We’re still several movies away from the end of Phase Three, but the suits at Marvel Studios are already planning ahead and working on films for Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Once Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers 4 bring the story up until now to a close, the next Phase of the franchise is free to introduce some fresh properties, and as we’ve heard on more than one occasion now, the studio’s very interested in a pic based on Jack Kirby’s Eternals.
For those who don’t know, the Eternals are a race of god-like humanoids descended from primitive humans who were experimented on by the Celestials. Their mutated counterparts are known as the Deviants. It would be fairly natural to introduce the species in Phase Four, too, as the concept of the Celestials has already been seen in the Guardians of the Galaxy movies. Not only that, but in the comics, Thanos is actually a Deviant, cast out by the Eternals of Titan due to his disfigured appearance.
It seems as if Marvel’s hoping to get things in motion on the project sooner rather than later, as The Hollywood Reporter is telling us tonight that they’ve already hired two writers to pen the screenplay. Those would be Matthew and Ryan Firpo, “whose spec script Ruin shot to the top of the 2017 Black List.” No further details were disclosed, but at the very least, this shows us that the studio’s serious about an Eternals movie and we might see it sooner than we think.
In fact, after watching Avengers: Infinity War, it’s actually quite easy to figure out how the race might fit into the MCU. Apart from the inclusion of Titan, Thanos’ homeworld which was home to one race of Eternals, the film also name-checks an important member of the species from the comic books.
If you’ll recall, when the Mad Titan meets Red Skull on Volmir, as he searches for the Soul Stone, Captain America’s former enemy immediately identifies him as “Son of A’Lars.” A’Lars, for those who don’t know, is Thanos’ father in the source material. More commonly known as Mentor, he’s also the founder of the Eternals colony on Titan.
Of course, there’s nothing to say that Josh Brolin’s big bad would even show up in Marvel’s Eternals movie, but the seeds are clearly being planted and with two writers now set, we imagine we’ll be hearing more on the project in the not too distant future.