Marvel Studios is calling dibs on another date in 2018. What's the movie? We have theories.
Four days ago, Marvel Studios surprised us all when they looked at the big calendar (the one that goes way out) and called dibs on a handful of far away dates, smiling evilly as people begged them to reveal what films would be released on those dates. Today, with SDCC starting up and the race for buzz supremacy ensnaring us all, Marvel pulled another ace from their sleeve and planted another flag in the calendar, this one on May 4, 2018.
Before I briefly offer up my thoughts on what this film could be, lets take a second to look at the new landscape for Marvel Studios over the course of these next four years.
August 1, 2014: Guardians of the Galaxy
May 1, 2015: Avengers: Age of Ultron
July 17, 2015: Ant-Man
May 6, 2016: Captain America 3
July 8, 2016: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
May 5, 2017: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
July 28, 2017: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
November 3, 2017: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
May 4, 2018: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
July 6, 2018: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
November 2, 2018: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
May 3, 2019: Untitled Marvel Studios Film
That’s a lot of freaking comic book movies -- three a year in 2017 and 2018 and twelve in the next half decade. And that’s just Marvel. Sony, Fox and Warner Bros. have their own plans, be they public or not. It’s stupefying, isn’t it? Remember when 2015 was going to bring all of us to tears with its fantastic largesse? Bigger just keeps getting bigger, but rather than worry about a possible backlash (though I do, on occasion… more and more), it might be better to accentuate the positives, because it’s not like this much product isn’t justified by the success of what they’ve already put out.
Here’s my theory, and it’s not at all unique: opening this many slots has to signal that we’re about to see the landscape get blown up a bit. Guardians has, from the moment it was announced, signaled that the Marvel Universe was going to go beyond the meat and potatoes characters and Ant-Man and Doctor Strange are other prime examples, but I think at this point, there are a lot of people who are eyeballing those circled dates and wondering when we’re going to see a bit more diversity in the Marvel Movie Universe.
It’s time for the Carol Corps to get the Captain Marvel movie that they all (and we all) deeply deserve. The one that will, in the right hands, utterly obliterate any dim theories that a female audience won’t show up for a superhero/comic book movie, especially since they always do show up, usually making up somewhere between 40 and 45% of the audience.
It’s time for a Black Panther movie. Whether John Boyega’s Twitter campaign to play T’Challa works or it doesn’t, going to Wakanda is a must for Marvel.
Sure, this could be something as basic as Iron Man 4 or maybe even the Namor situation got less complicated -- we don’t know yet, but while we all expect Marvel Studios’ panel to inspire a wall rattling response from the gathered fans in Hall H on Saturday, their victory will feel more full and they will look all the more ambitious if they fill up the calendar with more films that break the supposed mold.
Lets forget, for a moment, the importance of having heroes that all people can identify with. That’s not the main reason why you make these movies. You make these movies because these are great characters and if Marvel is going to stay golden and immune from a backlash, they’ve got to be the ones that lead the way when it comes to putting out films with characters that are not already firmly established in the mainstream. They’ve taken the first steps, now its time to put an exclamation point on the thing.
Either way, we should have some answers on Saturday night as Marvel tells us what we’re all going to be obsessing about for the next half-decade of our lives.
Oh, and we have plenty more theories here.
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