Top 5 Potential Directions The MCU Could Go Post-‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ According To Fans
The MCU’s multiverse saga is set to end in December 2027, when Avengers: Secret Wars is released, leaving everyone wondering where it all goes from here.
Unlike the Infinity Saga, which broke countless industry records, the Multiverse Saga has struggled with many issues which including fan fatigue, fractured narratives, over-reliance on trope characters, and a screaming stagnation in creativity; hence the increased calls for an overhaul.
To put it into perspective, the majority of MCU films preceding Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars haven’t hit the $500 million mark at the global Box Office; a figure surpassed by every MCU film released between The Avengers in 2012 and Avengers: Infinity War in 2018.
It is, therefore, no surprise that the fan base is eager for the change after Kevin Feige announced that Secret Wars would end the MCU’s Phase 6 and the bedevilled saga with it. However, as everyone looks forward to new storylines and faces in the MCU, no one really knows what the future holds for the franchise.
The launch of new teams, such as the recently unveiled New Avengers*, and the introduction of more mutants into the Sacred Universe are still good signs of plans for a better Phase 7 and the future of the MCU, and here are the directions that fans think the franchise should take post-Secret Wars.
A full cinematic reboot with new actors in classic roles
Whether hard or soft, a reboot of the MCU is almost definite now, especially with the Box Office numbers still dwindling, and fans hope to see new faces take over the same old roles. A reboot would put the MCU on the same path as DC, whose reboot under James Gunn has garnered increased fan interest in their projects. “A brand new MCU will rise, and new actors and actresses will take on the roles. This new MCU will have the Fantastic 4 and the X-Men in the beginning instead of being introduced later on,” One Redditor proposed in a thread.
Another Redditor suggested the conclusion of the Avengers: Secret Wars in the same way the Multiverse Saga ends in the comics, where all the universes are collapsed into one prime universe, allowing Marvel to reschedule and recast the same old characters and then start all over with a less convoluted storyline. The Young Avengers are especially popular, with fans eager to see younger blood take over the roles. Other users also suggested diversifying to a whole new set of superheroes that remain untapped in the MCU.
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Split up the MCU into distinct team-based groups
Despite the increased calls for a reboot of the MCU, there are many aspects of the franchise that fans still enjoy. That doesn’t mean that the storyline hasn’t grown too big and too complicated to follow. As a result, some fans have proposed the adoption of a split system where superheroes only fight in their specific jurisdiction. The earliest proposals include splitting the MCU into ground-level and cosmic-level superheroes.
More fans on Reddit have since proposed the adoption of up to six tiers of superheroes, namely, street level (Defenders, Spider-Man, Hawkeye, Echo), Avengers (Captain America, Thunderbolts), The Fantastic Four, Mutants (X-Men, Namor), Cosmic (Captain Marvel), and Supernatural (Loki, Doctor Strange). There is still an argument for what happens with a few isolated characters like Shang-Chi and Moon Knight, but this seems like a feasible form of a soft reboot that keeps most of what makes the MCU great while seamlessly blending in new characters and simpler storylines.
The rise of the mutants and an X-Men saga
The MCU has not really utilized the X-Men so far since Disney acquired the rights to the franchise back in 2019. That the mutants have an equally compelling universe with superheroes and villains that could easily outclass anything fans have seen so far in the MCU is not in question. Fortunately, their integration into the MCU has now been ramped up, starting with Deadpool & Wolverine, which was a huge success, and then Avengers: Doomsday, which has more X-Men debuts. Secret Wars could, therefore, be the perfect turning point to launch the mutant saga.
The X-Men’s rich but simpler universe, with so many powerful characters to explore, can be easily integrated into the Fantastic Four, the Thunderbolts, and pretty much every aspect of the MCU. After snippets of the X-Men in Deadpool & Wolverine, Avengers: Doomsday, and a couple of other films preceding Secret Wars, the MCU can launch a whole new Mutant Saga in a bigger way than what fans saw in the X-Men films, making their story the center of the franchise for decades.
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Young Avengers vs X-Men
Kate Bishop (Hawkeye), Shuri (Black Panther), and Kamala Kahn (Ms. Marvel) are young Avengers that the MCU has turned into crowd pleasers; favorites whose future adventures would be cherished by fans. It would also be disheartening to simply destroy the multiverse, after endearing the fan base to so many characters from other universes who have joined the MCU. It, therefore, makes more sense to end the Multiverse Saga in a soft reboot where the Multiverse is either saved or recreated in some form — with the MCU’s story going forward as it is led by the Young Avengers and, probably a few, legacy heroes to offer guidance.
Some fans on Reddit have even proposed the introduction of Krakoa as the new center of action, which would be perfect for the reboot. Another interesting theory is the launching of the Young Avengers vs the X-Men saga, which would act as baptism by fire for both the Young Avengers and the X-Men. The X-Men would have to be integrated over time, before the Phoenix Force is introduced for any version of an Avengers VS X-Men saga to make sense to everyone, but it is still a perfect direction for the MCU to take; potentially giving the franchise decades worth of storylines to explore.
Reboot with a greater focus on street-level heroes with smaller stakes
“I would have it start street level and then slowly introduce more out there characters…,” one Reddit user suggested in a thread about the best way to reboot the MCU. While it isn’t the most popular of opinions, it still makes a lot of sense. One of the problems ailing the Multiverse Saga is the lack of relatable everyday-life stories. Street-level films, namely Spider-Man: Far From Home and Spider-Man: No Way Home, make two of the only three MCU films to cross the $1 billion mark since Avengers: Endgame, pointing to the untapped potential of such films.
The positive reception of Daredevil: Born Again points to a bright future for street-level heroes and simpler stories that even non-comics fans can follow. While high-stakes sagas are interesting to watch and the core of the MCU, rebooting with superheroes like The Punisher, Hawkeye, Moon Knight, and Luke Cage in a low-stakes saga before relaunching the usual ‘big bads’ could still be profitable.
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