Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame were genre-defining movies, and it’s the Multiverse Saga finale may be borrowing a key narrative choice.
Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Secret Wars could repeat Avengers: Infinity War’s narrative trick. Since Kevin Feige announced the development of Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars at 2022’s SDCC, the MCU has been setting up the epic conclusion to the Multiverse Saga, introducing several aspects of Marvel Comics’ crossover event throughout the MCU’s Phase 4. Speculation has been stirring about the magnitude of Avengers: Secret Wars’ storyline, but the sheer scale of the upcoming project is hitherto unknown.
Marvel Comics’ Secret Wars event brought together the majority of the Marvel Universe’s heroes and villains in the wake of an incursion that destroyed the multiverse. Collecting on Battleworld, a world comprised of fragments of the broken cosmos, Marvel’s characters were reimagined in a variety of ways while the primary heroes, including Reed Richards, Black Panther, Namor, and Doctor Strange, sought to take down the tyrannical Doctor Doom and restore the multiverse. Secret Wars was one of Marvel Comics’ biggest crossover events, and recent speculation implies that there’s one clear way to translate this effectively into the MCU, but this could be a problem.
Avengers: Secret Wars Could Be Split Into Two Parts
While Marvel Studios’ presentation at 2022’s SDCC revealed Avengers: Secret Wars as one major project, Inside the Magic recently reported that Secret Wars could be split into two parts. Back in the Infinity Saga, Avengers: Infinity War was originally set to be in two parts, but Marvel Studios changing the second part’s title to Endgame created a clear division. Nothing’s been confirmed, but, given the scope of the source material, it could be fitting for Secret Wars to be it’s own two-part story separate from The Kang Dynasty.
Marvel Comics’ Secret Wars Is Too Big For 1 MCU Film
Marvel Comics’ Secret Wars ran for nine months starting in May 2015 and brought together most of the Marvel Universe’s characters into one epic crossover storyline, becoming one of the largest and most world-changing comic storylines in history. To match the scope of the comics’ story, Avengers: Secret Wars is expected to feature several returning characters from the MCU’s past, as well as introduce many non-MCU characters into Marvel Studios’ shared franchise, such as Fox’s X-Men and Fantastic Four and Sony’s Spider-Man-related characters. Even more surprises could be in store.
The volume of characters expected to appear in Avengers: Secret Wars might mean that splitting the project in two could be the best choice. A lot of action takes place during Secret Wars’ complex narrative in Marvel Comics, and most of this will need to be told in the MCU’s Phase 6 for the story to make sense. Telling the storyline over two projects instead of one would allow the intricate details of Secret Wars to be told in full without any aspect of the storyline being rushed or forgotten.
MCU & Other Franchise Characters Can Get More Attention In Two Secret Wars
While Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame are widely regarded as strong films, they did receive criticism for not focusing on some of the more secondary characters enough. The Infinity Saga’s concluding projects centered mostly on the original six members of the Avengers, but a lot of other characters got lost in the crowd. If Avengers: Secret Wars is bigger than one project, this would allow Marvel Studios to avoid these issues at the end of the Multiverse Saga. Every character would be able to get some impactful moments and their fair share of attention.
The MCU’s Phase 6 could mark the perfect opportunity to close certain in a positive light, especially ones that, with the benefit of hindsight, weren’t given the sendoffs that they deserve. Creating strong connections between the MCU, Fox’s defunct franchises, and Sony’s Spider-Man Universe could also allow these other characters to get developed further in projects following Secret Wars without the film being split in two. In doing so, the entire superhero genre would be getting a boost.
Secret Wars Needs To Be The MCU’s Biggest Crossover Event
The fact that Avengers: Secret Wars could feature most of the MCU’s characters, past and present, and those from Sony’s Spider-Man Universe and Fox’s X-Men and Fantastic Four franchises mean that Phase 6 might produce the MCU’s biggest crossover event. Recent news suggests that the MCU will be shifting its focus onto “newness,” so Secret Wars could be gearing up to end several stories and set up new ones for Phase 7 and beyond. The potential for crossovers is simply massive.
Phase 6’s Secret Wars Repeating Infinity War Comes With Some Risks
Splitting Avengers: Secret Wars into two projects would allow the Phase 6 film to reimagine one of Infinity War’s strongest moments, but it comes with some risks. Since Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars were announced, comparisons have been made between the endings of the Infinity Saga and the Multiverse Saga, with many questioning how Phase 6 could beat the standard set by Infinity War and Endgame. With the Saga’s finale already being two films, splitting one up further risks the move coming off as repetitive. A cliffhanger ending, should any of the Phase 6 Avengers movies have one, may suffer from being too directly compared to Infinity War.
