen as Jiang Li, and Florian Munteanu as villain William Young aka Razor Fist.
Shang-Chi along with Black Widow are still set to be released in theaters, not on Disney+, with the Destin Daniel Cretton martial arts action film set for July 9, 2021.
Director Sam Raimi has started filming Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness is officially shooting and will not only connect to WandaVision but also Jon Watts’ Spider-Man 3. While Kevin didn’t confirm it, there is a good chance that Tom Holland‘s Peter Parker and other characters carrying over to the Doctor Strange sequel.
However, he did confirm that that Xochitl Gomez will be playing America Chavez aka Miss America. The young newcomer joins Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Rachel McAdams, Benedict Wong, and Chiwetel Ejiofor as villain Baron Mordo.
It’s release date is set for March 25, 2022.
We finally know Christian Bale‘s character in Thor: Love & Thunder as he’ll play the film’s villain Gorr The God Butcher. A role we assume will be done with motion-capture given the design of his comic book counterpart.
Deadline recently reported that Jaimie Alexander will reprise the role of Lady Sif.
The rest of the cast consists of Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tessa Thompson, Chris Pratt as Star-Lord, and director Taika Waititi will return to the role of Korg.
Filming begins next month in Australia and it’s release date has been moved once more to May 6, 2022.
Captain Marvel 2 director Nia DaCosta was finally confirmed alongside the return of Brie Larson as Carol Danvers. New additions to the franchise are Ms. Marvel‘s Iman Vellani co-starring as Kamala Khan and WandaVision actress Teyonah Parris as the adult version of Monica Rambeau aka Spectrum.
There is a good chance that it will connect to Secret Invasion as it will also shoot in the United Kingdom.
The film’s date was bumped to November 11th, 2021.
Marvel revealed the title for Ant-Man 3 will be Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania. Peyton Reed will be back as director with Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lily, Michael Douglas, and Michelle Pfeiffer returning as part of the main cast. The title suggesting the film will be entering the Quantum Realm or have strange things come out it.
The big announcement concerning the film is that Kathryn Newton (Freaky) has been recast as Cassie Lang aka Stature with rising-star Jonathan Majors (Lovecraft Country) confirmed as villain Kang The Conqueror. It remains to be seen if the third installment will help introduce The Fantastic Four before their own solo film from Jon Watts given Kang’s connection to the former 20th Century Fox heroes.
A release date wasn’t mentioned but is expected something in 2022.
James Gunn is officially back for Guardians of The Galaxy Vol.3 with them aiming for a 2023 release date. They’re also developing a holiday special and Groot shorts for Disney+.
Kevin Feige didn’t give much in the way of details for Black Panther 2 but revealed they would not be recasting Chadwick Boseman‘s role of T’Challa. He stopped short from explaining what they are doing with the sequel and reaffirmed that writer/director Ryan Coogler is still working on the film.
While we suspect potential delays on the project, they announced the film is coming July 8th, 2022. The spot was previously held by Captain Marvel 2.
Marvel also announced another round of Disney+ shows.
The Nick Fury series was confirmed to be an adaption of Secret Invasion, which involved a bunch of humanity revealed as being replaced with Skrulls. In the comics, it was revealed that a bunch of Avengers were uncovered to be Skrulls too. As assumed, Samuel L. Jackson will reprise the Fury role with Ben Mendelsohn back as Skrull leader Talos.
The Fox portion of the Skrull rights via Fantastic Four are now in the hands of Marvel and could allow for Super-Skrulls to come into play becoming a big threat as they mimic superpowers of various Marvel Comics heroes.
It had been reported that Kyle Bradstreet would be developing the show.
There are signs the series will shoot in the United Kingdom around the same time as Captain Marvel 2, which could suggest a direct connection via S.W.O.R.D. and the Skrulls.
Olivia Wilde is reportedly directing a Spider-Woman film for Sony Pictures. It’s worth mentioning that Jessica Drew is an Agent of S.W.O.R.D. and is one of the characters in the comics revealed to be a Skrull (Veranke The Skrull Queen). Marvel’s participation on that film while assumed hasn’t been made official.
Don Cheadle will lead his own Disney+ series as War Machine titled Armor Wars.
If the series takes cues from the comic book series we could see the return of Sam Rockwell‘s Justin Hammer, another fan-favorite that is still kicking around in the MCU.
We could also see the addition of unused Iron Man villains such as the Crimson Dynamo, Titanium Man, and others.
An Ironheart series will star Dominique Thorne as whiz-kid Riri Williams, who creates her own advance armor. I wouldn’t be shocked if there happens to be a crossover with Armor Wars.
They revealed new trailers for their upcoming slate of Disney+ series including WandaVision (coming January 15,2021), The Falcon & The Winter Soldier (coming March 19, 2021), Loki (coming May 2021), and their animated series What If…? (coming summer 2021). The trailers give us the first look at X-Men location Madripoor in Falcon and the scale of the Loki series with teases of his return to Asgard.
Additional information concerning the upcoming shows includes that Ms. Marvel and Hawkeye will indeed be aiming for a 2021, something The Ronin reported on earlier this month. Kevin Feige providing an sizzle footage for the former which is impressive given it only recently started shooting in Atlanta.
With She-Hulk, Kevin confirmed that the cast will include Tatiana Maslany as Jennifer Walters aka She-Hulk, Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner/Hulk, and the return of Tim Roth‘s Abomination. The latter addition could help support previous chatter that we might see William Hurt‘s Thunder Bolt Ross and Liv Tyler‘s Betty Ross in the series as well bring most of The Incredible Hulk cast back.
I’m sure there are more things to be announced in the future as they hinted to upcoming news concerning Mahershala Ali‘s Blade. Although, I’m sure fans were a little upset they left-out Ryan Reynolds‘ Deadpool 3 or an update on the X-Men reboot. There is now overwhelming evidence that The Young Avengers are coming at some point given that most have been cast already.
THE RONIN 