Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige confirmed Friday that he the studio will not move the release date for comic book film "Captain America 3," despite another superhero blockbuster being released on the same date.
Warner Bros. Entertainment announced in January 2014 that they were pushing the release date of "Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice" from between July 17, 2015 to May 6, 2016. In April 2014, Marvel announced that "Captain America 3" would premiere on the same 2016 date.
Warner Bros. told TheWrap in January that "Batman v. Superman" was being pushed back nearly 10 months to "allow the filmmakers time to realize fully their vision, given the complex visual nature of the story." The film stars Ben Affleck as Batman, and Henry Cavill reprises his "Man of Steel" role.
After Marvel's "Captain America" was announced with an identical release date, Warner Bros. expressed confusion at their competitor's decision.
"It doesn't make a lot of sense for two huge superhero films to open on the same date but there is a lot of time between now and 5/6/16," Warner Bros. said in an April statement. "However at this time, we are not considering a change of date for 'Batman vs. Superman.'"
Bloggers and industry experts theorized that Marvel would change the "Captain America 3" release date because Warner Bros. claimed it first, and because the films will likely decrease their box office take by releasing on the same day. Feige quelled those rumors on Friday, however.
"I continue to be all for quality entertainment for moviegoers to enjoy on weekends," the Marvel head told Empire.
"If it is on the same weekend, I enjoy it slightly less. But we are doing what we've always done, which is sticking to our plan and sticking to our vision for the movies going forward and we have a very large vision that we're working on for 'Cap 3′ and for all the '3's' movies, and just because another movie plops down onto one of ours, doesn't mean we are going to alter that. Maybe we should, but we're not going to."
Three other "3's" movies include third installments of the "Avengers" and "Thor," whose release dates have not been announced. Some bloggers suspect that "Avengers 3" will be released in 2017, and "Thor 3" in 2018.
