Let's think. You're Marvel. You have just made cinematic history by bringing together a multi-franchise cast of characters to gather in one film,
Marvel's The Avengers. What should you do now? Making an
Marvel's The Avengers 2 is invertible but is it all of Phase 2? Lets see what we can piece together.
Naturally most of you have heard about a little film called
Guardians Of The Galaxy by now. As announced at the last SDCC,
Guardians Of The Galaxy is headed to a theater near you in 2014. Okay, so this means that Peter Quill, Rocket Raccoon, Drax, Gamora, and Groot are all going to appear in
Marvel's The Avengers 2? No, of course not, that's silly and stupid. But if you take it that
Marvel Cinematic Universe is framed around the Avengers that's what you'd have to think.
Marvel's The Avengers 2 already will have its hands full of characters it needs to add to the roaster, with Ant-Man (Scott Lang), Giant Man (Hank Pym), Wasp (Janet van Dyne), Ms Marvel (Carol Danvers), Black Panther (T'Challa), and Vision, being just a few of the fan favorites and some of the more famous Avengers. But what if the Avengers are only part of the story? What if they aren't the biggest story in Phase 2?
The first time I started thinking this way, I was wondering how they could sum up the whole
Infinity Gauntlet story arc in an Avengers film. The conclusion I finally came up with was, they couldn't. The Avengers alone would be so out gunned by Thanos with the Infinity Gauntlet it would be ridiculous, even throwing the Guardians of the Galaxy in there it wouldn't add to the threat much. More on that later. So is Marvel either going to do a half-cooked adaption of the
Infinity Gauntlet or are their plans bigger than The Avengers?
I then thought of
Inhumans. There has been some talk about doing an
Inhumans movie for some time. Now before you say
Inhumans are dumb characters I recommend you read this story arc
here. You don't need any prior knowledge of the characters etc. that story arc will introduce them to you and show you why they're interesting. Kevin Feige has stated many times that these characters were possible candidates for their own film. And according to
It'sOnTheGrid the story synopsis is thus.
Aliens who were put on Earth as sleeper cell aliens to eventually call back their race to take over the planet. Ultimately, the group of aliens fully assimilates and don’t want to cause war.
Obviously the story has been somewhat changed in this synopsis but I would say that it would fit nicely in the MCU this way and done right, it could be a better adaption to their very confusing origin story. It would give good ways to introduce the Kree, possibly have Captain Marvel play a part in it and/or have a Ms Marvel cameo as her origin story is very Kree based.
My next thoughts were, “Well what about all the movies for Doctor Strange, Iron Fist, Namor, Nova and even the possibility of a new
Incredible Hulk movie?” They have all been talked about by Marvel, so what do they have in common? Well, let's think. Do they belong to a team? Yes,
The Defenders.
Building the franchise not unlike
Marvel's The Avengers, with each character having their own solo movie, then building up to a team movie, would be the best direction to go with these characters. Who would be the villain for all the Defenders to team up against? Annihilus. They could do an adaption from the
Annihilation story arc with Annihilus trying to take over the Galaxy, and having Nova (Richard Rider) becoming the last of the Nova corps. This type of story would easily fit the sort of haphazard like team the Defenders are. Because they are not really a team, they're more just people thrown together at the last minute to defend us.
Now, if Marvel is going ahead with all these team films, what is their plan? Now, I think would be a good time to talk about Thanos. Yes, this is where I think the MCU is headed. How can Marvel do the
Infinity Gauntlet story arc? Build up all these teams, then have the teams team up against a threat to the Universe. What I mean is an adaption of the
Infinity Gauntlet story arc which would bring the Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, Inhumans, and the Defenders together in a team up of teams which would be in a two part movie.
Need more explanation? Here is what I'm guessing is the big picture line up of the MCU.
2008
Iron Man
The Incredible Hulk
2010
Iron Man
2011
Thor
Captain America: The First Avenger
2012
Marvel's The Avengers
2013
Iron Man 3
Thor: The Dark World
2014
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Guardians Of The Galaxy
Ant-Man
2015
Black Panther
The Incredible Hulk 2
Marvel's The Avengers 2
2016
Doctor Strange
Inhumans
Namor
2017
Iron Fist
Nova
2018
The Defenders
2019
The Infinity Gauntlet Part 1
2020
The Infinity Gauntlet Part 2
This is what I could see happening. This would give plenty of time to see more of Thanos, to build his character and his story before he gets the Gauntlet. It would also give enough time to introduce most if not all the needed characters by the time the
Infinity Gauntlet movies came around.