Since rumors about a potential World War Hulk(s) film circulated a couple of years ago, information about a second Marvel Studios-produced Hulk film has dried up almost entirely. With Red Hulk believed to be set to appear in Captain America: Brave New World, the stage seems set for the studio to put together some sort of Battle of the Hulks project; however, it’s not so simple as putting together a script and starting production when it comes to the Hulk and associated characters.
Similar to Spider-Man, yet unique and a little different, the live-action rights to the Hulk have always been tied up in a deal that now involves NBCUniversal. While it’s thought that perhaps some settlement has been reached during negotiations over Hulu that would allow Disney to take over the rights to the character, nothing official has ever been shared. If the old deal were still in place, Marvel could make the film but would ultimately share profits with NBCUniversal. Still, Hulk actor Mark Ruffalo has expressed the desire to continue to evolve the character on the screen and has made it known he’d love to do another solo Hulk project. While talking with Comic Book, Ruffalo was asked if there was a change of possession of the live-action rights following the Disney an NBCUniversal deal.
“Not that I know of,” Ruffalo began before adding that he’d “been asked not to comment on it, that specifically.” Once a fountain of MCU spoilers, it seems that Ruffalo has been the subject of some recalibration by Disney. While he wasn’t able to reveal any major updates on the status of the live-action rights, he did, however, share that he was as hopeful as anyone that another Hulk film might happen and that if it does, he’s got some ideas about what it should be. “Hopefully, one day though they’ll work it out,” he said of the right’s exchange. “I think [another MCU-set Hulk film] could be really cool and I’ve been putting a lot into what it could be to be cool, but I don’t know yet.“
If such a project is officially in the works at Marvel Studios and part of the Multiverse Saga, perhaps Disney will find a way to share some news in 2024.
Since author Jeff Kinney first published Diary of a Wimpy Kid in 2007, more than 275 million copies of his Wimpy Kid books have been sold worldwide. Earlier this year, the 18th book in the series, No Brainer, was published and now a third animated feature, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever, is set to debut on Disney Plus on December 8th. Despite being in the business for nearly two decades, it seems like Kinney is just getting started. The author told us that there are no plans to end the series and that he hopes to ultimately adapt each of his books into an animated feature for the streaming service but for a creative mind like Kinney, there are certainly a lot of ideas that haven’t made it into a book just yet and new ideas being generated by the day. So what to do with all those ideas?
Working alongside Disney to develop the series of animated Wimpy Kid features means that while Kinney serves as the writer and producer of each project he’s also one half of a creative partnership with a studio that has its own streaming service. While talking to Kinney about his latest project, we wondered if Kinney had considered creating an original Wimpy Kid story for Disney Plus.
“I hadn’t thought of that,” expressed a genuinely pensive Kinney, “but I wouldn’t be too surprised if they approached me with that idea. Sometimes you find…like I said, this time around they were like ‘we really could use a holiday story’ and if I hadn’t written one before, I think that Disney probably would have asked me to write one. So that would be interesting to have a feature that’s not in the Wimpy Kid canon.“
While the author was clearly open to the idea, he quickly indicated that if he ever did create a project for the streamer, he wouldn’t forget about his first love: the Wimpy Kid books. “What I’d probably do is say, ‘Ok, sure I’ll do that but I’m also gonna make this into a book.‘” said Kinney, “because I want to sort of duplicate my efforts.” Given Kinney’s willingness to try something new and the success of the series of animated features on the streaming service so far, it would seem anything’s possible.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever debuts on Disney Plus at 12 AM PST/3 AM EST on December 8th.
About Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever
Get ready for the Wimpiest Christmas ever! The original animated adventure, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever, the latest animated movie based on Jeff Kinney’s wildly successful book series, will premiere December 8, 2023, exclusively on Disney+. The film is a hilarious and heartfelt holiday tale centered around everyone’s favorite disaster-prone middle school student.
The winter holidays are turning out to be especially stressful for Greg Heffley this year. After accidentally damaging a snowplow while making a snowman with best friend Rowley Jefferson, Greg worries he won’t get the new video game console he so desperately wants for Christmas. To make matters worse, he gets snowed in with his family, including his grumpy older brother Rodrick and annoying younger brother Manny.
