Phase One of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is a group of American superhero films produced by Marvel Studios based on characters that appear in publications by Marvel Comics. The phase began in May 2008 with the release of Iron Man and concluded in May 2012 with the release of The Avengers. Marvel began exploring producing their own feature films by 2005 with character rights they had retained after previously licensing characters to other film studios. Following the opening weekend success of Iron Man and their plans for additional solo films, they realized the characters they had the rights to could culminate in a team-up Avengers film. Paramount Pictures served as distributor until The Avengers, when Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures took over following Disney's purchase of Marvel. Kevin Feige produced every film in the phase, alongside Avi Arad for Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk, with Gale Anne Hurd also producing The Incredible Hulk.
The films include Iron Man with Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark / Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk from Universal Pictures with Edward Norton as Bruce Banner / Hulk, the sequel Iron Man 2, Thor with Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger with Chris Evans as Steve Rogers / Captain America, and the ensemble The Avengers with Downey, Hemsworth, Evans, Scarlett Johansson, and Jeremy Renner reprising their roles and Mark Ruffalo replacing Norton. The six films of the phase grossed over billion at the global box office and received generally positive critical and public response.
Samuel L. Jackson appeared the most in the phase, starring or making cameo appearances in five of the Phase One films, while The Avengers actors – Downey, Evans, Ruffalo, Hemsworth, Johansson, and Renner – signed contracts to star in numerous films. Marvel Studios created three short films for their Marvel One-Shots program – The Consultant, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor's Hammer, and Item 47 – to expand the MCU, while each of the feature films received tie-in or adaption comic books and tie-in video games. Phase One, along with Phase Two and Phase Three, constitutes "The Infinity Saga".
Development
Marvel Entertainment began planning to produce its own films independently by 2005, and distribute them through Paramount Pictures. Previously, Marvel had co-produced several superhero films with Columbia Pictures, New Line Cinema and others, including a seven-year development deal with 20th Century Fox. Marvel made relatively little profit from its licensing deals with other studios and wanted to get more money out of its films while maintaining artistic control of the projects and distribution. Avi Arad, head of Marvel's film division, was pleased with Sam Raimi's Spider-Man films at Sony Pictures, but was less pleased with others. As a result, Arad decided to form Marvel Studios, Hollywood's first major independent film studio since DreamWorks Pictures. Kevin Feige, Arad's second-in-command, realized that unlike Spider-Man and the X-Men, whose film rights were licensed to Sony and Fox, respectively, Marvel still owned the rights to the core members of the Avengers. Feige, a self-described "fanboy", envisioned creating a shared universe, just as creators Stan Lee and Jack Kirby had done with their comic books in the early 1960s.
In order to preserve its artistic integrity, Marvel Studios formed a creative committee of six people familiar with its comic book lore: Feige, Marvel Studios co-president Louis D'Esposito, Marvel Comics' president of publishing Dan Buckley, Marvel's chief creative officer Joe Quesada, writer Brian Michael Bendis, and Marvel Entertainment president Alan Fine, who oversaw the committee. Feige initially referred to the shared narrative continuity of these films as the "Marvel Cinema Universe", but later used the term "Marvel Cinematic Universe". Marvel gained the film rights to Iron Man in November 2005 from New Line Cinema. In February 2006, Marvel announced that they had gained the film rights to Hulk from Universal, in exchange for letting Universal own the distribution rights to The Incredible Hulk (2008) and the right of first refusal to pick up the distribution rights to any future Marvel Studios-produced Hulk films. In April 2006, Thor was announced to be a Marvel Studios production. Soon after, Lions Gate Entertainment dropped the Black Widow project it had been working on since 2004, giving the rights back to Marvel.