It doesn’t come as much of a surprise considering the reporting going on last fall, but Marvel Studios Kevin Feige confirmed that the film rights to the Marvel Comics superhero Daredevil have indeed reverted back to the studio from Twentieth Century Fox.

Fox had purchased the rights back in the 1990s and released one film featuring the character being played by Ben Affleck in 2003. Last October the studio was under a deadline to have new film with the character in production by October or else the rights would automatically revert back to Marvel. 30 Days of Night director David Slade had been working on the project since the spring of 2011 before abruptly leaving. The studio brought in Joe Carnahan who pitched them a dark and gritty take on the Hell’s Kitchen hero in which the studio reportedly was interested. Unfortunately, the reversion deadline was too close for Carnahan to get a script ready in time.

While Feige confirmed that Marvel now had the hero back in their stable of characters available to show up in their growing cross-franchise cinematic universe, he did not state what, if any plans, they had for when he could return to the silver screen.

But barring an appearance in The Avengers 2 in 2015, I don’t really foresee Daredevil swinging his way into cinemas before about 2018. We already know Marvel’s release schedule up through the end of 2015, when we’ll see Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man, the first film in Marvel’s “Phase 3″ which will supposedly culminate in The Avengers 3 sometime in 2018. But Feige has already stated that we could very well see either a Dr. Strange film and/or a Black Panther film as part of Phase 3. Provided that Marvel stays at a two-films-a-year pace, that only leaves two other spots that a Daredevil film could be slotted into and I would think that Marvel would rather use them for either a third Captain America or Thor film or a second Guardians Of The Galaxy film. This would push Daredevil to a post-Avengers 3 position.

Now there is one other possibility that the studio could be considering – Television. It currently has a pilot for SHIELD television series sitting with ABC that seems like a sure thing to be picked up. But the studio had been developing a number of Marvel’s properties for television, though they did not have much luck in getting them past the pilot script page. One of those was Cloak And Dagger for ABC Family which featured two more street-level characters in a mold similar to Daredevil. Granted this is pure speculation on my part, but if SHIELD is a hit, the studio would certainly want to look to exploiting that with further television series. And since SHIELD has crossed over to TV from the Marvel films I would see no reason why a television Daredevil wouldn’t be able to cross over to the Marvel films for an appearance.

Via Newsarama.

In a multi-part series, Comic Book Film Editor William Gatevackes will be tracing the history of comic book movies from the earliest days of the film serials to today’s big blockbusters and beyond. Along with the history lesson, Bill will be covering some of the most prominent comic book films over the years and why they were so special. This time, we’ll talk about superhero films not adapted from any comic book.  

Not every movie starring a superhero is adapted from a comic book but each has been inspired by or in turn inspired comic books.  Many of these non-comic book comic book films have sprung up in recent years but they have been appearing in movie theaters for over thirty years. We will dedicate the next few installments to these movies. We’ll try to talk about all of them here, but odds are one or two will slip our notice. Let us know what you think we’ve missed and maybe we’ll include them in a future installment.

One of my most fondly remembered superhero movies was 1980’s Hero At Large.

John Ritter stars as Steve Nichols, an underemployed actor who is hired to portray the character Captain Avenger at the opening of a film based on the character. A job that entailed just signing autographs for fans becomes something more when Nichols breaks up a robbery while in costume. The media grabs hold of it, and his life becomes much more complicated. Nichols is compelled to keep fighting crime as Captain Avenger while political interests want to use Nichols for their own interests.

I haven’t seen the film in a while, but it was one of my favorites as a youth. It wasn’t Hamlet, but it wasn’t awful either. Anne Archer, passed over several years prior for Lois Lane in Superman, gets to play a similar part here as Nichols’ neighbor/love interest. Kevin Bacon has a small part in the film as well.

The film made $15,934,737 at the box office that year. That might seem paltry by today’s standards, but it out grossed other, better well known films from that year such as Prom Night, Used Cars, Stardust Memories and Mad Max.

A year later, Disney came out with its take on the superhero, Condorman.

Hero At Large might have been cheesy, but it was nothing compared to this film. Condorman couldn’t have been cheesier if it was paired with a beef stick and sold at a Hickory Farms kiosk over the holidays. The film has been all but consigned to the dustbin of history by most (the above trailer was put together by a fan), those that do remember it recall it fondly in a “so-bad-it’s-good” sort of way.   Michael Crawford, five years before he would take the stage as the Phantom in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s production of Phantom of the Opera, stars as Woody Wilkins, a comic book writer of a character called “Condorman” who is pulled into a spy exchange in Europe. Wilkins adopts the Condorman identity, becomes a spy for the CIA, and rescues a Russian double agent played by Barbara Carrera.

