With ‘the release of Kick-Ass 2’s today, there is a lot up in the air in the world of Kick-Ass, Hit Girl, and crew. Mark Millar (‘Wanted’) recently sat down and gave out a ton of information on what is happening and what he’d like to see happen!

It’s a bit interesting but quite a bit of the social media interview sponsored by Total Film really revolves around Hit-Girl and how she’s envolved within the film. Clearly a fan favorite, but we also get some teases on the direction of the franchise from here and what to expect. There isn’t that much in the way of direct spoilers aside from a small section near the end (which we’ve labeled for you.)

So, enough rambling – on to a quick voyage within the mind of Mark Millar as he talks ‘Kick-Ass 2’!

First up, Millar was asked if Hit-Girl could get her own movie? With how popular the character is, would it be a feasible option?

You know it’s funny, as a lot of people say Chloë [Grace Moretz]’s the standout you do think: ’that’s a licence to print money’! *laughs* We have talked about it but then I think about movies like The Empire Strikes Back. If they made a Han Solo movie rather than Return Of The Jedi, you’d be like: ‘What? Hang on, what’s that doing in there’. But secondly you just think: ‘finish the story’ you know? But I definitely think Hit-Girl has potential for something, maybe a prequel.

I know prequels tend not to be great but I feel there could be a story with her and Big Daddy before they met Kick-Ass because there’s a whole five years there that you can explore. I love the idea of her travelling the world and learning these skills – because she didn’t get that good that quickly, you know?

In Kick-Ass 3 there are major deaths so it might be quite hard to do anything with these characters, you know? So that’ll be the last we’re going to see of these guys I think, which my agent’s really pissed off about because he wants Kick-Ass 4 and 5. *laughs*

While it’s possible, a Hit Girl stand alone film is not sounding too likely. The prequel idea would be feasible, but at her age they would need to find a new actress to fill her shoes and I wouldn’t want to imagine anyone aside from Chloë Grace Moretz (‘Carrie‘) playing the part. I understand re-casts happen but I’d prefer them not to in some cases and this is one of them.

What we DO see is that clearly a ‘Kick-Ass 3’ is on the table. I’m sure it depends how ‘Kick-Ass 2’ does at the box office, but that is a promising sign that they want to finish it off at least as a trilogy (with Millar wanting to do even more!).

Speaking of Chloë Grace Moretz she was very vocal about supporting the film when Jim Carrey (‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind ‘) spoke against the violence in it. How did that pan out for Millar?

My initial reaction was very different from my ‘25 minutes later’ reaction. My initial reaction was: ‘Oh my God, what?’

It was a total blindside, and nobody saw it coming.

As soon as I saw it, I phoned Matthew [Vaughn] and said “Jim Carrey’s just denounced the movie, says it’s too violent for him’.

And Matthew just said: ‘Wow’, because his producer brain began kicking in and was already thinking this could be quite good publicity *laughs*

And he was right because for the next week it was all across Good Morning America, CNN News, Fox News – everybody was taking about Kick-Ass 2.

And they weren’t talking about R.I.P.D or all the other big movies that were coming out. We were the ugly duckling of the summer really, we were the runt of the litter, and we were coming along at the end on a $28 million budget against these titans that we were up against.

But one by one all these giants have sort of fallen down over the summer. And we’ve been this plucky little movie at the end that’s been given mega-budget movie visibility thanks to Jim Carrey walking.

‘Jim Carrey goes on Leno’ or ‘Jim Carrey goes on Letterman’ isn’t a very interesting story, but it’s a really interesting story if Jim Carrey says the film is too awesome to be involved in *laughs*.

If you’ve seen the movie, you know it’s no more violent than the first one, and Jim loved the first one. It’s identical levels of depravity *laughs*. I mean they’re both objectionable movies but after you’ve seen the first one, you know what to expect from Kick-Ass 2.

Free press is awesome. That’s how it ended up. While free press is good, the movie is violent and could be considered controversial with a few scenes based off of the graphic novel. There is a spoiler below but it’s one that sets my mind at ease because the two scenes in the comic version that would have made me not enjoy the film look to have been slightly changed in order to work on the big screen. I, for one, have no problem with these changes at all.

*SPOILERS* It’s only small things really, just a couple of things. The dog doesn’t die in the movie, but I think that was a good choice.

With comics you have to constantly bombard people with interesting imagery to keep them turning the pages because you’ve only got 22 pages and four panels a page on average, so you constantly need to make people draw breath, and give a little cliffhanger at the end of every page to make them stay with you.

Movies tend to be a bit more human and quiet and contemplative generally. So if you see really bad things happening, it tends to be more upsetting if you see it on film. If you see a dog dying in real life or on film, it’s really upsetting rather than seeing it in a comic. The movie becomes a horror movie then, it becomes a different thing from the comic.

We also changed the rape scene from the comics – because in the comic it’s cut away, you know, and it’s grim but it’s grim in comic-book terms so no real people are really involved… but in the movie it just felt a little too much so we softened it. And turning it into a joke on Chris Mintz-Plasse was great.

Finally with the cast getting older (and the main concern here being Hit-Girl’s age as she gets older) you have to wonder when the third film will be? Fortunately it sounds like it’ll either film it soon or not at all. Personally I’m hoping for quickly. As Millar explains:

It kind of has to otherwise Chloë’s going to be pregnant or a granny! Chloë is already in her mid-teens and even if we started shooting it early next year which is, I guess very possible, I think that would be a good time to do it if we have a script ready by Christmas and maybe shoot it next summer, but Chloë’s already going to be 17 or 18 by then so you don’t want to leave it until she’s in her twenties.

I think you either do it now or you never do it so let’s get it done. But it was always planned as three movies and it is sometimes tempting because it’s gone down so well – the first book has sold a million copies worldwide and we own it so we get to keep the cash and everything – so there is that Scottish side of my brain that says:’ do Kick-Ass 50!”

And then you think: ‘think of all the things you love that have bled until they died and you hate. And the great thing about the Star Wars films (until the prequels came out) was that they were sort of untouched little movies and they were legendary because of that. There’s no Star Wars 15, and I think it’s really wise to protect your stuff like that.

I always had my ending figured out; I knew the final page of Kick-Ass 3 when I started writing the first page of Kick-Ass 1 because they overlap slightly, and I’m really pleased at what I’m building towards.

I’m only ten pages away from finishing the whole thing now, and then Kick-Ass 3 is almost done. The comic has started and that will run until February next year. And then there’ll never be any more Kick-Ass again, there’s a very definite conclusion to the story.

Wait, did he say ‘Kick-Ass 50’?! OK, I know that was more of a joke and wishful thinking on his side. However, if the ratings hold, anything could prove true. Let’s just hope they end the series before they add Jar-Jar Alien-Boy to the team that they are putting together.

Are you seeing ‘Kick-Ass 2’ this weekend? Are you excited for more movies in the same universe? Sound off below!