What Does Robert Downey Jr.’s Casting as Dr. Doom Mean for the Future of the MCU?

Some things are simply inevitable, like death, taxes, and Thanos. Anyone following the Marvel Cinematic Universe over the past four or five years would likely have also added Robert Downey Jr.’s eventual return to the franchise he helped usher into existence. Well, that moment has finally arrived sooner than anyone expected and in a fashion no one can believe.

At Comic-Con 2024, Marvel revealed that Robert Downey Jr. is returning to the MCU and has been cast in a central role in the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday. Here’s the thing, though: he won’t be starring as Tony Stark or Iron Man. Instead, he’ll bring to life the evil machinations of one of Marvel’s most infamous villains, Dr. Doom. This news was met with shock, followed by admiration, and then, inevitably (there’s that word again) blowback. Is Robert Downey Jr.’s return to the MCU good for the franchise?

Who Is Dr. Doom?

The Big Bad Marvel Fans Have Been Waiting For

First introduced in Fantastic Four #5 by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Joe Sinnott, Doom’s full name is Victor Von Doom, and he’s a genius-level scientist from the fictional European country of Latveria. More often than not, Doom has served as the main antagonist to Reed Richards and the rest of his family, the Fantastic Four. Having met Reed Richards during their college days, at first, Victor was a friend, but following a lab accident that leaves him horribly scarred, Victor dons a metal mask and a suit of armor, becoming the egomaniacal Dr. Doom.

As the dictator of Latveria, Dr. Doom demands nothing short of power, control, and acknowledgment that he’s the absolute best at everything. Whether using his vast intellect to travel through time, conjure up deals with demons, or occasionally put aside differences with the Richards to defeat a common foe, Doom’s endgame is always at the forefront of his mind.

That said, Dr. Doom and Robert Downey Jr.’s former character in the MCU, Tony Stark, share more than a few things in common. Much like Tony, Doom is eccentric, a charismatic megalomaniac determined to ensure things turn out precisely as he has planned them. In particular, in alternate universes, the two men have even seen their destinies intertwined, and, in the main Marvel continuity, Doom filled in for Tony as Iron Man for a short period during the Infamous Iron Man series.

Regarding the movies, Dr. Droom has been portrayed on-screen twice before, first by Julian McMahon in the 2005 Fantastic Four movie and then by Toby Kebbell in the often-forgotten 2015 reboot. It’s probably pretty safe to suggest that even though those performances have more or less already been forgotten to time, they’re about to become even more so once Downey Jr. finally takes the stage as Victor Von Doom.

How Did the MCU Arrive at This Decision?

A Doomsday Scenario

Casting Robert Downey Jr. as Dr. Doom is a purely reactionary move on Marvel’s part. At Comic-Con in 2022, the next Avengers films were announced as Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars. While the latter title suggests that Dr. Doom was likely always part of the franchise’s grand design, the former film was meant to focus not on Doom but on Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror.

First introduced in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, Kang was set to serve as this new phase of the MCU’s big bad, but real life got in the way. Not only did Quantumania underperform at the box office last year, but Majors was charged and found guilty of misdemeanor charges of assaulting his ex-girlfriend, precipitating Marvel to release him from his contract and pivoting in a new direction. The formerly titled Avengers: The Kang Dynasty has been renamed Avengers: Doomsday and will be bringing back the Russo brothers in the directors’ chairs.

Will the MCU’s Dr. Doom be Connected to Iron Man?

A Demon in Armor

Ever since Marvel announced Fantastic Four, Dr. Doom’s arrival has been all but a formality. What wasn’t expected was that the studio would cast the former heroic face (and easily the most beloved actor in their franchise’s history) as its next mainline villain. How this will shake out hasn’t been clarified, but intriguing possibilities exist.

The recently retitled Fantastic Four: First Steps has been confirmed to occur in an alternate universe outside the MCU’s primary setting. Due to Doom’s close ties to the Fantastic Four, the MCU’s Dr. Doom will likely also originate from this universe. That could mean that the cleanest way to tell this story would be to make this version of Doom an evil, alternate version of Tony Stark. After all, even the version of Tony that all MCU fans know and love had his moments where he strayed from his more heroic qualities, suggesting that somewhere in the multiverse is a different version of Tony, more willing to succumb to his base desires.

