LATEST NEWS

Jon Favreau Starts Talking the Future of Iron Man

by Alex Billington
June 6, 2008
Source: SuperHeroHype

Despite an Iron Man sequel has already been schedule for 2010, I really didn't expect to hear much from anyone involved for quite a while. However, Jon Favreau himself talks at length with the guys from SuperHeroHype, discussing where the sequel could go, how to make it bigger and better, and new ideas for villains. Favreau still hasn't officially been rehired for the second movie (as we originally mentioned a few weeks ago), but we're sure in time it'll all work out. That doesn't mean Favreau can't speculate on Iron Man 2 already, and he doesn't spare any details discussing the future of the Iron Man franchise.

To kick things off, Favreau attempts to explain why he thinks people loved Iron Man so much. I think it was just a very well put together movie with a great script and great cast, but he's a bit more humble. "I think people were pleased based on the fact that they had no preconceptions about the project. Now, we have a movie that people seem to like and you can't give them less. You have to give them more. There are challenges that come with that as well as the benefit of people already understanding who he is and the character. We told the origin story so where do you go from here? There are plenty of story lines to explore from the 40 years of history from that character."

Now that we know there is a huge history to draw from, it's just a matter of building off of the character that Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. created. "I know that Robert and I have talked a lot about what types of things we would like to do, and how to play into the strengths of what we discovered last time around. I look forward to rolling up my sleeves." In addition to the character of Tony Stark, another supervillain needs to rise to the occasion as the big opposing force. And I think Favreau explains best why the right bad guy is important. "We really spent most of the time dealing with Tony in this one, explaining who he is, and why he is the way that he is so that now Iron Man comes to life. You then have to reveal, I think, some heavy duty, heavy weight bad guys that you could then counter balance this incredibly powerful super hero."

Favreau explains the big hurtle that they must jump with the sequel - and it's also the most significant.

"I think it's the nature of Iron Man because it comes from a serialized piece of source material, that it does lend itself to having sequels. It's all new ground for me, it's new ground for Marvel, although they have been partnered up and done sequels with other studios. There are a lot of different approaches you could take. Hopefully we end up going for a sequel that is going to be bigger and better than the first one. That's not always the case with sequels. Sometimes you end up trying to do just rush, and hit a release date. Hopefully this sequel will be driven by the material and driven by good ideas."

I hope so, too! Only time will tell, but let's just hope Marvel brings back the same creative team behind the first one, writers and all. What about the "Demon in a Bottle" storyline that has been so publicized since Iron Man was even mentioned? As much as its the perfect story from the vault to draw from for a film, Marvel just won't let it happen. They won't let one of their precious comic book movies push past the PG-13 rating. They're all about family. However, it's at least an idea worth discussing and Favreau knows that.

"It seems that Hancock is dealing with a lot of those issues too. The comic book fans might see 'Demon in a Bottle' as a fresh story line but I haven't seen Hancock yet. From what I've seen it seems there is a lot of imagery that seems to be shared. Him flying through billboards and things. The idea of the hero whose biggest enemy is himself, and him fighting through his demons, you want to come at the audience with something fresh. You don't want to feel like you are echoing something that somebody else is doing. I think you have to look at the comics, look at what else Marvel is doing, but then you have to look at the landscape of superhero films."

There is a lot more in Favreau's interview that can be found at SuperHeroHype. There really aren't any major updates and we're all just waiting to see how the sequel develops, including where the writers want to take the story and the general theme that Marvel wants to go with. You can expect to hear a lot more on all of Marvel's upcoming films this July at the San Diego Comic-Con. We will likely have plenty of confirmed details on Iron Man 2 by then and hopefully a lot more news on this sequel and more!

Tweet Pin It

Related categories: Hype, Movie News