In all fairness, the film is more a Disneyfied version of the James Bond-esque spy thriller than an actual comic book, although Crawford does appear in costume as Condorman and uses many Batman-esque gizmos and gadgets. It goes without saying that the film was a critical and commercial flop.

While Condorman probably began with the noblest intentions and wound up at cheesiness accidentally, The Toxic Avenger wallowed in its inherent cheesiness to the fullest extent from the very first day of production, as is the trademark of the studio that released it, Troma Entertainment.

Whether it was intended to be or not, 1984’s The Toxic Avenger was like all of the Marvel Comics from the 1960s brought to the big screen all wrapped up in one. Toxie, as he is lovingly referred to, starts the film as a nerdy janitor bullied by his peers (much like Peter Parker was before he became Spider-Man). One day, he has an accidental exposure to radioactive materials (like, well, take your pick: Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, The Hulk, Daredevil, any number of other heroes and villains from Marvel at that time) which causes the nebbish to grow into a superhumanly strong creature (like The Hulk). He uses his new power to fight crime in Tromaville, finding love along the way with a blind woman who loves him for who he is and not what he looks like (mimicking a plot point featuring the Fantastic Four’s Thing and blind sculptress Alicia Masters).

What separated the film from the Marvel Comics of the 1960s was the schlocky, off-center and off-color humor, the violence that was so graphic that it became absurd, and the copious amounts of sex and nudity that is the trademark of the Troma film. But the first film was a success and that spawned a sequel, 1989’s The Toxic Avenger Part II:

When Troma found they shot enough footage for two films, they released another sequel in 1989, The Toxic Avenger Part III: The Last Temptation of Toxie:

And yet another sequel, 2000’s Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV:

That last film pulled out all the stops when it came to celebrity cameos, featuring Ron Jeremy, Corey Feldman, Hugh Hefner, and Julie Strain, with Stan Lee serving as narrator.

The Toxic Avenger was also adapted into a short-lived Marvel comic book in 1991 and a stage musical in 2008. A rumored fourth sequel was planned, but might have made way for a PG-13 remake produced by Akiva Goldsman and directed by Hot Tub Time Machine’s Steve Pink.

The next film we are going to discuss was made with noble intentions but became a box office failure. Hollywood Shuffle’s Robert Townsend wanted to make a film that was a counter-point to the popular “gangsta” films such as New Jack City and Juice that dominated cineplexes at the time. So, in 1993, he came up with a film idea that presented a positive black role model that would work to stop black-on-black violence instead of glorify it. That film was The Meteor Man.

The film told the story of Jefferson Reed, a Washington, DC teacher who is struck by a meteor and given superpowers. He uses these powers to clean up his neighborhood—stopping gang violence, demolishing crack houses, and stopping robberies. While the Toxic Avenger was a mix of a bunch of Marvel superheroes, the Meteor Man seemed to borrow from a number of DC Comics heroes, most notably Superman (who shares most of the same powers and the “mom-made costume” bit) and Black Lightning (DC’s first major black superhero, who was also a teacher named Jefferson Pierce).

The film featured a veritable who’s who of the best African-American actors America had to offer, including Bill Cosby, James Earl Jones, and Robert Guillaume and did earnestly try to present a more positive African-American role model.  But the film was rather simplistic and the naive (the two gangs in the film, the Bloods and the Crips, put aside their differences to support Meteor Man in his fight against the white drug lord) script led to box-office disappointment.

Next time, we cover three popular movies that might stretch the definition of the superhero, but that had an effect on comic books for years to come.

If the news had come from Mark Millar’s mouth, I wouldn’t have believed it. After all, this is that same man that stated back in 2008 that he was in line to reboot the Superman film franchise, a bold statement that never came to pass. So him saying that some studio hired him to act as a consultant on their comic book franchises, it would be easy to write off.

Only, this time it’s not Millar saying it, it’s the studio itself. 20th Century Fox announced today that it has hired Millar to act as a “creative consultant” on movies from their studio based on Marvel Comics books. The studio is currently developing the writer’s Nemesis miniseries into a feature film.

This news comes after Joss Whedon has signed on with Marvel in a similar capacity and Warner Brothers rumored to be considering Frank Miller for some involvement with their Justice League film.

Fox currently still owns the rights to the X-Men and Fantastic Four properties, two franchises Millar has written stories featuring for Marvel’s Ultimate Comics imprint. Millar’s friend, director Matthew Vaughn, is currently working on X-Men: Days of Future Past for the studio.

