I'm going to start with the last part of Alan Taylor's conversation with the Telegraph UK, because that's the most interesting part of the interview. Not that the rest is boring, but the director teasing Doctor Strange is obviously the bigger story.
Taylor was asked which future Marvel project interested him the most, and while responding he mentions a Doctor Strange movie as possibly being part of Phase 3 of Marvel's cinematic universe, which starts with ANT-MAN.
“I do like the weirder ones….What’s cool about them is they can now start exploring the weirder ones because they had so much success with the mainstream ones. So Ant Man is coming along, Guardians of the Galaxy, you know a raccoon is one of the main characters and that’s nuts. And then Doctor Strange. They’ve got lots of places to go."
Not "Maybe then Doctor Strange" or, "I think Marvel is looking into Doctor Strange after that": "And then Doctor Strange." Taylor sounds pretty confident that the character is going to have his own movie in the future, and we do know Marvel is interested in using the character in their films. Kevin Feige recently said it probably wouldn't be until the middle of next year before there was an official announcement on what films will follow ANT-MAN, but it certainly seems like one of them will have the Sorcerer Supreme.
In the interview Alan Taylor also spoke about following in the footsteps of Kenneth Branagh, who directed the first Asgardian adventure. Taylor jokingly says he first approached the project, “with fear and self-loathing," before talking about how working with actors that have been directed by Branagh is slightly intimidating.
“The scariest part was talking to these actors who are so good at what they do, knowing they’d done these characters with, you know, him. Ever since Henry V he’s been a hero and he’s an actor so he speaks their language more than I ever will.”
Alan Taylor went on to talk about shooting for THOR: THE DARK WORLD, which was prolbematic at times in London.
“They’re very sensitive about St Paul’s. You can’t destroy it because it survived the Blitz so they really don’t want superheroes to smash it. So we had to negotiate how many roof tiles we could take off when something hits it.”
Marvel has some of interesting projects in the works between GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY and ANT-MAN, and hopefully things will get a little strange after that.
THOR: THE DARK WORLD hits theaters this Friday.