We’ve been wondering what Avengers 5 will be about and when it’ll be released since the moment Steve Rogers had his dance with Peggy Carter at the end of Avengers: Endgame. Marvel has yet to reveal anything at all about the next major Avengers installment. The studio announced the first films and TV shows from the MCU’s Phase 4 a few months after the Endgame premiere, but it didn’t disclose any future Avengers projects. We explained at the time that Marvel will not just dump its most lucrative franchise, especially now that Fantastic Four, X-Men, and Deadpool are available for fabulous team-ups. But Marvel has to introduce plenty of new superheroes and add new Avengers team members before it can announce an Avengers 5 release date. The same goes for villains — we need scary new threats like Thanos.
Since then, we’ve heard all sorts of rumors and reports about Marvel’s Avengers plans. The studio has already warned that Avengers 5 will not have the same scope as Endgame, teasing that it hopes it’ll be able to offer a similar movie down the road after a massive buildup. But Avengers 5 might be a sort of reboot because so many original Avengers will be replaced.
It’s mid-2021 and Marvel hasn’t gotten around to making Avengers 5 announcements. The pandemic didn’t help, as Marvel postponed all of its Phase 4 movies by more than a year. But we now have a brand new Avengers 5 rumor that tells us the film is already “on the board,” and teases a potential launch timeframe.
Marvel ran an excellent teaser video a few days ago, reminding fans of some of the most iconic moments in the MCU so far and teasing the films that are coming soon. Marvel showed footage for Eternals for the first time, revealed the titles for the Black Panther and Captain Marvel sequels, as well as release dates for Ant-Man 3 and Guardians 3. Here’s another reminder of Marvel’s MCU movie schedule through 2023:
2021:
- July 9th: Black Widow
- September 3rd: Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
- November 5th: Eternals
- December 17th: Spider-Man: No Way Home
2022:
- March 25th: Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
- May 6th: Thor: Love and Thunder
- July 8th: Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
- October 7th: UNTITLED MARVEL PROJECT
- November 11th: The Marvels
2023:
- February 17th: Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
- May 5th: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
- July 28th: UNTITLED MARVEL PROJECT
- November 3rd: UNTITLED MARVEL PROJECT
YouTuber John Campea talked about Marvel’s teaser, wondering why some of the titles we already know are in the making have not been shown in the clip. The list includes Fantastic Four, Deadpool 3, Blade, and X-Men projects. The first Fantastic Four film was at least teased in the video. We expect it to drop in July 2023, according to previous rumors.
Campea reached out to an unnamed person who is supposedly familiar with Marvel’s plans, and he received this answer:
It’s basically the same reason Avengers 5 and Eternals 2 weren’t announced. They were only announcing those films up to 2023 that have verified release dates. There are over 20+ projects on the board.
If genuine, the answer implies that Fantastic Four will be released by the end of 2023, which is already great news. It also tells us that Eternals will have a sequel at some point in the future. But the most exciting detail concerns the Avengers. If this is accurate, the next movie in the franchise will not launch any earlier than 2024.
This gives Marvel plenty of time to prepare the audience for an Avengers team-up that might be unlike anything we’ve seen so far. As a reminder, Black Widow, Iron Man, and Steve Rogers are gone for good. Thor and Hawkeye might also retire soon, and their replacements are expected to be introduced in upcoming Marvel projects.
Also exciting is the fact that Marvel has more than 20+ projects “on the board.” Considering the answer above is related to Marvel’s promo clip and that clip was an ode to watching Marvel movies in theaters, these 20+ projects must be movies. The list above only includes 13 projects, which means Marvel has some big plans for the near future, having mapped the MCU’s next phases several years in advance. That’s not exactly a surprise, as we already know that Kevin Feige and Co. plan out several years of Marvel adventures when deciding the MCU’s fate. That’s the only way to make these films intertwined and ensure they contain the necessary hooks that tie them to the bigger MCU storyline.
As always with rumors, nothing is confirmed at this point. But if we don’t see an Avengers 5 announcement soon, it might be because the film is still several years out. Campea’s full video is available below.
