Could Marvel’s New Avengers Comic Be Tied to the MCU’s Plans?

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Just last week, Marvel announced the upcoming arrival of Superior Avengers, a new team of Avengers comprised of new takes on some of Marvel’s most dangerous villains, and led by Kristoff Vernard, son of Victor Von Doom. This new group of antiheroes will be working for Doom as part of the “One World Under Doom” status quo, and some fans believe it could shed light on plans for upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe storylines.

The MCU has biased more and more toward the very recent comic storylines, with movies based on Jason Aaron’s Thor run, Ed Brubaker’s Captain America run, and other stories that were published within just a few years of a film’s announcement or production. With Fantastic Four and Avengers: Doomsday both coming soon, fans are expecting big things from Doctor Doom on the big screen — and this new Avengers title set the stage for a perfect excuse to pair Robert Downey, Jr. with Chris Evans onscreen one last time.

Who Are Marvel’s New Superior Avengers?

Doom is arguably more powerful now than ever before.

As most Marvel Comics readers likely know, the idea of the Superior Avengers is rooted in Superman Unlimited writer Dan Slott’s Spider-Man lore. Years ago, when Dr. Octopus was at death’s door, he figured out a way to switch his brain with Peter Parker’s. Doc Ock became Spider-Man, doing the job with ruthless efficiency and making no apologies for it. Meanwhile, Peter was trapped inside a near-comatose body, helpless to stop his old foe. The series was controversial at first, but proved to be a fan favorite over time, and the Superior Spider-Man concept has been revisited a few times since.

The Superior Avengers title isn’t quite as elaborate as all that, but the idea is that Dr. Doom, now acting as Sorcerer Supreme and functionally the ruler of the world, needs his own team of Avengers to help him tackle crises that might arise. The title will feature new versions of The Abomination, Malekith, Ghost, Doctor Octopus, and Killmonger, and Marvel’s announcement posed the question, “Are they really who they claim to be? Where did they come from? And, most importantly, whose side are they really on?” Doom’s personal army of antiheroes is set to make for some interesting stories, but what’s more interesting is the concept of Doctor Doom as the head of an Avengers team.

Tony Stark and Steve Rogers Could Both Be Villains in Avengers: Doomsday

Could a Doom-led team of Avengers explain everything?

Ever since Robert Downey, Jr. was cast as Doctor Doom, fans have wondered whether Downey will be playing Doom as a new character, or as an Iron Man variant. After all, it’s convenient that your genius robotics expert should die, only for the same actor to be cast as a genius robotics expert. If the two characters turn out to be one and the same, then it would be even more compelling to see Downey lead a “Dark” or “Superior” Avengers team that features a twist on Steve Rogers as Captain America, giving him an alliance with Downey’s Doom.

Creating a team like this — using variants of existing characters — could also allow Doom to play with the multiverse, bringing back beloved baddies like Michael B. Jordan’s Killmonger and Alfred Molina’s Doc Ock. If that’s the direction it goes, this could not only explain the return of Chris Evans, but open up the door for the return of Scarlett Johansson as well. The opportunities for cameos, last goodbyes, and multiverse shenanigans are endless. Such a curtain call would also make sense, because these are the first big Avengers movies since the two-part “closeout” of Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame.

The MCU Could Be Headed For A Reboot After Avengers: Secret Wars

A Crisis-level event could give fans a chance to say goodbye to old favorites

In the comics, the Marvel Universe has had a “rolling timeline” since the 1960s, allowing for everything that has ever happened in a Marvel comic to simultaneously be “true” in the same universe, despite the fact that there isn’t really enough time, the Presidents were different, and so on. The movies don’t have the same kind of setup, though. Not only do the actors age in real time, but due to some time jumps and flashbacks, a significant amount more time has passed since Iron Man (2008) in the MCU than in our world. Characters have aged, had children, and even died.

That means in order to bring back beloved characters like Iron Man and Captain America, producers have to get creative. It isn’t just that they died, but also that the actors themselves are now 20 years older than when they started, and they don’t necessarily want to be exclusive to Marvel until the end of time. Marvel succeeded in making Iron Man and Black Panther household names, but imagining new portrayals so soon can seem unthinkable. If the theories are true, though, the MCU could get a clean — or at least partially clean — slate and a chance to reinvent some of those characters from scratch.

A New Avengers Movie Could Revitalize Interest in the MCU

Most of the new heroes aren’t generating Iron Man levels of enthusiasm.

The next Captain America movie is not tracking for big numbers at the box office, suggesting that the ecstatic reception to Deadpool & Wolverine may have been more of an outlier than a return to form for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Since 2020 or so, most Marvel projects have struggled to capture lightning in a bottle. Some projects have done better either critically or commercially than others, but in the post-Endgame world, it has been rare for Marvel to have an unqualified hit. Doubly rare when you look outside fan-favorite franchises like Spider-Man and Guardians of the Galaxy, leading the most pessimistic to pronounce the MCU dead.

Of course, Deadpool & Wolverine made over $1 billion last year, and even though it’s not going to beat Civil War‘s numbers, Captain America: Brave New World is on pace to beat out The Marvels and deliver a modest-but-respectable box office haul for Disney. The MCU may not be the juggernaut it once was, but “dead” is certainly overstating it. There also hasn’t yet been an Avengers-branded movie that didn’t make at least $1 billion at the box office, so it’s easy to see one that brings back Robert Downey, Jr. as a fairly safe bet.

A Steve Rogers/Tony Stark Reunion Is Exactly The Kind of Big Moment the MCU Thrives On

This could be the Multiverse Saga’s Mjolnir Moment

If Robert Downey, Jr.’s Doom ends up sharing the screen with Steve Rogers, one way or another, we know there will be fireworks. Will it capitalize on the two being best friends and co-founders of The Avengers? Will it lean into the conflict between them that happened during Civil War and defined years of the MCU? Or will producers go another, unpredictable direction entirely? At this point it will be quite a while before we have any kind of confirmation of the situation, but it’s exciting to dream up theories, and the new Superior Avengers book feels like… if not a clue, then at least a tie-in.

In any case, like DC’s upcoming Summer of Superman, it seems clear that Marvel is taking advantage of the enthusiasm around Doom and the MCU to capitalize with print projects that highlight the movies and try to draw on them for additional comics sales — or at least hype. After all, the connection between movies and comic sales is…let’s say not entirely clear. In any case, tuning in for Superior Avengers could very well point us in the direction of what Marvel Studios is doing next.

“}]] The Superior Avengers are coming…  Read More