With Iron Man 3 crossing the $1 billion mark at the box office today, Marvel is currently enjoying its status at the top of the superhero movie food chain.  The studio has a full slate of films hitting theaters over the next couple of years as part of its Phase Two plans, culminating in The Avengers 2 in 2015.  However, even with the prospect of Thor and Captain America sequels and Guardians of the Galaxy on the horizon, fans are still clamoring for more, more, more.  The studio’s Phase Three is a giant question mark at the moment, with only one film firmly slated for release to kick off a new batch of superhero movies: Ant-Man.

Director/co-writer Edgar Wright recently talked a bit about the film and why it’s taken so long to come to fruition, revealing that production will finally get underway next year.  Hit the jump to read on.

Iron Man 3 opens this weekend so it’s old news.  It’s six months until Thor: The Dark World so now we need to know almost everything about it.  The sequel has Thor (Chris Hemsworth) reuniting with Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), and faced with the new threat of sorcerer Malekith the Accursed (Christopher Eccleston) and his horde of dark elves.  New director Alan Taylor (Game of Thrones) takes the action off of Earth and into the mystical realms that will lend themselves to some impressive sets and set pieces.

Hit the jump for what Kevin Feige, Marvel’s President of Production, had to say about the Asgardian’s upcoming adventure, and also comments on Edgar Wright‘s Ant-Man.  The film also stars Tom Hiddleston, Stellan Skarsgård, Idris Elba, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Kat Dennings, Ray Stevenson, Zachary Levi, Tadanobu Asano, Jaimie Alexander, Rene Russo, and Anthony Hopkins.  Thor: The Dark World opens in 3D on November 8th.  Click here for Feige’s comments on Captain America: The Winter Soldier and The Avengers 2.

Earlier today, we were treated to some images of concept art from Marvel’s Phase Two slate of films, courtesy of the release of Marvel’s Phase One box set today on Blu-ray.  Now, there is a sneak peek video for Marvel’s Phase Two available along with concept artwork and images that provide a look at Iron Man 3, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Thor: The Dark World, Guardians of the Galaxy and even Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man.

Hit the jump to take a look at the video, concept art and images from Marvel’s Phase Two films.

In addition to recently talking about Iron Man 3, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige also spoke about Phase Two and Phase Three of the upcoming Marvel Movies.  First, he talked about how Phase Two and The Avengers 2 will be about taking these characters deeper.  Speaking to SFX Magazine, Feige says “Almost whatever the heck else is happening is gravy in that franchise, because all I care about is Bruce and Tony, Tony and Steve, Widow and Bruce – and how Thor fits into it, because he’s always the outsider amongst outsiders. So I think that’s where the value lies. And going deeper amongst those characters in those relationships.”  So it looks like when we finally come back around to The Avengers in 2015, we’ll be seeing the same team but with a different mood based on what happened to the characters earlier in Phase Two.

However, we might be seeing some new members on the team as well.  Hit the jump for more including what we might see from Doctor Strange.

Though Marvel Studios is incredibly secretive when it comes to developing projects, we’ve known about director Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man for quite a long while.  Wright has been working on the script alongside co-writer Joe Cornish (Attack the Block) for the past few years, but he’s understandably been busy with his other directorial projects.  The studio finally announced a release date for the film late last year, and at last summer’s Comic-Con Wright unveiled a test reel that demonstrated his fantastic visual approach to the character’s unique fighting style (ie. switching between normal size and ant-size within the blink of an eye).

With a 2015 release date approaching, Wright is gearing up to begin production on the film fairly soon.  He recently provided a bit of an update on the film, talking about its relationship to the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and why it took so long to come together.  Hit the jump to see what he had to say.