Directed by Luke Cormican (Teen Titans Go!) and written and produced by Jeff Kinney, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever features the voices of Wesley Kimmel (The Mandalorian), Spencer Howell (Ithaca), Chris Diamantopoulos (Beavis and Butt-Head), Erica Cerra (Power Rangers), and Hunter Dillon (Deadpool 2).
The Characters
Wesley Kimmel (The Mandalorian) is the voice of Greg Heffley, the disaster-prone middle school student having a stressful winter holiday. He is trying to be on his best behavior so he will get the new video game console he desperately wants for Christmas but gets into trouble with best friend Rowley Jefferson when they damage a snowplow while innocently building a snowman.
Spencer Howell (Ithaca) voices Rowley Jefferson, who enjoys spending the winter holidays inside sipping hot cocoa and singing Christmas carols with his parents, eagerly anticipating the arrival of Santa Claus on the big night. He is an unwilling accomplice to Greg Heffley’s snowplow cover-up.
Erica Cerra (Power Rangers) is the voice of Greg Heffley’s mother, Susan, who lives for the Christmas holiday season and all its traditions. She is happiest when the family can celebrate the Yuletide season together.
Chris Diamantopoulos (Beavis and Butt-Head) voices Frank, Greg Heffley’s father, who is so busy anticipating a massive winter snowstorm that he is missing out on the family’s holiday traditions that are so important to his wife Susan.
Hunter Dillon (Deadpool 2) is the voice of Greg’s older brother, Rodrick Heffley, who is spending the winter holidays lazy and unmoving from the couch until he decides he will find the culprits wanted by the police so he can take the reward money for himself.
Lisa Ann Walter (Abbott Elementary) voices Gabby, who drives a snowplow to make extra money for the holidays. She is a single mother to her son Tyler, who is the light of her life.
Elfriendo is a homemade doll from Susan Heffley’s childhood who keeps watch over children and reports any bad behavior to Santa and his elves at the North Pole.
The Filmmakers
Jeff Kinney (Writer/Producer) is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series and the Awesome Friendly Kid series. He is a six-time Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Award winner for Favorite Book and has been named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. He spent his childhood in the Washington, D.C., area and moved to New England, where he and his wife own a bookstore named An Unlikely Story.
Luke Cormican’s (Director) numerous animated credits include over 78 episodes of Teen Titans Go, on which he served as writer, producer, and director, as well as The Penguins of Madagascar, Brandy and Mr. Whiskers, The Buzz on Maggie, and Ren and Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon, among others. Cormican also served as head of story on Teen Titans Go to the Movies.
John Paesano (Composer) is a BAFTA-winning, Emmy®-nominated composer with a range of credits that include The Maze Runner film trilogy, both of PlayStation’s Spider-Man videogames, 50 episodes of Marvel’s Defenders and Daredevil and 100 episodes of the How to Train Your Dragon series (for which he won an Annie Award).
It’s been almost three years since we uncovered evidence that Marvel Studios was developing a Nomad project. Following that discovery, COVID continued to impact production for quite a while and by the time Marvel Studios got back to SDCC in June of 2022, there had been no public acknowledgement of a Nomad project.
Months ago, several of the trademarks that were filed for “Marvel Studios Nomad”turned up as “dead” and recently those “dead trademarks” made the rounds on social media and message boards. Between those dead trademarks and the lack of any sort of announcement by Marvel Studios, the general consensus seemed to be that the Nomad project was dead. Now it looks like it may only be mostly dead which is, as Miracle Max taught us, slightly alive.
When Marvel Studios trademarks upcoming projects, they file multiple different trademarks. Some are for toys, some are for clothing, some are for cups and other types of merchandise; however, they also file one for “entertainment services” which essentially indicate they are making either a film or TV series.
Entertainment services, namely, the development, creation, production, and distribution of digital multimedia and audio and visual content, namely, motion picture films, television programs, and multimedia entertainment and educational content; development, creation, production, distribution, and rental of audio and visual recordings; production of entertainment shows and interactive programs for distribution via audio and visual media, audio and video streaming, and electronic means; production and provision of motion pictures, entertainment news and entertainment information via electronic communication networks and audio and video streaming; providing online computer games; providing websites featuring a wide variety of general interest entertainment information relating to motion picture films, television programs, musical videos, film clips, photographs, and other multimedia materials; entertainment services, namely, providing online non-downloadable comic books and graphic novels; amusement park and theme park services; educational and entertainment services rendered in or relating to theme parks, namely, live stage shows, live amusement park shows, live performances by costumed characters, and production and presentation of live theatrical performances; production and presentation of live shows; theater productions; entertainer services, namely, live appearances by a professional entertainer
As with everything else they make, Marvel Studios filed one of these for Nomad and while they’ve let all the other trademarks die, this one remains alive and well. In fact, the studio has taken measures to extend the trademark on several occasions including recently.
