SURPRISE!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE!!!
I hope the title didn't give it away. We tried extra hard to keep this whole thing a secret. No, this has nothing to do with the perks of dating on a small campus. My gimmick is movies. You should have seen your face...
On May 2nd, 2008, the world saw the release of the first film of what would become a string of action packed, game changing movies. This "little iron suit that could" paved the way for a hulking cinematic universe. Worthy of nothing less than Thor's hammer, its vast expanse of characters and story lines must be approached with a hawk's eye. The audience these movies attract ranges from as young as our Boy Scouts of America to as mature as our army captains of America. Low-key, those who have suffered serious illnesses or black widow bites have even encountered its characters paying charitable visits to them in the hospital. Spiders, man...
Alright, that's enough of that. Eight years ago last week, Marvel Studios released the first live-action Iron Man film, and it ameliorated the movie industry. After a multitude of mediocre to decent critical releases (with the exception of the Spider-mans and X-men movies, whose legal residences are still a topic of debate) Marvel took a gamble on Robert Downey Jr., Jon Favereau, and a post-credits eye-patch, toted by Samuel L. Jackson. The film was a critical (94% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) and financial (585.2 million dollar box office receipt) success.
Following this blockbuster hit came 11 more movies under the titles of five other unique superheroes, and two different collaborative teams. Together these colorful do-gooders have scraped together a total of $9,277,294,995 at the world box office (Yes, the Avengers and associates are well on their way to not only save the world, but also to pay off our nation's debt). In honor of Marvel's Cinematic Universe's 8th birthday and the opening weekend of their 12th, and potentially most successful, film Captain America: Civil War (#TeamCap), here are 10 awesome facts about the MCU:
1. Chris Evans wasn't always Captain America. Before he donned the star spangled shield, he played The Human Torch in the original Fantastic Four movies.
2. The newspaper photo of Iron Man that Tony Stark is reading at the end of the first Iron Man was taken by two guys that were hiding in bushes on set during the movie's filming.
3. The Russo Brothers (Directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Civil War) got their start on the beloved indie TV series Arrested Development and Community.
4. The casting choices for Thor came down to being between Chris Hemsworth and Liam Hemsworth.
5. For his role in Guardians of the Galaxy, Chris Pratt lost 60 lbs in 6 months.
He did this while still filming Parks & Recreation, where he played the lovable (and far less in shape) Andy Dwyer. The series played it off by having Andy explain he lost it by cutting beer out of his diet.
6. Scarlett Johansson was so dedicated to her role as Black Widow that she dyed her hair red for the auditions for the character.
7. The train route Thor takes in Thor: The Dark World to Charing Cross is far from accurate to the real world location.
The correct route from Charing Cross is as follows: Leave the Tube station, board the National Rail train from Charing Cross mainline station, then change at London Bridge. From this point that it is probably quicker to keep going to Maze Hill station, one stop after Greenwich, given its relative distance to the location where crazy stuff was going down.
8. Marvel owns the trademark for the word "zombie".
In the 70's Marvel tried to legally protect their comic series Marvel: Zombies and the word was copyrighted. The word became a cultural normalcy so Marvel decided its use was too widespread to try to acquire royalties from. It is reported they lost the rights in 1996.
9. The motion capture technology used to create The Hulk in The Avengers is so intricate that the not-so-jolly green giant has Mark Ruffalo's fingerprints.
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