Marvel: Avengers Campaign

Marvel has been at the forefront of the popular superhero era in film, with their series of films by Marvel Cinematic Universe. One of their biggest and most popular film they have released to date is 'Avengers Assemble' and with the sequel coming out in May 2015, 'Age of Ultron' the film campaign of the avengers has kicked off again.

The Avengers is a team of superhero consisting of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye and Black Widow led by Nick Fury, Within 'Age of Ultron' the audience is being treated with the arrival of two new members Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. The team is faced up against fearful foes who threaten the survival of humanity and their role is to prevent and stop this threat.

How Avengers was Introduced

The avengers was first teased to the audience at the end credit scene in Iron Man (2008) with Nick Fury approcahing Iron Man stating 'I'm here to talk to you about the Avenger initiative' This is a big clue into what Marvel plan to do with the series in the coming years and keeps the viewers guessing about what he meant in that scene. We later find out that it was in fact teasing at the upcoming film 'Avengers Assemble'

Marvel have been very successful using this technique to get the audince guessing about upcoming films or projects and have now included an end credit scene in all of their films in their series. With their latest one being in 'Guardians of the Galaxy' where they tease with the appearance of Howard the Duck.

The film order to AvengersThe films leading up to the avengers also helped in providing the audience with excitement and anticipation for the Avengers, and gave the audience insight into most of the characters and their background storyline.

The films that lead up to the Avengers were stand alone films for Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America and Thor. 4 of the main characters of the film. This aided in the campaign of the Avengers as now the audience knows the characters and knows what their powers are they can utilize the style and look of these characters for the Avengers film campaign. For example using these characters in posters, magazine covers etc. However at this point they never showed all of the characters in the film, leaving out Hawkeye and Black Widow, creating mystery surrounding these two characters who they can still use to tease.

Avengers Teaser PosterA further element that Marvel has became very good at is the use of symbolism throughout their campaigns to tease the audience about what will come.

This teaser poster uses that symbolism perfectly as the whole poster is just the logo of the Avengers with ‘Assemble’ written in the middle of it. There is also a date ‘2012’ which is very brief and doesn’t give any indication as to when in 2012.

Avengers also released six posters showcasing all of the characters individually (as you will see on the next slide). This aids in the audience getting to see what each character looks like.

Avengers Teaser PosterThese posters give us some insight into each of the characters who will appear in Avengers. All of the individual characters are creating their own brand and have their own symbol that is associated with them and these posters help to enforce that further. Some examples of these symbols are Captain America with his patriotic shield, Thor and his hammer and Nick Fury with the eye patch.

The posters also help us get a view of what will be occurring in the film, we can see in the background that it is set in a major city and in the poster on the bottom left we can see what appears to be a flying alien in the background, a hint to the enemy in the film.

Avengers Full Theatrical PosterFollowing on from the teaser posters came the full posters. Unlike the teaser posters we finally get a glimpse of the team being together and what they look like as a unit.

However as we can see in both posters Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr) appears to be bigger then all of the other members. This could foreshadow his role in the team as the leader or someone who does something more important.

In the poster at the top there is also an iconic building in the background, Stark Towers, which is also linked to Iron Man. Furthermore also provides us with a more accurate setting for the film.

Avengers Teaser Trailer/ TV SpotMarvel had the opportunity to show

a very short teaser trailer at the Superbowl XLVI. This is the first time they showed moving images for this film in a short 12 second long clip. Within this trailer we get to see all of the heroes in the team but however we still don’t see who the main villain is.

We have to wait to the TV Spots come out for the reveal of the villain to be showcased. This TV Spot helps to provide the audience with more insight into the overall storyline. Within the first few seconds we get the view of the villain in a very sinister shot as you can see to the left, and again the Avengers logo is used at the end, for the symbolism aspect of the trailer.

Avengers Full TrailerThe full trailer the follows on from the teasers, but this time treats the viewers with 2 and half minutes worth of clips.

