Recasting works in some cases, less so in others, mainly depending on how contingent a character's popularity is on the person playing him/her. For instance, it's easy to recast the Hulk, since he spends most of his "fun" scenes in CGI form and is a more low-key character in human form. Also, you can pretty much put whoever in the role of Hawkeye, since he's not particularly important. However, the other end of the spectrum is RDJ's Iron Man, which would be borderline impossible to recast - the character in its movie incarnation is very much tied to RDJ's portrayal. For MANY people, RDJ IS Iron Man. Most of the others fall somewhere in the middle here, and I'm pretty sure that if Captain passes the torch to Bucky, it won't go over too well.
However, the trickiest proposition is replacing them with other characters. Oh sure, the comic book enthusiasts will love it, but for general audiences it will suck balls. The current lineup relies on the more prominent characters in the Avengers, the ones who are better known in the general pop culture conscience, even before the movies started. And you have to be realistic here - if you want the Avengers to have the budget and scale it has, it can't rely on enthusiasts alone; it needs to appeal to a broad audience who will foot the bill.
And let's face it, general audience won't give two shits about Ant-Man or most of the other second and third tier Avengers.
So what is to be done? Make do with what you've got, maybe recast some of the minor ones if needed, pass a torch on someone, keep RDJ on stem cell infusions for the upcoming decade... and finish this continuity. Maybe do it with Avengers 3 or 4, giving most major characters one or two other solo movies, and having Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. fill in the blanks. And then just end it. Tie up the plot and call it a day.
Then wait some time and "reboot" it. Doesn't have to be a full-on hard reboot, but you can recast the characters with fresh faces, maybe do some new takes on the material, and people won't ***** so much since this would be a new Iron Man, a new Thor, etc.
However, the trickiest proposition is replacing them with other characters. Oh sure, the comic book enthusiasts will love it, but for general audiences it will suck balls. The current lineup relies on the more prominent characters in the Avengers, the ones who are better known in the general pop culture conscience, even before the movies started. And you have to be realistic here - if you want the Avengers to have the budget and scale it has, it can't rely on enthusiasts alone; it needs to appeal to a broad audience who will foot the bill.
And let's face it, general audience won't give two shits about Ant-Man or most of the other second and third tier Avengers.
So what is to be done? Make do with what you've got, maybe recast some of the minor ones if needed, pass a torch on someone, keep RDJ on stem cell infusions for the upcoming decade... and finish this continuity. Maybe do it with Avengers 3 or 4, giving most major characters one or two other solo movies, and having Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. fill in the blanks. And then just end it. Tie up the plot and call it a day.
Then wait some time and "reboot" it. Doesn't have to be a full-on hard reboot, but you can recast the characters with fresh faces, maybe do some new takes on the material, and people won't ***** so much since this would be a new Iron Man, a new Thor, etc.
