The future is bright for Comic Book movies and with four major film studios vying for blockbuster payouts there are a plethora of quality titles to entice you into the cinemas in the coming years.

2015:

Let us begin with the here and now, as there are 4 exciting films to soak up this year alone.

Big Hero 6 (Disney) Dir. Don Hall, Chris Williams

Two points to be made about this off the bat:

1) This technically has already seen it’s release (and major box office success) last year in America, but it is still to hit our screens here in Ireland so I am including it.

2) The film strays from the little-known comics and really should be taken as a separate identity.

Disney’s Oscar nominated tale of a boy genius, Hiro, and his marshmallow-man, Baymax, has had its fair share of marketing, yet you would be hard pushed to find someone who knew it was based on a Marvel comic. This was exactly Disney’s intention. They purposefully took a relatively unknown Marvel team so they could shape them just as they like and, more importantly, just how their audience would like.

In fact, Marvel has said that they have no intention of releasing any new comics (or even rereleasing the hard-to-come-by old editions). This very well may have been part of the agreement with Marvel over the rights. The overly sexualized nature of the manga-styled drawings in the comics would not really fit in with the big-eyed cutesy persona of Disney characters, and although it may drag more fathers to the cinema, I doubt that was ever a direction Disney wanted to take this franchise in.

I haven’t seen this critically praised animation as of yet so I cannot comment on whether it deserves a sequel (and one is not on the ticket… yet) but knowing Disney, this could be a big hitter in the coming years.

Big Hero 6 is in cinemas now.

The Avengers: Age of Ultron (Marvel) Dir. Joss Whedon

Hitting our screens on May 1st we have the eagerly awaited sequel to The Avengers, the record breaking Marvel team-up smash. Age of Ultron is the second outing for the super-ensemble and I have already looked at the first trailer, in some depth mind you, which was released in October of last year. Below is the second trailer for what is sure to be the first big summer box office hit.

We are treated to a few more sneaky peaks at the destructive force of Ultron as well as a mystery woman whose identity has been the topic of discussion and ridicule (as fanboys do) on many sites. A few possibilities thrown out were connections to either the Guardians of the Galaxy or the new Marvel project Black Panther (more to come on that later).

Ant-Man (Marvel) Dir. Peyton Reed

The second Marvel adventure to hit our screens this year is Ant-Man. With its problems along the way, this is the most apprehensive I have been about a Marvel release in years. It hits the cinema on July 17th and, a few weeks ago, I looked at the trailer on the Showreel.

*UPDATED* The full trailer has now been released and it is full of big action on a miniature scale.

Paul Rudd and Michael Douglas star in the special effects heavy tale of a superhero whose suit can shrink him to a tiny size while simultaneously increasing his strength. Director Peyton Reed has not lit the movie-world on fire but the talent of the actors and writers on board may be the films savoir. The story is written by Joe Cornish, of Adam and Joe fame, and Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz). The screenplay is written by lead actor Paul Rudd and Adam McKay (Anchorman, Step Brothers and The Other Guys).

How this film will do in the box office is still to be seen, and whether or not the Marvel big-wigs will bring him along for the ride in future cinematic outings will depend on its success. I just hope it won’t bring a dampener to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

So this year will give us an animation, a sequel, a new character and then a reboot.

Fantastic Four (Fox) Dir. Josh Trank

The Fantastic Four films of 10 years ago were pretty poor and although the Silver Surfer sequel was a tad better it was still inadequate and quickly forgettable.

The reboot is brought to us by Fox Studios, who have done themselves proud with the reimagining of X-Men; resulting in the success of First Class and Days of Future Past.

2015’s Fantastic Four reboot bodes well after the release of the first trailer. Check it out below.

Josh Trank takes his seat behind the camera for the first time since his brilliant feature debut Chronicle, and he has teamed up again with Michael B. Jordan (Fruitvale Station) who stars as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch. Whiplash’s Miles Teller, as Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, along with Kate Mara (House of Cards) as Sue Storm/The Invisible Woman and Jamie Bell (King Kong, Billy Elliot) as Ben Grimm/The Thing.

With a talented young cast and an excellent new director to boot, I have high hopes for the future of the Fantastic Four franchise. They have one more thing on their side; it can’t possibly be worse than what has come before it.

The narrative of the movie seems to be the familiar origin story, which was also the plot of the 2005 movie. Although it will be a recognizable storyline, without too many surprises, it is sure to bring a new dimension to the backstory and with the young talented cast in toe, it will hopefully bring the much-loved comic family to life once again.

*UPDATED* The brand new trailer is now out and we get to see a whole lot more of our Fantastic friends. We get up close and personal with The Thing and Johnny Storm, who both look great, and we get to see Sue Storm’s powers in some detail. We also get our first peek at Doom. It looks as if Fox have done it again with this reboot and I, for one, am getting excited for this release.

Coming Up In Part 2:

2015 has a mere sprinkling of Supermovies compared to the years that follow. 2016 alone, will house no less than 8 Superhero movies and it only gets crazier from here on out and we will look at that in Part 2.

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