Avengers: Doomsday broke the Internet this week. The cast announcements were all over the news, with the announcements of the inclusion of stars from the old Fox X-Men movies especially exciting folks. Fans all over the Internet are speculating on what exactly the movie will look like. Are we going to see something like the battle between the 616 and 1610 Earths from Secret Wars (2015)? Is it going to be like the crossover event comic Avengers Vs. X-Men? Will it be something entirely different? Fans are in a tizzy trying to figure things out, as always, with MCU fans and comic fans alike pretty excited for the prospect of the MCU and the FoX-Men coming together for a big movie.
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Marvel Studios often take inspiration from the comics, and there are lots of great Avengers/X-Men to choose from. The X-Men have starred in brilliant stories, and one of them is a crossover with a version of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes… although in this case, it might be better to call them Earth’s Mightiest Villains. That story is Avengers/X-Men: Utopia, by Matt Fraction, Terry Dodson, Luke Ross, and Mike Deodato Jr. It’s an out of left field choice for the movie, but is it possible that Avengers: Doomsday will take inspiration from it?
Avengers/X-Men: Utopia Went in Some Very Interesting Directions
Avengers/X-Men: Utopia came at a very interesting time for both teams. Marvel was going through the “Dark Reign” storyline. This post-Secret Invasion status quo started after Norman Osborn got the kill shot on the Skrull Empress Veranke. Osborn was given control of the superhero national security apparatus that was set up after Civil War, and created his own team of Avengers. He combined Ares, the Sentry, and Noh-Varr with the villains Bullseye, Daken, Moonstone, and Venom wearing the costumes of Hawkeye, Wolverine, Ms. Marvel, and Spider-Man respectively. These were the stars of the “Dark Reign” flagship book Dark Avengers, which followed Osborn and the team as they fought threats to the world and solidified Osborn’s power over the superhero community.
Meanwhile, the X-Men weren’t in a great place either. House of M had wiped out the mutant race, leaving 198 mutants with their powers. The X-Mansion was turned into a reservation for mutants, but attacks by various enemies saw the venerable old Xavier Institute destroyed. The X-Men left and went to San Francisco, taking up residence in Graymalkin Industries and financed by Mutantes Sans Frontieres, with back up from Warren Worthingon III and Emma Frost’s fortunes. Anti-mutant protesters march on the city, led by the Friends of Humanity, which starts riots, and leads Osborn to take control of the situation through Emma Frost, a member of his Cabal.
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That’s the set-up to Avengers/X-Men: Utopia. Osborn and the Dark Avengers lead the forces of HAMMER, Osborn’s SHIELD replacement, to San Fran to quell the riots. There are clashes between the Avengers and the X-Men, and Osborn has Emma start a Dark X-Men team, one controlled by him. Meanwhile, HAMMER starts arresting mutants and taking them to a secret facility, all to feed a special machine created by the Age of Apocalypse‘s Dark Beast. However, Osborn is outplayed, as Emma revealed to Cyclops in the days before the attack that she was a member of the Cabal. Cyclops made a plan, one that would get the Avengers and HAMMER to stick their necks out, and allow the X-Men to not only strike back, but also to create a new home for mutantkind.
Avengers/X-Men: Utopia is one of the best stories of its time. “Dark Reign” was one of the coolest Marvel status quos ever; it was great to see Norman Osborn given power and how he dealt with it. The Dark Avengers were an awesome team to read; watching the villains on the top, their petty squabbles, and what they’d do to keep their power was extremely entertaining. The X-Men books at this time were a bit of a drag, and there wasn’t really a direction for the group since they came to San Francisco. Utopia helped that along, establishing an interesting status quo for the X-Men, and kicking off the Utopia Era, which would be a very important part of X-Men history. Looking at the details of the story, it doesn’t really seem like Avengers: Doomsday will use anything from Utopia, but there’s actually a way to take some of the story and bring it to the big screen.
There Is One Way to Bring the Ideas of Utopia to the MCU
This is going to take a little explaining, so here goes — before “Dark Reign”, Norman Osborn was the leader of the Thunderbolts, which was doing the Suicide Squad thing of a government sanctioned team of supervillains. The MCU is introducing the Thunderbolts, and that’s the way for parts of Utopia to hit the big screen. See, Avengers: Doomsday/Avengers: Secret Wars is almost certainly going to use the idea of Incursions — alternate Earths ramming into each other. The FoX-Men Earth could have an Incursion with the MCU Earth, and the Thunderbolts could be sent in to try to destroy the planet with an antimatter bomb or something. The X-Men try and fight them and — BOOM! — a fight that is sort of like the one at the end of Avengers/X-Men: Utopia.
It’s highly doubtful that Marvel Studios is going to use much of Avengers/X-Men: Utopia in Avengers: Doomsday. There’s nothing really cosmic about the story and Avengers: Doomsday is going to be a multiversal romp of some kind. However, there’s a small chance that we’ll get some sort of Thunderbolts versus FoX-Men battle, and that would honestly be really cool.
Want to talk more about Avengers/X-Men: Utopia? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
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