It is not known exactly what Millar will be consulting on. The obvious project would be the Fantastic Four reboot, but rumors are that FOX was so high on Josh Trank’s take on it that they were willing let Daredevil slip back to Marvel rather than let Marvel get their hands on any FF characters. The X-Men franchises seem to be fairly self-sufficient by this point, with the satellite Wolverine and First Class  franchises chugging along and Bryan Singer supposedly willing to return to the main franchise. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of consulting work to be done, unless Millar is going to be charged with getting more mutant franchises such as Deadpool up and running. Or maybe he’s just going to be a highly paid information desk, a resource the directors to use. It remains to be seen.

Dear Warner Brothers,

Hi. How are you doing? Good I hope.

My name is Bill. I’m a comic book fan and have been for thirty years. I have been a film buff for almost as long. And I’ve been writing about both worlds for about as long as the Internet has been around, give or take a year or two.

I say this just to provide a little background to you. Because I have been meaning to speak with you in regards to your philosophy towards comic book films. And an article I read today compelled me to not wait any longer.

Over at Bleeding Cool, Rich Johnston relayed an experience from an anonymous comic store employee whose shop was visited by a “fan” who had a pronounced lack of knowledge of comic books, but an overwhelmingly odd knowledge of DC Comics films. This fan, no, wait, let’s call him what he likely was–a badly disguised marketing researcher, asked questions such as “what superhero films have had good Facebook pages?”, “Do you think comic fans would accept a superhero film without Nolan’s involvement, would him serving as a producer suffice?” “What do fans think of Aquaman? He’s lame isn’t he?”, “What is regarded as the strongest lineup of the Justice League and would work as a film?” The marketer closed his survey with an intriguing question: “What would fan reaction be to a Justice League movie with Frank Miller’s name attached?”

I don’t pretend to speak all fans or comics, films, or comic book films. I speak for myself and hopefully other fans agree with my opinion. And my reaction to this news is that it could quite possibly be the worst in a long line of bad decisions your studio has made in regards to its comic book properties.

Now, I understand that you’re in a difficult position. You once had the superhero film market all to yourself with first the Superman films then the Batman films. Then Marvel went from being a laughing stock to becoming the dominant producers of comic book films and you ended up playing catch up. Marvel has just had their most successful film to date with The Avengers and the DC Comics film slate is in a state of chaos. You are rebooting the Superman franchise for the second time in ten years. The Batman franchise is coming off a successful reboot by Christopher Nolan and is in a state of flux. Sure fire franchise starters such as Jonah Hex and Green Lantern ended up D.O.A. at the box office. Suddenly, playing catch up became being so far behind that there is a danger that it isn’t even a race anymore.

And, to be brutally honest, it’s all your fault. The list of failed attempts at rebooting the Superman franchise before you settled on Superman Returns is legendary for how bad the attempts were. I read the original script for Jonah Hex and while it might not have been a hit, it would have been closer to source material. But reading that script, it was easy to see what the studio mandated reshoots got us–Hex’s superpowers and the campy “weapons of mass destruction” plot line. I also read the Green Lantern script and thought it had the potential to be a fun film. Unfortunately, what we got was a film lacking a sense of awe and wonder.

Listen, I can see why you think Frank Miller might be an exciting choice for the Justice League movie, a film that needs some excitement because it meant to act as The Avengers in reverse (Instead of individual superhero films leading up to one big team up movie, you’re having one big team up movie that will hopefully lead to individual superhero films). Miller is a legendary comic book creator and has become a filmmaker as well. He even works with green screen techniques in his directing, which is quick, cheap and one of the reasons why you hired Zack Snyder to do Man of Steel.

But there is one flaw in the idea. the present day Frank Miller is just terrible at what he does. He just is. Now, I have nothing personal against Miller, despite how Wikipedia might make it look. I came in a bit after his storied run on Daredevil, but I was right on time for his Batman:The Dark Knight Returns. I consider that series to be the second best comic book story of all time. But since 2000, Frank Miller has become a case of diminishing returns. I don’t know if it’s because of the auteur syndrome (where creative individuals have been told that they were genius enough times that they figure anything they create is automatically genius so they stop trying) or something else, but Miller’s output in the new millennium–Dark Knight Strikes Back, All-Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder, Holy Terror–has been awful.

I mean, have you seen The Spirit? Obviously not, because if you did, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Watch it. Okay, that might be asking too much. How about you just go on Rotten Tomatoes and read some the reviews for the film? No, that probably won’t work either. How about you take a look at the earnings for the film?  Money, you’ll pay attention to that. I’ll give you a hint: the reviews were as bad as the grosses–completely horrible.