Another possibility is that Dr. Doom might look like Tony Stark but otherwise be unrelated to him. More often than not, Doom spends his time hidden behind his mask, and it’s possible that his face might never be seen and that Robert Downey Jr.’s only task will be to bring him to life through a voice-only performance. Would Marvel have made such a big deal about Robert Downey Jr.’s return to hide him behind a mask forever? It seems unlikely. Complicating matters is that the Russo brothers confirmed this version of Dr. Doom will still be named Victor Von Doom, which reduces the likelihood that he will be an evil alternate version of Tony while increasing the probability that Downey Jr. has been cast for his voice and not his visage.

It’s also worth mentioning that there are versions of Dr. Doom in the Marvel multiverse who are Tony Stark. One is Iron Maniac, an alternate version of Tony Stark first introduced in 2004’s Marvel Team-Up #3 by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman and Scott Kolins. A few years later, a similar idea was revisited in What If? Iron Man: Demon in Armor #1 by David Michelinie, Bob Layton, Graham Nolan, and Mark Pennington. In that latter issue, Doom swapped bodies with Stark during their college days.

The most likely justification for Doctor Doom being played by the same actor as Tony Stark is that he’s a variant. In the MCU, variants are separate characters who look like other, well-established names (like Iron Man) but have lived different lives due to alternate choices made in other timelines. For instance, despite having a different name, Sylvie is a variant of Loki featured on the popular Disney Plus television series, which introduced the concept of variants to the MCU.

It’s Been Mixed, to Say the Least

The reaction to the bombshell news that Robert Downey Jr. is returning to the MCU has been a bit of a mixed bag. During the announcement at Hall H during Comic-Con, the room erupted into furious applause akin to a large wrestling pop. In other words, people seemed incredibly excited.

However, on the internet, it was a different story. Some fans expressed concern that the casting could change Doom’s backstory, assuming that he is a Stark variant. Meanwhile, other trepidatious fans are concerned that this new role of Dr. Doom undercuts Robert Downey Jr.’s legacy as Iron Man while diminishing the opportunity for other new actors to leave their mark on the franchise.

Fans can’t deny that Marvel is at least trying something unexpected and new by rebooting Robert Downey Jr. as the franchise’s next big bad. The question is whether this is an organic decision dictated by storytelling needs or simply a cash-grab reactionary choice made thanks to diminishing box office returns since Downey Jr.’s initial exit. Considering Marvel’s recent downturn of success, it’s hard to imagine that the latter didn’t inform this decision.

What Is Marvel’s Plan?

Plotting the Future With Their Past

Now that Deadpool & Wolverine has hit theaters (and turned into an unqualified success), there’s a clear link to be drawn between the MCU’s present and its future: Its past. This is to say that Marvel appears to be moving forward with the MCU by turning their attention towards its distant history. Deadpool & Wolverine is a film constructed around drawing from Marvel’s cinematic history, specifically its 20th Century Fox history revolving around X-Men and Fantastic Four.

The gigantic box office success of Deadpool & Wolverine, not to mention the vast amounts of critical and audience acclaim of X-Men ’97 and Spider-Man: No Way Home, suggests that they might be on the right track. A franchise that used to be so future-focused (like post-credit scenes hyping upcoming releases) has turned its attention towards mining past glories. For some, that decision will be nothing more than admitting defeat. A concession that Phase Four and Phase Five of the MCU without Downey Jr. have not gone according to plan.

This return to nostalgia by the MCU was inevitable. As hard as it might be to believe, the MCU is now as old as Return of the Jedi was when The Phantom Menace was first released. But just because this decision might reek of creative concerns doesn’t mean that people won’t show up to watch. It also doesn’t mean that Marvel can’t pull something spectacular off and make us fall in love with the MCU all over again. It does, however, run the risk of diminishing the MCU’s future in the hopes of bolstering its present.