Mike Colter Officially Cast as Marvel's Luke Cage

There have been primarily two African-American superheroes fans have been wanting to see hit the big screen for Marvel, and neither was the Falcon. The first was Black Panther, who we know will be played by Chadwick Boseman. The second was Luke Cage aka Power Man. While it's unclear when or if Cage will ever make his way into the big leagues, we know he's got a Netflix series coming up, and now we also know he'll be played by Mike Colter.

After his name surfaced as the frontrunner some weeks back, Colter has been officially cast as Luke Cage. The character will first appear in the series AKA Jessica Jones, starring Krysten Ritter. He'll then move on to his own 13-episode series sometime afterward. Cage and Jones are an item in the Marvel Universe (they even have a kid together), and it looks like they'll be attached at the hip here, too.

"During the course of an investigation in New York City, private investigator Jessica Jones encounters the enigmatic Luke Cage – a man whose past has secrets that will dramatically alter Jessica in ways she could never have imagined."

AKA Jessica Jones follows an ex-superhero with who gave up her crime-fighting career after a tragic incident. Now she works as a private detective solving crimes involving other heroes.

Colter can be seen now as Jameson Locke in the Microsoft original series, Halo: Nightfall. It will be interesting to see if his character makes the leap to The Avengers considering the clamor from fans who want to see it happen. AKA Jessica Jones will premiere some time in 2015 following the Daredevil series, which just debuted some new images of star, Charlie Cox, which you can see below. There is also a series following Luke Cage's best friend and partner, Iron Fist. 

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Marvel Eyes Teresa Palmer, Alexandra Daddario for 'Jessica Jones'; Two Names Emerge for 'Luke Cage'

Marvel is looking to stake a larger claim on the small screen than just Agents of SHIELD and Agent Carter. As we know they're currently developing four Netflix series, with production on Daredevil already underway. The next on their list are shows based on the characters Jessica Jones and Luke Cage, and it looks like the casting search has begun for both.

According to Deadline, Krysten Ritter (She's Out of My League), Alexandra Daddario (True Detective), Teresa Palmer (Take Me Home Tonight), and Jessica De Gouw (Arrow) are up for the Jessica Jones role. Jones is a former superhero who decided to quit and start a detective agency helping other heroes. In the comics she's the mother of Luke Cage's child, and their shows will be closely tied together. Cage is expected to appear in 6-7 episodes of Jessica Jones leading to his own series that will debut after Iron Fist.

As for who will play Cage, a character many have been expecting to appear in the big league Avengers movies at some point, Lance Gross (Our Family Wedding) and Mike Colter (The Following) are said to be in contention. Neither are very big names at this point but taking on a major Marvel character and prominent Avenger like Cage is a good way to get some attention.

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Terry Crews Expresses Interest in Playing Luke Cage for Marvel

Normally I find these "actor interest" stories pretty pointless and refuse to post them, but an exception will be made in this case for a couple of reasons. One: it involves the always awesome Terry Crews. And two: we already have this cool fan-made poster of Crews as Marvel's Luke Cage.

There has been a lot of talk about Crews possibly taking on the role of Cage in a future Marvel movie, but with the character receiving his own Netflix series it could very well happen. Collider had a chance to talk with Crews while he was doing publicity for Tyler Perry's The Single Mom's Club, and he sounds more than interested...

Crews: “Anything can happen. All I know is scheduling and all that stuff—anything can happen. I’m open to all kinds of things, but who knows? Actually I took myself out of the Luke Cage running a while back, just because it was people trying to put people against each other. [It was] Idris vs. Michael Jai and I’m like, ‘Wait a minute, this is not even greenlit! Can we talk to Marvel? Why are you talking to me? Don’t put me against my homeboy for a movie that’s not existing.’ I said, ‘Take me out!’

“I heard [it’s greenlit] but I haven’t gotten any calls. I’ve been hearing stuff like, ‘oh you’re too old,’ and I’m like, ‘Man do my workout 20 years ago and we’ll talk about who’s too old (laughs).’”

