10 Unresolved MCU Plots and Where They Might Come Up Again

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has become a massive franchise universe spanning fifteen years, thirty-three movies (including The Marvels), and eight Disney+ series. With all of the canon that’s been established in different MCU projects during that time, it’s understandable that some of it has gotten forgotten along the way. 

Below you will find a list of 10 of the biggest MCU plotlines that have never been resolved. Hopefully, some of these plotlines do end up coming back around in the films and TV series planned for Phases 5 and 6 – because there are certainly some big opportunities to do so! 

Where Is Betty Ross?

The Incredible Hulk (2008) will forever remain the strange foster child of the MCU, due to the complicated licensing and rights issues between Marvel and Universal. Mark Ruffalo took over the Hulk role from Ed Norton after Incredible Hulk, and with that recasting a lot of the lore established around Norton’s Bruce Banner was also paved over – including his relationship with Betty Ross (Liv Tyler), daughter of Secretary Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford). 

Betty Ross hasn’t been mentioned in the MCU ever since – despite being one of the lead researchers into Gamma radiation, and a character deeply connected to Thunderbolt Ross, as well as Bruce Banner. It’s been downright awkward to see Betty Ross go so long as the only Phase I supporting character/love interest to never return to the franchise – however, the upcoming film Captain America: Brave New World will finally resolve some threads from Incredible Hulk – including bringing back Liv Tyler as Betty Ross. 

When Does Scorpion Get Revenge?

Spider-Man: Homecoming had Peter Parker (Tom Holland) take on The Vulture (Michael Keaton) and his crew – but he also did some collateral damage to another criminal crew, led by Mac Gargan (Michael Mando). The Battle on the Staten Island Ferry left Gargan disfigured and vowing revenge against Spider-Man – and Marvel fans knew it would be in the form of classic Spider-Man villain: The Scorpion. 

Well, we’ve had two more Spider-Man MCU movies since Homecoming – and an entirely different version of a Sinister Six – but no Scorpion. It was a weird omission from Spider-Man: No Way Home, as the worldwide exposure of Peter Parker’s identity as Spider-Man would’ve been a big deal to Gargan – and the spell taking that knowledge away still keeps a Scorpion-sized target on “Spider-Man’s” back. 

Spider-Man 4 will see the web-slinger presumably getting back to basics as a street-level hero – and Scorpion would be a great street-level threat for him to face. 

Why Is the Plan for Pym Tech?

Ant-Man (2015) ended with the somewhat ominous tease that while Darren Cross’s Yellowjacket armor had been neutralized, his HYDRA partner (former SHIELD double-agent Martin Donovan) is seen escaping the final battle at Pym Technologies with a vial of Pym Particles in his possession. Since then, there’s been no further reveal about what HYDRA wants with Pym Particles – but the Ant-Man franchise didn’t stop there. 

The sequel film, Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) centered around a plot in which black-market dealer Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins) was trying to double-cross Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Hope van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly), trying to steal their Pym Tech. Sonny explains that the tech would go for a high price to potential buyers – but by the time of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, the MCU arms race – and Pym Tech’s place in it – seems to be all but forgotten. 

That’s a big thread to leave dangling, as Hank Pym’s entire arc in the MCU has revolved around the obsessive quest to keep his tech out of the wrong hands. It’s a story thread that needs revisiting – but how, where, and when are the real mysteries.

What’s Left of the Nova Corps?

The Nova Corps is a crucial part of the cosmic side of the MCU – the police force that maintains order in the galaxy. The Nova Corps and their headquarters on Xandar were key supporting characters in the first Guardians of the Galaxy film – and the organization took on a pivotal role later on in the Infinity Saga when Xandar became the place where Ronan the Accuser’s Power Stone was kept. 

Well, Avengers: Infinity War gave MCU fans the update that Xandar had been razed to the ground by Thanos, as the Mad Titan stole Power Stone, with half the population of the planet being killed. However, Xandar’s fate has never been seen firsthand, and that particular dangling plot thread is key in one day explaining how the Nova Corps’ mission is passed down to the Marvel hero Nova, who has long been waiting for his MCU debut. 

What Are The Kree Wars About?

The cosmic side of the MCU is a mess of disconnected franchises, half-cooked stories, and lots of dangling threads. One of the most long-running and confusing parts of MCU lore has been the saga of the Kree Wars. 

The Kree and their aggressive militaristic/religious campaigns have been at the center of films like Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel, and The Marvels, and the alien race was explored in much more depth during the run of the non-canon Agents of SHIELD series. 

And yet, the more the Kree are featured in different MCU projects, the more it becomes clear that there’s no real cohesive lore about who the Kree are (why some are blue, others not); what their history is and culture is (military factions like Starforce vs. fanatics like the Accusers); what actually happened in the Kree-Skrull war and where it stands now; or even the role of the Supreme Intelligence, artifacts like the Quantum Bands, etc. 

The Kree holds a pivotal place in MCU lore, but no project on the horizon makes us think that Marvel Studios will pull all these loose threads of Kree lore back together into a cohesive story arc. The Marvels did very little to clear up or even clearly continue the saga of the Kree – or its close cousin, the Skrull saga. It’s just a bigger and bigger mess. 

What About Mordo’s Anti-Magic Mission?

