With the recent news that Scott Lang would be the Ant-Man in the upcoming Edgar Wright film in 2014 and Hank Pym passing the mantle to Lang, I got to thinking is this just Marvels way of keeping the darker themes out of their movies?
The MCU is known to be accessible to everyone and this has given them hundreds of millions of dollars from their movies and toys based on the movies etc. But news of Hank Pym just being the guy passing down the mantle of Ant-Man to Scott Lang and just being a secondary character, along with Demon in the Bottle still not being addressed in an Iron Man movie and with the Guardians of the Galaxy movie, im really starting to think Marvel is too scared of doing something a little darker.
This is the infamous panel that made Hank Pym (then Yellowjacket) known as a wife beater even to this day. While I think he just gets a bad rep for this when even Spider-Man beat his wife Mary Jane and no one mentions that. I still think this could have been a great opportunity to deal with a real world problem.
And Marvel has done commentary on some darker stuff like with the Iron Man movies. Here is a self absorbed rich boy who thinks him making weapons of mass destruction is right, until he's captured and really sees what kind of evil his weapons are being used for and that in some way its his own fault.
This made him grow as a character and as a person, it also wasnt dropped because Iron Man 2 addressed this with Tony having to fight for possession of his own armor because he knew the government would just use it commit more murder, thereby ensuring more blood on Tonys hands.
This easily could have been covered in a Ant-Man movie, but with Pym just being a secondary character, it means this whole incident with Wasp will be omitted.
And speaking of which what does this mean for Wasp? Is she going to be his wife, or Langs wife or is she going to be cut completely from the movie as well? I doubt the last one, but considering Hank Pym had no career as a super hero, the wife beating is 99.9% gone. Wright wanted to do flashbacks to Hanks days as a super hero in an older version of the script but this was also dropped as heroes are still fairly new and there isn't much before the Avengers were assembled against Loki.
Also Pym is responsible for creating Ultron, the robot that has been one of the Avengers greatest enemies. Pyms experiences with the Avengers made him create Ultron as he could no longer go against his pacifist beliefs, he created Ultron believing he could be a force for good. Obviously this backfired and is another dark stain on the character.
How will Hank Pym not being a superhero effect the creation of Ultron? Maybe he's working for S.H.I.E.L.D. and they'll tell him to create a prison for super criminals at the end of Ant-Man? This seems like a plausible way of introducing the killer robot in the MCU, but still even if Hank does feel bad when Ultron inevitably goes bad, he's just going to be a supporting character so it wont effect the real Ant-Man or the Avengers as much as it could have.
Perhaps if Hank Pym becomes a likeable secondary character on the level of Coulson, then perhaps his failure will still resonate with us the audience and the characters in this universe. But good luck making some one as awesome as our dearly departed Phil Son of Coul.
Now, you guys might be wondering why is Guardians of the Galaxy here? Well because I feel as if this evading of darker tones is a push to a more kid friendly style for the Marvel movies.
Many of the characters seem like something perfect for a CGI style movie, I mean just look at the short descriptions of these guys. Star-Lord (an otherworldly police officer), Drax (a musician turned resurrected nemesis of Thanos), Groot (a tree-being), Mantis (an alien-woman hybrid) and Rocket Racoon (a genetically altered racoon). (Basically "The Avengers" with more aliens.)
Groot and Rocket Racoon will be CGI for sure while the other three members will probably be live action. Still a character like Rocket Racoon really seems like a character that will become a pop culture icon for his Australian accent and gun hoo attitude.
However many people think CGI flick and go ITS FOR KIDS! And this is a great set of characters that would work for that young demographic. But I hope that this isn't a sign that were going to be getting less mature films in favour of kid friendly CGI fests.
This doesn't mean Guardians of the Galaxy wont be a great movie, because I think it will, I just don't see how will these guys fit in with the Avengers when I know that it will require more than just 1 team to beat Thanos. This is a guy who's beaten up Thor and Hulk without much hassle. So the Guardians will most assuredly be in some capacity in Avengers 2.
If they can make a standalone Thor movie look great, then im confident they can make the Avengers work with the Guardians while making a solo GOTG film looking amazing all on its own. Just do not go too overboard with the family friendly approach Marvel....