Marvel has a pretty complicated problem, in that The Avengers is a massive hit, and that not only do all the stars have that massive hit on their resume, they also have independent film series that are also massive hits. So eventually, Marvel will either have to recast or give said cast more money. Or they could, you know, just throw out almost all of the Avengers and introduce an entirely new team. Which, according to the latest Avengers 3 rumors, is exactly what Marvel’s going to do.
Specifically, according to Badass Digest, the first set of Avengers will scamper off to their own movie, possibly fighting a threat somewhere off screen, while, in Avengers 3, Tony Stark and anybody from the original team without a franchise has to rally a new set of Avengers, consisting of Ant-Man, Doctor Strange, and a couple of others to fight off something else.
In some ways, it makes sense: Marvel gets to feature the original team and wrap up their contracts, and if nobody wants to come back, they’ve still got an Avengers. It would also explain those wacky rumors about the third movie being split in half, which wasn’t actually possible, legally speaking.
There is also the implied threat to the original cast, which is that they can be replaced with Paul Rudd and what will probably turn out to be Ethan Hawke. It’s not a coincidence the people with more movies on their contract get to be in Avengers 3 according to this rumor, just as the Falcon taking up Cap’s mighty shield in the comics was almost surely an attempt to get nerds on board with Anthony Mackie taking the job in the movies.
There should be a few grains of salt added here. Marvel hasn’t even shot Doctor Strange yet, Ant-Man is still in production, and there’s still the question of who else is on the roster. That said, don’t be surprised if the summer of 2018 has a lot of Avengers.
