Marvel is looking to draw audiences back to the movies with help from someone who just made Oscars history.
On Monday, a surprisingly revealing sizzle reel called "Marvel Studios Celebrates the Movies" previewed the studio's first feature film since 2019 — July's Black Widow. In addition to promoting that movie and the upcoming Shang-Chi, Marvel also revealed the first look at Chloé Zhao's Eternals, which follows a race of immortal aliens with a cast that includes Angelina Jolie, Richard Madden, and Kumail Nanjiani.
Zhao, who directed Eternals, is coming off a historic night at the Academy Awards, where she made history as the first woman of color to win Best Director, and her film Nomadland also became the first film directed by a woman of color to win Best Picture. Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige recently hyped up Eternals as looking "really impressive" visually, promising it features Zhao's "signature style" as a director.
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The new reel also revealed that the upcoming Black Panther sequel, which won't be recasting Chadwick Boseman's role following his death, will be titled Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, while the new Captain Marvel sequel will be called The Marvels. The latter film is expected to feature not just Brie Larson as Captain Marvel, but also Iman Vellani as Ms. Marvel after she debuts on her own Disney+ show.
Marvel's sizzle reel is centered around a celebration of experiencing movies in theaters, even including footage recorded in a theater during an opening night screening of Avengers: Endgame, and it ends with text on screen that reads, "See you at the movies" — though the first of these upcoming films, Black Widow, will also be available on streaming. Brendan Morrow
