The Russo Brothers have their work cut out for them. But of course, they already did. The directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Captain America: Civil War (and the 2006 Owen Wilson comedy You, Me and Dupree) have signed on to direct Marvel Studios’ two-part motion picture crossover Avengers: Infinity War, and it’s going to be a major event unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.
Just how big is Avengers: Infinity War? According to Comic Book Movie, reporting from Wizard World New Orleans, these films might have 67 characters in them.
“We have so many characters we’re dealing with,“ Joe Russo told the crowd at the convention. “We’re breaking ground on Avengers: Infinity War. We have a board with 67 characters on it.”
Now… calm down. We all know that trying to include too many characters has been the death knell for a lot of superhero movies, including Batman & Robin and Spider-Man 3. But Joe Russo isn’t talking about the script, he’s talking about “a board,” and for a film on which he admits they are currently “breaking ground.”
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That means that they are currently considering all those characters for inclusion in the film, in one way or another. There could be a lot of cameos and background roles. There could also be a LOT fewer characters on camera once they finally hammer out the screenplay and start shooting.
What’s more, Joe Russo could have simply been exaggerating for comedic effect. It’s not uncommon for these kinds of quotations to be misinterpreted or quoted out of context once they are transcribed. Last year we broke the news that Blade Runner 2 filmmaker Denis Villeneuve would “take care of” the enigmatic ending of the original Blade Runner, by which he meant that he would preserve the mystery. But once his quotation was transcribed, sites all over the internet instead reported that Villeneuve had actually told us that Blade Runner 2 would solve the mystery once and for all. This was an understandable mistake to make, given the filmmaker’s phrasing, but it was also just not true.
In any case, whether he was exaggerating or 100% serious, Avengers: Infinity War is clearly an ambitious project for Marvel Studios. We sure as hell hope they pull it off.
Photo: Marvel Studios
William Bibbiani (everyone calls him ‘Bibbs’) is Crave’s film content editor and critic. You can hear him every week on The B-Movies Podcast and watch him on the weekly YouTube series Most Craved and What the Flick. Follow his rantings on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
