At this point in the saga of Marvel’s somewhat inexplicable twenty-first century cinematic boon, it should come as no surprise (following success after continued success) that there would be a hiccup. And when every move you make is a $100 million investment into characters that people care deeply about, it should come as even less of a surprise when that hiccup is quite profound.
That’s where we were at when the news broke of the “creative differences” that halted Edgar Wright’s already-in-production Ant-Man, an incredibly promising project that presented Marvel the opportunity of expanding its reach past simple blockbuster status and into the realm of casual genius that Wright has been working towards during his short, but basically flawless, career.
Following Wright’s departure, Ant-Man moved on (with a new director, new script—pretty much a new everything except for Paul Rudd), and is set for a July 17 release, but no one seems to have forgotten the drama from last year, and that includes Joss Whedon.
In an interview with BuzzFeed News, the Avengers: Age of Ultron writer/director (and Marvel’s Chosen One) spoke very candidly about his feelings regarding the Ant-Man departure (which he protested from day one), going into full-on rant mode when prompted about the fiasco:
I thought the script was not only the best script that Marvel had ever had, but the most Marvel script I’d read. I had no interest in Ant-Man. [Then] I read the script, and was like, Of course! This is so good! It reminded me of the books when I read them. Irreverent and funny and could make what was small large, and vice versa. I don’t know where things went wrong. But I was very sad. Because I thought, This is a no-brainer. This is Marvel getting it exactly right. Whatever dissonance that came, whatever it was, I don’t understand why it was bigger than a marriage that seemed so right. But I’m not going to say it was definitely all Marvel, or Edgar’s gone mad! I felt like they would complement each other by the ways that they were different. And, uh, somethin’ happened.
Bummer, man.
(via The A.V. Club)
