Marvel's Agent Carter

[Tetsujin]

Seems like this is actually moving forward:

http://www.thewrap.com/abcs-agent-carter-books-hayley-atwell-resurrection-duo-showrunners/

ABC’s “Captain America” spinoff “Agent Carter” is gaining momentum, landing commitments from Hayley Atwell, who played the World War II government agent in the movie, and showrunners Tara Butters and Michele Fazekas.

The show’s pilot is written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, who wrote “Captain America: The First Avenger” and the upcoming “Captain America: The Winter Soldier.”

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Is anyone else starting to worry the Marvel Cinematic Universe may be reaching an oversaturation point already? Obviously it has a ways to go yet berore it gets near going overboard the way the comics have, but if they throw a couple more TV series at us, I'm going to say they risk losing the "new reader-friendly" status they've enjoyed up to this point.

I mean, really, Agent Carter? A TV series? Even the comics didn't give her a series of her own. And how much SHIELD do we need?

 

[Tetsujin]

Then there is Marvel’s stealth Agent Carter project. Last year, the company went into Fort Knox mode on its Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. pilot, which was kept under lock and key. They took that a notch further this year with Agent Carter. Because there is a prototype — the project is inspired by a one shot, which was featured on the Blu-ray release of Iron Man 3 — word has been that it would forgo a pilot and go straight to series. The script was finished more than three months ago (“the script is great,” ABC’s Paul Lee said back in January), the option on one-shot’s star Hayley Atwell came up and was extended, but the green light never came. Now there is talk that a pickup for Agent Carter may come along with a renewal for Marvel’s freshman Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., with the new series possibly serving as a bridge between the fall and spring portions of S.H.I.E.L.D.

http://www.deadline.com/2014/04/pilots-2014-early-buzz-edition/

 

[Tennyo]

Is anyone else starting to worry the Marvel Cinematic Universe may be reaching an oversaturation point already? Obviously it has a ways to go yet berore it gets near going overboard the way the comics have, but if they throw a couple more TV series at us, I'm going to say they risk losing the "new reader-friendly" status they've enjoyed up to this point.

I mean, really, Agent Carter? A TV series? Even the comics didn't give her a series of her own. And how much SHIELD do we need?

I'm beginning to fear this as well. I think just one TV series to go along with the movies is pushing it. I've never taken the time to watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. I only really care about the movies.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

I'm beginning to fear this as well. I think just one TV series to go along with the movies is pushing it. I've never taken the time to watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. I only really care about the movies.

I think of SHIELD and other series just as "icing" as the events that happen are directly connected to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and provide extra motivation or scope (and in Agent Carter's case history) for the larger universe. It's like reading tie-in Graphic Novels, but with a wider audience. Similar, but different from the Clone Wars/Rebels series & Star Wars films.

At a point, you can reach a saturation level, where the general public is aware who the general viewing populace is aware of, and the fact that they can drop them in and out of events more easily. For example: Hulk only has one MCU film that's got a completely different actor, but even if you hadn't seen it, I doubt anyone would've been confused by the big green guy showing up because he's well known (unlike Thor/Cap/IronMan by comparison who would've been harder to drop in basically without warning). There's a balance to pulling off crossover events in comics that they're likely using their experience with, and making sure that you and your active audience are on the same page & they're not overly obtuse to just jumping in to them.

The important stuff there is knowing which titles you have BUILD and which titles FLAVOR. So long as you keep that balance intact, they shouldn't have any issues.



X

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Any thoughts on Marvel Studios having a roadmap all the way to 2028 with at least two movies per year?:

http://www.newsarama.com/20754-kevi...atic-universe-plans-expanded-out-to-2028.html

 

[X-SOLDIER]

Any thoughts on Marvel Studios having a roadmap all the way to 2028 with at least two movies per year?:

http://www.newsarama.com/20754-kevi...atic-universe-plans-expanded-out-to-2028.html

Oh yeah. That's something that's a really good thing in my mind. CLEARLY nothing's in stone (cast, directors, etc. etc. etc.), but a "roadmap" really shows all the places you CAN go. It lets you follow the things that work, and shows how all those interdependencies function. If you have one film that you have high hopes for, but doesn't pan out as big, a big roadmap will be the thing that lets that title work as more of a "flavor" & less as "structure" to work towards each new Phase without shattering plans.