In a recent interview, Kevin Feige confirmed that Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man would be the official starting point of Marvel’s “Phase Three.”  What other films will be included in the post-Avengers 2 grouping?  For starters, none other than the long-rumored Doctor Strange adaptation.  Feige mentioned Doctor Strange in the same sentence as the “Phase Two” film Guardians of the Galaxy, since both pictures will be somewhat outside of the normal realm of core characters we’ve come to know and love.  Hit the jump for more on “Phase Three” from Feige and an update on Iron Man 3 and Avengers 2.

Disney has just sent out a press release announcing release dates and changes for their upcoming slate of films.  The most notable announcement is that Edgar Wright‘s Ant-Man finally has a release date. The little-big-superhero is due to hit theaters on November 6, 2015.  Since this will be the first Marvel movie to follow The Avengers 2 (which opens May 1, 2015), I wouldn’t be surprised if we see Hank Pym pop up in Joss Whedon‘s film.

Here’s the rest of the list:

• Iron Man 3 will now be available in 3D – previously announced 5/3/13 wide playdate is unchanged (Marvel)

• Phineas and Ferb moves to “2014 Undated Wide” (from 7/28/13 wide)

• Thor: The Dark World is final title of previous “Thor 2” and will now be available in 3D – previously announced 11/8/13 wide playdate is unchanged (Marvel)

• Saving Mr. Banks is now dated on 12/20/13 wide (Disney)

• Captain America: The Winter Soldier is final title of previous “Captain America 2” – previously announced 4/4/14 wide playdate is unchanged (Marvel)

• Bears is now dated on 4/18/14 wide (Disneynature)

• Guardians of the Galaxy is final title of previous “Marvel Untitled” – previously announced 8/1/14 is unchanged (Marvel)

• DISNEY ANIMATION UNTITLED is now dated on 11/7/14 wide

• PIXAR ANIMATION UNTITLED is now dated on Wed 11/25/15 wide

One of the highlights of Comic-Con this year was finally getting a tease of what writer/director Edgar Wright’s long-gestating Ant-Man film might look like.  He and co-writer Joe Cornish have been developing the script at Marvel for a couple of years, but they took a big step closer to production by putting together a live-action test reel that visualized how Wright would bring the miniature superhero to life.  The footage was short and unfinished, but it was pretty damn exciting.  Wright’s signature style and comedic tone was wholly intact, but the reel also teased some seriously inventive and cool action sequences that we could see in the full film.

We’ve heard that Marvel may be releasing the finished footage to the public soon, but a fan and Deviant Artist has impressively put together a storyboard recreation of the footage that skews pretty close to what we saw.  Hit the jump to take a look.

Though we’ve watched a number of Marvel films move through the development stages over the years, culminating in their theatrical release, writer/director Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man has yet to actually move to the production phase even though it’s been “in the works” for quite a few years.  This wasn’t exactly a surprise, as Wright is an understandably busy guy (he referred to his development process on Ant-Man as “the Terrence Malick approach”), but fans of both Marvel and the filmmaker have been eager to see Ant-Man come to the big screen.

The project took a big step forward when Wright shot some test footage earlier this summer and then debuted it at Marvel’s Hall H panel at Comic-Con, and now it looks like we could be seeing Ant-Man finally come to fruition much sooner than previously expected. 2014, to be exact.  Hit the jump for more.

On Friday night at Comic-Con, Marvel premiered their latest short film Item 47.  Directed by Louis D’Esposito (Co- President of Marvel Studios) and starring Lizzy Caplan, Jesse Bradford, Maximiliano Hernández and Titus Welliver, Item 47 is about a hard-luck couple who get their hands on an alien gun that falls from the sky after the events of The Avengers.  For more on the short (which will be available on The Avengers Blu-ray) click here.

The day after the premiere, I got to sit down with D’Esposito for an extended interview.  We talked about being at Comic-Con, what props he owns, how he go to direct Item 47, if he had any additional money for the budget due to his position at the studio and whether the actors signed on for feature films.  In addition, we also talked about the possibility of future short films premiering at Comic-Con, the success of The Avengers, if they’ll release an extended Avengers directors cut in theaters, Ant-Man, deleted scenes that have never been released, if they’ll ever make R-rated Marvel movies, the importance of bringing other Marvel characters to life, and a lot more.  Hit the jump to watch.