“Like I said, anything can happen, I never rule anything out. I’m game. There are no rules. What’s up, Marvel? I’m right here, baby. I ain’t goin nowhere. You know where I live!” 

 Crews is currently starring on Fox's cop comedy Brooklyn Nine-Nine, but I'm willing to bet he'd try to get out of that contract for a plum gig in the Marvel Universe. The plan is for Marvel to produce four 13-episode series beginning with Daredevil, followed by Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and then Iron Fist. That will lead to a four or eight-episode miniseries titled The Defenders.

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Disney and Governor Cuomo Strike Major Deal Bringing Marvel's Netflix Shows to NYC

Unlike DC Comics which use fictional places such as Gotham City and Metropolis as locations for their stories, Marvel sets the bulk of their action smack dab in the heart of New York City. So it makes sense that they'd want to set their upcoming Netflix series' there, and now they've struck a major deal with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to make that happen.

Disney, Marvel, and Cuomo have announced that all of Marvel's upcoming Netflix shows featuring Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, and Daredevil will filmed in New York City as part of a major $4M tax incentive. The Wrap adds that these will be 60 one-hour episodes, 13 for each individual character, followed by a four-to-eight episode miniseries titled The Defenders. Drew Goddard's Daredevil will be the first to take advantage of this deal with filming to being this summer. That means we should be learning soon who will be playing the "Man without Fear".

Daredevil will be followed by Melissa Rosenberg's long-developing Jessica Jones series, leading into Luke Cage and a solo series for his kung-fu partner, Iron Fist. We're even starting to get some promotional art thanks Marvel's Agent M, who released the above image on Tumblr.

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Idris Elba Confirms He Talked with Marvel About Playing Luke Cage

Idris Elba would be a pretty awesome Luke Cage. He'd be a pretty awesome anything, really (James Bond!!!!), but as half of Marvel's Power Man & Iron Fist duo he would have kicked some serious ass. A film based on the unlikely combo had been talked about for years with nothing happening, and we know now that they'll each get their own solo TV series on Netflix. But back when those movie rumors were still circulating, Marvel thought Elba would have been great for Cage, too.

While talking to HuffPo, Elba was asked about superheroes he would like to play and revealed that he had talks with Marvel about playing Luke Cage....

Elba: "Yeah, man, I wouldn't mind giving that a go. But, no, other than that, I don't really have any superhero that I like. There was talk about Luke Cage at one time -- I thought Luke Cage was a pretty interesting character. They were going to do it, but I don't know what happened..."

So what's to stop Marvel from asking him back for the TV series? He's obviously no stranger to the episodic format with shows like The Wire and Luther on his resume. The likely reason is his continued role as Heimdall in the Thor movies, which despite his character having a slightly expanded role in the sequel, it still feels like he's being misused. It would be unfortunate if such a small part is what keeps Elba from playing bigger Marvel heroes.

As for who might really play Luke Cage in the Netflix series? There's always Terry Crews, right? And thanks to CC Scorsese over at DeviantArt for that sweet image of Elba.

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Marvel Announces Live-Action Netflix Shows Featuring Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage & Iron Fist, and The Defenders

Marvel's domination over all forms of media is now complete. A couple of weeks ago a story emerged that Marvel Studios and Disney were shopping around a package of four TV series and a miniseries to cable and digital streaming networks. It didn't take long for them to find a buyer, either, as a deal has now been struck with Netlix to stream the Marvel Universe right into your home.

The ambitious plan has Marvel producing four 13-episodes series, and the most awesome thing about it is they involve characters we've been expecting to see on the big screen forever. The first series will center on the newly-acquired Daredevil. Next up is Jessica Jones, who in the Marvel comics is a former superhero-turned-detective. She's also married to Luke Cage aka Power Man, who is next up to get his own series, which will then be followed up by his pal, Iron Fist. All of this will culminate in an epic miniseries titled The Defenders.