What does this mean for the development of the project? Ultimately it may well mean nothing. Bob Iger‘s return to Disney in combination with a pair of major strikes have further slowed development of several of Marvel Studios announced projects. Given that Nomad has never been officially been acknowledged as a future MCU project, it could easily go by the wayside as part of the studio’s renewed commitment to quality over quantity.
There are no firm details on what the project might even be about which means there’s no way to know if it was ever integral to the Multiverse Saga to begin with. At the end of the day, the existence of the trademark provides no assurance that any Nomad project will ever hit any screen, big or small; however, it does still have a pulse so don’t bury it just yet.
Kids love superheroes. From their flashy costumes to their incredible powers, superheroes allow a measure of escapism while also teaching them traditional values and even offering them opportunities to be critical thinkers and problem solvers. While they’ve become more mainstream than ever with the rise of Marvel Studios, superheroes have been a part of pop culture since the 1930s and just about anyone, young or old, can name a favorite or two.
That holds true even in the fictional Wimpy Kid Universe where Greg Heffley and his best friend, Rowley Jefferson, live. While the two are known for their misadventures, they’ve always had active imaginations and in the 2019 book Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid: Rowley Jefferson’s Journal, Greg even went so far as to create his own superhero: Intergalactic Man. Born in the unknown depths of space, Intergalactic Man was gifted with the incredible ability to have different powers emanate from each of his four fingertips: fire, ice, electricity and an undefined zapability.
With Greg now part of the Disney family, where the live-action rights to almost all of Marvel Comics greatest characters reside, we wondered if he might have a favorite. Of course, nobody would know better than Wimpy Kid creator Jeff Kinney, who offered up a character who is certainly among the most beloved across the globe when we talked with him about the upcoming streaming release of Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever.
“I think he would like Spider-Man,” said Kinney when asked who Greg’s favorite Marvel superhero might be. “Peter Parker was a bit of a weakling before he got his superpowers–I don’t think Greg would really relate to one of the big, tough guys so probably Spider-Man.“
Peter Parker has remained one of Marvel’s most popular and beloved heroes since he first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15 in 1962. With one of the greatest stables of supporting characters in all of comics, Peter’s Spider-Man has connected with people of all ages and his stories have been adapted into both live-action and animated adventures that are among the most popular superhero projects ever. If Spidey were indeed his favorite hero, nobody could question Greg’s choice.
About Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever
Get ready for the Wimpiest Christmas ever! The original animated adventure, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever, the latest animated movie based on Jeff Kinney’s wildly successful book series, will premiere December 8, 2023, exclusively on Disney+. The film is a hilarious and heartfelt holiday tale centered around everyone’s favorite disaster-prone middle school student.
The winter holidays are turning out to be especially stressful for Greg Heffley this year. After accidentally damaging a snowplow while making a snowman with best friend Rowley Jefferson, Greg worries he won’t get the new video game console he so desperately wants for Christmas. To make matters worse, he gets snowed in with his family, including his grumpy older brother Rodrick and annoying younger brother Manny.
Directed by Luke Cormican (Teen Titans Go!) and written and produced by Jeff Kinney, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever features the voices of Wesley Kimmel (The Mandalorian), Spencer Howell (Ithaca), Chris Diamantopoulos (Beavis and Butt-Head), Erica Cerra (Power Rangers), and Hunter Dillon (Deadpool 2).
The Characters
Wesley Kimmel (The Mandalorian) is the voice of Greg Heffley, the disaster-prone middle school student having a stressful winter holiday. He is trying to be on his best behavior so he will get the new video game console he desperately wants for Christmas but gets into trouble with best friend Rowley Jefferson when they damage a snowplow while innocently building a snowman.
Spencer Howell (Ithaca) voices Rowley Jefferson, who enjoys spending the winter holidays inside sipping hot cocoa and singing Christmas carols with his parents, eagerly anticipating the arrival of Santa Claus on the big night. He is an unwilling accomplice to Greg Heffley’s snowplow cover-up.
