Sorry, Disney Has No Plans to Release ‘Avengers’ Director’s Cut in Theaters

You may have heard the rumors that Disney and Marvel were planning on releasing ‘The Avengers‘ “Director’s Cut” in theaters this August. It’s a great story, except it’s not true.

The story goes that director Joss Whedon’s first cut of ‘The Avengers’ was over three hours long. This much is true; he told Collider as much. But from there the rumor took on a life of its own (anonymous sources at a site called Superhero Authority?…) and all suddenly it became a foregone conclusion that Disney would re-release ‘The Avengers’ in theaters with bonus footage later this summer. But we check with the actual people at Disney who confirmed they have absolutely no plans to release an ‘Avengers’ Director’s Cut in theaters.

If you’re disappointed, you shouldn’t be.

For one, it wouldn’t be a real “Director’s Cut.” Whedon told Collider that his first three-hour edit was “self-indulgent.” He wasn’t forced by Marvel or Disney to cut anything from the film so the version you saw in theaters is already the “Director’s Cut.”

Second, you’ll see all the additional footage – over thirty minutes of it – on the DVD and Blu-ray when it hits stores this fall. It’ll have an alternate intro, an alternate ending and some great stuff with Captain America and Peggy Carter. It’s an extra month or so to wait, but you can make it, we promise.

And really isn’t it better that way? Wouldn’t we be chastising Disney and Marvel for double-dipping if they released a movie, re-released a “Director’s Cut” and then released a DVD and Blu-ray with all that footage all within about five months time?

So no, there will be no ‘Avengers’ “Director’s Cut” and frankly, that’s a good thing.