Anthony and Joe Russo have directed several movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, including Avengers: Endgame, the most successful movie of all time. According to The Wall Street Journal, the Russo Brothers have been talking to Marvel about doing another movie, but I wouldn’t get too excited just yet.
According to the WSJ, talks with the Russos have hit an “impasse” in the wake of Scarlett Johansson’s lawsuit against Disney. Johansson is suing for tens of millions of dollars, alleging that Disney violated her contract by releasing the movie in Disney+ as well as in theaters, thus depressing the box office returns to which she was entitled to a portion of. Now, the Russos are allegedly concerned that Disney might show whatever movie they direct on Disney+ and pay them less money.
Bear in mind that this information is not coming from the Russo Brothers, at least not yet, but rather from people “familiar with the matter.” Maybe it’s serious, maybe it’s a speed bump, maybe the talks were never that serious anyway. Given how important the Russos have been to the success of the MCU, you’d figure Disney would be willing to work overtime to keep them around.
Are the Russo Brothers actually in talks for another movie?
If the Russo Brothers do come back to direct another movie (or potentially a Disney+ show), I can’t help but wonder what it would be. Last year, they spoke with Brobible and had a lot of Marvel fans in a frenzy over the idea of them adapting the Secret Wars storyline from the comics. “I read that when I was 10 or 11, and it was the scale of getting all of the heroes together,” Joe Russo said. “It was one of the first major books to do that — that was really event-storytelling to me at its finest.”
Marvel’s Secret Wars is one of the first big event comics. It involves heroes and villains alike getting kidnapped by the Beyonder, an all-powerful being, and taken to a place called Battleworld where they duke it. It basically has everyone in it, including The X-Men and The Fantastic Four, so it could be the next big movie crossover event.
“It would be the biggest movie you could possibly imagine,” Anthony Russo said. “So that’s what really excites us about the story — the ambition of it is even bigger than the ambition of the Infinity Saga.”
That sounds like a pretty epic movie, but will it happen? The writer of Secret Wars and Marvel’s former Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter did claim that Marvel tried to get him to hand over the rights to the story. Time will tell.
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