It's a pretty shrewd move for Marvel, and as long as they find a way to make each series capable of standing on their own, there should be no risk of fans experiencing superhero fatigue. This also gives Marvel the chance to do go in some darker directions than they may have been able to on public television or in the movies. For instance, Jessica Jones' comic series Alias (one of the best written comics ever, IMHO) explored some of Marvel's nastiest corners and dug into the personal lives of heroes in ways that would potentially turn off general audiences looking for something less weighty. And let's be honest, we all just hope they turn out better than Agents of SHIELD, right?

So what do you think? Is this a good idea? Which show are you looking forward to most?

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Producer definitively answers whether Luke Cage is in 'Agents of SHIELD'

After Sunday's trailer for Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, people stopped asking about Agent Coulson (Clark Gregg), and turned their attention to the mysterious, super-powered character played by J. August Richards. The speculation has been that he was actually Luke Cage, while some speculated he could be the New Warrior known as Rage. We just received a definitive answer to one of those theories, while the door is opened to many more.

IGN caught up with producer Jeffrey Bell, and hen asked about Richards he had this to say....

Bell: "He’s so good, because we were looking for this character M-- I almost said his name. It’s not the one people are talking about."

When pressed further and asked specifically about Luke Cage, Bell was definitive in his response.

Bell: "I’m going to say that’s an interesting Marvel character, but no. But he came in and killed it. Honestly, we were looking for this part, and we just said, look, all our parts are open to all diversity. So the fact that we have a black dude who is awesome and it's J, was just because he was the best actor. It wasn’t like, “You know who…!” 

But is the character at least a Marvel character? Or is he someone completely new? Bell does a bit of tap-dancing around that answer....

Bell:   "You know, not necessarily. I mean, we’re going to draw from it, but Marvel has its thing, and we’re also going to be expanding forward, and this world is different since The Avengers. So I think there will be people showing up, some from the Marvel Universe and some not. But to commit to anything more would be telling."

That's a perfectly solid non-answer Bell just gave, which leads me to suspect that Richards is playing someone familiar to the Marvel Universe.  There's the suggestion from IGN's transcript that Bell made an 'M' sound in almost giving away the character's name, but that's far too subjective to be taken seriously.  So marking Luke Cage off the list, who else could it be? There are a lot of options, believe it or not, many of which I'll be addressing very soon.

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What if Marvel cast a white guy as Luke Cage in the movie?

"Trick or treat, suckas!!" Some of the discussion I've seen on this new spoof video has been hilarious, but others have taken it into pretty serious territory. Basically it shows the end result of having two white guys make a movie of Marvel's most popular African-American superhero, Luke "Power Man" Cage, and just how disastrous it would be casting a white guy in the role. Look, it's different taking someone like Nick Fury and having a black guy play him. Nick Fury is a soldier. His upbringing and any hardships he's experienced due to his race arent' an integral part of his character, whereas the same can't be said for guys like Luke Cage, Black Panther, or even a non-comic book character like Shaft. So having a white guy play them is automatically wrong.

But really, I prefer to take this video for what it is, a chance to show how extraordinary uncool white people are, especially when they're trying to act and sound "black".  If the Luke Cage movie ever gets off the ground, let's hope Marvel is wise enough to keep these dudes away from it...

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XXX writer to script Iron Fist's big screen adventures

We've known for awhile that Marvel Studios was looking to create series of lower budget films centered around the publisher's B-list superheroes. Now we're getting word that they've hired Rich Wilkes(XXX) to script a film centered around Iron Fist, the martial artist/businessman frequently partnered up with Luke Cage. Cage is another character rumored to have a film in the works. Could this possibly lead to a crossover film of sorts? I think it's highly likely.

Iron Fist, aka Danny Rand, was a character borne out of the 1970s and America's fascination with martial arts, with Bruce Lee a superstar at the time. He's since gone on to star in a number of short lived series, most notably Power Man & Iron Fist which ran from 1977-1986.  His most recent series, The Immortal Iron Fist, ran from 2006-2009. Iron Fist has been a member of the Heroes for Hire, posed as Daredevil for a short while, and is currently a member of the New Avengers.

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