Movie News: Two More Names in Talks to Direct ANT-MAN

In what is the first real blip on the Marvel Studios radar, it appears that the studio is making a royal arse of replacing Edgar Wright and finding a new director for ANT-MAN. After Wright and Marvel parted ways, the gig was offered to ANCHORMAN’s Adam McKay. He declined. The offer then went out to DODGEBALL’s Rawson Marshall Thurber. He declined. Their third choice was ZOMBIELAND’s Ruben Fleischer. Having recently had a child and being eyed for GHOSTBUSTERS 3, he’s now said to be out. So, step forward the next two contenders.

Deadline is reporting that Marvel and Disney have now turned their attention to BAD NEIGHBOURS’ Nicholas Stoller and GOON’s Michael Dowse. It’s claimed that both of these have been approached by the powers that be and that they are both in some form of talks. So far, Marvel Studios have hit a home run with pretty much every single one of their MCU outings. With Wright having walked due to his script getting completely rehashed, and with several others saying “no, thanks”, ANT-MAN is proving to be a tad troublesome for Marvel and the House of Mouse. And then there’s the issue of the names that have been approached. Okay, we can just about buy the director of ANCHORMAN getting involved due to Paul Rudd playing Scott Lang/Ant-Man. We can buy Fleischer getting involved because we enjoyed ZOMBIELAND. But the director of DODGEBALL, the director of BAD NEIGHBOURS, the director of GOON? Really? The guys who directed these films are wanted by Marvel Studios to direct the often complex and heartbreaking tale of Ant-Man? Granted, Hank Pym, usually the source of the deep, dark and twisted Ant-Man stories, is seemingly playing second fiddle to Rudd’s Scott Lang in the MCU, but are the studio trying to make ANT-MAN into a comedy?

Whoever eventually signs up for the ANT-MAN directing gig will find themselves overseeing Rudd as Lang, Michael Douglas as Hank Pym, and unconfirmed roles for Evangeline Lilly, Patrick Wilson, and Corey Stoll.

ANT-MAN is set to kick-off Marvel’s Phase Three of films on 17th July, 2015.

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