The Spirit shows what happens when Miller is given free hand to write and direct a comic book film adaptation. He took one of the most quirky and iconic comic book characters in history, paid no respect to the original version, and married traces of the character to his fetishes (namely, film noir and hyper-sexualized femme fatales), a Calvin Klein ad, and force fed the concoction through a MacBook. The result is something the was as awful as you would expect it to be.

And this was a character created by his friend and mentor, Will Eisner! What would he do to the Justice League, a concept he has no emotional attachment to? Well, we do have some idea based on how Miller portrayed the team in All-Star Batman, The Dark Knight Returns and Dark Knight Strikes Again.  Superman will be an ineffectual wimp incapable of independent thought, preferring to be led around by weaker men. Green Arrow will be a raving lunatic hippie. Wonder Woman will be a man-hating harridan. Batman will be a psychotic bastard. And the rest of the League will be made up of either sociopaths or feeble weaklings. In other words, nothing like the casual fan remembers them as being and not the type of characters that would be appealing to everyday moviegoers.

What’s that you say? You’ll never let that happen? Gosh, the only worse thing I can think of other than a Frank Miller Justice League film is a Frank Miller Justice League film after heavy studio meddling.

That fact that you might be considering Miller for this job tells me something I’ve always suspected–you think there’s some hidden secret to doing a successful superhero movie, and, by gum, you’ll try everything until you find it. Jonah Hex doesn’t have powers? All Marvel’s film characters have powers. Let’s give him some. Iron Man was a cocky and arrogant who is unfazed by whatever life throws and wields a powerful weapon. That characterization would work exactly as well for Green Lantern! The Nolan Batman films were dark and gritty. So, making the Superman film dark and gritty would mean that it will be just as successful! Joss Whedon, a Hollywood director who wrote comic books, leads The Avengers to over a billion dollars in box office receipts? Man, then fans would really flip if we got Frank Miller, a comic writer who is a Hollywood director, to do Justice League!

You are right though. There is a proven method of doing a comic book movie right, but it’s no secret. You get a talented and proven director. You get a great cast of actors. You get a great story that respects the source material while standing on its own as a film. You work with the comic book company to make sure the films stay on point. You don’t interfere unless it is to make any of the four prior things happen.  It’s rather simple, but it’s not easy. You need to invest the time, do the due diligence, and trust the people you’ve hired when your only instinct is to overrule them and make unnecessary changes. But if you do that, your films might just be the quality of Marvel’s or Nolan’s.

Thanks for listening to me, Warners. I know I might have come on a bit too strong. After all, you were just pooling opinions. But I just think hiring Frank Miller for Justice League would annihilate any chance you have of ever competing with Marvel’s film output. I felt I had to say something, as a friend, before it was too late.

Stay in touch!

Bill Gatevackes.

Be it coincidence or homage or the outright hope that they don’t get caught aping someone else’s movie, filmmakers have been replicating the work of those who have gone before them for some time now. Every now and then we like to stop and point out one of those instances.*

How is Mega City One like Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen? When they’re both watched over by a protector who likes to lurk about on rooftops.

That’s the answer suggested by looking at both the posters to 2003′s Daredevil and Dredd, opening up later this month. Interestingly, although they are both comic book adaptations, Daredevil is more straight up superheroics while Dredd has a much more a satirical, science-fiction setting. But man, do both heroes like to stand on roof tops.

*And in the spirit of the swipe, we readily acknowledge that we were “inspired” by a similar feature over at Rich Johnson’s comic book news and gossip site, Bleeding Cool.

When I first read The Green Mile in its original, monthly serialized form, I was struck by two thoughts. First, that it would make one hell of a movie. Second, that it would be unlikely to ever become one, because it would be nigh impossible to cast the character of John Coffey, the black 6′ 8″ hulking simpleton who was falsely accused of the rape an murder of two young white girls in the novel.

Michael Clarke Duncan was three inches shorter than John Coffey, but other than that he was perfect for the role. He had been an actor for five years prior to landing the role, typically in small roles as bouncers (in Married With Children, Bulworth and A Night at the Roxbury) or guards of one sort or another (in Back in Business, Living Single and The Players Club) in a number of films and TV shows. Arguably, his largest role prior to The Green Mile was as a member of Bruce Willis’ crew in Armageddon.

