Today I was doing my normal thing searching for some sort of Marvel news to post that wasn’t a Thunderbolts* star telling us to watch Doomsday or some sort of Spider-Man: Brand New Day leak, and unfortunately there just wasn’t much out there. This got my thinking back to the days of the first phases of Marvel where we weren’t focused on one or two movies at a time, but a road-map filled with upcoming properties that all added to an overall narrative that would conclude after being in the making for ten years. So, what is going to happen in Marvel after Doomsday and Secret Wars? What else do we have to look forward to?
Along with the rest of the world, it seems like Covid threw off Marvel’s entire game-plan after Infinity War and Endgame, and the MCU just hasn’t felt the same since. Since the days of Phase 1 movies such as Iron Man and Captain America: The First Avenger, fans were always in the know about where the company would be headed years in advance and even though we didn’t have details about the plot of movies or how exactly they were going to connect with the overarching MCU, we had a road-map (usually rolled out by Kevin Feige himself at comic-cons and other large scale presentations) of which properties to look forward to. We knew which movies were coming down the pipeline, but we didn’t know which movies would include post credit scenes that would massively impact the timeline or when exactly to expect Earth shattering moments for the entirety of the MCU (the HYDRA twist in Captain America: Winter Soldier, for example) that made fans realize even the most standard seeming of movies could have some of the largest overall impacts. This led to an environment of large scale theorization and gave both the studio and news outlets a plethora of different properties to both report updates on and speculate on at the same time. From someone who was deeply engrossed in this world back in the mid 2010’s, things definitely feel… different.
I’m not going to sit here and say Marvel didn’t try – we have received timelines and road-maps post Covid and post Endgame, but the amount of times they’ve been changed and altered has led many fans to not even taken them seriously anymore. Now, it feels as if Marvel does not have a clear idea of where exactly they want to be in ten years, but are scrambling to retcon the mistakes of the Multiverse Saga… if you could even completely call it that. I can’t fully blame that one on Marvel though, as at one point it seemed like they had the idea of where they wanted to go with the Kang Dynasty, and it wasn’t exactly Marvel’s fault that Jonathan Majors legal issues threw that whole idea off the rails. However, prior to Endgame, it seemed like Marvel knew exactly where they wanted to end up, while now it seems like they just want to make sure they made it to their next movie. Doomsday and Secret Wars are big swings that in my mind will act as palette cleansers for the confusing of the 2021-2026 era, but where are we going after that? X-Men is being thrown around a lot, bit asides from a potential Mutant Saga, we have no idea what to expect from Marvel after the next Avengers movies, and that’s slightly alarming. I’m sure both films will be good, but there just isn’t the same level of anticipation for the rest of the narrative outside of those films that almost feel as if they are going to be self contained stories.
Back in 2015, if you were to ask me what Marvel was going to be doing 3-5 years down the line, I could pull up a road-map from Marvel themselves about what to expect. This wouldn’t be perfect and items could slightly change such as anticipated release dates and details from the films production such as directors or directions for each film, but we still had a good idea of at least what properties to expect and where we would be going with the universes narrative as a whole. We knew Thanos was out there collecting Infinity Stones and the Infinity Gauntlet, and eventually that would come to a head. It gave us something to speculate on down the line, and gave Marvel massive marketing opportunities for news and updates that weren’t just redundant interviews and promotion for the same films. I will be honest – from what I can remember, this did get a little convoluted prior to the release of the first Doctor Strange movie as at the same there was an oversaturation of marketing items on that film (new posters, images, and other promo items for months leading up to the film) that it was hard to keep up with all the updates. Now, however, it seems like Marvel has shifted too much in the other direction to where their marketing feels like a dried up ocean leaving news outlets high and dry and leaving their fans with big question marks. It also doesn’t help that Marvel has drastically reduced the number of films they are releasing every year, which in my kind is a clear indication they are fully aware of the problem I am addressing. It feels like instead of picking a long term goal and slightly pivoting their details about how to get there, they are okay with just completely destroying their own ideas and starting fresh again.
Deadpool and Wolverine was the palette cleanser they needed in 2024 and I was fully on board with that because it both helped us take a breather after the confusion of the Multiverse Saga and also gave us a loose introduction to mutants in the MCU, but now Doomsday and Secret Wars seems like… another round of palette cleansing? Doom should be seen as a Thanos level threat that takes ten years to build up to, but so far we’ve only had two or three film to introduce the concept and the character and it just doesn’t hit like the Infinity Saga did as a result. I guess what I’m trying to say is that a cleansed palette doesn’t need more cleansing. I will admit that Captain America: Brave New World, Thunderbolts*, and Fantastic Four weren’t exactly home-runs, but neither was the first two Thor movies, the first Hulk movie, Iron Man 2, or even Ant-Man, but Marvel stuck to their guns and still released those movies. But just because not everything was a Guardians of the Galaxy or a Captain America: Winter Soldier didn’t mean the studio had to completely scrap and restart their ten year plan. I don’t think that’s even in the cards today, because there doesn’t seem to be a ten year plan, or at least one that is marketable to the masses. Let’s be honest, most of the movies from the first ten years were not massive hits, but we knew they were pieces to a much larger puzzle and that’s what kept us coming back to theaters without it feeling like a chore.
I’m not trying to sound totally negative over here and I’m sure Marvel has a long terms game plan that are keeping locked up in an office somewhere, but that’s where the problem lies. If I can’t find anything cool for Doomsday or Spider-Man to report on, then those who write about these movies for fun are just left high and dry. We don’t even know what to speculate on, because we don’t know what the studio is planning ahead for the next 3-5 years, let along their ten year plan. We know X-Men are coming down the pipeline, but in what capacity? Are we getting new mutants, or are we going to stick with the James Marsden and Hugh Jackman versions? This might be changing soon if we find out Sadie Sink is in fact playing Jean Grey in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, for example, but even though that is cool in itself it doesn’t really have any long term implication for the overall universe, at least that fans can sink their teeth into and speculate on yet. What happened to Blade? A second Eternals or a second Shang-Chi? What about Kang? Yes, Jonathan Majors got into trouble, but Jonathan Majors isn’t character in the MCU, Kang is. There are a to of pieces somewhere up in the air but there’s no real rhyme or reasons if they all connect, how they connect, or if they will ever connect.
I still love the MCU, but what I am trying to say is that I don’t feel the same excitement for a variety of properties and characters the same way I did ten years ago. I want to have many movies and a long term overarching story to fall completely into, but that just doesn’t seem to be a thing anymore. Maybe we will receive more of a clear idea after Doomsday or Secret Wars, but the latter of the two isn’t going to be released until 2027. That’s… a long time away. If this were one single franchise like Batman, that would make more sense, because DC has many different movies and properties to release until the next Batman movie, but I am talking about an entire large scale universe as a whole. As someone who wants to fall back into this world the way I did during the first phases of the MCU, I hope Marvel gives us their ten year roadmap again. They can modify and alter it, but at least give us an idea of where we will be going and give us years to build up to another cataclysmic event, not just one or two movies that go into another Endgame level story. It depreciates the anticipation and excitement, at least for long terms fans of the universe. I hope I’m not the only veteran Marvel fan who feels this way.
