While DC and Warner Bros. are still trying to figure out what to do with their superheroes, Marvel already has the path laid out for "Phase Two": Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and Guardians of the Galaxy. Granted, all of the films except Guardians are sequels, but Marvel Studios' President Kevin Feige says we shouldn't be expecting more of the same.  Fans should anticipate new approaches, different sides of the characters, and trying to build it all to The Avengers 2.

Hit the jump for more.

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Speaking to SFX, Feige says different parts of Phase Two will cover different aspects of the expanding Marvel universe:

The Thor film and the Guardians of the Galaxy film certainly are cosmic. Guardians and Thor will take the brunt of the cosmic side of the universe, particularly Guardians, which is 95% in space.

It's probably best to keep a movie in outer space when "of the Galaxy" is part of the title.  As for the other 5%, perhaps it deals with Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) on Earth, because Feige says Guardians is going to be out there in more ways than one:

It’s much more of a standalone film. It takes place in the same universe. And when we’ve been on the other side of that universe in other movies, you might see those characteristics in Guardians, but the Avengers are not involved with what’s happening out there at this time.

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Moving to the non-cosmic side of Phase Two, Feige explains that the tone of Iron Man 3 and Captain America: The Winter Soldier will be different than what we saw in the previous films:

I think Iron Man 3 shows the other side of Phase 2, which is delving deeper into the characters. Throwing them on a much more personal journey. And Captain America will showcase… What’s exciting to me about Cap – sort of about Iron Man 3 too if you look at it – is it’s tonally almost like a different genre. [Director] Shane Black’s described Iron Man 3 as a Tom Clancy sort of political thriller, which I like a lot. We hired our directors on Cap because they loved our explanation that we really want to make a ’70s political thriller masquerading as a big superhero movie. Just like with the first film – we got Joe Johnston because we said, ‘We want to do a ’40s World War Two movie masquerading as a big superhero movie.’ I love that we’re doing a sequel to a film that’s a completely different genre than the first film. I think that’s fun. And the comics do it all the time.”

This is the one of the reasons why Marvel has managed to be successful: risk-taking.  It would be easy to simply repeat the same adventures, and the weakest Phase 1 film, Iron Man 2, is the safest of the bunch because it doesn't rethink the character in a challenging way.  Some fans may take a "If it isn't broke, don't fix it," approach, but you don't make better movies that way.  I don't know if the sequels will pan out, but I like the vision Feige is presenting for where Phase Two is headed.

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Image via Marvel