But his playing John Coffey was a thing that happens all too rarely in Hollywood–the absolutely ideal marriage of an actor and role. His physical appearance matched the fearsome and imposing figure Stephen King described in his novel, but  Duncan’s acting captured the nuanced characterization–the sweet innocence and simple nature–that King wrote into the character. It’s telling that in a film where awards season favorites such as Tom Hanks, David Morse, Patricia Clarkson, James Cromwell and Sam Rockwell gave bravura performances, Duncan was the only member of the cast to get a Oscar nomination (for Best Supporting Actor, which he lost to Michael Caine for Cider House Rules).

Unfortunately, while Hollywood has no shortage of roles that Duncan’s physical presence would be ideal for, few of these roles would play up to his acting talents. Regardless, he would fulfill his dream of becoming a working actor, typically in science-fiction and comic book genre films.

He played Wilson Fisk, a.k.a. The Kingpin, in 2003′s Daredevil, played Manute in 2005′s Sin City, and voice the alien trainer Kilowog in 2011′s Green Lantern. In addition, he had pivotal roles in 2001′s Planet of the Apes, 2002′s The Scorpion King, and 2009′s Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li.

Duncan would also appear in a number of comedies, notably 2000′s The Whole Nine Yards, 2006′s Talladega Nights: The Legend of Ricky Bobby and School for Scoundrels, and 2009′s The Slammin’ Salmon. And his deep baritone lent itself to voice overwork in animation and numerous video games.

At this point it appears as if Twentieth Century Fox’s plans to take a second attempt at a Daredevil franchise are pretty much dead and the studio is resigned to letting the rights revert back to Marvel in October. The last director that was working on the project was The A-Team helmer Joe Carnahan and he was the one who confirmed that the project was pretty much dead at Fox yesterday.

But Carnahan wasn’t finished with talking about the now moribund project. He also tweeted out the two “sizzle reels” that he assembled to give Fox execs an idea of the type of feel he was going to go for if they gave him a greenlight for the project. And after watching them, I think you’ll agree that it looks like Carnahan was going to bring the equivelent of Frank Miller’s often imitated but never quite duplicated gritty classic run on the comic book character to the big screen in a way that recalls the gritty crime dramas of the 1970s. Take a look and you’ll probably recognize shots from Taxi Driver, The Warriors and others mixed in with a few shots from 2003′s Daredevil. Note: the second reel contains a bit more violence, which Carnahan has labeled as “NC-17.”

The ball’s in your court now Marvel.

Twentieth Century Fox’s plans to attempt a new Daredevil comic book adaptation seems to be existing in a state of quantum flux these days – Some re[ports have it that the studio is working hard on the project, even to the point where they are negotiating with Marvel Studios to extend their rights to the character while others have been reporting that the studio is lukewarm on the film and would probably let the rights expire when the contract runs out in October.

One thing that is certain is that director Joe Carnahan was the most recent in a line of creative types to work on the project for the studio. Carnahan’s announced intent to tell the story of blind lawyer Matt Murdoch who defends the residents of New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen with the aid of radiation-enhanced senses as the superhero Daredevil in the style of a gritty 1970s crime drama like The French Connection certainly sounded promising.

But seems as if that promise might be going unfulfilled, as Carnahan took to his twitter feed last night to deliver some bad news.

Think my idea for a certain retro, red-suited, Serpico-styled superhero went up in smoke today kids.

— Joe Carnahan (@carnojoe) August 14, 2012

 

We shall see. Time is NOT on anyone’s side.

— Joe Carnahan (@carnojoe) August 14, 2012

While he doesn’t elaborate any further, I think we can read the tweet as confirmation that Fox is seriously leaning towards letting the film rights revert back to Marvel.

On the one hand, it is good news for those, like myself, who would like to see the hero interact with the other heroes in Marvel Studios’ shared Cinematic Universe. It’s also bad news for those, like myself, who were interested in seeing the vision Carnahan has for the character. Of course, I don’t think that there would be anything stopping Carnahan from heading over to Marvel to pitch his idea there.

And if Daredevil does revert to Marvel, based on their announced schedule of films, we probably won’t see a film featuring the character until at least late 2015 after Avengers 2. And that’s even if Marvel wants to exploit the character in feature films. There’s always the currently unnamed television project for ABC that Joss Whedon has been mentioned as helping to develop that could be a good fit for the character’s more street-level action.

Fox has until October 10 to get a Daredevil film in front of the cameras if they want to hang on the to the character’s film rights. The clock is ticking…

While Marvel Studios have had great success with building a cohesive cinematic universe with the comic book properties to which they own the film rights, there are still a number of key characters that the studio doesn’t have access to rather generous film rights agreements the studio made back in the 1990s when their parent company, Marvel Comics, was strapped for cash.

