Kevin Feige lays out the future of the MCU
By Dan Selcke
The other day, Marvel uberboss Kevin Feige fielded questions about the MCU. Where is it going? What’s the plan? How do the new rash of TV shows fit into it? And so on?
Feige was happy to provide answers, although obviously he couldn’t reveal everything. Here are some highlights from the conference at the TCAs:
How did the pandemic affect production at Marvel?
2020 was a weird year for a lot of reasons, but one of the minor ones was that there was literally no new Marvel content. Happily, they’re making up for lost time this year. WandaVision is already on the air with several more Disney+ shows to follow, and movies like Black Widow, Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings will be hitting theaters.
“We were lucky if this had to happen it was last year because it didn’t mess up our storytelling,” Feige said, noting that there was going to be a break between Phase 3 and 4 of the MCU anyway. “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was the first series we started and we had the intention for it to go first, but [pandemic] delays in 2020 meant WandaVision went first and that had no impact on either series. Going forward, we hope to continue what we set out to do which is follow characters from series that then interact with features and some will go back into series with everything eventually on Disney+ where all of the Phases are right on Disney+. I love having that arena for fans and particularly for newcomers.”
Like I said, there are plenty of new Marvel shows coming this year. After WandaVision is over, we’ll get The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Then it’s time for Loki. The there’s What If…?, Ms. Marvel and Hawkeye, which is entering the backend of production now. And there’s more on the way in the years to come, with Feige noting that production on She-Hulk and Moon Knight are getting off the ground. “It’s been three years of developing shows for Disney+ and it’s been a burst of creative energy for us to enhance our universe and explore new characters in different and unique ways,” he said.
Will these Marvel shows have more than one season?
When it comes to how long they’ll run, it sounds like Marvel is taking an ad-hoc approach to its TV shows. WandaVision, for example, was always supposed to be a one-season thing, with Wanda’s story continuing in the upcoming movie Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, due out in 2022. But shows like Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk and Moon Knight may have longer lives. “There are shows that we are about to start filming where we are keeping in mind structure for a potential Season 2 or Season 3 in a more direct way, than WandaVision which leads into movie,” Feige said. “But all of this is new. Perhaps someday we’ll chart out five seasons of something but it’s one at a time right now.”
As for how long each season of these shows will run, Feige is committed to a six-hour format, but that can be spread out different ways. WandaVision, for example, is 9 episodes long, but the episodes themselves are shorter, which better fits its sitcom theme. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, on the other hand, is a straight six episodes. “The per-episode cost is very high so six [hours] feels like the appropriate number for us now,” Feige said.
Will any Marvel movies other than Deadpool 3 be rated R?
The MCU is generally a PG-13 kind of place, with Disney not wanting to potentially alienate younger crowds who might be shut out of R-rated movies. That said, when Disney bought 20th Century Fox and inherited the Deadpool franchise, it committed to keeping it as vulgar and violent as ever, as it should.
Might that encourage Marvel to experiment with other R-rated superhero fare? Is Captain Marvel going to drop an F-bomb or what? “Other than Deadpool, which has already established itself as a certain genre and a certain rating, that we already said we would not mess with when we started working on Deadpool—which we have—other than that, we haven’t encountered a story or a storyline or a character’s journey that a PG-13, or the tone, or the ratings we’ve been using up to this point has prevented us,” Feige said. “We haven’t been held back by [PG-13]. If we ever are, then certainly there can be a discussion that can be had now that there are other [outlets]. But that just hasn’t been the case. We’ve told all the stories that we wanted to with the tonality and the rating we have now.”
It sounds like most of the MCU will be kept PG-13, at least for now.
Will Netflix heroes like Daredevil and Jessica Jones ever cross into the MCU?
A lot of fans were upset when Netflix cancelled Marvel superhero shows like Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist and The Punisher. Those shows technically took place in the MCU, but Feige’s team didn’t make them. Word has been that the rights to these characters have reverted to Disney and that Marvel could bring them over into the MCU if they wanted, but Feige wouldn’t confirm that. “Some [rumors] are true and some are not true,” he said of all the buzz.
Still, he left the door open to crossovers down the line, saying simply “perhaps someday.”
And the year (decade?) of Marvel begins.
Next. Take the Black: George R.R. Martin’s new HBO show, WandaVision review and more. dark
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