The film industry and comic book movie genre took a big hit last week when Marvel Studios announced writer/director Edgar Wright had left Ant-Man. A film Wright has been developing since as early as 2006, and perhaps even earlier.
Hardcore Wright fans were shocked and angry. While those who are waiting for Marvel Studios to fail had the ammo they needed to begin their debates that the studio is finally having issues.
The story as to why Wright left Marvel Studios and Ant-Man is as simple as stating that Wright's auteur style was no longer a fit for the studio. In the studio's infancy, Wright was a great fit. But now Marvel Studios has a much bigger entity looming over all their films with parent company Disney, who wants movies made for as broad of an audience as possible. One of The Hollywood Reporter's sources provided more information about this divorce in a new report.
"Kevin Feige [and his top lieutenants] run Marvel with a singularity of vision, but when you take a true auteur and throw him into the mix, this is what you get. They don't want you to speak up too much or have too much vision. People who have never worked there don't understand how they operate, but if you trust them, they have an amazing track record."
As of the writing of this post, Marvel is supposedly searching for a replacement director to come in immediately and begin principle photography at the end of July.
"The challenges are clear in finding a director who can pick up a project infused with Wright's vision for years. In addition, sources say the film's key crew -- its heads of departments -- departed when it became clear production would not begin as scheduled July 28. Rudd's reps say he's still in, and a source close to the production says all key crew positions will be filled shortly."
Side note: The fact that The Hollywood Reporter clearly states Ant-Man was scheduled to begin filming on July 28 corroborates The Daily SuperHero's April scoop saying filming was delayed until July. Click right here to read that scoop.
Back to the point, it sounds like Wright and Marvel Studios' relationship has been deteriorating for a while now and Wright should have known that his original vision for Ant-Man would be a tough thing to accomplish as the studio grew bigger, more popular and as a huge financial success. This is Marvel Studios and they make their films their way while Disney backs them since there is a proven track record of success. Wright, on the other hand, had his chance at blockbuster movie status with Scott Pilgrim vs. the World in 2010 but lost money on that movie ($60 million budget vs. $47 million worldwide box office grosses) and this could have played a big part in this divorce as well.
In the end, it's "The Marvel Way" or the highway if you want to direct any of their films now. So if you're a director and you'd like to work with them and get "The Marvel Bump" for your career, be prepared to do things their way.
Stay tuned as a new director should be hired fast so he/she can prepare for filming in July. Unless Marvel Studios is considering pushing Ant-Man's release date back to November 2015 (its original release date) but that's probably too close to the release of an even bigger Disney-owned movie property called Star Wars.