X

 

[Tennyo]

I think of SHIELD and other series just as "icing" as the events that happen are directly connected to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and provide extra motivation or scope (and in Agent Carter's case history) for the larger universe. It's like reading tie-in Graphic Novels, but with a wider audience. Similar, but different from the Clone Wars/Rebels series & Star Wars films.

At a point, you can reach a saturation level, where the general public is aware who the general viewing populace is aware of, and the fact that they can drop them in and out of events more easily. For example: Hulk only has one MCU film that's got a completely different actor, but even if you hadn't seen it, I doubt anyone would've been confused by the big green guy showing up because he's well known (unlike Thor/Cap/IronMan by comparison who would've been harder to drop in basically without warning). There's a balance to pulling off crossover events in comics that they're likely using their experience with, and making sure that you and your active audience are on the same page & they're not overly obtuse to just jumping in to them.

The important stuff there is knowing which titles you have BUILD and which titles FLAVOR. So long as you keep that balance intact, they shouldn't have any issues.

Hopefully they will keep that balance. If it becomes necessary to watch every single TV show and every single MCU movie just to know what's going on they're going to lose their audience.

It's nice that so far this has not been the case with the films. You may have to watch the first two Iron Man movies to appreciate Iron Man 3, and you may have to watch the first Captain America to understand Winter Soldier, and watch the first Thor movie to understand what's going on in Dark World, but you don't need to watch them to understand what's going on in other heroes' movies, including The Avengers. Granted, it's good for character development, but not a necessity.

This was actually one of my thoughts after watching Winter Soldier. As awesome as that movie is I feel like it made a lot of changes and may become required viewing for everything else. Hopefully they can find a way to work it in seamlessly.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Oh, yeah, "Winter Soldier" changed the whole landscape. It's absolutely required viewing.

 

[Tennyo]

And that's what I'm becoming afraid of. You can't count on the general populace to always eat up every tiny bit that gets churned out. Some people may only be interested in one hero, or just in the movies where they all team up.

At the very least they need to not make the TV shows required viewing to understand what's going on in the movies. That's going into overkill mode.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

By the same token though, Loki being a part of Thor was a HUGE thing in Avengers that they handled well within the film. I think, if anything Captain America 2 is actually making the landscape MORE Avengers-friendly,

Spoiler: because

it's JUST the Avengers Tower as a reliable base of operations, and just the main heroes getting everything handled. SHIELD is essentially out of the picture, so Avengers 2 can focus JUST on the heroes handling things on their own without massive support. It'll also be introducing Hydra in the form of Quicksilver & Scarlet Witch, so it pulls the needed pieces of Captain America 2 into its own plot in a capacity that it can stand alone on - and that's all they need to explain within Avengers 2 that SHIELD is dealing with other Hydra-based forces on a large scale - thus eliminating heavy dependence on Captain America 2 - despite its success.

By the same token, I'd expect the same stuff with the Guardians and Thanos moving towards Phase 3.

X

 

[Tetsujin]

And that's what I'm becoming afraid of. You can't count on the general populace to always eat up every tiny bit that gets churned out.

The movies aren't tiny bits though.

The connected universe is kind of the big draw with the MCU.

The movies are getting more and more successful *because* the general populace wants to keep up.
Same reason why arc-based tv series are successful too, really.

As for Agents influencing the movies, that seems to be highly unlikely anyway. The movies will always influence the series but most likely not the other way round.
I mean, as far as the Avengers are concerned, Coulson is still dead. He won't be in Age of Ultron either.

As for other big plot elements in the MCU influencing other movies, there's always characters that can act as audience surrogates for those who might not have watched some of them. Example:

Spoiler

Thor is busy with shit on Asgard and has no clue that SHIELD doesn't exist anymore. When he returns in Age of Ultron, he could be the audience surrogate for those who have not seen Cap 2, requiring some brief exposition bringing him up to date.

