Debate of the Day: What Exactly Will a Marvel TV Show Look Like?
In case you haven’t heard the news, this week Joss Whedon was wooed to not only come back to direct The Avengers 2 (whenever the hell that may be), but also develop a live-action Marvel TV show for NBC.
While I’m sure The Avengers 2 will be worthwhile under his direction, I’m a little confused as to how exactly he’ll make a live-action superhero show work set in the Marvel universe. Sure, TV is his bread and butter, but which heroes could be featured that wouldn’t be budget busting? The vast majority require a fair amount of special effects, including Iron Man, The Hulk and even Thor. I suppose Black Widow and Captain America could get their own spin-off, but I can’t see Jeremy Renner or Scarlett Johnasson committing to a TV project.
In fact, I doubt this will be Avengers-centric at all. Marvel has hundreds of heroes to choose from, and I’m sure there are a few out there who would work in a week network show. But who? I thought The Punisher could work, and even Tom Jane would definitely come back for that, but that’s going to be too gritty for NBC. I don’t think Disney has the X-Men or Spider-Man licenses back yet. So that’s the question, which hero(es) will be picked for this show, and what will it be like? Debate below.
As far as I’m aware, Disney own the rights to ALL Marvel characters for television shows; the Spider-Man, X-Men, Daredevil contracts owned by other companies only pertain to movies. So this TV show could include any and all of them.
My guess is an X-Men show because Whedon seems to love them so much, especially Kitty Pryde.
Deadpool.
+1 for Deadpool
Pretty sure it’s been put out there that it will most likely be a S.H.I.E.L.D show.
I don’t remember where i read it (pretty sure it was a link from this site), but i rmeember reading that it was going to focus on the lesser known or non-main avengers members. Who I’m thinking will appear:
*crosses fingers* West Coast Avengers!!
They should just fill the roster with Beast, Black Knight, Tigra, Hercules, Wonder Man, and Jack of Hearts.
That would be hilarious.
Realistically I could see it being some of the…simpler….super hero teams like Heroes for Hire, X-Factor, Runaways, maybe the Young Avengers. But personally I would love a live action Spider-man show kind of in the same vein as Smallville. But Peter Parker did have those high school drama years so they would fit in well. Also X-Men or some incarnation of those mutants would be awesome. The problem with them and most super hero tv shows is special effects.
Daredevil could be great, or possibly Heroes For Hire. Any street level hero would do. A Black Widow/Hawkeye prequel series could be killer if Johansson and Jackson would stoop to television work (not likely). There is a rumor that Disney/Marvel has offered FOX a deal where they could have an extension on the film rights to DD if they let Disney have Galactus (possibly for the Guardians film in the works). That would make a lot of sense if Marvel already has the rights to DD on TV and knows that FOX isn’t planning to on cashing in on the film rights. It’d be a win/win move for them. I vote Daredevil. The possibilities are excellent.
I would love to see a show based on “Damage Control”. Characters from that Marvel comic series going to clean up messes left by some bigger name heroes set New York City. You wouldn’t even really have to see any of the flagship heroes just build stories around collateral damage they caused. Could be funny and dramatic.
This week on “Damage Control”. The crew have to find a way to pull an unstable plasma bomb out of the Hudson River that was submerged after a confrontation between Spiderman and The Green Goblin.
Marvel/Disney has the rights to all of the characters for TV, so they can use any Marvel Character (except ROM, and some others) that they want.
While New Avengers could never happen on the big screen (As Spider-Man is with Sony, Fox has the X-Men and Daredevil), this could happen on TV. And if I had to vote for my favorite, why would anyone want anything BUT a show with Iron Man, Wolverine, Captain America, Spider-Man, Luke Cage, and others?
I’d love a Runaways series though I think that may be a bit expensive for the effects. Also Molly’s a mutant and Fox has film rights to X-Men, I’d assume that extends to mutants in general.
I think it might be interesting to get something set in the Marvel U but not superhero centric, maybe a take on Front Line or Alias.
Heroes for Hire would be awesome and very easy to adapt to TV. Iron Fist and Luke Cage are both street level hereos with connections to many of the avengers, I could see that working well.
+1 for “Damage Control” Love to see the group have to fix the “just-offscreen” heroes…..
I’m personally hoping for a Daredevil legal drama with She-Hulk being a recurring character along with Marvel’s plethora of New-York based street-level characters.
Marvel is probably getting the rights to Daredevil back soon, so there’s the chance.
“Runaways” would be fantastic. Molly is one of my favorite characters. Ever.
I think the two most likely would either be ‘Young Avengers’ as its the easiest to tie in with the Avengers franchise they’ve got going on and would not require any of the big budget cast beyond maybe cameos. It would be a group of young heroes emulating their idols who we’ve already seen in the movie. Alternativly Joss Whedon has already done a lot of work with ‘the runaways’ writing entire story arcs for the comics. Either of these would play to his strengths as a producer as he’s great at ensamble group shows/young people teaming up to take on the big bad world… However I think it’s more likely they’d go with ‘young avengers’ as it would be more directly linkes to the established characters and almost an extra publicity machine for further movies.
An outside runner though that I would love to see is if Fox don’t do anything with the Daredevil rights before October they revert back to Marvel and we could see Matt Murdock in his own show both as Daredevil AND a legal procedural elemant which NBC seems to love
It’s not NBC…it’s ABC. ABC is Disney/Marvel. That’s how this works.
You make this show work with something of an Avengers West Coast lineup with a base of:
Tigra
Wonderman
Moon Knight
Mockingbird
You could throw in Henry/Janet Pym, you can insert Vision and they can ultimately tie it to the movie.
Otherwise they’ll with Callum’s suggestion of the Young Avengers.
Hulkling
Speed
Wiccan
Iron Lad
Patriot
Stature
They tried getting a Runaway film off the ground a couple of years ago and last I heard it was shelved til 2014
If it’s anyone but Luke Cage, I’ll be disappointed.
A SHIELD series would be perfect. do it in the style of THE X FILES. 2 shield agents investigating random goings on within the marvel universe. i’d also add Cobie smouders as maria hill in a director Skinner type role. sometimes their adventures could be mundane(investigating a serial killer with ties to AIM) sometimes more supernatural(tracting down an escaped alien SKRULL) sometimes a full blown adventure with a comic book hero such as Iron fist, cloak and dagger or man thing). then the MAJOR crossover episodes where our agents participate in the event of marvels latest feature film from shields behind the scenes point of view. a two parter before and after the films release. i could even envision Sam jackson making a cameo in a season finale. the show could have endless possibilities.
think power rangers but marvel cheesy every episode with the same basic plot of beating up bad guys and end up destroying everything after all disney did buy out marvel and disney can’t make anything without ripping off something and destroying it. just how they cut spectacular spider-man and replaced it with ultrafail spider-man they ripped off who’s line is it anyway except bad with that show as in they are in it for the money and the fans don’t matter
if they ruin the wolverine origin rise movie i’m going to freak
Wolverines true gritty death in his wake story line doesn’t fit disney rather they would prefer he was called kitten man
@ dalton kates
FOX is doing the new wolverine movie not disney/marvel. get your facts streight
What no love for static shock here. That would be the greatest.
I like the idea of Luke Cage & Iron Fist kicking ass on TV, or even the Irredeemable Ant-Man. Great characters, easier on the budget, and lots of adventures to entertain the audiences. Though i wish Whedon would make an adaption of Nextwave: Agents of H.A.T.E. That would be crazy awesome to watch.
Just remembered that static is dc. oops.