The Marvel Cinematic Universe uses the multiverse as a crutch, not a tool

Recent news that Chris Evans and Hayley Atwell will both be returning Avengers: End of the World made me feel… disturbed.

I know, I know – it’s unlikely they’ll come back as their sacred timeline characters. Instead, they will likely return as variants from another, far away universe. Perhaps Atwell will reprise her role as Captain Carter as she did in What if …? And Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Maybe Evans will return as Johnny Storm again, like he already did Deadpool and Wolverineor he will emerge as a never-before-seen version of Steve Rogers. Maybe he’ll just return as Skinny Steve™. I like Skinny Steve.

All in all, none of these options will work Really affect the continuity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the multiple returns of characters are par for the course in the comics. And yet Evans, Atwell and Robert Downey Jr. return in the next one avenger movie, so soon after all of their stories ended in the last avenger Movie, feels somehow wrong. Almost as if, after the rocky road the MCU has had over the last few years, it’s a throwback to the old days when people would buy MCU tickets months in advance and put their lives on hold to watch the latest Marvel Watch trailer on your phone.

Honestly, I get it and I’m not saying that everything the MCU has produced in the multiverse saga has been bad or pointless. Far from it! But that End of the world News paired with this year’s Deadpool and Wolverine Publication makes it clear to me that the MCU uses the concept of the multiverse as a crutch, not a storytelling tool. Bringing back familiar faces will surely attract people to the cinema, right? Variants are the answer to everything!

Audiences loved seeing the old Spider-Men Spider-Man: No Way HomeSo why not bring Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine back for the umpteenth time? (I say this as someone who really enjoyed it Deadpool and Wolverine– it made me smile on a shitty day). Why not bring back Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. and make people nostalgic for something that ended just a few years ago? Shang-Chi will have to wait for its sequel. The Eternals may never be heard from again. Mahershala Ali’s Blade will probably never make it to the big screen. It doesn’t matter as long as we can do it Avengers: End of the World and see Downey Jr. as Dr. Doom in action.

However, the multiverse isn’t just an excuse to bring back old actors. It should serve as a narrative framework. It’s a way to ask interesting questions. What if …? has the right idea, although some of the show’s concepts seem lacking or unimaginative. Instead, Marvel has created an incredibly complex web of terms and ideas, such as the sacred timeline, branching timelines, anchor entities, incursions, variants, nexus entities, absolute points, and more, to create an overarching story that is difficult to follow if you don’t keep up to date with the latest releases from the MCU.

I’ve realized that this is one of the reasons I’m so excited for the upcoming Marvel projects Captain America: New World Order, lightning*and especially, Daredevil: Rebornis because it is highly unlikely that the multiverse will play a significant role in any of these stories. I hope that the multiverse doesn’t play too big a role in the introduction of the Fantastic Four either.

Now that the Multiversal can of worms has been opened, the MCU will never be able to completely get away from it. In some ways, I wish that Marvel Studios had chosen to introduce the Multiverse as a swansong for the next few years, rather than rebooting it after the all-encompassing Infinity Saga. There really were other ways to incorporate the F4 and the X-Men. The Multiverse should be the story to end all stories; Instead, the MCU has tied itself to a narrative device that is difficult to understand and even more difficult to use innovatively.