 

[Tennyo]

Tiny bits also includes the show(s).

People want to watch the movies because the movies are connected, but it would be a dick move if suddenly stuff happened in a movie because of the show and people are left confused because they didn't know they had to watch the episode first. But you already said this probably won't happen, which I sure hope you are right.

 

[Tennyo]

Agent Carter officially picked up.

 

[Geostigma]

Whelp im out.

Marvel has a bad habit of over saturating the market with useless crap every other 10-15 years and it looks like they are right back on track with the carter pick up.

edit:

Im not saying that Carter is crap I love the character, but I mean history has been repeating itself since the 70's with Marvel. I just have no faith that they wont do what they did with live action shows in the 70-80's , and what they did with the cartoons in the 90's which with the exception of Spiderman and Xmen were god awful at worst and forgettable at best.

 

[Tetsujin]

I'm so in.

I don't think there's going to be much of an oversaturation especially since earlier they said they envision this as more of a limited series with maybe 13 or fewer episodes.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Let's hope they stick to that.

 

[Tetsujin]

It might also be a bridge show between AoS seasons one and two. Would certainly hope so.

 

[Geostigma]

Idk. I can count on both hands the amount of times Marvel managed to fuck something amazing up. They have perfected the ultimate let down so well that I legitimately think at times that by the time Phase 3 rolls around all interest will be gone.

 

[Ⓐaron]

Thus far they've been doing things pretty solidly, with at least three outright amazing entries in the MCU (the last several episodes of AoS have been pretty close to that level as well). We'll see, I guess.

 

[Geostigma]

Thus far they've been doing things pretty solidly, with at least three outright amazing entries in the MCU (the last several episodes of AoS have been pretty close to that level as well). We'll see, I guess.

Thats my point lol.
They always get to a point where they make some really good stuff and then just manage to fuck it all up by over doing it.

They have done it in the comics, live action and in the cartoons since the 70's.
At the moment they have no where to go but down and historically when they go down they go way way way down. There is a reason why Marvel has gone bankrupt or have needed bail/buy outs so many times.

Im just saying they dont have a good track record here and it really looks like they could be repeating the past here.

 

[Tetsujin]

 

[Tennyo]

I do have to admit that I am excited to see more ladies pop up as part of the MCU.

 

[Carlie]

Fazekas: I will say, the nice thing about "Agent Carter" being set in the '40s is it predates a lot of the Marvel universe. As you know, the guys who wrote "Captain America" 1, 2 and are now writing 3, wrote the pilot. So they know that universe very well. So I don't feel like we're hamstrung by anything. I think there's a lot of room to play and a lot of room to be creative with the story.

Butters: And also, it allows us, the movies were such a wonderful set up for the series. There is definitely something to draw on from "Captain America" 1 and 2, and hopefully that there are characters and people that are set up there that we'll hopefully see in our universe. I think that she's such a wonderful character. She's strong, she's independent, but she's in a world where, after the war, a strong and independent woman isn't what people want. So I think there's a fun emotional story that we get to play with in the series.

But I will say, Marvel is very much about synergy and synergy between their properties. We know a lot of the writers on "S.H.I.E.L.D." because we worked with them on other shows. We know Jeff Bell, we know Paul Z. We know Maurissa and Jed. We worked on "Dollhouse" with them. So I think if there's room for synergy, if there's room for little things between the shows, I think everybody's open to that. If we can find it and it makes sense, it's organic and it doesn't just look like a gimmick.

 

[Tetsujin]

Loeb calls the project a true partnership between Marvel Television and Marvel Studios. D'Esposito will direct the first episode and says the Russo brothers (who did "Winter Soldier") will direct the second and third episodes. He also just got off the phone with "First Avenger" director Joe Johnston, and they are hoping to get him to direct episode 4.

http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-wa...re-to-comic-con-live-blog#lXBJoaPh837R64mE.99