How The MCU Got So BIG
5. Assembling The Avengers
Feige grew up with Marvel Comics, and wanted to simulate the feeling that any character could suddenly appear in Marvel films like they could with each page turn of a comic.
Feige had the opportunity to realise that dream, as Marvel had reacquired all the rights of The Avengers. Black Widow was returned by Lionsgate shortly after the Merrill Lynch deal, with Hulk returning to Marvel after Universal’s 2003 Hulk film. The next step was in sight: build-up to an Avengers movie.
Release schedules were tight, with at least one film produced every year (bar 2009). Even if an Avenger didn’t get their own movie, they were at least introduced in another (e.g. Hawkeye in Thor).
On top of introducing characters, the first five films established vital world-building to help facilitate an Avengers crossover. On paper, a supernatural Thor and technological Iron Man don’t gel. So 2011’s Thor presented the Asgardians as an alien race, depicting their “magic” as more of an advanced technology.
Marvel’s colossal contracts signed actors up for unprecedented numbers of movie appearances to solidify future team-ups. Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, and Chris Hemsworth signed six-movie standard deals. Samuel L Jackson signed up for nine films as the one-eyed Nick Fury.
Keeping people in-house extended well beyond actors too. The Harvard Business Report summarised an average of 25% of a Marvel film’s core creative group overlapped from one film to another, with an average of 14% for the full crew.
With the Avengers introduced, Joss Whedon was the perfect director choice for an Avengers movie.
Despite The Avengers being his second feature film directing, his television experience proved he could bring together diverse casts of characters, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly. He had also worked with Marvel in the past creating the Astonishing X-Men comics.
With his expertise, a star-studded cast, and four years of story-telling preceding it, The Avengers was a smash-hit, becoming the third highest-grossing film of all time.