Similarly to the other elements of the campaign, Marvel tease us again with the full trailer, only giving us a little bit of info into the main villain Loki. However they do continue with their element of symbolism surrounding each character as they are all introduced using their powers or abilities, two examples are to the right of Iron Man and Captain America.

Avengers Magazine CoversEmpire magazine gave avengers 4 exclusive covers for their magazine all of them hosting a different character. However different from all of the other content that the campaign has provided so far the characters own unique symbol is hidden, with an exception to Iron Mans suit. The colour scheme surrounding Iron Man and Captain America relate to the colour schemes of their superhero suit, something that in a way is also symbolic to their individual characters. But overall these magazine covers provide us with something different then what the campaign has previously given.

Avengers Build up to #2After Avengers Assemble, Marvel concluded that their ‘Phase 1’ of the series was complete and they was now working on their second phase which included another Avengers film.

Similar to the first avengers they had a series of films leading up to the big finale of the avengers to finish off this phase. These run up of films included The next instalments to Captain America, Thor and the final of the Iron Man trilogy. But they also included a new team of heroes in Guardians of the Galaxy.

Avengers: Age of Ultron Teaser posterWith the new Avenger film fast approaching, Marvel began doing what it is good at and teasing the audience.

There first poster, and first content for this film follows their usual use of symbolising in the characters. Which is what this poster does well. As all you can see is Ultrons face on a black background it immediately gives away that he is the bad guy in the film. They are also using the exact same Avengers logo then before, but however they have changed their colour scheme to be red for this film, this ties in with the bad guy as you can see in the poster, as he has red eyes and a red mouth.

Avengers Teaser Trailer #12 years before the movie was even due to be out in cinemas and Marvel have already dropped a teaser trailer. However this isn't the norm of teaser trailers.

The trailer consisted of just Ultron’s helmet rotating with the unveil at the end of the Avengers logo and the title of the film. Where this was released so early in the films campaign it build up a lot of speculation within the Marvel fans.

The trailer follows on from the exact same thing that the teaser poster had, with Ultrons helmet, along with the red colour scheme and the logo.

Avengers Full Theatrical PosterWith Age of Ultron now only a few months away from being released we are getting more and more content. Like this full theatrical poster.

However it doesn’t follow the typical theme we have seen from the previous content, we can now see all of the characters alongside each other, including the two new Avengers for this film. The poster also gives away a few more narratives, we can see that Ultron has an army, and alongside this we can see the setting is once again around the iconic Stark Tower. Despite these differences the Avengers logo is still in red which does follow on from the themes of the previous content.

Avengers Teaser Trailer #2https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmeOjFno6Do

The teaser trailer only just came out recently, and prematurely as unfortunately for Marvel their trailer got leaked forcing them to release it early.

This trailer provided the viewers with more clips as to what the film will offer, along with further narrative and insight into the storyline. Similarly to the previous Avenger film, it follows the same style of showing off all of the characters alongside their iconic power/style. The title of the film is also identical to all of the other content that this film campaign has provided so far.

Avengers Magazine CoverAnother step in their campaign is to try to get onto the covers of magazines, this is so that they can reach a much wider and precise audience.

The magazine cover to the right however isn't a main stream magazine, but it does appeal to a clique market with the title of this cover being ‘Comic-con preview’. The cover showcases the bad guy within the film Ultron, who has so far appeared on all of the campaign so far. Captain America and Iron Man also make their appearance on the magazine. However the title doesn’t follow the same style as what the other content has done so far with the title being in white and not red.

Marvels AnnouncementDuring the build up campaign of Age of Ultron, DC announced their line-up of films over the coming decade. Marvel followed this up with their upcoming films in their titled ‘Phase 3’. One of the films they announced was another Avengers film, but this time it is a 2-parter. They also announced that Avengers Age of Ultron wouldn’t be the finale of Marvels ‘Phase 2’ but instead Ant-Man would.

This announcement has already kick started the campaign for the next Avengers film titled ‘Infinity Wars’ with the other Marvel film Guardians of the Galaxy already showcasing the villain in the film, as seen on the right.