While we all remember Iron Man as the movie that set the Marvel Cinematic Universe into motion, the post-credit scene featuring Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury was added at the last minute. During an interview for Inverse, comic book legend Brian Michael Bendis revealed how he was called last minute by MCU producer Kevin Feige and asked to write the dialogue of the movie’s end-credits scene.
When Iron Man hit theaters in 2008, Marvel Studios was still treading the water to see how the public would react to a fairly unknown superhero getting a big-budgeted cinematic story. Feige and the other genius behind the MCU were already discussing their interconnected universe. Still, the MCU didn’t officially exist, and no one could imagine any studio doing something like it. So, we can confidently say we were all surprised by Iron Man’s end-credits scene, in which Nick Fury tells Stark he wants to discuss the Avengers Initiative.
After fifteen years and dozens of movies and TV shows, Nick Fury’s introduction remains the best MCU end-credits scene. It was a simpler time when we weren’t tired of the MCU always teasing future projects, and the promise that there was a bigger universe filled with superheroes felt like a dream come true. However, the MCU’s first end-credits got even more thrilling, as Bendis reveals the creative team put everything together in less than a day.
How Iron Man’s Post-Credits Scene was Improved
As Bendis explains, “I got a call from Kevin, who said, ‘Samuel L. Jackson is showing up tomorrow to do a favor. He’s just showing up and we’re going to wing it.’” It’s absurd to think about Marvel Studios improvising an end-credit scene with one of the biggest Hollywood stars ever, but the MCU worked as an indie production for its first projects when nothing was set to stone years in advance. That’s why Feige asked Bendis: “Do you have time to write anything?” The comic book writer said yes, of course, which would give him an unexpected amount of work. As Bendis puts it:
“My memory is: ‘Write everything you can think of.’ “As delightful as that sounds, I stayed up all night. This was like a writer’s puzzle. I wrote a couple of pages down. I wrote every serious thing you can think of and every dumb thing you can think of.”
The result was a list with multiple dialogue options that could have set a whole different MCU storyline. For instance, Iron Man could have become a public enemy if Nick Fury had said, “I’m here to shut you down. You’re done. There’s no Iron Man.” Or the team-up process could have been speeded up after Fury said, “Welcome to the Avengers!” The first post-credits scene in MCU history could have also become a joke with Snakes on a Plane since one of the options Bendis came up with was “Get that motherfucking armor off your motherfucking…” Still, Bendis is happy with the path Marvel Studios followed, as Feige chose the best option from the writer’s extensive list. As Bendis puts it:
“It’s like a good cliffhanger. You leave the movie thinking about the story told, and you’re creating what you think might be the next story. The takeaway is that the credits [show] a world of imagination beyond what they were just shown. Isn’t that what this is all supposed to be about?”
Iron Man is currently available on Disney+. Jackson will return as Nick Fury for Secret Invasion, a Disney+ series premiering on June 21.