Marvel Studios' Evolution of the MCU

0:00 hey everyone welcome back to marvel live here at the live stream lounge and i am very excited very pleased because i am talking with the director of visual development from marvel studios the one the only andy park how are you my friend i'm good thank you so much for having me langston so i have to ask we're back in san diego for the first time in a long time how has the convention been for you oh my gosh the convention has been amazing so glad to be back after the long hiatus that is covet of course but i've been i've been a fan of comic con san diego comic-con i've been going since like high school 1992 i think the first time i ever came here and i got my first job at 19 years old for portfolio in hand meeting rob liefeld he gave me a job at extreme studios image comics so i had a long

0:47 history with um comic-con that's awesome yeah so i want to talk about kind of like about your origin story so uh can i take us through that how did you come into your current role at marvel studios yeah i kind of mentioned the comic books i drew comic books marvel comic books image comic books for about 10 years i made a switch um about 15 years ago into concept art built a new portfolio i worked in video games on the god of war series and then around that time i met a guy named ryan meinerding you might have heard of him yes i did we talked earlier charlie when and they were forming the newly um the visual development team at marvel studios kevin feige knowing that there's going to be an interconnected group of movies moving forward leading to the avengers they hired me to work start working on the avengers so i've

1:33 been working at marvel studios since 2010 it's my 12th year there and we've been designing the characters um doing key frames coming out the the look and feel of the films working with kevin all the amazing directors for the past dozen years it's been a ride i can't imagine i can't imagine speaking of that right um these movies have grown and it seems like everyone every new marvel studio that comes out it's bigger and more vibrant more awesome so what has it been like to see the marvel films grow and evolve over the years since you started illustrating and now working with studios yeah i mean it's been amazing because i again i was a fan right i started off as a fan i remember i first started as adolescent reading iron man that was the iron man

2:20 number 200 that's the one that got me mark bright bob leighton the silver centurion iron man and then from there that point on i collected everything marvel right west coast avengers the x-men avengers everything right spider-man and then um sorry i lost my train of thought yeah i just wanted to remember what your question was how you felt about the journey yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah so i also get distracted when i think of this yeah totally totally so i remember as a fan watching iron man one right and seeing nick fury come out i was in that theater just just like everyone else that were hardcore fans you know with my hands raised in the air knowing exactly where they're leading to right but it was something that i never thought would ever happen as a fan that you could have main heroes all together in what can be

3:07 a movie called the avengers so to be a part of this seeing the evolution watching iron man 1 watching captain america thor i started working there on captain america one and then and thor avengers and then from that point on every single film you know since then right and i've been i've seen the evolution i've been there i've watched the decision makers work with all the directors kevin feige and all the amazing artists in the visual development department and you know all the different directors from you know the original directors kenneth branagh to like the russo brothers payton reed dustin daniel crenton every single director has a different vision different flavor right but it's still in the family of of the marvel cinematic universe yeah

3:54 it's essentially the same model as the comic books that's true yeah right you got jack kirby stanley but you also have jason aaron in the more modern right kelly sue the conic so but it's all the same character same universe so we're seeing that exact same thing realized actualized in live action for the past whatever 12 years whatever 30 films yeah and now we've arrived at uh a magnificent film marvel studios thor loving thunder thunder i mean talk about this i mean again because this movie is so vibrant so a visual feast so please yeah we're gonna look at smart runners so please break it talk us through this amazing this is such a great this is amazing so please talk about the process of working on this uh this may be continuing the story of thor yeah sure

4:41 like this is the second film i got to work with the amazing taiko ytd right he came came into the studio stormed into the rooms right with his personality so boisterous so amazing very fresh take on thor so being able to work on the the second movie with taika was nothing but a pleasure i think um leading the visual development team on this uh with the amazing artist that we have the vision that is uh taika ytd like he with ragnarok you wanted like thor to be very grounded as far as his look right um so it was mainly leathers that kind of stuff with with um love and thunder he wanted to go to the other extreme so he wanted like that's why he has the bright blues the golds the big old helmet with a little eagle you know head on in the

