Wolverine has just laid the smack down on Hit Girl. No, we’re not talking about some crazed** X-Men**/Kick-Ass 2 crossover. It’s simply the most appropriate way to inform you that 20th Century Fox has won out over Universal to distribute Matthew Vaughn’s next Mark Millar collaboration, The Secret Service.
The idea that Fox would join the movie – which Vaughn and his Marv Films Company are financing independently, much as they did with the first Kick-Ass – is hardly a shocker, since Millar is now Fox’s big comic book creative consultant and Vaughn made X-Men: First Class for the company. But when the director left the First Class sequel, Days Of Future Past, it seemed as though a spanner might be thrown in the works.
Not at all! Vaughn, according to Millar, wanted to focus on Secret Service to get ahead of similar projects. “If we didn't do it now, it would probably never get done,” he told Empire in November. “Matthew had a really difficult choice, and he had a lot of great ideas for X-Men.”
Vaughn and co-writer Jane Goldman have adapted Millar’s comic, which follows the world’s greatest secret agent training his n’er-do-well nephew to be the next James Bond. It was in competition, along with another Millar title, Superior, for Vaughn’s attention but all involved are focusing on Secret Service as his next directing job. He’ll kick off shooting in August ready for a 2014 release date.
For more from Millar, check out our Podcast interview with him below.