By Lindsey Bahr
Marvel Studios unveiled the first trailer for " Black Panther: Wakanda Forever " — set to "No Woman No Cry" — to fans at Comic-Con on Saturday in San Diego.
It was just one part of the massive Hall H presentation, which also included first-looks at "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3," "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania" and new information about Phase 6 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which will conclude with two Avengers movies in 2025: "Avengers: The Kang Dynasty" and "Avengers: Secret Wars."
" Black Panther: Wakanda Foreve r" director Ryan Coogler was on site in San Diego to preview the highly anticipated film, which is due to arrive in theaters on Nov. 11 and serve as the conclusion to Phase 4. Coogler paid tribute to Chadwick Boseman, who died in August 2020.
"The impact that he made on this industry will be felt forever," Coogler said.
After the massive success of "Black Panther" in 2018, plans for a sequel were quickly set into motion. But those were altered after Boseman's unexpected death from colon cancer. The studio said it would not recast Boseman's role of T'Challa. but very little has come out about the film in the years since. Production wrapped in March after several delays, one of which was due to an injury sustained by Letitia Wright, who plays T'Challa's brainy sister Shuri. Also returning are Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Winston Duke and Angela Bassett, but not Daniel Kaluuya, whose "Nope" schedule conflicted.
Phase 5, Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige said, will kick off in February with "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania" and conclude with "Thunderbolts" in July 2024. The new "Blade," starring Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali, also got a release date of Nov. 3, 2023, and "Captain America and the New World Order," featuring Anthony Mackie's Sam Wilson, will hit theaters on May 3, 2024.
The "Guardians of the Galaxy" will also come to an end in the midst of Phase 5 in May. Director James Gunn showed up in San Diego to confirm that "Vol. 3" would be the last for the space rogues. Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Karen Gillian and Dave Bautista are all returning for the film. New cast members include Will Poulter, as Guardians adversary Adam Warlock, and Maria Bakalova.
Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Jonathan Majors and director Peyton Reed made the trip to San Diego to show some footage from "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania."
Phase 6 will launch with a new "Fantastic Four" movie on Nov. 8, 2024, and finish with "Avengers: The Kang Dynasty," set for May 2, 2025, followed by "Avengers: Secret Wars," on Nov. 7, 2025.
Marvel also showed trailers for Disney+ series such as "Secret Invasion," with Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury and Cobie Smulders as Agent Maria Hill, due in the spring, and the half-hour comedy " She-Hulk: Attorney at Law," starring Tatiana Maslany, debuting in August. The second season of "Loki" is also expected next summer.
Comic-Con runs through Sunday.
Lindsey Bahr is an AP film writer
James Earl Jones, Lauded Actor and Voice of Darth Vader, Dies At 93
James Earl Jones, who overcame racial prejudice and a severe stutter to become a celebrated icon of stage and screen — eventually lending his deep, commanding voice to CNN, "The Lion King" and Darth Vader — has died. He was 93.
His agent, Barry McPherson, confirmed Jones died Monday morning at home in New York's Hudson Valley region. The cause was not immediately clear.
The pioneering Jones, who was one of the first African American actors in a continuing role on a daytime drama and worked deep into his 80s, won two Emmys, a Golden Globe, two Tony Awards, a Grammy, the National Medal of Arts, the Kennedy Center Honors and was given an honorary Oscar and a special Tony for lifetime achievement. In 2022, a Broadway theater was renamed in his honor.
He cut an elegant figure late in life, with a wry sense of humor and a ferocious work habit. In 2015, he arrived at rehearsals for a Broadway run of "The Gin Game" having already memorized the play and with notebooks filled with comments from the creative team. He said he was always in service of the work.
"The need to storytell has always been with us," he told The Associated Press then. "I think it first happened around campfires when the man came home and told his family he got the bear, the bear didn't get him."
Jones created such memorable film roles as the reclusive writer coaxed back into the spotlight in "Field of Dreams," the boxer Jack Johnson in the stage and screen hit "The Great White Hope," the writer Alex Haley in "Roots: The Next Generation" and a South African minister in "Cry, the Beloved Country."
He was also a sought-after voice actor, expressing the villainy of Darth Vader ("No, I am your father," commonly misremembered as "Luke, I am your father"), as... Read More