RUMOR: Disney Axes Ant-Man, Eternals, Captain Marvel Sequels

Movies

Some details on Bob Iger’s promised Marvel culling may have just dropped. Insider Daniel Richtman (whose blog is behind a paywall, so here’s the information courtesy of Bounding Into Comics) says that plans for three MCU films have been scuttled: Eternals 2, Ant-Man 4, and Captain Marvel 3/The Marvels 2. Supposedly, Bob Iger personally put the kibosh on Eternals 2 over Kevin Feige’s objections, saying it was a guaranteed money loser. But given the box office performances of The Marvels and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, further sequels to those films were seen as too risky, too. This is an interesting development considering a recent interview with Captain Marvel actress Brie Larson, who, when asked if she knew anything about her next MCU appearance, seemed to disassociate herself from the brand:

If this is true, it’s a signal that Bob Iger may not hold Kevin Feige in as high a regard as he once did. I don’t think he’s going to remove the Marvel Studios president anytime soon, but he appears more willing to overrule some of his questionable decisions. On what planet does Feige think Eternals 2 would be a good idea? The first one was such a snooze people slept through that gay kiss that was supposed to save lives or something. The characters were duller than a blank sheet of paper, and I can’t imagine that throngs of moviegoers wanted to know what happened to them next. Since Eternals, fans often commented that there was no mention of the hand and head of a Celestial sticking out of the ocean in any of the subsequent Marvel movies. The Marvels was a walking meme before Madame Web came around to overshadow it, and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania single-handedly torpedoed the plan to make Kang the Conqueror the new central MCU villain (something his appearance on Loki should have done beforehand), so it’s not a big surprise that they’re leaving those series alone.

But this isn’t necessarily the death knell for the characters, as Bounding Into Comics points out. I don’t think we’ll see the Eternals again, but Ant-Man and the Wasp will probably show up in future films, and unless Brie Larson really wants out, I’d be surprised if Kevin Feige doesn’t force her into another movie where she doesn’t belong as he did with Avengers: Endgame. The same goes for the other two Marvels that make up the Marvels from The Marvels; for some reason, the media is pushing the idea that Ms. Marvel is mega-popular, but I really don’t think she is. She’s just a character they’re desperate to make a thing, but so far, she’s been in one TV show and one movie, neither of which most people saw. And Monica Rambeau was such a non-entity they didn’t even bother to give her a superhero name. (How’s that for inclusive?) I tend to think this will fall in line with a shifted focus on the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, with some others like Spider-Man around as well. But they’d better be good movies, otherwise Disney will be back in this same position a few years down the road.