Marvel Studios finds itself in a dilly of a pickle over Jonathan Majors, who plays the villain Kang in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Or at least he did before his criminal conviction for assault and harassment, for which he still has to be sentenced. Marvel and parent company Disney cut ties with Majors after that. Given that Kang was planned to be a major villain for the MCU, you have to wonder: who will replace Majors?
Deadline journalist Justin Kroll (Deadline being a consistently reliable source for entertainment news) has some insight, tweeting that whomever replaces Majors, we probably won't hear about it anytime soon. "There will be plenty of Marvel breaks in coming weeks on various fronts but don’t hold your breath on that one," he wrote.
"This isn’t dismissing any rumor this week about potential contenders for the role, I don’t have any intel on those being true or not true it’s just letting you know, if I were betting what gets announced first, Kang or the field, I’d put money on the field."
So far as rumors go, we've heard that actor Colman Domingo — known for his roles in Fear the Walking Dead and The Color Purple — is the top contender to replace Majors, but it's just a rumor. In fact, I don't think we can dismiss the possibility that Marvel might just decide to write Kang out of the MCU entirely and replace him with a different villain. Outlets like CBR seem to be interpreting Kroll's tweets as evidence that, at the least, Kang will still be around, just played by someone new. But I don't think that's quite what he's saying. We'll keep our ears to the ground.
Thunderbolts and Daredevil: Born Again get back underway
Meanwhile, Marvel rolls on. For instance, Sebastian Stan talked to Variety about returning to the role of Bucky Barnes, which he'll do in the upcoming film Thunderbolts, where Bucky is part of a super-team made of up antiheroes. “I’m excited," he said. "I’m going to go back basically in a month or so. I’ve missed it. It’s a great cast.”
Thunderbolts, which is due out in July of next year, has had to stop and start production a couple of times, but sounds like it's getting back on track. Maybe this movie can reverse what's been a bit of a rocky road for Marvel of late, what with movies like Ant-Man and the Wasp and The Marvels either underperforming or bombing. “The batting average is so high that it’s difficult to always land everything right away," Stan offered. "It’s always been a great experience. With this one in particular, I think there’s a lot of good things.”
Meanwhile, The Hollywood Reporter has it that production will start up again on Daredevil: Born Again, which has shut down by the writers and actors strikes last year and then put on ice for a minute after executives looked at the footage and decided to retool things a bit. Philip Silvera, who worked as the stunt and fight coordinator on the Netflix version of Daredevil, has returned, and Deborah Ann Woll and Elden Henson are now rumored to be coming back as Karen Page and Foggy Nelson. We already knew that Charlie Cox and Vincent D'Onofrio were returning as Daredevil and the Kingpin.
Both Cox and D'Onofrio recently appeared as Daredevil and Kingpin in the new Marvel show Echo, and the studio wants to keep that momentum going. Will all these tweaks result in a revival for a MCU? Stay tuned.
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