Erica Cerra (Power Rangers) is the voice of Greg Heffley’s mother, Susan, who lives for the Christmas holiday season and all its traditions. She is happiest when the family can celebrate the Yuletide season together.
Chris Diamantopoulos (Beavis and Butt-Head) voices Frank, Greg Heffley’s father, who is so busy anticipating a massive winter snowstorm that he is missing out on the family’s holiday traditions that are so important to his wife Susan.
Hunter Dillon (Deadpool 2) is the voice of Greg’s older brother, Rodrick Heffley, who is spending the winter holidays lazy and unmoving from the couch until he decides he will find the culprits wanted by the police so he can take the reward money for himself.
Lisa Ann Walter (Abbott Elementary) voices Gabby, who drives a snowplow to make extra money for the holidays. She is a single mother to her son Tyler, who is the light of her life.
Elfriendo is a homemade doll from Susan Heffley’s childhood who keeps watch over children and reports any bad behavior to Santa and his elves at the North Pole.
The Filmmakers
Jeff Kinney (Writer/Producer) is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series and the Awesome Friendly Kid series. He is a six-time Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Award winner for Favorite Book and has been named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. He spent his childhood in the Washington, D.C., area and moved to New England, where he and his wife own a bookstore named An Unlikely Story.
Luke Cormican’s (Director) numerous animated credits include over 78 episodes of Teen Titans Go, on which he served as writer, producer, and director, as well as The Penguins of Madagascar, Brandy and Mr. Whiskers, The Buzz on Maggie, and Ren and Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon, among others. Cormican also served as head of story on Teen Titans Go to the Movies.
John Paesano (Composer) is a BAFTA-winning, Emmy®-nominated composer with a range of credits that include The Maze Runner film trilogy, both of PlayStation’s Spider-Man videogames, 50 episodes of Marvel’s Defenders and Daredevil and 100 episodes of the How to Train Your Dragon series (for which he won an Annie Award).
“I would love to do a summer movie, eventually,” said Kinney. And as fans of the series might expect, the author already has one story in mind. “I’m really hoping we get to tell lots of stories including Dog Days because I think a really good summer movie would be fun.”
Published in 2009, Dog Days is the fourth book in the series. It details Greg’s adventures on the summer vacation between his seventh and eighth-grade years, one Greg remembers as possibly the worst summer ever. So far, each of the three Wimpy Kid animated features has been released in December but it’s possible that Disney would work with Kinney to roll one out during the summer allowing kids to take it in on their own summer vacation.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever is now streaming on Disney Plus.
When Jeff Kinney started writing the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series in the mid-2000s, it was a way for him to, in his own words, “sneak” his cartoons into books once his career as a newspaper cartoonist didn’t pan out. A decade and a half later, Kinney is still pushing out new ideas (the 18th book in the series, No Brainer, was published in October) while also working with Disney to adapt his stories into animated features for Disney Plus. Ahead of the release of the latest animated feature, Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever (read Arlyn Murphy’s review here), Kinney talked with us about his career and the unique opportunity provided to him to be able to revisit his own works years later.
“It’s funny because I wrote the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books…when I first started writing them I was 28 years old,” began Kinney when asked to reflect on his career trajectory. “Now I’m 52. It’s a big jump forward in time. At first, I didn’t really know what I was doing. I was writing–I was just trying to write jokes–just write a bunch of jokes, string them together into a reasonable plot but I never really cared about writing a good story,” he explained.
“Now I care a lot about writing a good story. So I think I’ve changed over time,” he reflected before adding that his work with Disney Plus adapting his own stories has fundamentally changed the way he works. “Movies really taught me how to structure a story properly,” explained Kinney, “and so now even when I write the books I’m using a cinematic framework to tell the stories.” With Kinney having no plans to stop writing new Wimpy Kid books any time soon, it looks as though fans have many more good stories to look forward to.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever is now streaming on Disney Plus.
Josh Brolin played a mean Cable in 2018’s Deadpool 2. The veteran actor brought the right amount of snarl and grit to the old time traveler but before Brolin landed the role, rumors suggested Brad Pitt was destined to portray the Askani’son. According to comic book creator Rob Liefeld, those rumors weren’t just the usual Internet fodder.
“I know for 100% fact that was true,” Liefeld said of the Pitt rumors in an interview with Comic Book. “They did previews, and David Leitch had a very special relationship doing stunt work with [Pitt]. What people don’t know is that was very early early on. So when they knew they weren’t going in that direction, they went down several others.”
