As amazing as it would be the have the kind of success as Joss Whedon and JJ Abrams, it must also be quite exhausting.
Just think what it would take to keep churning out awesome movies and TV shows like that. Forget it. Most of us mere mortals would crumble within minutes of trying to accomplish such a superhuman task.
In fact, Whedon recently spoke at the South By Southwest film festival, and as Deadline reports, he said he’s “in constant danger of burning out. Look, this is not a healthy person talking to you. ‘I’m going to make a sequel to the biggest movie I’ve ever made! Perhaps a TV show would go along nicely with that…’”
Whedon is currently promoting his Shakespeare adaptation, Much Ado About Nothing, which is updated to modern day, but of course The Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. is going to come up. The pilot for S.H.I.E.L.D. just wrapped, and Whedon said that it was “fun to do, but again, too much work. It’s the more intimate stories that belong on television that can really tap into the visual style and ethos, even some of the mythology, of the Marvel movies.”
Whedon also added, “For me the most important thing is that people fall in love with it on its own merits, rather than constantly asking, ‘Is there going to be an Avenger?’” Funny enough, we just reported about where the Hulk could possibly go in the future, and Whedon was asked about the big green guy as well. There won’t be a Planet Hulk movie, and Whedon said for S.H.I.E.L.D., “there’s not going to be a Hulk because that guy’s too expensive.”
Whedon added that the Hulk is “the most difficult Marvel property because it’s always about balance. Is he a monster? Is he a hero? Are you going to root for a protagonist who spends all his time trying to stop the reason you came to the movie from happening? It’s always a dance.” You also get the impression that Whedon would be more comfortable with the Hulk as part of an ensemble piece than having his own movie.
And of course, Whedon was on the short list of great people who could potentially take over the Star Wars franchise. “Everything I see I think, Oh, I’d really love to do one of those,” and it indeed would have been great to see what Whedon could have done with Star Wars, but he was already committed to the Avengers, “so there was never any question. There was just a peep of sadness from me. But I think, in all honesty, that JJ Abrams is the guy for the gig and I couldn’t be happier about that.”
It’s also a trip to think they’ll be going head to head in 2015 with their respective blockbusters, Avengers 2 and the next Star Wars film. What a hell of a genre summer that’s going to be.
