Weekly MCU Review for June 11

Another week, and more MCU news!  More casting news for Spider-Man: Homecoming, plus new information about Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther.  Oh, and some Marvel TV stuff, too.  Put some ketchup on your eggs, and catch-up on your Marvel news!

Mostly MCU Reviews

My articles from the week

First up for the week, my review of Daredevil season 2, episode 11, “.380.”

Next, my retro-review of The Incredible Hulk.  What is your opinion of this movie?

Finally, here is my Civil War follow-up to talk about the heroes that don’t really fit into either of the previous categories.  Which stories are you most excited to see in Phase 3?

MCU News

Links to news articles and blog posts about the MCU

Michael Barbieri has been cast in Spider-Man: Homecoming, where he will evidently play a version of Ganke, Miles Morales’ (Ultimate Universe Spider-Man) best friend.  What do you think of the news?  I have to admit, there is one casting that I’m really hoping for but they haven’t mentioned at all:  Flash Thompson.  They need a Flash Thompson to eventually become Agent Venom!

Spider-Man: Homecoming added another cast member:  Kenneth Choi as the school principal.  You may remember that he was also Jim Morita of the Howling Commandos in Captain America: The First Avenger (and a cameo on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.).  While it is unlikely that the two roles are related, there are at least 2 possibilities for connections:  He might be playing his own son/grandson, or he might be a Life Model Decoy of the original who works for S.H.I.E.L.D.  Considering that on the Ultimate Spider-Man series Agent Coulson was Peter Parker’s principal for a couple years, they just introduced the concept of an advanced L.M.D. on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and there is even precedent for turning Howling Commandos into L.M.D.s to keep them around (see “Dugan, Dum Dum”), that latter idea is actually a valid option!

Thor: Ragnarok will start filming on July 4 on the Gold Coast of Australia, so we will hopefully get a lot of information soon enough.

Michael B. Jordan confirmed that he will be appearing in Black Panther.

Sharon Stone gave a little more information about her mystery Marvel role:  her superpower is “heat.”  That could still mean that she’s playing Janet Van Dyne, a.k.a. Wasp, as she has bio-electric stings which are sort of like heat.  However, there are plenty of other heat-based heroes in the Marvel Universe to pick from.  Maybe she’s playing an older hero in Captain Marvel from whom Carol Danvers takes her inspiration (perhaps a gender-swapped Mar Vell).

In news that would be more surprising if she said the opposite, Elizabeth Olsen indicated that she would be willing to do a Scarlet Witch movie as long as it “make[s] sense for how it advances in the world.”  Personally, my vote would be a Scarlet Witch and the Vision movie to explore those 2 characters and their relationship.

Here are some of Clark Gregg’s thoughts about possibilities for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4.

What do you think about the idea of adding another The Walking Dead alum to Marvel’s Netflix lineup?  Norman Reedus would be interested in playing Ghost Rider if Marvel came calling.  Would you want to see that?

So Brian Michael Bendis is working on a TV series based on his character Scarlet which will apparently air on Cinemax.  I don’t know anything about the character, but I am curious why they would not put it on a Disney/ABC-run channel.

News from Around Geekdom

Anything not related to the MCU that I find interesting

Well, a Justice League Dark movie is on its way… but it’s (presumably) going to be animated.  That sounds pretty cool, but I don’t know what this means for that live-action one that was being thrown around forever.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens has finally finished its domestic theater run, and comes in with a Domestic Total Gross of $936,662,225!  Wow!  That's more than most movies make worldwide!

So it seems pretty clear that Indiana Jones 5 is actually happening, and they just added one more to the number of returning talents:  John Williams.  So even if it doesn’t look and feel right, at least it will sound right?

I really hope that this isn’t some sort of Family Guy prank!  Considering that Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ is the best and most-accurate recent Biblical movie, this could actually be a really good movie.

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