Disney/Marvel

As you’ve probably heard by now, The Walt Disney Company is in the process of acquiring Marvel for $4 billion. But what does this mean for the future of Marvel Comics and Marvel Films? Disney CEO Bob Iger responded to questions on a conference call this morning, and here is some of the information that you need to know.

Disney CEO Bob Iger said the company didn’t plan on interfering much with any of the in-development Marvel movies, using the term “If it ain’t broke…” All of the creative control will remain in the hands of the people who know the Marvel Universe best: the people at Marvel.

Disney’s acquisition does notaffect the deals for movies in place at other movie studios, such as Spider-Man and X-Men at 20th Century Fox.

Paramount still holds to rights to distribute up to five Marvel films, including: Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America, The Avengers and possibly one more unannounced film.

There are still existing deals in which other studios hold the big screen rights to certain characters.

But after those deals expire, Disney “want[s] to be sole distributor of these films.”

On the possibility of Pixar developing a future Marvel films? “We’ve talked about this internally. Pixar boss John Lasseter talked to the Marvel guys about this and they all got excited about it. We think there’s ultimately some exciting product that come of that. Sparks will fly!” Sounds like Lasseter is very interested at the possibility.

Disney also plans to “exploit more lesser-known characters.”

It is unclear what Marvel’s deal looks like with Universal Studios, but it’s hard to imagine that Disney isn’t interested in the theme park rights to the Marvel Universe.

And I have to include this out-of-context unintentionally funny quote from Iger telling CNBC how they hope to attract more young boys: “We’d like love to attract more boys, and we think Marvel’s skew is more in boys’ direction. Although there’s a universal appeal, we think, to a lot of their characters and a lot of their story. Just look at Spider-Man and Iron Man films. This is a great fit. But we obviously know Disney has a lot of products that are more girl-skewed than boy. And we’d like the opportunity to go after boys more aggressively.”

  • Rockie
    lets all hope they stay true to the "if it ain't broke" style

    it still feels dirty
  • I think people are forgetting that this isn't Eisner's Disney anymore. They've improved drastically with their production habits and studio interference, so I think this Marvel merger could be a good thing
  • joe
    Does this mean there will be no more R rated movies from Marval? Sad :(

    I was looking forward to a spider-woman with jessica parker and her lesbian love interest ...
  • Miramax still does R films. That being said I doubt Marvel was going to make many R films anyway.
  • chris
    Joe,

    Disney has made R rated films they Touchstone Pictures, Hollywood Pictures, and Miramax labels. They are responsible for such films as End of Days, Dirty Pretty Things, Rounders, and the newer Halloween movies
  • concernedxfan
    Frack the movies and theme parks..wat does this mean for the COMICS????
  • I really don't think Disney gives 2 shits about the actual comics so they probably will leave them alone. Even if sales magically doubled it still would not be a huge source of income for a company like Disney. This is more about the big acquisitions like X-Men, Spiderman, Iron Man, ect and the potential to bring more comic characters to the big screen and TV. The execs at Disney probably care about the actual comic books as much as the execs at Time-Warner care about DC comic books.
  • mangoshakes
    yah i doubt it'll change anything, as long as the comics don't lose any money which they won't. WB doesn't even care, i think there's something where they lose rights if they don't publish so whatev
  • You're on a site that deals entirely with movies and tv. Don't expect much news on actual comics.
  • EbonPinion
    Disney acquired Marvel Entertainment. Not Marvel Comics. There will be no change to the comics.
  • jspegele
    Marvel Publishing (Marvel Comics) is a subsidiary of Marvel Entertainment, so, Disney will be Marvel Publishing's parent company. Doesn't mean they will make any changes, but they will be in charge.
  • MarkoP
    "Disney also plays to “be exploiting more lesser-known characters.”"

    They're gonna make a Devil Dinosaur movie, aren't they?
  • fanboy_d
    pixar presents franklin richards: son of a genius

    please
  • AfroVince
    the end of the world... 2012... is on it's way..... man.
  • Oh jeez calm down people.
  • for real, lol.
  • yes, Mickey Mouse wants to go after the boys more aggressively...
  • longliveracsobeast
    hahaha

    so weird
  • You just know that this means an Incredibles movie with Marvel cameos. It is simply too too obvious to ignore. Or that the Incredibles could be worked into the Marvel universe which would also be cool.
  • Weyland_Yutani
    No, no it wouldn't.
  • TheMarquis
    I would much rather see Pixar developing its own properties than messing around in Marvel dogma.
  • Jaysun
    Sweet, Pixar will make a Miracleman/Marvelman movie! Right?
  • Chitown Jason
    DC Comics has been owned by Warner Bros. for 40 Years. This is nothing but good things for Marvel to me.
  • "We’d like love to attract more boys"

    *snicker*

    "And we’d like the opportunity to go after boys more aggressively."

    *rofl*
  • Ben C
    Exactly my thoughts. Lol.
  • Fantastic Four movie produced by Pixar directed by Brad Bird.

    Nuff said.
  • billyb123
    Um... yeah... it was called The Incredibles
  • Nickssfsn
    Just need to wrangle control away from Fox, yeesh.

