Marvel Is Planning Their Next Ten Years Of Movies And Shows

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been very good at playing the long game. Their earliest movies -- 2008's Iron Man, 2010's Iron Man 2 and 2011's Thor and Captain America: The Last Avenger all were designed with a massive teamup in mind (that came together in 2012's The Avengers. From there, they introduced new characters: Dr. Strange, Ant-Man, the Black Panther, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel and Spider-Man, all of whom appeared in 2018's Avengers: Infinity War and/or 2019's Avengers: Endgame. Since then, they've introduced a number of other characters, including Shang-Chi, the Eternals and Moon Knight, with Ms. Marvel and She-Hulk set to debut with Disney+ series later this year.

And earlier today at CinemaCon, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige premiered new scenes from Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness, which opens on May 5,  and discussed Marvel's future. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Feige said he came directly from Marvel Studios’ first in-person creative retreat in three years. The event, he said, featured a giant board “that takes us through the next decade, and they are unique and special and they are meant for your theaters.”

Of course, Marvel will still create programming for their streaming TV channel, Disney+, which has already run seasons of Wandavision (which continued Wanda Maximoff's story after Endgame; we'll see her next in Doctor Strange), The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (which continued Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes' stories following Endgame), Loki (which followed the story of a "variant" Loki, and explores the "multiverse," a concept that we'll see more of in Dr. Strange and, surely, in more Marvel shows and movies in the years to come) and What If...? (the animated anthology that explores several different multiverses). It's currently closing in on the finale of Moon Knight, which introduced the titular character.

Marvel's upcoming schedule, beyond Doctor Strange, includes Ms. Marvel on Disney+ (the season starts on June 8), Thor: Love and Thunder (in theaters July 8), Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (in theaters November 11). Disney+ hasn't yet announced the start date for She-Hulk, or when the Guardians Of the Galaxy Holiday Special will premiere.

For years, there's been lots of talk among fans of Marvel's Netflix TV shows about how they fit into the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe... if they do at all. In the early seasons, there were definite references to the films -- New York Bulletin reporter Ben Urich (Vondie Curtis-Hall) had reported on "The Battle of New York" (as seen in the first Avengers film). Jessica Jones name-dropped "the big green guy and the flag-waver." Luke Cage also mentioned "the big green guy and his crew." But the MCU never seemed to notice Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Danny Rand or the Punisher.

SPOILERS AHEAD IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN HAWKEYE AND SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME.

Part of this came down to real-life corporate politics. Kevin Feige used to be "just" the President of Marvel Studios, but his department apparently didn't have much communication with the television division. Allegedly, he didn't like the television division and was interested in continuity with their storylines. But now, in addition to his role with Marvel Studios, he's also the Chief Creative Officer for Mrarvel Comics, Marvel Television and Marvel Animation. To quote another classic franchise, he became the one boss to rule them all. Now he's able to oversee story arcs from characters who may go from movies to TV shows back to movies. For instance, Elizabeth Olsen's Wanda's story went from Avengers: Endgame to the Wandavision series on Disney+, and we'll see her next year in Dr. Strange In The Multiverse of Madness (and she appeared in a post-credits scene after Spider-Man: No Way Home). Anthony Mackie's Sam Wilson went from Endgame to the  Falcon and the Winter Soldier series  and we'll see him next in Captain America 4. 

But within one week in our timeline, we've seen two references to the Netflix characters, thrilling fans of those shows. But are the Netflix shows (all of which were canceled) part of the MCU's canon? Will it turn out that the Netflix shows were part of another, darker, timeline? (If that doesn't make sense, you should binge-watch Loki.) Time will tell. But here are the characters -- and the actors who play them -- who we want to see again (and, TBH, two that we're ok with never seeing again).