Corona | Coming Attractions

In the editing suite a movie can change its tone dramatically. By inserting a serious moment here, removing a comedic or lighter touch there, and presto-chango, your emotional reaction to what you see on-screen shifts.

Sometimes it works well for the movie's box office results. Other times...not so much.

If travel to parallel worlds becomes possible one day, perhaps we'll see what happened at the box office in the universe where Marvel's The Avengers began on a somber tone. Director Joss Whedon considered a different opening sequence, one that comes during the aftermath of the superheroes' fight against Loki and his alien army, the Chitauri. And it's this tonally different opening that will be included as a bonus feature on The Avengers movie DVD (coming out on September 25.)

In the alternate (and not used) material, S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) is being interviewed by her off-camera superiors. Still bloody from the fight, Hill isn't impressed by the leadership displayed by her ranking officer, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson).

If Whedon had used this slower and more ominous opening, would The Avengers had gone on to gross $1.4 billion dollars worldwide and become the second-highest grossing movie of all-time? Watch and speak your thoughts below.