Marvel really wants people who have complained about the apparent lack of direction or focus in Phase 4 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to know that there is, in fact, a plan — and yes, the Avengers will be reassembled.
As part of a blitzkrieg of news on Saturday during Marvel Studio’s Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2022, and having just announced their entire Phase 5 roster, Kevin Feige prepped Phase 6 and announced the titles of The Avengers 4′ and ‘Avengers 5’: ‘Avengers: Kang Dynasty’ followed by ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’.
“The Kang Dynasty” will hit theaters on May 2, 2025. “Secret Wars” will follow on November 7, 2025, marking a shorter wait than the year between “Infinity War” and “Endgame.”
These two films will conclude what Marvel says are Phases 4, 5, and 6: The Multiverse Saga. It’s the new Infinity Saga, and it kicks off retroactively with “Loki,” “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” and “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”
For those of you who don’t know, Secret Wars gets its name from Marvel’s groundbreaking miniseries Marvel Super Heroes: Secret Wars. It ran from May 1984 to April 1985 and turned out to be the first company-wide crossover event in comic book history.
The series was born when Marvel struck a deal with Mattel for a line of action figures. Mattel wanted a big, challenging crossover event to hype up the toy launch, so then-Marvel Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter came up with the idea based on frequent requests from readers for some kind of event involving all the Marvel characters.
The story is simple: A space being of immense power is curious about Earth’s superheroes and super-villains, so he teleports Marvel’s A-list heroes to an artificially constructed planet called “Battle World” and orders them to fight to the death. “I am from the beyond!” Kill your enemies and everything you desire will be yours! Nothing you dream of is impossible for me to achieve,” he tells them.
The simple premise heralded huge changes for Marvel’s then status quo. Most famously, Battleworld is where Spider-Man picked up his black suit, which of course turned out to be the Venom symbiote. But the series also resulted in She-Hulk replacing The Thing as a member of the Fantastic Four, some interpersonal drama among the X-Men, and The Hulk suffering injuries that restored his uncontrollable raging version.
Of course, the X-Men don’t exist in the Marvel Cinematic Universe yet, so if we had to guess, Secret Wars is how we’ll meet them for the first time. Easy enough to be kidnapped along with everyone else for an echo of when Tony, Doctor Strange and Peter Parker met the Guardians of the Galaxy in Avengers: Infinity War.
One thing, though: The fact that Kang is the main villain of whatever Phases 4 and 5 turns out to be suggests that it will be him, or rather one of Kang’s seemingly endless time-traveling variants, who puts together the new version of The Avengers instead of Beyond.
Speaking of Kang, Kang Dynasty takes its name from the 16-part Avengers storyline written by the great Kurt Busiek that ran from 2001-2002. In it, Kang, in short, returns from the 30th century and actually succeeds in taking over the entire planet Earth – destroying the United Nations headquarters in the process. Of course, the Avengers eventually stop him, but at great cost.
Avengers: Age of Ultron (Marvel) Marvel Studios Marvel Studios
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