This last Saturday, at San Diego Comic-Con, Marvel Studios had their presentation. With it came a lot of the expected news. Anthony Mackie and Harrison Ford trying to sell us on Captain America: New World Order (2025)—because the trailer didn’t do a great job of doing that—and Florence Pugh and David Harbour attempting to convince us that Thunderbolts (2025) is totally worth getting hyped for. And of course, a whole bunch of information regarding Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025), including a teaser that has since leaked. But they waited for the very end to drop the big bomb, and I don’t think anyone could’ve guessed that (at least not in sincerity). The titles for the next two Avengers movies are Avengers: Doomsday (2026) and Avengers: Secret Wars (2027), which will both release in May 2026 and 2027, respectively. And as the name Doomsday may suggest, the new big bad of the Avengers will be Dr. Doom, played by none other than… Robert Downey Jr.?
While a core audience of Marvel superfans certainly got very excited over the announcement, I think it’s fair to say that more than a few people had a very similar reaction to mine, which was complete befuddlement. Followed almost immediately by the realization that the MCU was done once and for all. There couldn’t be a more obvious press of the big red emergency button on a major public stage, sloppily masked as another era-defining moment that welcomes deafening cheers from its audience, and maybe worst of all, cheer they did.
Before I go any further, I want to emphasize that I’m not writing this from a place of hatred. I care about these silly little movies, or I used to, at the very least. I was 6 when Iron Man (2008) came out, and I was 17 when Avengers: Endgame (2019) was released. And I watched all 22 of those films at the cinema opening weekend with my dad. I mean, I used to be obsessed with them. And while there’s a part of me that has certainly outgrown them, they are without question one of the main reasons why I care about movies as much as I do now, and they still have an important place in my heart. And even after the release of Avengers: Endgame (2019), I wasn’t done with the MCU. I defended them, confident that they could continue to build on what could’ve been a great finale.
By now, we all know that’s not what happened. Sure, there’s a layer of nostalgia here, as well as aging and a change of taste, but there has undeniably been a decline in quality, and it seems even Kevin Feige has had to admit that, even if he doesn’t want to say it out loud. Bringing back Robert Downey Jr., Joe and Anthony Russo to direct, and even bringing back screenwriter Stephen McFeely. It is an attempt to get back to when things still worked – because they haven’t worked in a while. And the only times they have worked, at least at the box office, has been with nostalgia cameos brought to us by the multiverse.
Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) brought back basically the entire Spidey crew from the past, whether hero or villain. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2021) had the Illuminati, and Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) has Hugh Jackman back as Wolverine, as well as other surprises I won’t spoil given the recency of its release. All of them use the multiverse and its variants for only one thing; to bring back familiar faces often in sacrifice of even just decent writing. So with all of that, let me acknowledge that, of course, Robert Downey Jr. or a Tony Stark variant as Dr. Doom could make for an interesting story. What doesn’t with good enough writers? But given the MCU’s history with the multiverse and familiar faces that return as variants, why would I give them the benefit of the doubt? It’s a move to somehow get people interested again by pulling from the past before things started going bad. Because the MCU hasn’t been able to move forward, any attempt to build something new in a post-Endgame world has failed dramatically. But how long can you sustain this cycle of nostalgia before you run out of recognizable faces?
The desperation of this move becomes especially apparent once you look at what Marvel Studios has been willing to give to get RDJ and the Russos back on their side. According to Variety, the Russos are getting a nice $80 million to return for Avengers: Doomsday (2026) and Avengers: Secret Wars (2027), while Robert Downey Jr. is getting “significantly more” than that, alongside plenty of other perks on the productions. So just the salary for these three alone is about the same, if not more than the entire budget of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024). And just Robert Downey Jr. alone seems to get paid a number that’s close to the entire budget of Oppenheimer (2023). These numbers are truly ridiculous and the kind you very rarely, if ever, get to see, even on a production of this size. Numbers you’re only willing to pay if you don’t see another way.
It’d be remiss of me not to mention another infuriating aspect of this casting. For just a second, let’s ignore the Tony Stark and nostalgia cameos of it all. Victor von Doom is Romani, and the ethnic cleansing that his people had to endure is no small part of his background and motivations. It absolutely should not be removed from his character, the same way you should never remove the Holocaust from Magneto’s past. It’s disappointing to see the MCU ignore all of this so blatantly in favor of the familiar face, especially because this is far from the first time the MCU has whitewashed its Romani character with their casting. Marvel Studios and Disney at large love to pretend that they’re diversifying the casts of their movies, but they only care so far as it makes them money.
But let’s look at the other side for a moment. We know who the villain is, but who are the Avengers supposed to be? Sure, there are a few old faces that are still around. Doctor Strange, Spider-Man, and Sam Wilson’s Captain America. But who’s realistically going to form the future of the MCU? The Eternals with Harry Styles? Hulk’s Son? Agatha Harkness? The sheer number of characters that have been introduced in Phase 4 that we’ll more than likely never see again is depressing. If I had to guess, the Secret Wars will look more like something along the lines of Nicolas Cage’s Ghost Rider, Ben Affleck’s Daredevil, and Michael B. Jordan as a T’challa variant than anything even resembling something new and exciting for the future of this universe. Just looking at the slate of upcoming MCU movies is depressing. None of these are real movies, just some fancy logos behind which years of development hell are hidden (looking at you, Blade (2025) and Armor Wars (2026)). And only doubling down on what already worked, because three new Wakanda projects is how you honor the late Chadwick Boseman, I guess.
The MCU has no future, and it’s slowly but steadily degrading its past. We all knew that; we’ve all been feeling it for a while. Martin Scorsese’s comments about theme park attractions ring more true than ever, and the overwhelming cynicism regarding the MCU is getting harder and harder to deny. Kevin Feige claims he wants the MCU to be around for another 60 years, but not even he seems to truly believe that anymore. How else am I supposed to take an announcement that so blatantly admits that there’s no hope, no future for the MCU? Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean this is the end of the MCU quite yet; that would be too easy. There will probably be another decade of these, at least, rehashing and regurgitating the same few faces and characters. The multiverse, ironically, has made the MCU smaller than it’s ever been. But it’s clear that there will never be real life again in these dead remains of a once-industry-defining spectacle. The MCU is dead; long live the MCU.
