So while I was mining one online rumor for a creative challenge, another was taking center stage. On the off chance you haven’t heard, Comic Book Movie was releasing what it says (potential spoilers, then, for most of this article) is a leak to the plot for Avengers: Doomsday, the first of two, possibly three, movies that sees the return of the Infinity Gauntlet duology’s directors and using a plotline that is not exactly celebrated by comic fans. That’s not a surprise given the only time they get anything from the comics it’s something comic fans weren’t happy about. Apparently the only time you’re allowed to take something from the comics is when you can screw it up and annoy the actual fanbase you should be courting. After all, they’re the ones who are most likely to go to the theaters and buy the merchandise unless you do something stupid like everything Marvel Studios does these days. Why wouldn’t you want to chase them off…if tanking the company and ending superhero movies as popular genre was your goal. I’m not putting it past them, mind you.
More popular reviewers than myself have already dissected the leak, which we can neither confirm nor deny even though it lines up with previous alleged leaks, so being a day late I’m not going to bother. We’ll still go over parts of it, but there’s something that every reviewer I follow has been missing out on. Maybe it’s because of things I’ve noticed about the entertainment industry lately. Maybe I’m going into some conspiracy theorist mode. Either way, and I’m trying to pad out the homepage as best I can, I see more than altering the landscape of the Marvel Cinematic Universe by using Secret Wars to pull a New 52. In their continuing self-important hubris I think the current creators of Marvel Studios are trying to be the only game in town, at least in fans’ eyes, which will backfire if I’m right. I don’t think this is just about altering the MCU. I think they’re going after all of Marvel media going as far back as the Captain America serials.
One example may be a coincidence born of willful ignorance, as there’s a producer whose name I keep forgetting that insists nobody who understands comics should be making their movies. The rest? It’s a result of everything wrong with Hollywood in general and Marvel Studios at current specifically. Right from the opening scene it’s clear what their real goal is, or I’m losing it. Frankly either or both is possible at this point. I did take time to geek out on multiverse numbers again, but I do so for good reason. First, let’s see how this begins.
Avengers: Doomsday begins in the reality that Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man calls home. He’s in the midst of a battle with Deadpool and Wolverine, who have been sent there by Beast with a device capable of destroying this world (similar to how the TVA would “prune’ timelines).
Wolverine manages to set the device and stays behind, perishing alongside the web-slinger. Deadpool, meanwhile, returns to his world, while we see Professor X watching on with sadness, as another planet falls.
However, the X-Men had no choice, as, similar to what we saw in Jonathan Hickman’s New Avengers run—which led directly into Secret Wars—you either save one reality or allow both to be destroyed in the Incursion.
In the comics it was the Illuminati, the collection of Marvel’s supposedly heroic genuses, that was responsible. This and later events in the story already annoyed some critics, as it turned out the already panned move by Steve Rogers to go back to the past with Peggy Carter was part of what started the incursions. So you have an event Captain America fans said Steve wouldn’t do because it goes against his sacrificing his personal life for the greater good, which we literally saw in the first Cap movie for the MCU, now being the cause of the incursions because a version of Loki prior to the end of the Disney+ series (I haven’t seen it) saved him and his family from the TVA by bringing them to another Earth in the multiverse.
Loki warns Steve about the TVA’s plans to prune his new timeline, and offers to move them to a world where they can safely hide because they don’t exist: Earth-828, the home of the Fantastic Four. Loki leaves the former Captain America with a card he can use to contact him, and he, Peggy, and Jim spend a happy 10 years there together.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps‘ post-credits scene is expanded on, and Doctor Doom tells Mister Fantastic about the Incursions and the fact that their universe is next. They figure out that someone is living in their reality who shouldn’t be there, and visit Steve, who agrees to join them on a trip to Earth-616, where he successfully convinces his world’s heroes to help Doom enact his plan.
Run while you still can, kids! (Also, Earth-21642)
I emphasised the destination for a reason. Starting with Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness they keep getting this wrong. And yes, it’s important for a number of reasons, including my theory of what Kevin Feige and company are trying to do. As I’ve pointed out numerous times, the MCU is NOT Earth-616, it’s Earth-199999. 616 isn’t just the “prime” Marvel Universe, it’s specifically the comics universe. In Marvel and DC Comics each Earth is assigned a different number. DC is Earth-1, so as a ribbing to their distinguished competition Marvel numbered their Earth as 616. Additionally, every alternate comic continuity, book, movie, television show, video game, children’s book, the old Hostess snack cakes ads, the Spidey Super Stories that tie in to The Electric Company–anything that doesn’t share a continuity exists as its own separate number. That makes every continuity canon to the Marvel multiverse, even the one where Spider-Man has a giant robot after getting powers from a space alien in Japan. Meanwhile, 616B is the home of the alternate Peter that mentors 1610B Miles in the Spider-Verse animated movies because Sony screwed that one up as well. I could go on, and maybe someday I’ll do an article just on that to point to since I mention it so often.
With this in mind, think of what we just saw. Critics have pointed out that this makes heroes into villains, who should be trying to avert the incursions without destroying planets and killing multiverses of people. After all, if they can stop an entire multiverse from colliding with another simply by destroying one planet, wouldn’t a bomb that powerful potentially move the universe away from theirs, thus NOT murdering an entire alternate reality? What they missed is that the Sami Rami Spider-Man universe (Earth-96283) just got blown up by the Fox X-Men universe (the chronologically confused Earth-10005) if this is where they’re getting Professor X, Deadpool, and Logan from. (The same Logan who learned to live and preserve Deadpool’s universe since now they’d have a Wolverine, or so I’ve heard.) This would match the cast list that includes Patrick Stewart, Ryan Reynolds, and Hugh Jackman, the original Fox version of these characters. They just kill off the Rami universe in the opening scene.
