Steve
Let’s start this think piece with a question: Is the marketing for Avengers: Doomsday getting you excited? Last year, Marvel held an online cast reveal featuring a timed distribution of chairs. Each chair had the name of an actor set to appear in Doomsday, with a new seat unveiled every 10-15 minutes (or so). As someone covering the event for JoBlo, the process was a slog. The wait for each reveal felt like an eternity, and the sweeping camera movements from chair to chair did little to add to the excitement. Speaking with others who are not part of the news-related trenches, they thought the event was fun, something they kept in the background as they went about their day. I envy them, because all the event did was make me question Marvel’s approach to its next pairing of “event” films.
Chairs? Really, Marvel? Chairs?
Things got quiet after the chair showcase, with Marvel keeping a relatively tight lid on any promotional materials. Well, until the teaser trailers started leaking. Unfortunately, it’s the nature of the beast for things to eke out early, given so many people snooping online and wanting to be the first to spoil the surprise. Instead of Marvel revealing the return of Steve Rogers, Thor, and more, random online accounts lifted the curtain, confirming what many already knew. Still, if their goal was to make the teaser campaign as anticlimactic as possible, mission accomplished.
For the life of me, I’ve not been able to get excited about Avengers: Doomsday, or Avengers: Secret Wars, for that matter. I say this as an MCU fan who roots for nearly every release and wants, more than anything, to once again feel that rush of collective enthusiasm that came with the Infinity Saga era. I don’t know that we’ll ever get back to that feeling again, but if not that, can we look forward to something new?
A burst of inspiration
I woke up two days ago, out of the blue, feeling optimistic about the MCU’s future. What changed my mind? I’m still trying to figure that out. While the thought of Marvel getting the band back together for a knock-down, drag-out fight with Doctor Doom intrigues me, I’m more excited about what happens after the smoke clears. Doomsday introduces Robert Downey Jr. as Doctor Doom, who in the comics is a close friend of the Fantastic Four’s Reed Richards and Susan Storm, and leader of the Kingdom of Latveria. The movie will likely find Doom trying to rule the world with an iron fist, with the Avengers and their super-powered allies assembling to stop his rise. As we’ve seen, the movie brings familiar heroes back to the MCU fold and reintroduces the X-Men, with several players from Fox’s beloved franchise reprising their iconic roles as the Children of the Atom. But what of Secret Wars?
With Secret Wars, Marvel has the potential to shake the MCU up considerably. Secret Wars introduces the concept of incursions. What are those? According to Fandom (and my reading of the Secret Wars event, however many years ago), incursions are “catastrophic events where two parallel universes collide and destroy each other, often leading to the collapse of reality.” I won’t get into too many specifics about how the Avengers solve the 616’s incursion problem for two reasons: We’ve not seen Avengers: Secret Wars yet, and there’s no guarantee the film will follow the same plot as Marvel’s comic book event series. However, the incursion presents Marvel Studios with an opportunity to reset the playing field. If you’re Marvel, how do you leverage that?
Where are the Young Avengers?
One way Marvel could capitalize on Avengers: Secret Wars is by establishing new teams and showing confidence in the growth and staying power of post-Infinity Saga characters (Shang-Chi, Ms. Marvel, etc.). As an example: Whatever happened to Kamala Khan leading a Young Avengers team? Do you remember when Kamala approached Kate Bishop about joining forces in the mid-credits scene from The Marvels? Let’s do that! Marvel has already laid the groundwork for the team, with more than a handful of potential members already introduced. Who could join the team? Kamala would obviously lead the charge, with the light-bending, embiggening hero in a field-ready Nick Fury-like role. Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld) could join the team, as well as Kathryn Newton’s Cassie Lang (a.k.a. Stature), Will Deusner’s Skaar, Joe Locke’s Billy Maximoff from Agatha All Along, Xochitl Gomez’s America Chavez, Jack Veal’s Kid Loki, Dominique Thorne’s Ironheart, Elijah Richardson’s Eli Bradley (a.k.a. Patriot), and Indla Rose Hemsworth as Love from Thor: Love & Thunder. That’s just who I can think of off the top of my head. If Marvel would get up off its ass and introduce live-action versions of Miles Morales and Spider-Gwen, we’d be in even better shape.
How does Marvel solve for X(-Men)?
Placing the Young Avengers aside, what of the X-Men? Will the MCU opt for an all-or-nothing era of mutant mayhem? Do fans want a series of solo features reintroducing the Children of the Atom, or do you keep making one X-Men team-based movie after another? There are so many mutants in the Marvel Universe. Why limit ourselves to the X-Men? Give us a Strange Academy TV series, and steadily introduce its characters into the films. Remember the I Am Groot shorts on Disney+? Do that again, but instead of Groot, it’s Doop! Don’t look at me like that. You know you want it. For the love of everything holy, reintroduce Magick and the New Mutants. They deserved better! Put Professor Xavier out to pasture and give us Quentin Quire! Okay, maybe that’s an unpopular opinion, but I stand by it.
It’s time to believe in the new guard
What’s the point I’m trying to make? There is so much potential for the MCU to flourish after Secret Wars. There’s little reason for Marvel to rely on legacy characters to put asses in seats. However, if they want people to show up, audiences need to feel that Marvel Studios believes in its characters as much as we do in wanting to see them succeed. Superhero fatigue is real, but it’s mainly because Marvel appears to have lost confidence in people’s ability to move beyond Steve Rogers, Thor Odinson, and other characters who helped lay the foundation of the MCU. Paying homage to the old guard is excellent, but at some point, we need to move on. Show audiences that you believe in new characters, and they will eventually get on board. Stop second-guessing yourself every time a film doesn’t quadruple its budget, or trolls bomb the comments. She-Hulk: Attorney at Law and The Marvels deserved better, dammit!
Anyway, I’m gonna watch some Agatha All Along, ponder the glowing reactions to Wonder Man, and hope that Marvel Studios rediscovers its love for its own characters in a post-Secret Wars world. Let us know what you want from Marvel Studios after Secret Wars in the comments.
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