The brothers Russo, who are helming the soon-to-be box office hit "Captain America:Civil War" recently sat down with Forbes to discuss Spider-man, Civil War, Infinity War, and a possible re-casting of Iron Man.
In discussing the their tendency to do ensemble films: "We love ensemble story telling" Anthony Russo tells the magazine. "We like stories that you can revisit mulitple times and there is something about ensembles that allows you to approach the different characters point of view at different times and we find that process fun... [We make] sure we fill out their role as much as we can and having as much with the characters as we can."
After discussing budgets in relation to the story-writing process, the talk turned to the possibility of re-casting Iron Man after Robert Downey Jr steps down from the role: Joe Russo states "It's almost impossible to replace Robert [Downey Jr]... One close up from Robert is worth anothers actor's entire performance... I think if and when he is done with the character, I think you will find that Iron Man might disappear for a while. I think the only way that you could reboot that character is to give a generational gap that would allow another actor to at least have a chance to redefine that character without the enormous spectre of Robert hanging over it. There are so many characters in the Marvel universe that can pick up the ball and run with it through the next phase or two before you need to see Iron Man again, frankly."
Could this mean that they might find away to make Iron disappear from the scene for a while, possibly even involving Stark's death?
"We have gone through a little bit of a transition with that content... we are thinking, very specifically, about to do new ways of [extras] with Avengers: Infinity War. We're just in the beginning phases of figuring them out. Yes, DVD's are gone, but there is this wonderful platform out there called YouTube... There can be more elaborate versions of trailers... that are shot specifically for online that will never appear in the movie but that may appear as a kind of short film"
Sounds very much like the fan favorite "Marvel One Shots" might be making a comeback!
Finally, in discussing the always-anticipated post credits scene, the directors warn us not to leave too early!
"We can't say who is going to be in it, but we can say that there certainly could be one, or two, maybe three"
Three possible post-credit scenes! As if we weren't going to stay until the lights came up anyway!
Anyway, to read the rest of the interview, including discussions on Deadpool, fan feedback, and Spider-Mans costume (which was mentioned HERE), head on over to Forbes.