Iron Fist

Marvel TV brought a heavy bag of goodies to Comic-Con 2016, including first looks at Netflix’s Iron Fist and FX X-Men series Legion, but will New York do one better? We’ll find out, as both series are due for panel treatment at New York Comic-Con 2016, along with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 4, and some new goodies from Marvel Animation.

Marvel’s Luke Cage already looms over Harlem in the first Netflix poster, and our third Defender casts and even bigger shadow in the official trailer. After a Comic-Con sneak peek, watch Mike Colter take on Harlem as the hero-for-hire come to life! Did we mention the tiara?

For as long and Marvel and Netflix have been putting out series, we’ve had to wonder about release strategy. Two per year has remained the norm; first Daredevil and Jessica Jones in 2015, then Daredevil Season 2 and Luke Cage in 2016, and with Marvel now confirming renewal for the former, as well a Punisher spinoff, it seems all else will wait until after The Defenders.

Marvel Television’s huge Netflix panel at San Diego Comic-Con was loaded with surprises, and plenty of new teasers and trailers. You’ve got your Luke Cage trailer and you’ve got your Defenders teaser. But what would the Defenders be without Iron Fist? They would just be two guys and a woman who fought crime, but didn’t have a crazy martial artist who could harness his chi into his hands for mega-powerful punches. Still pretty formidable, to be honest. But not quite as cool.

In case you thought Luke Cage’s first official trailer, Iron Fist footage or Daredevil Season 3 news weren’t enough, prepare for The Defenders! Straight from Comic-Con 2016, the four Marvel Netflix heroes gather for a first teaser that confirms a familiar voice, and a Hand-y foe ahead.

Last time in Superhero Color Theory we explained why our main heroes look the way they do. Now it's time to look at the secondary colors and how they often, but not always, signal the presence of a bad guy. Obviously it makes the most sense visually, that to stand apart from a primary colored (red/blue/yellow) hero, you want a secondary colored (purple/green/orange) one. But what do these colors tell us about what type of character the heroes are encountering?

Since the dawn of the Silver Age, legacy characters have been a staple of superhero fiction, and having a new character step into a well loved roll can open up new opportunities for writers and artists to tell different kinds of stories. In The Replacements, we’ll look back at the notable and not-so-notable heroes and villains to assume some of the most iconic mantles in the superhero genre. This week, in honor of Mutant Week, we’re looking at the X-Men’s most storied legacy position. That’s right, we’re looking at the women, men, and clones who have at one time or another called themselves Phoenix.

The moment Jessica Jones announced that Carrie-Anne Moss would play a gender-flipped version of Iron Fist character Jeryn Hogarth, it seemed inevitable the former Matrix star would cross paths with Finn Jones’ Danny Rand. And so it is, that Marvel confirms Moss will appear in the first season of Marvel’s Netflix Iron Fist!

Attention now turning from Civil War to Avengers: Infinity War (or whatever they end up calling it), time and time again Marvel brass have tempered expectations as to whether the climactic MCU event will finally bridge the gulf between movie and TV. Not likely, it seems, as writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely reveal the “nearly impossible” challenge in logistics.

No matter how great the divide between Marvel’s TV and movie universe, fans have always quietly banked on Avengers: Infinity War uniting all its live-action heroes in one universe-shattering showdown. Directors Joe and Anthony Russo don’t want to get your hopes up, however, noting “our focus is on telling the stories of the characters that currently exist on the movie side.”