The Marvel Cinematic Universe will never be the same when Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars premiere in theaters over the next couple of years. The studio has brought back the Russo Brothers and Robert Downey Jr. for a crossover event that aims to be as relevant to pop culture as Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame were back in the day. But with the critical response received by movies released during the MCU’s Phase Four and Phase Five chapters, uncertainty looms in the distance for the upcoming crossover blockbusters.
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Regardless of the skepticism that has been seen around the internet since the movies were announced, Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars have the opportunity to breathe new life into a franchise that used to be bullet-proof at the box office. Disney won’t stop producing Marvel movies after the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes confront Doctor Doom, so what comes next for a series that has entertained millions of people from all over the world for almost two decades?
The End of an Era (For Real This Time)
The idea of ‘The Avengers coming to the end of an era’ has been heard before; in fact it was the main selling point of Avengers: Endgame. After a decade of building towards the confrontation between the Avengers and Thanos (Josh Brolin), it was time for The Infinity Saga of the MCU to come to a close. But no one could have predicted what happened next.
A global pandemic shut down the entertainment industry just when Marvel Studios was getting ready to launch a new era of heroes, villains, and impressive action blockbusters. At the same time, Disney wanted to pivot their biggest brands towards producing stories for Disney+. The result was a collection of films and television series that delivered too little, often too late. Black Widow introduced a premise that would have really worked after the release of Captain America: Civil War. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier delivered updates that could have been an email, and the box office results seen by Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and The Marvels proved that the general audience wasn’t going to watch just anything that had Marvel Studios’ name attached to it. Kevin Feige and his team had to pivot toward a new major attraction… in the form of nostalgia.
Everyone’s favorite former two Spider-Man actors (Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield) came back for Spider-Man: No Way Home; Patrick Stewart’s Professor X returned in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness; Avengers: Doomsday will bring back most of the cast that made the original X-Men films so unforgettable more than two decades ago. But where does that leave the franchise, creatively speaking? What is the point of introducing new, young faces to lead the MCU if the veterans are going to take the spotlight, anyway? That can all change, thanks to Avengers: Secret Wars.
Avengers: Secret Wars got its name from a comic book story in which multiple universes clash within a single amalgamated space, with a different Marvel Universe being born on the other side of the conflict; the Secret Wars movie is the MCU’s chance to be born again. It’s unlikely Robert Downey Jr. will return after Secret Wars as new actors can be recast in the Tony Stark and Victor Von Doom roles. If a new universe is born, the MCU can get its own X-Men and stop relying on the Fox cast.
The young heroes who have charmed audiences on Disney+ can take the spotlight, and the veterans who keep returning for disappointing sequels, such as Thor: Love and Thunder, can finally rest. It’s easy to see why Disney relied on nostalgia over the last few years to sell tickets. But if the franchise wants a chance of moving towards the future, it needs a new cast. And Avengers: Secret Wars is just the way to do it.
No More “Homework Watching”
Many audience members who enjoyed the thrill of the MCU stopped watching after the release of Avengers: Endgame. The conclusion of the Infinity Saga felt like the perfect point to get off the proverbial wagon after a decade of tuning in. In addition to that, the Disney+ series attempted to expand on narratives seen in theaters. Unfortunately for the studio, many viewers felt like the television series were being positioned as “essential watching” for upcoming theatrical releases – but really, many of the television spinoffs ended up feeling like homework. With the main characters of the franchise closing out their stories during Endgame, some fans didn’t consider films such as Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings worth their investment.
Avengers: Secret Wars can bring things back to basics. With a new universe in place, general audiences could see this as the perfect time to return to Disney’s cash cow. How can this work? It’s already happened multiple times in the comic books that inspired these movies. Whenever multiple Marvel comic book series stop selling issues because readers don’t feel compelled to read issue #762, the publisher breathes new life into the status quo with a new issue #1. Add some of the familiar faces fans know, a new supporting cast, and new villains, and it gives readers the chance to dive deep into a series without feeling that they need to care about the years of storytelling that came before. Could this be the strategy for the MCU’s future? Yes, and it’s already happening.
A (Kind of) New MCU
Spider-Man: Brand New Day will mark the return of Peter Parker (Tom Holland) to the big screen, but it’s important to point out that no one remembers who Peter Parker is in the MCU. Sadie Sink has already been cast in an undisclosed role in the sequel, which will be directed by Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi). Brand New Day will feature the same Spider-Man under a new director (Jon Watts directed the previous trilogy) and with a new supporting cast: it’s just like when a long-running comic book needs to be launched again.
The roadmap for the MCU after the release of Avengers: Secret Wars remains a mystery. Sure, it’s evident that Marvel Studios wants its own version of the X-Men. But what else can be expected alongside the mutants? Nothing is set in stone, and that can be an exciting prospect if looked at the right way. Marvel Studios has a chance to usher the MCU past an era of nostalgia-based productions and revamp old characters and franchises into content that truly feels new and exciting again, within a Marvel Cinematic Universe that is truly whole for the first time. The Avengers, X-Men, Fantastic Four (and everyone in between) all in one sandbox, as fans dream about. Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars will prove that Marvel Studios is up for the challenge of clearing up its own mistakes – and what comes after will give both MCU fans and mainstream audiences a very good reason to jump back in.
Avengers: Doomsday will be released in theaters on May 1, 2026.
