Thursday
08May2008
Marvel's 'Thor' Searching for a New Director
Thursday, May 8, 2008 at 10:05AM 
Think all the way back to Monday. Remember those heady days when Iron Man was the second highest grossing non-sequel in opening day history, and Marvel took that opportunity to announce their next three years of movies? Ah, the good old days.Overlooked in all of the Marveling is another hurdle for comic book movies. It was announced that Matthew Vaughn, director of Layer Cake and last year's Stardust, is no longer on board Thor, one of Marvel's big releases for the summer of 2010. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Vaughn's holding deal expired in December, which despite the way it sounds, probably has nothing to do with weed.
This is the second time Vaughn has gone through the Marvel turnstiles; at one point, he was slated to direct X-Men: The Last Stand, but bowed out over creative differences.
So let's take some inventory now with Marvel's self-produced features. In 2010, we'll have Iron Man 2, and everyone's returning to that party. Less than two months later, it's Thor, which is now a big question mark: No director, no star locked in yet (although you hear rumblings of Kevin McKidd). Keep in mind that Robert Downey was announced as Iron Man in October 2006, so there's certainly time to right the ship here, but, you know, not much time.
In 2011, we'll have a Captain America movie directed by Nick Cassevetes, who I am not sold on for this kind of movie. And then there will be an Avengers movie like the next week or something.
Thor presents interesting problems, because as Marvel's Kevin Feige said this week, "It's very much a Marvel superhero story but against the backdrop of nothing you've seen before," adding that's it's more a period fantasy a la Lord of the Rings.
Obviously, Marvel is one of the biggest brands in entertainment over the past six or seven years. I'd be very surprised if they didn't get all of this Thor business sorted out soon. Who knows? They might bring Vaughn back after all this, or they might just let directors come to them with ideas.
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