Kevin Feige Says Robert Downey Jr. Will Not Return as Iron Man - "We Would Never Magically Undo" His Death

There have been a few reports from Hollywood insiders that have claimed Marvel Studios is looking to bring Robert Downey Jr. back as Iron Man, along with several other core members of the Avengers team for a new Marvel movie. Well, Kevin Feige has confirmed in an interview with Vanity Fair that Downey Jr. will not be coming back to play Tony Stark, they have no plans to do that after his heroic death in Avengers: Endgame. When asked about the rumors, Feige said:

“We are going to keep that moment and not touch that moment again. We all worked very hard for many years to get to that, and we would never want to magically undo it in any way.”

That’s good to hear. At least they understand that bringing Iron Man is not a good idea. Feige went on to talk about casting Downey Jr. in the movie and how Marvel nearly passed on the opportunity to cast him because of his shady past. Feige recalls:

“It purely came down to the Marvel board being nervous at putting all of their chips in their future films on somebody who famously had those legal troubles in the past. I wasn’t very good — and I’m still not great — at taking no for an answer. But I also don’t pound my chest to try to get my way. I try to figure out ways to make it as clear to other people why we should head in a direction. And that’s when the idea of a screen test came up.”

Timothy Olyphant was the actor that the Marvel board wanted, but that screen test that was shown is what won Downey Jr. the gig. Former Marvel Studios president David Maisel previously shared:

“My board thought I was crazy to put the future of the company in the hands of an addict. I helped them understand how great he was for the role. We all had confidence that he was clean and would stay clean.” 

In the end, everything worked out for Downey Jr. and he appeared in nine Marvel movies over the course of eleven years. All the other actors brought in also looked up to the actor, and Feige explained:

“We used to joke and say that Robert was the head of the acting department because everybody there looked up to him. He took them all under his wing but not in a subservient sense. He just became their cheerleader.”

Are you happy to learn that Marvel Studios has no plans on bringing Robert Downey Jr. back as Iron Man?