5:26 front so it's just coming with all these different designs um and concepts that are just really far just really pushed because not playing it safe right so i think working on this basically the sequel to the taiko initial movie right right it's just coming up these new ideas and working with him every single day it's just uh it was it was nothing but a pleasure just to kind of really explore what is thor and in this one doing more of a romantic comedy and bringing back jane i love the love story between the orange and being able to design the mighty thor yes with jane knowing that she's gonna get taller now she's like six feet whatever with muscles and having that that awesome like costume from the comics i think it was an assad ribbik

6:12 original um design and then taking that and translating it for the mcu i mean that's that's the fun of our job taking the inspiration from the comic uh looking at the story that they're trying to tell in the mcu with taika as a writer and the director and then translating that to a reality that is the mcu nice and with the mighty thor i mean it's it's continuing something that you said that your career has been very female centric and something that you're very proud of and that's something that you hold private so talk about that and like you know really developing i'm again seeing the mighty thor again on screen i remember seeing the people losing their minds it was so great so please like talk about that aspect of your career like the female-centric stuff and helping to develop these amazing female characters yeah i think i've been very fortunate throughout my career because even when i drew comic books

6:58 for whatever reason i've been hired to draw and illustrate the stories of strong female characters um i was in the comic book world i was more known for drawing uh tomb raider laura croft um and then when once i joined the mcu a lot of the characters i got to have had the honor of designing from black widow throughout all the films to scarlet witch to help design gamora and mantis um captain marvel uh wasp and then you know more recently with the mighty thor jane mighty thor so it's something that i'm really proud of that i've been able to help bring the story of these strong female characters into the mcu because each of them have their own aspect they're all different right but then they not only in their look but

7:44 in their who they are as a character like i love the story of wanda yes right she's such a tragic character but she's so powerful and then you have a character like black widow who doesn't have any powers right but her she's not less powerful as a character right so being able to help come up with their look visually to help portray their story for the filmmakers you know it's it's it's an amazing job yeah and so we're talking we see some of you some of the amazing artwork for wanda and we just recently seen wanda come to full fruitions of scarlet witch yeah in marvel studios dr strange and the multiverse of madness briefly talk about really bringing from where where wanda started to now this amazing look

8:29 like please just briefly talk about like what it's been like bringing the scarlet witch in this journey visually as a as an artist yeah because again i i i collected west coast avengers right so wanda was in there or the scarlet witch was in there when i was first tasked to help design wanda it was for age of ultron back then they told me she's not going to be wearing her classic costume of course the fanboy and me is like oh man you know she's going to be wearing more real world clothes so leather jackets you know skirts you know just anything real right but nothing no superhero outfit of course i had to as a fan do some initial designs with the crown and but i knowing that they're gonna shut it down and be like ah nice try right so you know her first couple

9:16 looks from there to civil war is more of a more realistic right with a leather jacket um so but then when mary lovano's the producer on one division approached me and said kevin feige has this new idea for one division and then eventually she's going to turn into the scarlet witch right so then of course the fanboy in me is like yes finally you know like i'm going to be able to help tackle the classic look without doing the swimsuit exactly yeah and also not knowing that they would do that in the halloween episode right so i was going for like the more what is this what is her version of the superhero costume inspired by the comic and then of course playing with the crown right so during that time they were kind of like is it

10:01 going to be just an effect it's going to be like a solid crown of course i was always trying to push for like it's got to solidify like i want to see that solidify so you know thank god match check checkman and the leadership you know agreed with that and then we got to see her come to full fruition as the scarlet witch right so i remember going to that final close to the final fitting with elizabeth olsen and costume designer mayas rubio and specialty customers in an iron iron shoot iron head all right iron head but but um and then being amazed seeing it there you know elizabeth olsen putting on the crown in the costume all of us were like oohing and awing and then seeing the final result in wanda vision was just

10:48 like you know watching with my family the final version at home on disney plus and just getting chills just here you know come to life as the scarlet witch yeah i just got chills you breaking that down because it was such an incredible moment such an incredible visualization and realization of that character andy thank you so much for joining us it's been an honor and a pleasure to pick your brain and hear your story working with marvel studios uh hopefully we'll get to talk again i just want to talk to you all the time about totally all the cool designs that you've done over the years but we are going to take a break and we're going to come back but stay tuned for more here from marvel here at san diego comic con 2022