All eyes will be on Marvel next year as the long-gestating Avengers finally gets released. With that cast and Joss Whedon at the helm, it’s very promising, but clearly Marvel are seeing it as the beginning of the next phase of their movie plans, not the culmination.

io9 have spotted a few snippets in Entertainment Weekly that handily spell out what Marvel are planning on doing after their first superhero teamup. Obviously, there are sequels to Thor, Iron Man and Captain America all confirmed, but that’s not all. They’re reporting that Ant Man, despite rumours, is not dead and that would tie in with a recent interview Joe Cornish did where he said himself and Edgar Wright have finished another draft.

But that’s not all. Kevin Feige mentions in the article that thanks to Thor opening up the idea of a ‘cosmic’ Marvel film, Guardians of the Galaxy is now a very real possibility and not just a rumour. We’ve reported this before, but it was basically pure speculation then, whilst this comes from the head honcho himself. This is fantastic news – Guardians of the Galaxy is another superhero team movie, but it’s all in space, and with an amazingly varied roster of characters. There is gigantic potential for this title, with Feige going as far as to say that an even BIGGER team up of Avengers & Guardians in one colossal movie.

What do you think of this news? Personally I’m such a huge Marvel fan I think it’s fantastic – I love how they’re treating their movies like comic-books in ways. However, many believe that the films suffer because of this. With Guardians there’s a potentially distinct franchise that could run alongside Avengers, with both culminating in one giant movie – it’s hard not to get excited about that, as far away as it is! As it stands, it’s great to hear they’re looking to some less-famous properties and still working on Ant Man, which could turn out very well itself.