Marvel Calls on ‘The Avengers’

Not content with developing individual characters for the big screen, Marvel Studios is hoping to make a movie about the superhero team the Avengers.

Studio pet writer Zak Penn (“Fantastic Four,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “X-Men”) will begin working on a script for what will be a live action feature.

These Avengers aren’t to be confused with the classic 1960s British TV series, which became a disastrous 1998 feature film starring Ralph Fiennes and Uma Thurman.

No, these Avengers first came together in a 1963 Marvel comic line. The original all-star team included Ant-Man, Wasp, Thor, Iron Man and Hulk, premiering three years after the DC Comics universe unveiled its own heroic all-star team, the Justice League of America.

The Avengers franchise has been frequently rebooted and spun off within the Marvel continuity and the core characters have occasionally varied, mostly notably with Hulk’s exit and Captain America’s increased centrality.

It’s appropriate that the Avengers and the JLA developed in tandem, Warner Bros. and DC have been developing a Justice League feature, recently moving into the script stage with scribes Kieran Mulroney and Michele Mulroney.

The decision to move forward with an Avengers feature comes as Marvel is working on features for several of the line’s main characters. Edward Norton is starring in the company’s reboot of “The Incredible Hulk,” while an “Iron Man” film will star Robert Downey Jr. Mark Protosevich wrote a script for “Thor” and “Ant-Man” has been linked to “Hot Fuzz” writer-director Edgar Wright.

The Hollywood Reporter story announcing Penn’s involvement goes so far as to suggest that “The Avengers” won’t go into production until after all of those other Marvel properties have hit the big screen.