Original excerpt from our February newsletter, now expanded with additional details. You can subscribe here.
Marvel Studios had a tough 2023. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania underperformed and the Jonathan Majors arrest followed a few months later, Secret Invasion flat out missed, and The Marvels failed victim to an audience that bought into the ongoing superhero fatigue narrative instead of just checking out the film for themselves (it was a blast!).
Kevin Feige’s Marvel Studios is now retooling on the fly but this February they were racking up simple wins, and the hype is growing.
The Hollywood Reporter wrote about Marvel Studios retooling and it gave us some tidbits of news.
Agatha seems promising according to reports. WandaVision showrunner Jac Schaeffer will likely deliver a surprise hit here.
Eric Pearson, who did work on Thor: Ragnarok and Black Widow, is polishing The Fantastic Four script. I’ve heard so many different writers attached to The Fantastic Four script but I have to imagine it’s pretty solid. Seems like Marvel Studios wants to get these films right going forward.
Marvel is still searching for characters and actors to carry its universe after Robert Downey Jr.’s Iron Man and Chris Evans’ Captain America retired. I’m confused by this statement because Marvel seemed like they had a good bench, post-Endgame. It just seems like the pandemic has clogged its opportunity to create new and consistent stars. RDJ and Evans consistently appeared in projects, and other MCU stars haven’t had that opportunity besides Benedict Wong (who plays Wong).
Joanna Calo, the showrunner of the acclaimed FX series The Bear, is working on the script for Thunderbolts. The creative teams from Beef and The Bear working together on Thunderbolts… Feels like they are taking one of their nerdier-centric projects and making it more attainable for general audiences. As we’ve seen with past MCU projects sometimes writers/directors of other shows don’t always translate well into the MCU.
Captain America: Brave New World is undergoing reshoots. It seems like some stuff will be reworked. I sincerely hope Marvel Studios makes Captain America: Brave New World and Thunderbolts a much-needed, connected one-two punch.
Avengers: The Kang Dynasty is now Avengers 5. Yet I still feel like we are a bit away from Avengers 5 because the New Avengers team hasn’t even assembled yet. The moving away from Kang was inevitable but there is still a possibility the character is recasted. Kang the Conqueror being the big bad could’ve been terrific but I think they made a few critical errors with the Kang story.
Spider-Man 4 rumors are running rampant. Hopefully, we get an announcement here soon with a director attached. It seems like Sony and Marvel Studios have differing agendas. Sony wants to do a multiverse sequel. Feige wants to do a street-level story (likely so he can include MCU street-level heroes like Daredevil, Echo, Kate Bishop, etc.). Spider-Man producer Amy Pascal also has the desire to bring Miles Morales into live-action, and I’m sure that will create another Marvel/Sony tug-of-war.
The Marvel Studios retool isn’t stopping the studio from developing new projects either. A Young Avengers project will likely be a film, that project was teased at the end of The Marvels. Despite slowing down it seems like there are plenty of priority projects they want to do. The retool is ongoing, and I’m sure we will get a boatload of details from Kevin Feige come August at D23. For now, it seems like there is positive momentum on their side.
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Zach Perilstein is the Editor-in-Chief of the Boardwalk Times
