What next for Marvel after Jonathan Majors sacking?

Tuesday 19 December 2023 by Jonathan Victoria  News

Marvel has decided to cut ties with actor Jonathan Majors just hours after he was found guilty of assault and harassment on Monday.

The news comes as no surprise as it was reported they would make this move when he was first arrested on 25th March this year. 

Majors was set to be the next big bad in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Kang, the Conqueror and appeared in numerous projects already, such as Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Loki season 2.

He had now been removed from all Disney projects, including the upcoming Magazine Dreams which debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival to mostly praise.

What next for the MCU?

Marvel had been slowly introducing Majors and his role of Kang, the Conqueror (also known as He Who Remains) into the MCU timeline.

Because of his role in the latest Ant-Man film and Loki series, Kang’s place in the MCU story is rather solidified, further complicating things now.

That’s not entirely Marvel’s fault, as the actors and writers’ strikes that went on this year meant they couldn’t rework their plans to write an exit plan for this worst-case scenario.

Marvel has not come out yet to explain what they will be doing going forward, although they will have time to think and work it through as their schedule only has one release coming for 2024, Deadpool 3, which actually could be the best thing for them.

Introducing the mutants

For a long time, it has been known that eventually, the MCU would incorporate other Marvel entities such as the Fantastic Four and X-Men after Disney purchased 20th Century Fox, where those characters used to exclusively reside.

Deadpool 3 will be the first full project that sees one of the mutants from the 20th Century Fox side of Marvel move over to the MCU. There has already been one crossover in the form of Professor Xavier, the head of the X-Men, appearing in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.

But the upcoming Deadpool 3, which will also feature fan-favourite X-Man Wolverine played by Hugh Jackman, is expected to open the door even more so. 

It is also known that a Fantastic 4 movie is coming, with filming set to begin in early 2024. So with that and the fact that Deadpool 3 is still filming, Marvel will likely be looking at their options, which may include bringing in a new big bad that is synonymous with the Fantastic 4.

Stick with Kang or switch to Doctor Doom?

It may be Doctor Doom's time to shine.

Doctor Doom is a powerful being in the comics. He first appeared as just a villain for the Fantastic 4 but eventually evolved to be something more, with many people saying that in a one-on-one fight against Thanos, he would be the victor.

While there are more powerful characters in the comics, the MCU doesn’t strictly stick to its paper counterpart, so it’s not out of the realm of possibility that they make Doctor Doom even more powerful to accommodate his new place as the main villain.

Marvel haven’t explicitly said they would be going with Doctor Doom, although rumours and supposed leaks from earlier this year suggest they are looking into it.

That’s not to say it will happen, though, as they could look to stick with Kang but obviously recast Jonathan Majors for the part.

It’s not unheard of in the MCU - if you think back to the first Robert Downey Jr Iron Man film, Terrence Howard played James Rhodes, who becomes the Iron Patriot but was replaced going forward by Don Cheadle.

That is a different situation of a much lesser magnitude character-wise than that of getting Majors out, but it shows that it can happen.

Whatever they end up doing, the likelihood is that the MCU calendar, which had already experienced some delays, will likely suffer some more due to having to figure out what they are going to do and how they can write the various upcoming projects to accommodate the change.