It doesn’t really take this past week’s news story that Marvel was looking to trade the rights to certain characters that Twentieth Century Fox had control of in return to extending their option on another to know that ultimately Marvel would like to get them all back under their roof. But until that happens, we’ve assembled a guide as to what characters currently reside at which studios.

Fantastic Four - The Fantastic Four are one of the cornerstones of the Marvel Comics universe, but their movie rights rest with 20th Century Fox, who picked them up in the mid-90s. According to most reports, the rights deal that Marvel initially struck with Neu Constantin (Roger Corman’s production company) and presumably transferred to Fox allowed for usage of all original concepts introduced in Fantastic Four issues 1 through 100.

Thanks to the two films Fox has already produced, we know that in addition to the team itself, Fox also owns the rights to ally Silver Surfer, villains Doctor Doom and Galactus and supporting characters postman Willy Lumpkin, Frankie Raye (although she first appeared in FF #164) and Alicia Masters. Frankie Raye’s appearance in Rise Of The Silver Surfer suggest that her heroic persona of Nova, a herald of Galactus, is also included. And while it is probably safe to assume that most of the FF’s rogue’s gallery are a apart of the rights package, the inclusion of Masters seems to definitely confirm the presence of her father, the villain known as the Puppet Master.

Although the FF have encountered many alien races over the course of their adventures, none more memorable than the shape-shifting Skrulls. Fittingly, the rights situation surrounding the aliens are as amorphous as they are. During an interview promoting the European premiere of The Avengers, Marvel Studio chief Kevin Feige stated that rights to the Skrulls are owned by both Fox and Marvel, and either studio could use them in their films. Although he did not say so, it would not be unreasonable to believe that the Skrulls centuries-old enemies the Kree, who also factored heavily  in many Fantastic Four and Avengers storylines, were under the same shared agreement. Furthermore, Feige did not clarify the status of one particular Skrull character, the so-called Super Skrull, who has all the powers of the Fantastic Four in addition to his native shape changing ability, though it is generally believed that the rights lie solely with Twentieth Century Fox.

Reports on J Michael Straczynski’s script for a Silver Surfer spin-off film stated that it would involve the character returning to his home world of Zenn-La. Presumably, many of the characters created in various comics stories for that portion of the Silver Surfer’s backstory including his lover Shalla-Bal fall under the Fantastic Four rights.

Although the superpowered evolutionary offshoot of heroes known as The Inhumans first appeared in the pages of Fantastic Four #45 (December 1965), their film rights are still controlled by Marvel Studios as evidenced by statements made by Feige that a film based on the characters was in development. Likewise, Black Panther, ruler of the fictional nation of Wakanda, debuted in Fantastic Four #52 (July 1966), but his rights are also back at Marvel Studios around who they have been developing a film.

Another character who is often strongly associated with the Fantastic Four is Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner. However, the Atlantean monarch’s rights are separate from what Fox owns. Back in September 2006, Universal Pictures had announced a Sub-Mariner movie with Jonathan Mostow signed to direct and rewrite a screenplay by David Self. However, as of May 2012 Marvel’s Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada has stated that “to the best of his knowledge” the rights to Namor, the Sub-Mariner currently resides with Marvel. Further evidence that Namor has reverted back to Marvel can be found at the end of Iron Man 2 in the scene where Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr) is debriefed by Nick Fury of SHIELD. On a computer screen in the background a world map noting several areas that the spy organization is monitoring we can see one area in the Atlantic Ocean marked, supposedly the location of Namor’s undersea kingdom of Atlantis.

Daredevil/Elektra – Based on who we see in New Regency/Fox’s 2003 Daredevil film and its spinoff Elektra, we can get a pretty good list of characters that are included in the rights package. (Twentieth Century Fox is the production company’s distributor.) This gives us Matt Murdock/Daredevil, his father Jack Murdock, Franklin “Foggy” Nelson, love interest Elektra Natchios, her father Nikolas Natchios, crime lord Wilson Fisk, aka The Kingpin,” villain Bullseye, reporter Ben Urich, Karen Page, Typhoid Mary, martial arts master Stick, the evil ninja clan known as The Hand headed by assassin Kirigi, Hand members Stone and Tattoo and the Chaste, the Hand’s secluded base of training and operations.

Furthermore, sequel discussions at the time of Daredevil’s release mentioned Mister Fear as a possible villain for a second film indicate that he is included. Other villains that are included in the Daredevil rights package probably include the Owl, Stilt-Man, Gladiator, Death-Stalker, Cobra and Mr. Hyde and Man-Bull, though no mention has been made of any of them specifically.

