Not everything in the MCU is good news. Several major upcoming films have had their release dates pushed back, meaning we won’t see Avengers: Secret Wars and the end of Phase 6 now until 2026. But where there are delays, there are also great opportunities.
Let’s take a step back and examine why these release date changes could actually be a good thing for the MCU, and why they could help the Multiverse saga really survive the landing.
Marvel’s Phase 6 Delays
Many release dates have been pushed back in the MCU recently, with the Blade film being the first of many dominoes to fall. The upcoming Marvel reboot is reportedly having some behind-the-scenes issues. Star Mahershala Ali is said to be unhappy with the short action-light script, and director Bassam Tariq recently quit the film. Blade has now been pushed back to 2024, causing a chain reaction of delays, meaning Fantastic Four Phase 6 won’t begin until February 2025 and Avengers: Secret Wars won’t wrap up the multiverse saga until May 2026.
But the most interesting thing about these delays in Phase 6 is what wasn’t affected. Although Fantastic Four and Avengers: Secret Wars have both been postponed, Avengers: The Kang Dynasty is still scheduled for release in May 2025. That means there will now be a full year between The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars.
This may simply be a sign that things are moving faster on the fifth Avengers film than on those other projects. The Kang Dynasty already has its director and writer and hasn’t faced the same setbacks as Fantastic Four or Blade. But the decision to double the gap between the next two Avengers films could mean more.
The big gap in phase 6
Given that we’re currently still at the end of Phase 4, it’s no surprise that we know very little about the plots of The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars. We’ve only just met a version of Kang in Loki: Season 1, and there’s still no reference to the Fantastic Four or other major Secret Wars players. (Reed Richards’ Multiverse of Madness variant notwithstanding.)
But based on the comic book source material, we can make some inferences about the direction of the next two Avengers movies. The Kang Dynasty will likely pit the new incarnation of Earth’s mightiest heroes against Kang as the self-proclaimed conqueror seeks to bend the entire multiverse to his will. As with Avengers: Infinity War, it’s probably safe to assume that the Avengers won’t save the day by the end of the film, setting up the rise of Battleworld and God Emperor Doom in Secret Wars.
One of the things that makes the Secret Wars comic of 2015 so great is the fact that its premise allows for a huge amount of spinoffs and side stories. When you have an environment like Battleworld – a mishmash planet made up of fragments from dozens of dead universes – the possibilities are endless. Marvel Comics definitely took advantage of this and paused most of its ongoing comic book line in the summer of 2015 to focus on new books set in the chaotic Battleworld realm.
There was a comic called Thors about the members of the All Thunder God Army enforcing Doom’s will. There have been several books that revisited classic X-Men crossovers like Age of Apocalypse and Days of Future Past. There was Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, a comic set in a reality where Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson are still married and have a super-powered daughter.
The problem with The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars being just six months apart is that the MCU has far fewer opportunities to explore Battleworld’s potential. But with a full year between them, Marvel has a lot more opportunity to play in the sandbox ahead of the climax of Phase 6 and the Multiverse saga. That may very well be why The Kang Dynasty’s release date hasn’t changed.
The Mystery Movies of Phase 6
Granted, even a year between these two Avengers sequels doesn’t guarantee Marvel will delve deeper into Battleworld. Marvel released two films between Infinity War and Endgame, and both were set before the Snap. The MCU films never got around to exploring the state of the world in those lost five years, leaving shows like WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier to fill in a few gaps later.
But the difference between then and now is that Marvel releases a lot more MCU content every year. There have been reports of several untitled Marvel movies slated for 2025 and 2026, though it’s unclear how much those dates have been affected by the other MCU delays. There is also a chance that unannounced Disney+ series will be released during this time.
We can only hope that at least one or two of these mystery projects are directly connected to Secret Wars. Thor 5 could be an ensemble film about the Thor Corps, bringing together the characters of Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman with any number of other multiversal Thors. Marvel Studios could build on Deadpool 3’s Wolverine return by reuniting the entire Fox X-Men cast for one final farewell set against the backdrop of Battleworld. Or how about a series set on the Shield, the barrier that protects the rest of the Battleworld from the ravening hordes of zombies and androids? This could well be Marvel’s answer to Game of Thrones.
Even though Marvel didn’t introduce Battleworld until the Secret Wars film, there are ways to expand and enrich this storyline in the year leading up to its release. Last but not least, Marvel should use this time to flesh out the Fantastic Four characters as much as possible. Secret Wars is both a story about the power of hope in the face of overwhelming darkness and an exploration of the rivalry between Reed Richards and Victor von Doom. Doom is portrayed as the almighty savior of reality, yet he proves unable to rise above his hatred of Reed and his own insecurities. It’s a story that draws heavily on the decades-long lore of the Fantastic Four in the Marvel Universe.
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Unfortunately, the MCU doesn’t have that long a history to draw on. Aside from a potential cameo in a movie like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, we likely won’t meet the FF before their movie releases in 2025. At this point, the Multiverse saga will be fast approaching its grand climax. It has to be argued that it’s just too early to attempt a Secret Wars film. But for better or for worse, that’s Marvel’s plan. The least they can do is take full advantage of the year-long gap between The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars.
Do you think the longer wait for Avengers: Secret Wars is a good thing? Which Secret Wars spinoffs are you dying to see? Let us know in the comments.
Jesse is a friendly editor for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket Follow @jschedeen on Twitter.
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