Thanks to the debut trailer that landed online last week, excitement for Joss Whedon’s The Avengers: Age of Ultron is at a fever pitch. Fans who have been closely following the events of the Marvel Cinematic Universe are thrilled at the prospect of their favorite big screen superhero team reassembling and working together to fight a robotic menace. We’re ready for Hulkbuster fights, the arrival of Vision, Black Panther hints and more… but if Robert Downey Jr. can be believed, then there may not be any way to prepare for the movie’s epic finale.
This past summer, I joined a small group of other journalists traveling to Shepperton Studios in England to visit the set of the then-in-production Avengers: Age of Ultron, and it was while talking with the star of Iron Man that we learned audiences are in for a real shock when the new Marvel Studios film hits theaters next May. Discussing his perception of the growing comic book genre and the way the new film fits into it, Downey Jr. explained the importance of doing something radically different from everyone else, and – in a spoiler-free response – said that Avengers 2’s ending delivered a true spine-tingling sensation. Said the actor,
"I think that there has to be a bit of transcendence of formula. And so without giving too much away, I think that’s why I just kinda stamped it when the first draft came in, ‘cause I thought, ‘Oh wow, it didn’t fall into that trap.’ And I read the last page and I got chills for a reason I definitely can’t explain."
Downey Jr. wore a giant grin as he said it, and everyone laughed, but it also got all of our minds racing: what could this mean?! The Avengers: Age of Ultron trailer certainly delivered a much darker tone than what we saw in the first movie – will that darkness spread to the very end, perhaps in the form of a surprise death? Could the chills come as a result of seeing a major player or players enter the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the first time? Or could the chills come from a surprisingly uplifting move that none of us see coming? Downey’s comment is simultaneously exciting and frustratingly vague – but it’s not like we’d want to know what happens on the last page of the Avengers 2 script at this point in time anyway.
We still have a ton of great info and special behind-the-scenes stories to share from our time on the Avengers: Age of Ultron set, so definitely stay tuned for more, and get pumped and excited for the Marvel Studios film to hit theaters on May 1, 2015.
