Comic Strip: Captain America and Black Widow, Sinister Six Teases and Justin Bieber in ‘Batman’

ScreenCrush’s Comic Strip is a weekly roundup of the hottest superhero movie news items. From Marvel to D.C. and points in between, if it pertains to costumed comic-book heroes, we’re covering it here, bringing you our expert analysis. This week, the Sinister Six keeps cropping up in ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’ conversations, and Joss Whedon wants you to work with him on ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ … if you love Doritos.

‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’

While Andrew Garfield dreams of a male love interest for Peter Parker, Marvel continues to drop hints that there might be a romantic development between Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) and Natasha Romanoff in the upcoming ‘Cap’ sequel, ‘The Winter Solider.’ While promoting her role in ‘Don Jon,’ Scarlett Johansson opened up to SuperHeroHype about teases worked into ‘The Avengers’ as well as the upcoming movie. She said:

“The pairing is strange on paper, but you'll understand the pairing when you see ‘Cap 2’ and of course Marvel's really good at noticing those connections too! They will continue to build on the different relationships that audiences connect to.”

‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’

It makes sense that Sony eventually would start sharing footage – any footage – of Marc Webb’s ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2.’ The studio has a substantial reel, which screened in Hall H at San Diego Comic-Con, and blockbuster fans are looking ahead to NEXT season, now that this summer has drawn to a close.

Suddenly, it sounds like we know when Spidey will show face.

Citing a Tweet from a producer who may or may not have worked on the trailer, ComicBookMovie reports that the ‘ASM 2’ trailer will run in front of ‘Thor: The Dark World’ and ‘The Hunger Games: Catching Fire’ this November. That’s legitimate timing, and the tie-in with the YA crowd as well as the comic-book crowd makes all the sense in the world.

Will Sony have a different cut of footage than what was shown in San Diego? How will Spider-Man fans react to their first shots of Jamie Foxx’s Electro in action? We’re going to have to wait until November, but if the footage is anything like what Webb brought to Hall H, it will be well worth the wait.

Meanwhile, ‘Spidey’ villains Jamie Foxx an Paul Giamatti have been dropping hints about the involvement of The Sinister Six in upcoming Spider-Man films. Foxx confirms for Total Film that producers “actually talked about it, the Sinister Six, so fingers crossed.”

Giamatti was a bit more vague in this interview with MTV News at the Toronto International Film Festival:

And Chris Cooper, while talking to Access Hollywood, revealed that Norman Osborn’s arc will extend to ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 3.' He hinted that Norman will be introduced in next summer's sequel, but that it all will lead to bigger things for the character. Which, if you're ever read a Spider-Man comic, probably should be obvious.

‘The Avengers 2: Age of Ultron’

Do you dream about possibly working alongside Joss Whedon on his wildly anticipated ‘Avengers 2'? Doritos, of all things, just might be your ticket.

The snack company announced that it will team with Marvel Studios for the “Crash the Super Bowl” contest. Entrants submit Doritos commercials for consideration. The winners will air during next year’s Super Bowl, while one winner whose commercial earns the most fan/audience votes will get the chance to work on Whedon’s sequel in some capacity.

Last year’s Doritos contest winner earned the chance to work alongside Michael Bay on 'Transformers 4.' So yeah, this is a serious upgrade.

Need more details? Play this video, and keep an eye out for the Stan “The Man” Lee cameo:

‘Batman and Superman’

None of us particularly expected Ben Affleck’s Batman – God, that still feels strange to type – to be a squeaky-clean Caped Crusader. The Dark Knight has been just that in years past: Dark; brooding; vengeful; and cloaked in shadow. So there’s little surprise in Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara’s comments about the look and feel of the Batman we’ll see in Zack Snyder’s planned Superman-Batman movie.

[He will be] tired and weary and seasoned and been doing it for awhile.

I wonder if this helped rule out the fresh-faced “rookie cop” Joseph Gordon-Levitt from Nolan’s trilogy. But, I keep going back to Snyder reading the Frank Miller quote from ‘The Dark Knight Returns’ at Comic-Con. It’s clear they want an older Bruce Wayne to tussle with Clark Kent. This just confirms it.

- We also know who is going to shoot this older, grizzled Batman. 'Sucker Punch' and '300' cinematographer Larry Fong reportedly is circling the project, ready to work with Snyder once again.

- Will they be shooting Justin Bieber in the Robin costume? No, we’re not kidding. The pop sensation posted a photo to Instagram of an alleged Batman/Superman script. He hashtagged it #Robin? But, it may all be a cruel joke Bieber drew up with Funny or Die.

‘Ant-Man’

We still don’t know who’s playing the lead character, but Marvel now says that Edgar Wright’s ‘Ant-Man’ will arrive in theaters months earlier than expected. The studio shifted Wright’s date from Nov. 6, 2015 to July 31, 2015.

That date didn’t really do a lot for James Mangold’s ‘The Wolverine,’ which opened to $53M and topped out at $130 million domestically. But this is Marvel, and a standalone film in the company’s planned Phase Three. Casting will be pivotal, but this is a huge vote of confidence in Wright and Joe Cornish’s submitted script.