Doctor Strange (2016) ended with a post-credits scene that allegedly set the next arc of the MCU’s mystical side into motion. Karl Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor) found himself disillusioned by the reveal that his mentor The Ancient One was channeling dark magic as her power source – and he took drastic steps to balance the scales. 

The post-credits scene revealed Mordo ambushing former Kamar-Taj student Jonathan Pangborn (Benjamin Bratt) and stealing his remaining magical abilities, which allowed Pangborn to walk again. Mordo declared that the world had too many sorcerers and that he aimed to lower that number – significantly. 

Since then, the world of the MCU (and worlds beyond) has been threatened by the magic of Wanda Maximoff, Agatha Harkness, Xu Wenwu, and other mystical threats – while Wong has run rampant as the new Sorcerer Supreme, fighting in cage matches, springing criminals from Jail (Abomination) and generally bending the rules as he sees fit. Then there was Stephen Strange and Peter Parker breaking a hole into the multiverse; Strange and Scarlet Witch battling across the Multiverse, and new generations of Kamar-Taj sorcerers and superpower mystics (America Chavez) emerging. That’s not even counting the larger scoping of shifting tides in the MCU supernatural world, as seen in Moon Knight, Werewolf By Night, and other projects. 

Amid all this mystical madness in the MCU, why has Mordo only shown up as a friendlier variant of himself in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness? What about the mission that began in Doctor Strange? Will Doctor Strange 3 do anything to bring us back around to Mordo – now that Strange has ventured into the Dark Dimension, with dark magic staining his soul? 

When Is It Hammer Time Again?

Iron Man 2 set up Sam Rockwell’s Justin Hammer to be THE rival industrialist/military contractor to Tony Stark in the MCU. Hammer unleashed the threat of Whiplash, and was hard at work trying to unlock the secret of Stark Tech – though it was clear he was nowhere near the level of Tony’s genius. 

At the end of Iron Man 2 Hammer was arrested for his crimes and sent to Seagate Penitentiary, where he was last seen in the one-shot short “All Hail the King”, doing time alongside “The Mandarin” Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley). Anyone who lives in the real world knows that someone as rich and connected as Justin Hammer wouldn’t remain in prison long. If Slattery is now a free man (see: Shang-Chi), we should definitely be seeing more from Justin Hammer – especially since his rival Tony Stark is now dead. 

It’s hard to imagine Marvel’s Armor Wars movie happening without Justin Hammer somehow being involved… 

How Did Cap Complete His Infinity Mission?

Avengers: Endgame ended with Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans) volunteering to take on the responsibility of returning the six Infinity Stones to their proper places in time/space. Rogers ended that pivotal mission by somehow getting himself a new life in the post-WWII past, living out his days with his true love, Peggy Carter. 

The “Time Heist” to gather the Infinity Stones was arduous and claimed the life of Black Widow – and yet, Steve’s return journey is made to seem simple and instantaneous. Moreover, there was a massive conflict of how Steve went back and lived in post-WWII America with Peggy, and still showed up as an old man in the current the same timeline of the MCU – when Endgame made it clear that changes in time resulted in splinter timelines being created, while the original timeline flowed on unchanged.

Fans have been so perplexed about how Steve Rogers’ MCU arc ended that they’ve been calling for a miniseries to detail how the Infinity Stones were returned. 

Does Anyone Notice The Ocean Celestial?

Marvel’s Eternals movie chronicled how the race of superbeings heroically broke from their creators, the Celestials, and defended their adopted home of Earth against Judgement and annihilation.

That said, The Eternals couldn’t complete their mission swiftly enough to stop a Celestial Emergence event from beginning in the Indian Ocean. The fledgling Celestial, Tiamut, ends up being turned into marble by the power of the Eternals’ Uni-Mind – and there he remains to this day. 

The reason that Tiamut’s Emergence is a dangling plot thread is that there has been no real impact from it on the larger MCU. The revelation of god-like beings like Celestials; the revelation that Earth was but an egg for that godly being’s birth, and the fact that Tiamut’s corpse is now one of the greatest natural wonders in the world – these are all game-changing developments for the MCU. And yet, they’ve changed nothing at all.

At some point, soon, the MCU needs to address that massive body hanging out in the ocean – even if it’s as a comedic aside. 

Who Bought Avengers Tower?

The Avengers had one of the most iconic headquarters around after their debut in Avengers (2012) – and the now-iconic party sequence of Avengers: Age of Ultron. 

Things got muddled in Phase III: Tony Stark sold Avengers Tower and opened Avengers HQ in upstate New York, while Avengers Tower became the site of invaluable tech and resources, and the main MacGuffin of Spider-Man Homecoming, and Adrian Toomes/Vulture’s supervillain schemes. 

Since Spider-Man: Homecoming‘s release in 2017, Avengers Tower has been conspicuously out of sight around the MCU – but never out of mind. “Who bought Avengers Tower?” has become one of the biggest fan queries about the MCU, with no clear time frame for when we’ll even get an answer. 

It’s also one of the most aggravating MCU dangling plot threads, as Marvel Studios has arguably had to do more work editing shots of the NYC skyline to avoid Avengers Tower sightings than they would just by revealing the new owners – or lack thereof.