Avengers: Endgame may not have been a total reset for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it did dramatically shuffle the board. Iron Man and Black Widow are gone, Captain America is a happily-retired old man, Hawkeye returned to his family and Thor ventured off into space with the Guardians of the Galaxy, bringing a definitive end to the original core team of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
Given that Endgame officially became the highest-grossing movie in history and the Marvel Studios Comic-Con panel confirmed that Phase Four would be the first in the MCU that didn’t feature an Avengers movie, many people were speculating that the end of the Infinity Saga also meant the end of the team themselves.
However, Kevin Feige revealed in an interview shortly after the conclusion of the Marvel panel that the Avengers would return somewhere down the line, just in a very different guise to what fans are used to.
“It will be a very different team than we’ve seen before. That’s what Endgame was all about. It will be a very different incarnation of the team with some people you’ve already met and some you haven’t met yet.”
Unsurprisingly, the president of Marvel Studios was incredibly vague when it came to divulging information, but hinted that the seeds for the eventual Avengers 5 would be planted across Phases Four and Five, much in the same way Thanos was teased as the ultimate villain across the Infinity Saga.
“Well it’s what I love about the Marvel comic method of storytelling. That’s not anything we invented, I love that things build up, they build to a crescendo, they all get together, they separate, they change. And now we get to do that, not just in movies but in these mega event series on Disney Plus has just invigorated all of us at Marvel Studios to keep going.”
Even without the majority of the original team, the MCU still has plenty of superheroes to call upon when the Avengers eventually reunite. Spider-Man: Far From Home heavily implied that Peter Parker was Tony Stark’s heir apparent while Thor, Doctor Strange, Captain Marvel, Black Panther, Ant-Man and the Guardians of the Galaxy are all well-established heroes that could easily fit into the team.
And that’s without mentioning Sam Wilson’s Captain America, Phase Four debutantes like Shang-Chi or the Eternals, and possibly even Mahershala Ali’s Blade, the Fantastic Four or the X-Men.