    Does anyone know when the Fox deals expire? Please let it be soon. I can't believe they have X-men and Fantastic 4.
  • You mean The Incredibles?
  • Wow really? TWO separate Incredibles comments?
    Yeah I get that it was a thinly veiled homage to FF, but weren't we talking about a FF reboot a little while ago? Don't they deserve a proper film?

    If not them (since this suggestion makes people all cranky-pants) how about Silver Surfer? Screw this pretense of it needing to be live action, and deliver this property to people who can tell a good story in an engaging way.
  • Garber
    Doctor Strange could probably work better as animated Pixar movie than as live-action.
  • I was onboard with everything until the last quote about boys, I thought it was a little creepy.

    Anyway, this sounds good that the whole Avengers storyline won't be disrupted and the quality of those films will indeed stay the same.

    I hope that in the long run of this deal, Marvel/Disney will be able to get all their characters back and we can have good X-men stories on the big screen.
  • Nickssfsn
    But what it really looks like at this point is that Warner Bros really REALLY needs to step it's game up now and get those freaking movies made and out the door.
  • Mike
    I hope to God that Pixar doesn't do a Marvel film, the result would most likely contain zero of the magic of a Pixar film.

    Plus I'm more of a DC fan myself :p
  • Browncoat1138
    I'm 100% sure that the comics will be fine. All the points everyone has made about WB and DC, spot on. I don't think Marvel will lose anything on the publication side. The thing I'm excited for is the prospect of more budget money going to Marvel films. I loved The Incredible Hulk, but i think it could have benefitted from a couple more bucks in post-production, most of those effects, while still better than Wolvie's claws in "Origins", looked like they needed a couple more weeks of rendering.

    As for the idea of The Incredibles and Marvel meshups. I don't know... that does sound like an obvious choice, but why would they do that when most of the Incredibles characters are based on Marvel/DC anyway? Elastigirl is just a housewife version of Reed Richards, Violet is just Sue, Frozone is a cross of Iceman and SIlver Surfer, and Mr. Incredible is just the Cap. I think a kids cartoon show might be ok, have the Incredibles pop up in THe Superhero Squad Show on CN once and a while, but I doubt we'll see Dash fly through the scene while The Cap, Iron man and Spider-Man are trying to subdue the Hulk.
  • Great write up, man. Very informative.
  • This seems like a good deal:
    Disney marketing+Disney $+Disney tech= Good marvel movies.
    Disney doesn't give a flying fuck about the comes.
    Pixar!

    P.S- I think a lot of people automatically think of Disney studio and Disney are the same (well they are but you get my point) The movies will not be produced by disney studios so I don't think they will mess around with the movies because then they would be committing suicide.
  • Brian
    Pixar could provide the scale to these stories that traditional live action films cant. For instance, Marvel (and DC) heroes traverse dimensions, planets, stars, etc. The stories, and their environments are BIG. Live action has failed to capture that, but I think Pixar could.
  • mike
    the next Kingdom Hears should be epic!!
  • josh
    Kingdom Hearts*
  • Merciful_budah
    Disney also plans to “exploit more lesser-known characters.”

    Looks like that Tyrese Gibson Luke Cage movie is gonna be made after all.

    Why...why...why...why...did it have to be Disney?


    This means Howard the Duck will never be published again (And don't argue with me on this one. If you know anything aboot this shit you know I'm right. Even if another comic comes out with that name on it, it's never gonna be right)
  • Guest
    doubt that will happen a black superhero at Disney dont think they will do that
  • Merciful_budah
    Oh they totally will. And it will be on par with the robots in Transformers 2. Just cuz Disney can't do some thing gracefully, doesn't mean they won't do it for the money.
  • greggorybasore
    So does this mean we'll get to see Mickey Mouse vs. Wolverine? No... How bout Donald Duck vs. Howard the Duck?
  • Merciful_budah
    I think Donald won that fight already when they forced Howard to start wearing pants.
  • Rhoche
    That comment about going after boys is extremely funny. I can't picture saying that with a straight face
  • mithoughts
    I think it's great. Disney is a powerful brand that's can introduce Marvel into a variety of markets. With regards to the comics, I don't think Disney would tweak anything that wasn't making money. Marvel and Disney are the same in that respect; they're companies interested in making money.
  • Marvel Fan
    Hates this.
  • What it means is: MARVEL IP IN 3D. :-) Finally.
  • Peter
    Not seeing the logic in terms of a theatrical asset.

    IMO, this deal only works when it mirrors Warner/DC (everything under one house). For now, it’s nowhere near that. They can’t take X-Men away from Fox, they can’t take Spidey away from Sony, hell, they can’t even take Island of Adventure away from Universal. Then there’s the current Paramount deal in place for Marvel Studios that’ll last another half a decade.

    There’s a debate whether or not they can even take X-Men characters yet to appear in the X-Men films.

    A catalogue of 5,000 Marvel characters means nothing when 4,975 are either not viable or unavailable. No one wants to see a Pixar film about Black Bolt or Triton.
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