This is why I bring up the numbering so often. In the past none of the movies or shows cared about the numbers. I’ve not even heard that Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, a game that takes place with different Spider-Men to bring back classic VAs, the Web-Warriors storyline from the Ultimate Spider-Man cartoons, or any other story involving the multiverse (you’d be amazed how often that happens to a Peter Parker in cartoons) outside of comics ever paid attention to. And yet Marvel Studios, the ones now trying to ignore continuity despite that being the point of pre-Disney Marvel Studios, has decided they’re the REAL 616 because they’re the media that matters or just haven’t paid attention to how the gimmick works in the comics despite using it to New 52 the MCU.
Everyone seems to agree that this has to be Kevin Feige rebooting the Marvel Cinematic Universe so they can start over, like the New 52 did in DC Comics and the DC movies attempted to replace the Snyderverse with the Gunnverse organically through their The Flash movie, a remake of the “Flashpoint” storyline that led to the New 52. However, I don’t think they’re following completely. Deadpool & Wolverine and Spider-Man: No Way Home continued the idea that each universe has a different looking version of characters (due to the different actors), thus furthering the comic idea that each piece of media is part of the larger Marvel canon. By doing a story that leads to all of the other universes, and thus other movies, being wiped out sets up what I think the true goal is.
It seems Thor has told his fellow heroes about Doom’s true nature, as the Avengers, Fantastic Four, and X-Men arrive in Latveria ready to fight. The God of Thunder prays to Odin, who sends an army from Valhalla to join the battle, and war ensues as the Final Incursion begins.
There’s no stopping that, and everything is destroyed…apart from Doom. When he stole Loki’s heart, he stole his powers and now uses them to create Battleworld. Resurrecting the fallen, Doom erases their memories and makes it so that they only remember this new reality (where they have new lives in this false reality). With that, Doom sits on his throne as the God Emperor of Battleworld.
In the comics, Battleworld2 (of the Battlerealm Earth-15543 I just learned) was created using the Beyonder’s power, but they don’t have time to introduce him. So they’re apparently going with Loki. My question is…do you think they’re going to stop with the Marvel movies? Disney now owns Fox and thus the Fox X-Men movies. Sony still owns the rights to the Spider-Man movies, and I’m surprised they’d let one of their GOOD movies be wiped out, because it shows off what I believe is the goal: replacing all of past Marvel media with their new Marvel Cinematic Universe. When this Battleworld is re-separated, if it is and not just altered to the new MCU, will the Ramiverse be restored?
This movie did so well that Feige wants it gone.
Or as I’m guessing, will this mean the forthcoming Marvel movies will be the only considered Marvel media worth caring about? We’ve seen replacements in the past try to erase characters. We know the Marvel Studios of today has created versions of characters that don’t match the comics, like Silver Surfer Girl, Shang-Chi, and probably the biggest alteration, Echo. Meanwhile they keep Riri Williams because they like the evil girl and believe all black teenage girls act the same, and now they’re using the Secret Wars version not on most fans’ favorite stories list.
I already theorized that they want to replace the existing MCU with one minus the Marvel movies made under the old regime. Ike Perlmutter and Avi Arad, both realizing that fealty to the source material doesn’t mean losing audiences AND does make fans more willing to see the movie, buy the stuff, and push the movies by word of mouth with free promotion, started the only good committee in Hollywood. They pushed loyalty to the source material but still allowed for a unique take. And what first proved that could work? Sam Rami’s Spider-Man movies, outside of the Venom stuff Rami didn’t want and the switch to organic webbing for some dumb reason. I suggest that the goal is to wipe all the previous media off, either kill the characters off or drain the heroism from those versions like we’ve seen with other heroes they’re trying to replace with the “modern” character because they don’t know how branding works or why people love those previous heroes.
Marvel media goes as far back as the 1940s serial (Earth-600001) and there are a ton of alternate universes according to the comic numbering system based on movies. I think Feige wants to wipe them out along with the pre-Disney MCU. Feige was happy to be rid of the continuity committee, to allow him and his friends to replace the comic loyalty with their own takes because the studios still don’t let them make their own IPs. So they take the stories they really want to make and use a brand name to push it, which Hollywood has done for decades. This isn’t a new phenomenon. Look at the 1990s Super Mario Brothers for example. So now they have a chance to toss out everything that happened prior because they screwed up the MCU badly and want to pull a DiDio and just restart everything so that the only universe that matters is what they make going forward.
If I’m right, then that plan will backfire miserably because all that will do is chase off more of the fanbase. “All that stuff you liked? #$%$# it, now you get nothing but our superior takes on these lousy comic characters and you’ll love them because it’s the Brand you like and we’re that amazing.” The very idea that Marvel Studios stood against is now how they operate, and I wouldn’t put it past them to damage every piece of Marvel from the comics to the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno Hulk to the Nicholas Hammond Spider-Man to the Japanese takes on Spider-Man. If they cared about cartoons, and modern Hollywood hates cartoons, they’d probably take those out as well. Marvel Studios has shown they follow their Disney masters in how little they care about what came before in favor of what they make now, and what they make is a mess. I could be wrong, and these leaks could prove either false or changed by the time Doomsday hits theaters. If not, I expect this attempt at revitalizing the MCU to fail miserably. They don’t understand why fans left and why casuals went with them. They don’t know how they’ve ruined superheroes. If those spoilers turn out to be genuine, expect the MCU to continue to fail. At this rate, I expect them to fail either way.
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