Joss Whedon On Superhero Movie Sexism

In a new interview with Digital Spy from the set of "The Avengers: Age of Ultron," Joss Whedon discussed the lack of a female driven superhero films.

The interview was conducted before ABC's limited series "Agent Carter" starring Hayley Atwell premiered and Marvel announced plans for an upcoming stand alone Captain Marvel movie, set for July 6, 2018.

"It's a phenomenon in the industry that we call 'stupid people'. There is genuine, recalcitrant, intractable sexism, and old-fashioned quiet misogyny that goes on. You hear 'Oh, [female superheroes] don't work because of these two bad ones that were made eight years ago', there's always an excuse. Marvel is in a position of making a statement simply by making [a female-led] movie, which I think would be a good thing to do. But it has to be a good movie, it has to be a good character, and most of the best characters in Marvel are owned by Fox, let's face it!"

In another chat this time  with Buzzfeed Joss talked about his plan to skip Avengers: Infinity War - Part I /Avengers: Infinity War - Part II where the topic of sexism in this genre and the lack of female  movie superheroes in leading roles came up again.

Whedon revealed that he was considering the idea of a solo, period, female superhero film:

"I was thinking about, Well, if I wasn't' going to do Avengers 2, what would I want to do? Of course the first thing I thought of was 'turn-of-the-century female Batman.' Not Batman actually. But, you know, something cool. One person. Can't stress that enough. Movie about one person - not a team, not 10, just one. But [I would] do a nice sort of hard action movie that combined all my favorite things.  Something that would be the love child of Sam Fuller and Edward Gorey. You know, I've had many thoughts since then. Oh, I could do this! Oh, I could do that! But it is my instinct to want to tell those stories."

Before signing on for "Avengers," Whedon spent years attached to a "Wonder Woman" film adaptation at Warner Bros.. With him stepping away from directing more "Avengers" films though, what might he work on next for Marvel? The obvious choice that many fans are bringing up is a Captain Marvel film:

"Um, I would never rule anything out, because I like working here. By the same token, the biggest thing for me is that I need to do something that I create myself. It's been way too long since I created a universe. Captain Marvel I don't know as well. There have been a few [versions] of her. I have the first issue of Ms. Marvel, back when she was that, and had the Farrah hair. My only issue with her is that she always felt sort of on top. She was very driven. A winner. I always like to dig into the soil of things to find my heroes, if I can."

Whedon believes the success of James Gunn's "Guardians of the Galaxy" has given the studio confidence to proceed with films about some of their lesser known characters including Captain Marvel:

"Honestly, you know, Guardians [of the Galaxy] might have helped it. Just because that was outside what was considered to be their box and did so well that- Well, let's put it this way: If a raccoon can carry a movie, then they believe maybe even a woman can."