Thanks to COVID-19, Marvel Studios has had to shift around its entire Phase 4 slate, with another round of delays coming our way last night. Now, Black Widow and Eternals are arriving in theaters a whole year after their original release dates, while Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings has slipped even further down the calendar into next July.
The Falcon and The Winter Soldier was supposed to arrive on Disney+ last month, but that's also slipped into 2021, and WandaVision is now set to be the first Marvel TV show to hit the streamer.
Black Widow is, of course, a "prequel" set between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War, but it's still widely believed that the movie will have ramifications for The Falcon and The Winter Soldier. As a result, there's some concern we now won't see that series until next summer; unfortunately, we're just going to have to wait and see what happens on that front.
In a story shared by Variety earlier this year, "Pushing 'Black Widow' affects nothing on the MCU timeline, said one individual close to Marvel Studios." At the time, they noted that was assuming it arrived before August, the original premiere date of the Disney+ TV series which introduces a new Captain America.
Would Marvel Studios really shift everything around just to protect a few subplots and perhaps an after-credits scene? It seems unlikely, but would Captain Marvel's role in Avengers: Endgame have made sense without that Captain Marvel stinger? Nope! This is the problem the studio now faces after creating a world that's connected in so many intricate ways.
For now, it seems the MCU's timeline is safe and that WandaVision can likely serve as a standalone story - well, until Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is released. Luckily, it seems fine for Eternals to come out after Shang-Chi. Moving forward, though, it's likely these movies and TV shows need to be released as soon as possible...and in the order originally intended!