FTN Speculation: If Thanos is Avengers 3 baddie, who’ll be Avengers 2 baddie?

 

Has a bit of Marvel casting news revealed details of the villain in Avengers 2?

Please note: Speculative plot spoilers for not one, but two of Marvel’s phase 2 titles may be included in the following article…

Just the other day on April 30th, Edwin Torres Jr posted this quick interview with Joss Whedon at a screening of Iron Man 3, in which he mentioned possible plans for the Marvel supervillain Thanos to possibly be kept back as the big baddie of a third Avengers movie. Thanos appeared in a small end of movie tease in the first Avengers movie, revealed to the audience as the unseen force behind the alien Chitauri army that invaded New York.

But if Thanos is not to be the lead villain in Avengers 2, who will be?

Well, as Whedon says, Thanos is a part of what he has going on for Avengers, but that there will “definitely be some people that will shake [the Avengers] up” – people, not a person, suggesting that unlike the first movie which only had Loki (Tom Hiddleston) as the sole villain, there may be more than one villain.

But who will these villains be?

Well, perhaps a little bit of casting news for one of Marvel’s other movies has possibly revealed one of them will be The Controller. It also suggests how James Gunn’s Guardians Of The Galaxy, a science fiction comic book series set in a galaxy far away, will connect to the more Earth based setting of the previous Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, Thor and Captain America movies already established. Ever since I heard of Guardians being made, I couldn’t help but wonder how this would connect with the other Marvel movies and The Avengers.

On April 23rd, website The Wrap posted that TV series’ Pushing Daisies actor Lee Pace was in running to star in Guardians. Pace had been in the running for the lead character of Star Lord, ultimately losing out to actor Chris Pratt, but had impressed enough during auditions that he was kept him in mind for the villain of the movie. Now it appears that he has been cast in Guardians and the Internet Movie DataBase, now with a fairly complete cast list, has his character listed as Basil Sandhurst, a character who after meeting Thanos, became The Controller, and this may possibly happen during the events of Guardians, leading him to be sent to Earth by Thanos, with some of the Guardians hot in pursuit to help the Avengers battle him.

Part of Avengers 2 may again take place in New York, since in one story of the comics, The Controller attacked New York but was defeated in part by the actions of Iron Man and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Jasper Sitwell (played in The Avengers by Maximiliano Hernández who will also be reprising the role in Captain America: The Winter Soldier), and seeing as after the events of Iron Man 3, Tony Stark may likely be in residence at Stark Tower (which after it’s remodelling from battle at the end of Avengers, looked more like it may become Avengers tower), this ties in with the events of things seen so far.

The other main question is, if there is going to be more than one, who could the other villain(s) be? Any ideas?