Marvel stuck one hell of a landing when Joss Whedon’s The Avengers hit theaters this past May and brought the studio’s “Phase One” of films to a close.  The tag at the end of the superhero juggernaut—a glimpse of supervillain Thanos—made for quite the tease regarding Phase Two, and over the past few months fans have been speculating as to how the purple guy will factor into the studio’s upcoming slate of films.  The most recent rumors have Thanos coming into play towards the end of Phase Two in Guardians of the Galaxy and The Avengers 2, which will likely bring Phase Two to a close and usher in a new slate of films for Phase Three.

Though Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige is remiss to make any confirmations, he’s always happy to geek out about the Marvel universe and what’s coming up.  He recently spoke a bit about the studio’s plans for Thanos and how that factors in to not only Phase Two, but also Phase Three, and he addressed the possibility of recasting the role.  Hit the jump for more.

Joss Whedon’s The Avengers capped off a great run for Phase One of Marvel Studios’ film slate, and now Phase Two of the studio’s comic book film line-up is taking shape.  Filming on Iron Man 3 is winding down, production on Thor: The Dark World has commenced, and Captain America: The Winter Soldier is set to get underway next March.  That leaves Guardians of the Galaxy and The Avengers 2 as the final two films of the Phase Two lineup, with Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man a slight possibility should he be able to get production started next year.

Ever since audiences were caught a glimpse of that big purple alien guy in the tag for The Avengers, fans have been pondering a major arc for the villain Thanos in further films.  As with everything Marvel we have no firm confirmation of how the character wlll come into play in Phase Two, but it’s been assumed that he’ll make his appearance in one of the later films of the slate.  Now solid confirmation is being claimed that the baddie will pop up in Guardians of the Galaxy and The Avengers 2.  Hit the jump for more.

Though Marvel was likely planning to unveil one or both of its “unannounced films in development” at the upcoming Comic-Con panel, it appears the cat may have been let out of the bag.  We previously learned that one of Marvel’s two in-development mystery films might be Black Panther, and now it looks like that “Untitled Marvel Film” slated for release in 2014 could be none other than Guardians of the Galaxy.  First, as a refresher, here’s Marvel’s “Phase Two” release slate as it stands now:

• Iron Man 3 – May 3rd, 2013
• Thor 2 – November 15th, 2013
• Captain America 2 – April 4th, 2014
• Untitled Marvel Movie - May 16th, 2014

Hit the jump for more regarding a Guardians of the Galaxy feature film. [Update: Reports have Disney and Marvel zeroing in Guardians of the Galaxy, which would take precedence over Black Panther.  Hit the jump for more.]

[This is a re-post of our article from last week.  However, since there will be plenty of people who are seeing The Avengers for the first time this weekend, we wanted to re-post it for those who didn't understand the brief scene from the middle of the end credits.  Also, make sure you stay till the very end of the credits.]

If you stayed seated during the credits of The Avengers (and by this point, you know you should for a Marvel movie), you may have had some questions about what you saw. It’s a scene, or rather, a moment that plays strictly to the comic geeks in the audience. But what about everyone else? If you were left confused by what you saw, hit the jump for an explanation. [WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD (Obviously)]

With this morning’s announcement that The Avengers scored a $207.1 million opening weekend—$6 million higher than yesterday’s estimate—Marvel’s superhero team-up pic now holds the record for the highest grossing opening weekend in history by nearly $40 million.  Given the massive box office take, I’m assuming most (if not all) of you reading this story saw the film at least once this weekend.  Just to be safe I’m keeping things spoiler-free here on the frontpage, but needless to say a certain character popped up in a mid-credits scene.

Writer/director Joss Whedon and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige recently talked about how that scene came to fruition and whose idea it was.  Hit the jump to see what they had to say.  Obviously, SPOILERS for The Avengers follow after the jump.