Marvel Rising: superheroes of color in feature film next year

ASAM NEWS

MARVEL COMICS has unveiled its new multi-platform offering, Marvel Rising: Secret Warrior and it’s going to feature quite a diverse cast.

The featured length animated film includes a number of prominent Asian/Americans already part of the Marvel universe. Chloe Bennet will voice Quake, the S.H.I.E.L.D operative and inhuman from ABC’s Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Bennet’s S.H.I.E.L.D. castmate, Ming Na Wen, will play the villain, Hala. Kathreen Khavari will return as Ms. Marvel, Kamala Khan, Marvel’s first Muslim hero.

“To have this brown girl who’s a Muslim, who’s a superhero, who doesn’t fall under these stereotypes … [and] is just a good, decent human being who wants to bring that out in other people — I feel really fortunate to be able to portray her,” Khavari told BuzzFeed.

Sana Amanat of Marvel

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Among the champions leading the project is Marvel’s director of content and character development, the New Jersey-born Pakistani/American, Sana Amanat.

“It came out of a desire to be able to tell stories about characters that we think are the next great heroes of the Marvel Universe,” she said.

AV Club reports the plan is to launch the project with a few shorts before diving into the full length feature. The cast will showcase much of Marvel’s younger characters and a strong women cast.

“It’s all stuff you can connect with and feel like, these heroes are a lot like me,” Cort Lane, executive producer on the project, said to ABC News.

Watch for Marvel Rising: Secret Warrior in 2018.

It's completely amazing to see that the world of comics, so often derided as a form of literature, is coming into its own and that the industry is doing what it can to reshape pop culture, especially in the impressionable minds of its readers.

The more young people see characters of color, even in comic form, represented in all forms of media, the more accepting our society will be of people who are different from what was considered -- up to this point -- the norm as defined by the dominant culture. The new normal includes people -- as well as fictional characters -- of color.

(Views From the Edge contributed to this post.)

Kamala Khan will provide the voice for Ms. Marvel.

Chloe Bennett will provide the voice for Quake.

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TGIF FEATURE; Aquaman like you've never seen him; 2018 teaser trailer

Hawaiian/American actor Jason Momoa as Aquaman will be moodier, more badass.

HERE'S AN EARLY PEEK at Jason Momoa as Aquaman looking more badass than ever in the new movie due a year from now. The "look" is quite different from the Aquaman we saw in this year's Justice League.

Director James Wan (The Conjuring and Furious 7) says in a piece in Entertainment Weekly: “It’s going to look very different, it will feel very different — aesthetically, tonally, story-wise — it’s my own take,” Wan tells EW. “It’s a much more a traditional action-adventure quest movie.”

RELATED: Want to have a body like Jason Momoa?

Unlike the Aquaman in the D.C. comic books, Momoa will go shirtless much of the time. That look is also different from his appearance in the Justice League where his upper torso wore body-hugging armor.

The movie, a solo vehicle for the King of Atlantis, will go into Tim Curry's backstory and how the half-Atlantean and half-human becomes a superhero. His version of Aquaman will include a plenty of scenes in fabled Atlantis, guarantees Wan, a Malaysian/Australian.

Aquaman, due to be released in December 2018, also features Nicole Kidman, Amber Heard, Willem Defoe and Dolph Lundgren.

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TGIF FEATURE: Unprecedented gathering of AAPI comic book superheroes

The cover for Totally Awesome Hulk #15 is by Storehouse.

PARDON MY NERDINESS, but the upcoming edition of Totally Awesome Hulk #15 is generating lots of excitement. For the first time, a gathering of AAPI superheroes will assemble to fight an as yet unidentified foe.

The AAPI superheroes -- Hulk, Silk, Shang Chi and Ms Marvel -- will appear together in the upcoming issue of Totally Awesome Hulk, the alter ego of Korean/American Amadeus Cho, that will hit the comic book stands Jan. 25.

EDITOR'S NOTE: You can order a copy here.

There’s big trouble going down in the Big Apple, and the Asian heroes of the Marvel Universe will be called upon to save the day. Totally Awesome Hulkwriter Greg Pak revealed on Twitter a new crossover that will pair Amadeus Cho, the new Hulk, with various Asian-American heroes from Marvel, including the triumphant return of Jimmy Woo, according to Inverse.

Beginning with Totally Awesome Hulk #15 and running until issue #18, the story arc “Big Apple Showdown” will have Amadeus learn to be a team player with Silk (Cindy Moon), Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), and Shang-Chi against an as-of-yet unnamed threat. The cover of issue #17, illustrated by South Korean artist Stonehouse, features Hulk with S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Jake Oh and Jimmy Woo, the latter one of the earliest non-stereotypical Asian comic book characters. Woo’s last starring Marvel series was 2009’s Agents of Atlas written by Jeff Parker.

RELATED: Superheroes of color

Writer Greg Pak first teased the upcoming historic event on his Twitter account.
As he was hanging out with some friends, "I found myself thinking of all of the dinners and karaoke sessions I’ve had with fellow Asian American colleagues at various film festivals and conventions, and I thought, hey, Asian American superheroes would probably hang out like that every once in a while,” Pak says. “What would they talk about? How would they bond — or what kinds of conflicts would they discover? And how would that carry over into a big superhero adventure? And now we’re all gonna find out! ”

Marvel has as of late introduced an influx of Asian and Asian-American heroes like Amadeus, Silk, Ms. Marvel, and Blindspot (the undocumented protege of Daredevil, who does not appear involved in the crossover). 

Pak noted that there would be a fun collision of generations with some of Marvel’s older school heroes like Shang-Chi and Jimmy Woo. “I realized there could be a fun, multigenerational group to play with here,” he said.

Do you think they'll sing Karaoke and sip boba drinks?

Can a movie featuring one or all of these AAPI superheroes be far off? I'd pay good money to see that!

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