Saturday was a pretty great day in Hall H at Comic-Con 2012.  We got Django Unchained, Pacific Rim, The Hobbit, Godzilla, Man of Steel, and more.  But for the last panel of the day, Marvel reminded convention goers that Hall H is undeniably their house.  Matt and I already brought you our recaps of the “upcoming projects” portion of the panel (which includes Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy) as well as the Iron Man 3 part, but now those of you not lucky enough to attend can take a gander at one of the more entertaining events of the whole Con.

True to form, Robert Downey Jr. entered Hall H from the back of the room with Luther Vandross pumping from the speakers and an Iron Man glove on his hand.  The crowd went wild, and Marvel has now released the video online for all to see along with excerpts of footage from their entire panel, including Edgar Wright talking Ant-Man.  Hit the jump to take a look, and catch up on all of our Comic-Con 2012 coverage here and here.

Saturday’s Hall H panel for Marvel at Comic-Con was billed as Iron Man 3, but from previous experience we all knew to expect more goodies from Marvel Studios than just IM3.  We were right, as the studio announced full, intriguing titles for Thor 2 and Captain America 2, confirmed Guardians of the Galaxy (including which characters will appear), and revealed test footage for Ant-Man with a surprise appearance by Edgar Wright.

Hit the jump for my full recap of this “update” portion of the Marvel panel. [Update: We've updated the article with concept art for the Guardians of the Galaxy movie as well as logos for all the upcoming Marvel films]

Although director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead) is currently prepping to shoot The World’s End, he’s apparently found enough time to put together a test reel for an Ant-Man feature.  The Marvel superhero is a scientist by the name of Hank Pym who can change his size at will, from the miniscule to the gigantic.  He also possesses a helmet that lets him communicate with ants.  Wright was originally attached to the project when Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk went into production, although Ant-Man was sidelined to make way for the origin movies of the heroes that would go on to star in The Avengers.  Ironically, Ant-Man was a founding member of the superheroic assembly; perhaps, if Wright’s test reel goes well, we’ll see an Ant-Man feature and a follow-up appearance in The Avengers 2. Hit the jump for more.

Fans have been curious about Marvel’s Ant-Man for quite some time.  Edgar Wright is attached to direct, and he’s been working on the script for the past few years alongside Attack the Block’s Joe Cornish.  The Avengers made an insane amount of money, so all eyes are on what Marvel Studios has coming up. Marvel president Kevin Feige recently revealed that there are two unannounced Marvel projects currently in development, in addition to Iron Man 3, Thor 2, and Captain America 2.  With word that Ant-Man was coming along nicely, many were hoping that the superhero pic would be Wright’s next film.  However, the director recently set a September start-date for a third film with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost called The World’s End.

Confirmation that The World’s End is finally happening was fantastic news, but fans were left wondering what that meant for Ant-Man.  Wright recently appeared on Empire’s podcast and he talked a bit about fans being impatient regarding Ant-Man.  Hit the jump for more.

If smashing the opening weekend record by nearly $40 million wasn’t enough to convince you that The Avengers is a juggernaut hit, surely the film crossing the $1 billion mark worldwide in a mere 19 days sealed the deal.  Naturally, all eyes are now on what Marvel Studios has coming up.  Iron Man 3 begins production later this month, and we know that Thor 2 is set to shoot later this year followed by Captain America 2.  Obviously The Avengers 2 will be coming down the line at some point, but I’d imagine the earliest we could see it in theaters would be 2015.  There’s a May 2014 release date slotted for a currently unannounced Marvel pic, but Marvel Studios president recently revealed that there are actually two unnamed films currently in development.  Hit the jump for more.