Joss Whedon Trashes The Original Avengers Script

When Marvel first approached the writer/director/producer Joss Whedon with the first draft for the Avengers movie, his response was not quite, what they were expecting.

In his latest biography, by Amy Pascale, Whedon recounts his initial thoughts on the first draft of the script for The Avengers, written by Zak Penn (Elektra, X-Men: The Last Stand).

"I don't think you have anything," Whedon told Marvel Studios President, Kevin Feige. “You need to pretend this draft never happened.”

Harsh words about Penn's initial draft, but Whedon acknowledge later in an interview with GQ that "there was a script, there just wasn't a script I was going to film a word of." 

Feige and friends may have been unhappy with Whedon's candidness, but the fact is that the director went home and wrote a five pages of material explaining his take on The Avengers, and even came up with a tagline: "The Avengers: Some Assembly Required"

Marvel liked what they saw, and hired him to pen the screenplay and helm the movie, but stipulated that Loki should be in the movie and that there should be a "battle among superheroes in the middle and an epic battle against villains at the end, and that he get the movie out in time for a May 2012 release."

As for Penn, he says:

"We could have collaborated more, but that was not his choice. He wanted to do it his way, and I respect that. I mean, it's not like on the 'Hulk,' where I got replaced by the lead actor," Penn told GQ, referring to Edward Norton's takeover of screenwriting duties on that film. "That was an unusual one. This was more normal."

Source - Business Insider

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