Who will be in the Avengers? We know that Iron Man, Captain America and Thor are locks, but who rounds out the team? There's been talk about Hulk as both a team member and a villain (which gibes with the origin of the team in the original comics), and beyond that ain't nobody knows. Which makes Robert Downey Jr's latest words about the film (to which he is signed) particularly intriguing.

Here's the context: MTV was in London talking to the actor on the set of Sherlock Holmes and they asked him about The Avengers. He's very aware that it could easily be a bad movie. “If we don’t get it right it’s really, really going to suck,” said Downey. “It has to be the crowning blow of Marvel’s best and brightest because it’s the hardest thing to get right. It’s tough to spin all the plates for one of these characters.”

He's also aware of how a more diverse Marvel Movie Universe could impact Iron Man: “The danger you run with colliding all these worlds is [director] Jon [Favreau] was very certain that ‘Iron Man’ should be set in a very realistic world. Nothing that happened in ‘Iron Man’ is really outside the realm of possibility. Once you start talking about Valhalla and supersized super soldiers and jolly green giants it warrants much further discussion.”

Woah, supersized super soldiers? That is not Captain America he's talking about but rather Giant Man, as reinvisioned in The Ultimates, Marvel's alternate world take on The Avengers. It's important to note that with Jon Favreau on board as a producer of The Avengers and with Downey showing a real interest in the franchise that he is likely not just talking out his ass on this one.

So here's what's interesting: the original Avengers included Ant-Man, who went on to become Giant Man (like a fucking yo-yo), while The Ultimates started out with Giant Man. In both cases the guy growing and/or shrinking was Henry Pym. Doing a movie version of the original team but changing out Ant-Man for Giant Man makes sense, as that roster also includes Pym's wife, The Wasp, who has similar shrinking powers. Two shrinkers on a team seems visually boring.

But the inclusion of Henry Pym makes me wonder how, if at all, this impacts Edgar Wright's long in development Ant-Man movie. I think that Wright's Ant-Man will be Scott Lang, who took over the persona from Pym in the comics, but I'm not sure. And I'm not sure if Wright's film deals with multiple Ant-Men or not. But with Marvel making a cohesive universe, I'm sure someone has thought it through. Hopefully I'll be able to dig up more info for you guys soon.