Marvel Studios’ Big Teaser Shows How the Retooling Is Already Working for One Hero

Marvel Studios’s retooling is already paying dividends for one hero. Last week, the company celebrated 85 years with a fresh look at Daredevil: Born Again, Thunderbolts* and Ironheart. That last hero’s new clip showed off a very impressive costume upgrade for Riri Williams. In the Marvel Studios 85 teaser, Dominique Thorne’s young Avenger flew through traffic in a fresh suit. After the response to Ironheart’s design in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Marvel has opted to lean into realism a little more for the character’s Disney+ debut. That swap shows that taking a bit more time to refine VFX is already paying dividends one year in. Check out the teaser up above.

The changes over at Disney+ and Marvel Studios have been no real secret. To start out Phase 4, there were numerous series and movies that populated those first two years back in theaters after 2020. Due to numerous factors, Marvel made the choice to pull back and focus on what’s already on its plate. You can see some of that from how the Studio approached San Diego Comic-Con and D23. ComicBook’s Phase Zero podcast spoke to Marvel TV head Brad Winderbaum about the change in pace back in March and his comments kind of sum things up.

“I mean, frankly, in all honesty, there was a mandate to kind of create as much as we could for Disney+ as quickly as we could,” Winderbaum said in the interview. “And then there was a shift. And all of a sudden, we have to start spreading our release dates out. So, that really accounts for a lot of the delays.” “Now, we’re using that time. We’re not sitting idle. So, it’s like it stays in the oven. You can bake certain things a little more. It’s actually, I think, ultimately, it’s only going to make things better. But, most of it is just frankly shrapnel from the business.” 

Ironheart Gets A Bunch Of New Looks 

All these different Ironheart armors share more than just color schemes with Tony Stark’s iconic looks. I spoke with Dominique Thorne for ComicBook and asked about the physical design of some of the suits we’re set to see in the Disney+ series. The Riri Williams actress actually told me that the costumes were designed by Legacy Studios. They worked on the Iron Man armor and some other film favorite franchises. It seems like there might be some more links to Tony Stark. But, for now, fans are left to wonder until more information about Ironheart drops early next year.

“The Legacy folks, that suit is built by Legacy Studios,” Thorne told me during our interview. “The same folks that built the Iron Man suit, they built a bunch of the Star Wars pieces. They are literal geniuses. The same folks that built the Mark I suit were brought over to Ironheart to build the practical versions of those suits as well.” 

Do you like what you’ve seen out of Riri’s armor so far? Is it an improvement on the design from Wakanda Forever? Catch all of our pop culture discussion at @ComicBook on social media!