This week Marvel Studios is releasing Captain America: The First Avenger, a period superhero adventure starring one of their most recognizable characters. But it's also a prelude to the company's next feature, which will be a kind of comic-book movie that hasn't been attempted on the big-screen before: a team-up adventure that unites some of Marvel's biggest heroes -- including Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans) and The Incredible Hulk (Mark Ruffalo, taking over from Ed Norton and Eric Bana) -- to combat a global threat. The title, of course, is The Avengers, the same name of the Marvel supergroup that's been battling bad guys in the four-color pages of the company's comics since 1963. Geek icon (and part-time comics scribe) Joss Whedon is writing and directing the film, which also stars Samuel L. Jackson as the group's leader, Nick Fury, Scarlett Johansson as the leather-jumpsuit clad spy, the Black Widow and Jeremy Renner as the ace archer, Hawkeye. Naturally, a project as ambitious as The Avengers didn't come together overnight. Marvel has been laying the groundwork for this film since the first Iron Man hit theaters in 2008, slipping in visual and verbal references to Avengers-lore in all their standalone superhero features. Here's a film-by-film guide to some of the Easter Eggs that have pointed the way to The Avengers

Disney has acquired the rights to Agatha Christie's meek-old-lady-solving-crimes property Miss Marple and plans to turn it into a feature film reboot starring... Jennifer Garner, who is only 38 and primarily known for kicking people while wearing lingerie on Alias. So they're going a different way with it! A younger, and hence, more attractive way with it, which sounds like a financially sound trend that could really take off. Might we suggest even worse old people recasting/reboot ideas? Yes. Yes we might.

The new disaster movie to end all disaster movies known as 2012 enters theaters this weekend with John Cusack in the hero role. This film involves crashing aircraft carriers, tidal waves and the destruction of New York, California and the White House. It looks relentless and John Cusack looks like he's going to do his best to stop whatever is causing this worldwide annihilation... or at least avoid getting killed in the process. But while this is Cusack's first proper disaster flick, there are other movies he's made that turned out to be massive disasters of a different sort. Some might have even been considered career suicide. He's lucky he survived.

Mike Judge's new workplace comedy, Extract, is arriving in (like four) theaters this Friday, and although the movie is getting very mixed reviews early out, it's still exciting. The man gave us Office Space! And now he's tackling the soulless working world of... bottle factories? It doesn't matter. The point is the persistent trailers made me want to rekindle my love for this genre with a little best and worst list.

In the past, we've wondered if James Cameron's project, Avatar, could really live up to the hype. Even the trailer, released last week, left us feeling kind of meh. But on Friday, Cameron released 20 minutes of 3-D footage in IMAX theaters nationwide, and it was instantly apparent why Cameron felt an Avatar Day was necessary, and why non-3-D footage of the movie doesn't convey how amazing the movie looks. Not that the movie is some groundbreaking piece of cinema: the storyline is a sci-fi take on Dances With Wolves (with a dash of Soul Man), the designs for the aliens and the military vehicles are old hat, and some of the dialogue is horrible. But when you're watching naked, blue versions of Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington running around the jungle in high-definition 3-D, all of these worries melt away. Read on for a day-after description of the footage; I may be hazy on some details, but it's mostly the same as the footage that was shown at San Diego Comic-Con. And don't worry about spoilers, as a 3-D James Cameron informed us a the beginning that these are all from the first half of the movie.

Looking to find out what the big movie releases of the fall are? Well, barring any unfortunate incidents like last year's surprise postponement of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, MWoP has put together the essential guide to the final season of 2009, broken down into five convenient categories: Comedies and Dramedies, Serious Dramas, Chills and Thrills, Animation and Sci-Fi, Action and Adventure. There's a bit of cross-pollination in there, but all of the big releases this season are covered in one of those galleries, as well as some little gems we can't wait to see. Sure, there are a lot of Oscar-bait movies and horror flicks, as is the season's wont, but there are also a lot of big spectacles and even a few potential blockbusters, so start planning your calendar appropriately!

Robert Rodriguez is known for two different kinds of films: bloody, sexy, hyper-violent crime-horror stories... and kiddie flicks, likely made to entertain his five awesomely named kids: Rocket, Racer, Rebel, Rogue and Rhiannon. While some of his kiddie flicks can be pretty entertaining to an open-minded adult (parts of Spy Kids 3-D are pure genius), mostly they're for the 12-and-under crowd, like the Racer-penned Shark Boy and Lava Girl. So when adult film buffs are sitting around waiting for any of the dozen genre projects under Rodriguez's purview to come to fruition, and he gives us the whimsical wish-fulfillment fantasy Shorts... well, we get a little depressed. Here are some of the projects that, given our druthers, Rodriguez should have been working on instead of Shorts.

So, you heard about this Facebook movie they're making, right? About the social networking site's rocky, apparently scandalous path to becoming the greatest thing since sliced bread? Well, apparently acclaimed director David Fincher is circling the project, which makes it sound a lot more interesting to us. Still, it's about the development and sale of a Website. Doesn't that sound kinda, I dunno, boring? Not like Flash of Genius "I invented the windshield wiper" boring, but maybe The Late Shift "who will host this TV show?" boring? Considering Fincher's body of work, there are a bunch more Facebook-related movie ideas we'd love to see him apply his talents to. Here are five.

Thanks to relentless movie marketing, you know what movies are out now. And thanks to theatrical trailers, you know what's coming soon. But where do you go to find out about the movies that are just now being made, and won't be "coming soon" for a while yet? You come here. Welcome to Coming Soonish, our weekly round-up of the week's best/weirdest in-development movie news. Check back each week for more development tidbits, including some films that may actually get made!