One of the biggest problems I had with Iron Man 2 was the absolutely needless shoehorning of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Nick Fury. All that wound up having virtually no real standing on the film itself and only served to toss in some cursory mentions that Iron Man would be in The Avengers. Somehow, a bunch of cursory mentions wound up adding a needless twenty minutes of film and turning this rabid nerd off the whole connected universe thing.

Fortunately, Marvel has heard my cries of anguish, and they’re looking to bring things back to basics. In an interview with Film Journal, Marvel honcho Keven Feige had this to say about Iron Man 3: “Audiences will see that Tony Stark is going back into his own world…There will be acknowledgments to the events of The Avengers and the character journey he took there, but he’s not going to be having tea with Thor and calling Nick Fury every five minutes.” GOD, that makes me happy. I’m glad that there’s a connected universe, still, but just tossing in massive references and setups for future movies just cheapens the actual movie you’re watching. Here’s hoping Shane Black’s going to return us to the kickass basics that made us all fall in love with the original Iron Man.

[Via Film Journal