Marvel President Kevin Feige talks about The Future of THE AVENGERS

The Avengers isn't set to be released until May of 2012, Marvel Entertainment has a lot of work ahead of them to make sure the transition into this Avengers film is nice and smooth. All of the films that are in development now, Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and even The Hulk, have been been leading up to this Avengers moment. They are working hard to make sure there is a connection with everyone and that the Marvel movie universe is in sync. Kevin Feige did a fantastic little interview in which he reveals that The Hulk is indeed going to be in The Avengers, and how when they make this transition into a multi superhero film, they don't want to lose sight of the individual characters that we know and love.

My only concern is that when we launch a franchise–whichever character's franchise that may be–it should stand on its own two feet… So by the time 'The Avengers' comes in 2012, it's not just a team superhero movie with a bunch of characters with powers. It's three people- four including the Hulk; five including Nick Fury- who you've seen before in other movies, coming together for the first time.

It's gotta be a lot of fun for these guys who are planning these films out. They get to throw in stuff, little easter eggs and such, to get the crowd excited about this expanding Marvel universe. From the sound of it, they are going to throw a decent amount of new characters in Iron Man that we can look out for. Not to the point where it will ruin the movie with overloaded characters though.

It's fun now, and we're introducing some new characters in ['Iron Man 2']. But it's not about just cramming in lots of new people; that's sort of the cardinal sin of the sequel - adding in too many characters. This is totally Tony Stark's story. And that's gonna weave into Thor's story, and Steve Rogers' story, and it's already ingrained with Nick Fury's story and the organization known as S.H.I.E.L.D.

I can't wait to see who they end up introducing in the story. I imagine it will be more members of the S.H.I.E.L.D. organization. Feige then goes on to talk about Thor and how they plan to bridge the gap between the world of Asgard and the technological modern world.

…we're doing the Jack Kirby/StanLee/Walt Simonson/J. Michael Straczynski 'Thor.' We're not doing the blow-the-dust-off-the-old-Norse-book-in-your-library 'Thor.' And in the 'Thor' of the Marvel Universe, there's a race called the Asgardians. And we're linked through this Tree of Life that we're unaware of. It's real science, but we don't know about it yet. The 'Thor' movie is about teaching people that.

I absolutely love that they are actually going to explain this stuff. Had these movies been made by anyone else, they would just do away with some very important aspects of the the story like how Asgard is linked to Midgard, and the science behind that. 

As far as future Marvel films go, it seems like Feige is very excited to actually touch on not only another Hulk movie, but also the cosmic side of the Marvel universe. saying,

I'd love to break into the cosmic side of the Marvel Universe even more- it's kind of there in 'Thor.' J.J. Abrams' 'Star Trek' got me jonesing to do that. It's what I grew up on - 'Star Trek' and 'Star Wars.' I want to do a big space epic. And we've got them in Marvel.

I looks like the first big superhero space epic will come from Warner Bros. and DC's The Green Lantern, but I seriously can't wait to see what they are actually discussing in terms of what this cosmic story line will be, and who exactly in the Marvel universe this movie will focus on. There are so many different characters to choose from.

What do you think about what Kevin Feige had to say? And who would you like to see Marvel bring to life for this Cosmic space epic?