No one can dispute that Marvel Comics film making arm, Marvel Studios, has made a couple of great films and continues to be a driving force in Hollywood. The Avengers and the movies leading up to it is a project that has fans and investors grinning with anticipation. Beyond that, Marvel properties licensed to other studios like Wolverine, The Punisher and Spiderman have projects either ready to drop or ready to gear up in the near future.
Marvel has been more successful than DC Comics at bringing its properties to the big screen in recent years and fans would like to see that aggressive positioning of well loved characters continue now that Marvel has the ability to make movies based on its own characters. It may be too early to speculate, but Marvel should be looking beyond 2011 to films that will give the Studio the next big hit after The Avengers.
The Black Panther
Prince T'Challa has appeared in the recent animated direct to video release, The Ultimate Avengers 2 and Djimon Hounsou has signed to voice the character in animated series that is coming to BET in 2009. The animated versions could spark enough interest in the character to finally see the Prince of Wakanda in a live action film.
Namor, The Sub-Mariner
Unlike DC's undersea hero, Aquaman, Namor can fly. This means that a movie about him doesn't have to be set exclusively underwater, which would be a budgetary and writing road block. The character is admittedly a B-List property for Marvel, but so was Iron Man a year ago.
Dr. Strange
Rumours swirl around Dr. Strange like mystic tendrils, but nothing official has been announced. Currently the speculation surrounds Johnny Depp in the lead with Guillermo Del Toro directing and Neil Gaiman writing the script. With the full slate that Del Toro has directing two back to back movies based on The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein and a likely Hellboy 3 project, that would put Dr. Strange's theater debut sometime in 2013 at the earliest. It's a dream team but nothing is on paper yet.
Alpha Flight
With X-Men Origins: Wolverine due in theaters in 2009 and no plans in place for another X-Men film (X-Men Origins: Magneto may well get filmed but it would be a long distant prequel to the three X-Men films Fox has made and likely wouldn't include any of the familiar X-Men characters except Professor Xavier.) as yet, the bankable Wolverine character could be spun into the Canadian team of mutants known as Alpha Flight.
Gambit
Arguably the most popular character in the Marvel Universe behind Wolverine and Spiderman, Gambit's origin as a thief, his power to imbue objects with explosive kinetic energy and his love of the ladies make him a natural to anchor his own movie. The character is due to make an appearance in X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Marvel would be wise to negotiate to repurchase their rights to the character from Fox before the movie hits theaters and Fox decides to spin off the character themselves.
Whatever path Marvel Studios intends to take once The Avengers is no longer the shining goal on the horizon, they need to map it out soon or they risk following in the foot steps of their competitor, DC Comics, and seeing their best and brightest characters languishing on paper.
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