It’s been just over nine months now since the Disney/Fox merger officially came into effect, and we’re finally beginning to see evidence of the Mouse House integrating some of their newly acquired properties into the MCU.
Recent set photos from WandaVision, for instance, have teased the introduction of S.W.O.R.D., the space-based counterpart of S.H.I.E.L.D. And thanks to a newly shared pic from Twitter user Luke Hatcher, we can also confirm that another former Fox property has found its way into the upcoming Disney Plus series, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
The set photo in question overlooks a garden of sorts, where a red insignia consisting of a lion, a star and a moon can be seen on the side of the left wall. And as scoopster Charles Murphy recently pointed out, these three symbols unmistakably form the national flag of Madripoor, a fictional country located in Southeast Asia that was first introduced in the 1985 comic New Mutants #32.
So, it looks like Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes could be the first MCU heroes to visit the famed island. But what might they find there? Well, in the comics, there was a period where the nation was under the rule of HYDRA, suggesting that Captain America’s old enemies could be on the verge of another comeback.
What’s more, it’s perhaps worth noting that Madripoor featured heavily in the Wolverine solo comics of the 1980s. And while it still seems far too early to introduce the MCU version of Logan, feel free to speculate that Marvel is once more playing the long game as they lay the groundwork for the mutant’s eventual arrival somewhere down the line.
In any case, we’ll find out what an island in Southeast Asia has to do with the latest adventures of Sam and Bucky when The Falcon and the Winter Soldier comes to Disney Plus in the fall of next year.