According to the latest whispers on the street, the upcoming Avengers: Secret War will not only take direct inspiration from its comic book source material and reboot the Marvel Cinematic Universe with a multiversal, cameo-filled crossover, but likewise follow it up with an ‘All-New, All-Different’ iteration.
RELATED RUMOR: Marvel Studios’ Upcoming ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ To Soft Reboot Marvel Cinematic Universe
This supposed new direction for the MCU was first brought to public attention on September 21st, courtesy of noted scooper CanWeGetSomeToast.
Retweeting fellow scooper MyTimeToShineHello‘s September 12th claim that Deadpool 3 will see the title hero “embark on a quest to find the perfect Wolverine throughout the multiverse”, whereupon, “After encountering numerous variants played by different actors he ultimately concludes that Hugh Jackman cannot be recast,” CanWeGetSOmeToast added, “Yes, Hugh Jackman won’t be recast until AFTER #AvengersSecretWars.”
“Feige is making Secret Wars the send off to not only the current MCU, but all the Marvel movies that came before Iron Man,” explained CanWeGetSomeToast, before seemingly confirming the worst fears of many a Marvel Comics reader.
“It’s the Ultimate (soft) reboot,” said the scooper, apparently indicating that the MCU’s original The Ultimates inspiration would soon be swapped out for stories based on Marvel Comics’ more recent, post-2014 books. “To make way for something All New, and All Different.”
Returning to the rumor mill on September 25th, MyTimeToShineHello shared a heavily photoshopped Avengers: Secret Wars fan poster, itself featuring nearly every pre-MCU, live-action depiction of a Marvel super hero, to their personal Twitter account and declared, “This is what Secret Wars is gonna be like.”
The Marvel heroes featured on the poster – and possibly the final film – include:
- The compete roster of 20th Century Fox’s Fantastic Four, including Ioan Gruffudd’s Mr. Fantastic, Jessica Alba’s Insivible Woman, Michael Chiklis’ The Thing, and Chris Evans’ The Human Torch (no doubt a cameo that will result in some reference to his role as Captain America), as well as Doug Jones’ Silver Surver
- Thomas Jane’s 2004 version of The Punisher
- Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garners’ respective takes on Daredevil and Elektra
- Nicholas Cages’ Ghost Rider
- Various members of Fox’s X-Men series, including Halle Berry’s Storm, Anna Paquin’s Rogue, Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool, Famke Jensen’s fully-Phoenix-powered Jean Grey, Patrick Stewart’s Professor X, Sir Ian McKellen’s Magneto, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine, some version of Nightcrawler, and a Cyclops ostensibly portrayed by either James Marsden or Tye Sheridan, the mutant leader’s signature visor making it hard to tell exactly which
- Sony’s Spider-crew, including Alfred Molina’s Doctor Octopus, Tom Hardy’s Venom, and both the Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire’s versions of the wall-crawler
- Both Eric Bana and Lou Ferigno’s portrayals of the Hulk
- Wesley Snipes’ Blade
- The animated Spider-Verse versions of Miles Morales and Spider-Gwen, as portayed by Shameik Moore and Hailee Steinfeld
- Peter Hooten’s Dr. Strange, as seen in the Sorcerer Supreme’s eponymous 1978, CBS-produced television film
- and finally, Toei’s tokusatsu interpretation of Spider-Man, Kōsuke Kayama’s Takuya Yamashiro
In an apparent confirmation of this multiversal overload, CanWeGetSomeToast retweeted the fan poster and asserted, “Pretty much. Although some of those Fox-Verse Marvel characters won’t be making it out of #Deadpool3…”
“It’s just missing Tom Holland’s Spider-Man as the lead of #AvengersSecretWars,” they further clarified. “Tobey Maguire’s Spidey will appear, but he won’t be a lead.”
Interestingly, the best supporting evidence for the MCU’s supposed plans to begin taking inspiration from Marvel Comics’ widely-panned All-New, All-Different publishing initiative come not from other rumors, but from the cinematic endeavor’s recent entries themselves.
Jane Foster’s Thor, Ironheart, Sam Wilson’s ‘Falcon Cap’, Kamala Khan’s Ms. Marvel, a primarily ‘heroic’ Loki – all these heroes were produced during this line-wide attempt by Marvel Comics to ‘diversify’ their readerbase, and all have made their debut in the mere four years since the original MCU Avengers had either died or hung up their tights at the end of Avengers: Endgame.
Combine this changing MCU roster with the fact that most of these ‘new versions’ of Marvel’s classic characters belong to Disney themselves, rather than Marvel or any individual creator, and it ultimately would come as no surprise that Marvel Studios would choose to ignore their declining quality and instead focus on milking their own products for all they’re worth.
As of writing, Avengers: Secret Wars is set to shake-up the multiverse on May 7th, 2027.