Jon Favreau Confirms Black Panther, Thor And Captain America Easter Eggs In Iron Man 2

Since the day Iron Man 2 opened, fan speculation has run rampant over the cleverly integrated easter eggs that snuck their way into the film. Now, some of that speculation can be put to rest as director Jon Favreau provides confirmation on what's what in the scene featuring Tony Stark and Nick Fury discussing the Avengers Initiative, the background of which was littered with an assortment of footage, maps and images hinting at other Marvel properties.

The confirmation was found within the special features of the Iron Man 2 Blu-ray. The Daily Blam! relayed the conversation:

[The first is] from "The Incredible Hulk", which means ["Iron Man 2"] took place before "The Incredible Hulk." If you look you see the the crater on the other monitor, that's the "Thor" thing. That's where the hammer was recovered. This is just a geek heaven here.

And if you think that anything on this monitors is not something we at Marvel didn't talk about for hours – you are crazy! See, there is a map up there, so... if you look at those maps, each one of those locations corresponds to something in the Marvel Universe. I'm not supposed to say that.

And if you look on each one, and I know what they mean, but I'm not gonna say it, but I'm gonna say this: Two of them relate to "The First Avenger: Captain America," one of them relates to "Thor." The one in Africa relates to Black Panther.

Is this a suggestion that Black Panther will somehow factor into The Avengers, or merely a way to indicate that all of these Marvel characters exist within the same universe? The former is certainly a possibility, as Black Panther has at one point been a part of the Avengers team. The latter is probably more likely though, since The Avengers line-up is already looking pretty full. A Black Panther movie has been discussed in the past, so this may just be a sly way of hinting at it.

ComicBookMovie has provided some screencaps of the easter eggs. Head over there to see them full-size.

News footage from The Incredible Hulk:

Top left: Crater left by Thor, as seen post-credits in Iron Man 2.

Circled spot in the middle: Black Panther.

Circled spots from left to right, as best as I can guess: Iron Man in California, Thor in New Mexico, Hulk in New York, Captain America frozen in Iceland, Captain America or Thor (again) in Europe, and at the bottom in the middle of the Atlantic, possibly Namor the Sub-Mariner?

I'm sure many of you guys are more well-versed in Marvel lore than I am, so feel free to help narrow down what highlighted location corresponds to what comic book entity in the comments.

Iron Man 2 hits DVD and Blu-ray on September 28, 2010.