As Liefeld indicated, Leitch worked as Pitt’s stunt double on five projects including Fight Club, Troy and Mr. and Mrs. Smith. In 2014, Leitch broke into the big leagues as a director when he co-directed John Wick with Chad Stahelski. When Deadpool director Tim Miller departed Deadpool 2 amidst creative differences, Fox quickly pivoted to Leitch to he the sequel.
Aside from Pitt, Kyle Chandler was also associated with the role. However, as Liefeld told Comic Book, the role quickly went to Brolin…once his wife convinced him to read for the role. Rumors have Cable’s time traveling device playing a major role in Deadpool 3 so it wouldn’t be shocking to see Brolin return as the Son of Tomorrow, especially given the number of actors set to cameo in their prior Fox roles.
Marvel Studios Untitled Deadpool and Wolverine film is set to hit theaters on July 26th, 2024.
The set photos, which can be viewed here, seem to indicate that a portion of the film will involve a battle in The Void that looks to be very much inspired by George Miller’s Mad Max franchise. The leaked images show more of a character who looks just like Tyler Mane‘s Sabretooth joined by a slew of other villains including Toad, a character who resembles Boyd Holbrook’s Donald Pierce from Logan and some other currently unrecognizable characters making their way through the Void on a wild array of vehicles. Among them are what looks to be a lunar rover hooked up to multiple motorcycles (is one of those Cap’s?) that’s reminiscent of the Doof Wagon seen in 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, the von Darrelman cupcake van from Moon Knight, and most incredibly a FULLY FUNCTIONAL FANTAST-ICAR which seems to be inspired by the MK1 model that first appeared in Fantastic Four #3 and was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.
As Marvel Studios only theatrical release in 2024, Deadpool 3 must pack quite a punch at the box office. Between the rumors surrounding its plot and the set photos that have made their way online so far, it certainly seems as though it stands a chance to impress!
In the multiverse, anything is possible. There have been many rumors that Marvel Studios has instantly tried to bring back its iconic Infinity Saga characters to undo whatever the internet has been complaining bout. As much as Phase 4 and 5 have been a bit more varied in their quality, there’s certainly something curious about the amount of rumors people still clamor around.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, however, Marvel Studios CEO Kevin Feige has once again highlighted that they are not going to undo the big heartbreaking death of Tony Stark’s death in Avengers: Endgame. He gave the following statement that they won’t “magically undo it in any way.”
We are going to keep that moment and not touch that moment again. We all worked very hard for many years to get to that, and we would never want to magically undo it in any way.
Kevin Feige
However, we should keep in mind that this doesn’t mean Robert Downey Jr. could still return in some form in the franchise. They could have him take on a different role and still appear in the multiverse franchise. The fact they haven’t used the actor since they started the multiverse storyline showcases that they are holding back and likely only reintroduce a version of him if it fits the story thematically.
We’ve all been waiting for the update on when we can expect an update on the fourth entry in Tom Holland’sSpider-Man franchise. As much as everyone is discussing the current status of Marvel Studios, there’s still hope to further build upon the rather melancholic ending that Spider-Man: No Way Home left us with. It seemed like the perfect time for Spider-Man to return back to basics.
Yet, it seems Tom Holland isn’t quite on board. This would mark the first actor to get a fourth live-action entry and it seems he wants to make sure they do it quite right, as he feels “very protective” of this iconic Marvel franchise and character. It’s fitting and hopefully, we’ll get more updates as time goes by, but in an interview, he highlights that he’s “actively engaging in conversations” on the fourth entry.
All I can say is that we have been actively engaging in conversations about what it could potentially look like for a fourth rendition of my character. Whether or not we can find a way to do justice to the character is another thing. I feel very protective over Spider-Man. I feel very, very lucky that we were able to work on a franchise that got better with each movie, that got more successful with each movie, which I think is really rare, and I want to protect his legacy. So, I won’t make another one for the sake of making another one. It will have to be worth the while of the character.
Tom Holland
Of course, there’s the likelihood that he’s already signed on and just highlighting how much he cares about the project, as they are trying to make sure they find their way moving forward. There are rumors that they might not fully remove the character from the multiverse saga though the hints have been for a more grounded storyline. Though, perhaps it’s simply a post-credit tie-in forced upon by Sony given that they don’t want to lose the contract again. Still, we’ll see once they start hinting at the next entry moving forward.
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