When Kevin Feige, the President of Marvel Studios, explained that the Marvel Cinematic Universe had the next fourteen years of releases planned out, it felt like ground zero for superhero movie fatigue. You can blame Amazing Spider-Man 2, but at the time, DC wasn’t doing anything special and Guardians of the Galaxy had yet to re-kickstart the genre in its goofy, unique way. But with Civil War kicking off phase three in 2016 and this year’s third coming of Spider-Man being a hit, the building momentum towards Infinity War has become a delight, even with the bittersweet goodbyes inevitably coming.
We know stars like Robert Downey and Chris Hemsworth might not stick around forever, so the next generation of superheroes are being segued into storylines. In Doctor Strange, Spider-Man, Black Panther and Captain Marvel, we have a solid core of stars that will lead us into Phase 4*, which will see the end of the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy.
But when will we say goodbye to Star-Lord and Co.? James Gunn pretty much came right out and said it. Here’s his public, teasing reveal in all of its polite glory: 2020.
Considering Marvel has already announced the next few years of films, including placeholder release dates of May 1st, August 7th, and November 6th in 2020, the next three years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is going to work out like this:
- Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
- Black Panther (2018)
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
- Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
- Captain Marvel (2019)
- Untitled Avengers film (2019)
- Spider-Man: Homecoming 2 (2019)
- Avengers 4 (May 2019)
- Two other (!!!) untitled movies in 2020
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2020)
The next question is just who the untitled 2020 movies revolve around. Kevin Feige told Collider last year that they are already working on 2020’s placeholder films, so it’s probably a matter of waiting until Comic-Con to find out what’s next.
We know what we’d like them to be for 2020. Over the years, where we’re aiming we’ve been lucky enough that it’s usually been the same thing but we always leave ourselves the opportunity to bob and weave and adapt if we have to. But we know where we’re headed for 2020 and we have ideas and were beginning to solidify the years beyond that.
We have to assume Doctor Strange 2 is one of those films, just due to the timing of its last stand alone film, but who’s next? Iron Man 4? A swan song for RDJ?
*Ant-Man cannot be considered a massive star in the next-generation due to Paul Rudd probably being contractually obligated to return to Wet Hot American Summer whenever he’s needed, and we know that is a much bigger IP.
(Via Polygon)