One Daredevil villain, the Purple Man, has an important role in the backstory of Jessica Jones, lead character in the recent comics series Alias. Marvel is currently developing a television series based on Alias, but it is unknown if the Purple Man is available to be included in the show or if his rights are still under the Daredevil agreement. Of course, if Fox doesn’t have cameras rolling on a new Daredevil film by the contractual rights reversion date of October 10 then the question as to who owns the rights to the villain becomes moot.

One thing that that Fox’s Daredevil rights doesn’t include is the right to use the Marvel Comics universe’s paper of record, The Daily Bugle. The rights for the Bugle are part and parcel of the Spider-Man rights over at Sony/Universal, leaving Fox to make the real-life tabloid The New York Post Daredevil supporting character reporter Ben Urich’s employer.

Ghost Rider – Universal has not had much luck at the box office with their two attempts to brong the supernatural character Ghost Rider to the big screen. With the casting the Norse gods of the Thor movies as humanoid aliens with technology so advanced that it appears to be magic, these movies are the only ones that explore the supernatural side of Marvel Comics. Judging from the two films starring Nick Cage, in addition to the characters of Johnny Blaze and his demonic counterpart Zarathos, the studio appears to have the film rights to the characters Blackout, Mephistopheles, Carter Slade/the Phantom Rider and Blackheart. However, if Marvel goes ahead with the previously talked about Doctor Strange film that would explore Marvel’s mystical side, none of these characters would be considered necessary for it as Marvel’s mystical roster is fairly deep and most of them probably reside outside of the Ghost Rider rights.

Spider-Man – Spider-Man has one of the most interesting supporting casts and one of the most dynamic rogues galleries in comics. And Sony most likely owns the rights to all of them.

The Amazing Spider-Man has shown that Peter Parker/Spider-Man, Aunt May, Uncle Ben, Richard and Mary Parker, Gwen Stacy, George Stacy, Flash Thompson, Curt Connors/Lizard, Norman Osborn/Green Goblin and the Daily Bugle are actively being used in the reboot franchise. Since most of these characters have appeared in some form in the Sam Raimi pre-reboot trilogy, it’s highly likely that Sony still owns all the characters from that series as well, meaning we might see Harry Osborn, Mary Jane Watson, Mendel Strom, the Daily Bugle staff (J. Jonah Jameson, Robbie Robertson, Betty Brant, et al), John Jameson, Doctor Octopus, Sandman and Venom in the future installments of the reboot.

And, since there have been so many aborted tries at getting various Spider-Man films on the screen, we have a good idea at what other Spider-Man characters Sony owns rights to. James Cameron’s script treatment that he did while the Spider-Man rights were at Cannon/Carolco featured Electro as one of the villains, so that character has to be included in the film rights. Sam Raimi was developing a fourth film of his franchise, one that would have had the Vulture and Felicia Hardy (who may or may not have been her comic book identity, the Black Cat, in this film). Rumor has it that one of the reason Raimi left the franchise was because the producers were trying to force the director to use latter day Spidey villain, Carnage. If so, that’s another character they could use.

Outside of that, it’s fair to say that Sony has rights to Spider-Man villains such as Hobgoblin and Demogoblin (both of which tie into the Green Goblin character), Chameleon, Jackal, Kraven the Hunter, Molten Man and Tombstone, all of whom are pretty much exclusively Spider-Man villains. They might also have rights to foes such as Scorpion, Mysterio and Rhino, a trio who started off as Spidey bad guys yet have fought other Marvel heroes. When you get to villains such as the Beetle and Boomerang, the rights issue gets murkier, because those characters have appeared in enough of other character’s books that they aren’t considered true Spider-Man villains, therefore probably not included in the rights Sony owns.

Several Spider-Man characters that Sony definitely does not own are Cloak and Dagger, who Marvel is developing a TV show for the ABC Family Channel with, Kingpin, who Fox owns rights to due to his connection to the Daredevil universe, and Morbius, whose rights were owned by New Line through their agreement to make a Blade film (he was meant to be the villain for a potential sequel), and whose rights reverted back to Marvel with Blade’s.

X-Men: – Conventional wisdom states that the agreement made between Marvel Comics and Fox for the X-Men film gives rights to all Marvel’s mutant characters to the studio. This makes sense because there are literally hundreds of mutants created in Marvel X-Men family of books. And the conventional wisdom does seem true because Fox has packed numerous mutants into the X-Men films, even including such obscure characters as Phat and Glob Herman. And given the number of X-books Marvel publishes in any given month, Fox has not really begun to scratch beyond the surface of what they can exploit.

