As some of you may know, Iron Man 2 news has been somewhat of a battleground recently with comments here and there from Marvel and Jon Favreau. I am here to catch anyone lacking in this knowledge up to date. It all began immediately after Iron Man's huge success where Marvel said that Iron Man 2 filming was set to begin filming in March of 2009 with a release date set at April 30th, 2010.

It then came to our attention via Jon's myspace and blog that he wasn't too fond of the start date for Iron Man 2 with him saying this,

It's been five weeks since the one and only phone call my reps have gotten from Marvel. I know their hands are full with the Hulk and I’m sure they will get into it shortly, as they tell me they intend to. I ran into the Marvel guys at the Hulk premiere and everyone sounded eager to get to work on IM2.

I am concerned, however, about the announced release date of April 2010. Neither Robert nor I were consulted about this and we are both concerned about how realistic the date is in light of the fact that we have no script, story or even writers hired yet. This genre of movie is best when it is done thoughtfully and with plenty of preparation. It might be better to follow the BB/DK, X/X2 three year release pattern than to scramble for a date. It is difficult because there are no Marvel 09 releases and they need product, but I also think we owe it to the fans to have a great version of IM2 and, at this point, we would have less time to make it than the first one.

At this point, the ball was left in Marvel's hands. They apparently responded with some quite odd comments. According to news broke over at IESB.net and their sources,

So according to our source at Marvel, Jon was expecting a moderate bump in his fee for the sequel but apparently Marvel has other plans.

Our source continues that Maisel believes Iron Man 2 will be a success regardless of Favreau's involvement and feels the studio does not need to pay Jon a higher fee for his services.

This is the most disappointing news that I have heard coming out of Hollywood in years, is Marvel out of their Vulcan mind?

So bottom line, Jon Favreau has not been locked in to direct Iron Man 2 for the simple reason that Marvel is being cheap - this is 100% accurate folks, no bullshit.

So there ya, go, Marvel is too cheap to higher Favreau again and thinks Iron Man 2 will be a hit regardless of who is directing.

Ahhh, but the plot thickens. Almost immediately after that news broke, we got another word that went a little something like this,

IESB says that three hours after they posted the story, their Marvel sources reported in with the news that the studio was reaching out to Favreau. Nikki Finke chimed in with a confirmation. Marvel Studio insiders are now wagging their fingers at us, wondering how we could be so gullible, and believe them to be so stupid. Here's where you can collectively roll your eyes.

At any rate, the story is now that David Maisel has put out an offer for Favreau to direct the Iron Man sequel, and that it is "much richer" than what he was paid for the first film. Here begin the negotiations, and here we can breathe a sigh of relief that things seem to be going the right way. I will also venture to applaud the anger of the geeks, as I suspect our ill will may have been the spark to get things moving.

It seems to be a bit of a confusion between what Marvel says and what Jon says, but in the end, I hope things get settled and Jon gets his dues come time for Iron Man 2. I mean seriously, it is one of the best superhero films to date. Let's not screw this up Marvel.