It’s no secret that there was a divide between Marvel Studios and Marvel Television and the newly released MCU: The Reign of Marvel Studios better explains the rift.
Marvel Entertainment (led by CEO Ike Perlmutter) is said to have pushed for Marvel Television’s creation. From there, the company’s “Creative Committee” – a group Kevin Feige hated so much that he’d later successfully convince Disney CEO Bob Iger to make Marvel Studios a separate entity – was allowed to call the shots.
Remember, this group wouldn’t allow Iron Man 3 to feature a female villain because of concerns over toy sales; in fact, they even tried to gut Captain America: Civil War, pushing for the crucial hero vs. hero conflict to become a story about The Avengers assembling to battle generic super soldiers.
It turns out Feige had plans for all the characters Marvel regained the rights to in the late 2000s/early 2010s, including Daredevil and Ghost Rider. However, the Creative Committee decided he was too busy with The Avengers and “ignoring the protests of Marvel Studios, it assigned all the wayward characters to Marvel Television.”
The relationship worsened from there Marvel Studios “obdurately refused to loan the shows its characters or actors.” That’s why Daredevil‘s first season, for example, featured vague references to characters like Thor and The Hulk, never naming them or even showing photos of the heroes while alluding to the Battle of New York.
In fact, Feige’s reaction to the news Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was happening on ABC tells us all we need to know about his feelings towards Marvel Television.
“They had said early on, ‘Hey, we’re thinking about doing this show about the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.,” the executive recalls. “And Joss [Whedon] said, ‘I think I might do this.’ I said, “That’s cool. God bless you. But you should know that we’re destroying S.H.I.E.L.D. in Winter Soldier. You guys do whatever you want. But know that’s what we’re going to do.”
Captain America: The Winter Soldier essentially made the series irrelevant, and while many fans argue that Nick Fury’s cameos confirm its status as canon to the MCU, the book confirms Marvel Studios only allowed him to be used because they had to.
These days, Marvel Studios controls the franchise’s big and small screen offerings. It’s been something of a learning curve for them, of course, with the studio’s streaming offerings on Disney+ proving a tad hit-or-miss, but at least Feige is now getting to choose which stories are told outside of theaters and how those inform the wider MCU.
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