But where this becomes problematic is that mutants have spread to pretty much all aspects of Marvel’s comic book output. For instance, Cloak and Dagger and Sub-Mariner are mutants and former members of the X-Men, yet their rights are held by Marvel. Franklin Richards, son or the Fantastic Four’s Reed and Susan Richards, is a mutant (not really a problem for Fox as they own the rights to the character regardless). And then there’s Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch.

Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch first appeared as members of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants way back in 1964′s X-Men #4. They were later revealed to be the son and daughter of X-Men villain Magneto. However, a large part of their comic book career was spent in the Avengers books, and both have contributed to many notable storylines in that title. Both also were members of the Ultimates, the version of the Avengers created for Marvel’s Ultimate line of comics, the universe where much of the feel and plot points for Marvel’s film universe is taken.

So, who owns the rights to these characters: Fox or Marvel? The answer is yes.

Kevin Feige, during an interview promoting the European premiere of The Avengers, stated that Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch are owned by both Fox and Marvel, and either studio could use them in their films much like the arrangement for the right to the Fantastic Four villains, the Skrulls.

Of course, the rights situations for any of these characters could change at any time, depending on the terms of each individual contract. Though we would suspect that over time Marvel Studio will eventually see most, if not all of their characters come home to live under the same corporate roof again.

-Rich Drees and William Gatevackes contributed to this article.

Okay, do you want the good news first, or the bad news? Bad news? Okay, then.

The bad news is that Variety is reporting that Marvel is negotiating with Fox to extend the studios rights on Daredevil, which are set to expire if Fox doesn’t start a Daredevil film by October 10 of this year.

The good news is that in exchange for the rights being extended, the Marvel will get the right to use some Fantastic Four characters, which Fox owns the rights to for the foreseeable future, in order to use said characters in the cosmic themed Phase II of the Marvel film franchises.

Don’t get your hopes up too high. Variety suggests that the FF themselves aren’t the characters Marvel wants, so we won’t be able to see Chris Evans play Captain America and Human Torch in the same film (darn it!).  The industry journal states that Marvel wants Galactus and Silver Surfer from Fox to use in the new “cosmic” path the Marvel films are taking.

While the space-faring Silver Surfer and the planet-eating Galactus would definitely fit in with the intergalactic films Marvel will be making, they don’t seem to be that great of a fit with the direction the films are taking. Galactus is as, if not more, powerful than Thanos, so including him and Thanos in The Guardians of the Galaxy or Avengers 2 might be a bit of overkill. And having the character simply make a cameo probably wouldn’t be worth this much effort. However, there are two other Fantastic Four supporting characters that Marvel might have their eye on that would be a better fit.

Annihilus is a villain who first appeared in Fantastic Four Annual #6 and fought the team numerous times over the years. He is an alien being who lives in an antimatter universe called the Negative Zone. Fanatical about staying alive, he is fixated with killing anything that he considers a threat to his life. Unfortunately, this means just about every other living thing.

Annihilus was the main villain in the Annihilation miniseries, the series where members the current version of the Guardians of the Galaxy united to stave off his invasion of our universe. Since he played a part in the origin of the team in the comic books, it seems natural that Marvel might want him to serve the same role in The Guardians of the Galaxy film as well, considering many of the same characters have been carried over.

The next character might not be part of the Fantastic Four characters that Fox owns, but his not being included in the plans for Phase II leads me to believe his rights are owned by someone other than Marvel, and if not Fox, then who?

Adam Warlock made his first appearance in Fantastic Four #66 as “Him,” a genetic creation of a cadre of mad scientist called The Enclave, who were endeavoring to create the ultimate humanoid life form that they could clone into an army and use to conquer the Earth.   Unfortunately for them, their creation was imbued with immeasurable cosmic power and was too powerful control. “Him” eventually left Earth for the stars, took the name Adam Warlock, and fought to make the galaxy safe.

If Thanos has an arch-nemesis, it would be Adam Warlock. Many a legendary comic book arc feature those two going at it, often times with one of both characters dying (or being brought back). Having Thanos in the the films without Warlock is like having a movie with Laurel but not Hardy. Just doesn’t seem right. By the way, Warlock was also a member of the Guardians of the Galaxy.

Of course, Deadline is reporting that their sources at Fox are denying the talks of the trade, and that they are really excited about the Josh Trank take on the Fantastic Four characters and that the talks are about Fox and Disney co-financing the Daredevil film, yada yada yada. I wonder if they are the same sources that told Deadline that Jessica Biel was a lock for Viper in The Wolverine, a fact that I’ll repeat with every Deadline news item because it was totally wrong.

I guess we’ll have to see which news organization’s sources are more connected. As they say, the story is developing.