Source: Marvel Studios / The Falcon and the Winter Soldier / Captain America
For the past few years films and shows released under the Marvel Studios banner have been receiving lackluster reviews and even less support from fans for various reasons such as weak stories, characters people aren’t really excited about and over-saturation of superhero content, which has led to superhero fatigue.
Knowing that changes have to be made in order to get back to the mountain top that the MCU stood upon back in their billion dollar box office days, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige and Co-President Louis D’Esposito know changes have to be made, and they’re ready to pull the trigger (and the plug) on some of their business practices going forward. According to Empire, Feige and D’Esposito have finally seen the writing on the wall and will begin to scale back on the number of projects that Marvel Studios releases on a yearly basis in hopes of countering the superhero fatigue they feel is to blame for disinterest in their MCU.
The move might actually be a step in the right direction as Deadpool & Wolverine will be the only Marvel film releasing in 2024. The hype behind it is ridiculous as fans of the MCU have been counting down the days to its release since the beginning of the year. How well future projects will fare will obviously depend on the popularity of the characters involved, but as they’ve learned, sometimes too much of a good thing can sometimes be a bad thing.
Empire reports:
“If we just stayed on top, that would have been the worst thing that could have happened to us. We took a little hit, we’re coming back strong.” That less-is-more ethos looks set to continue in years to come. “Maybe when you do too much, you dilute yourself a little bit,” says D’Esposito. “We’re not going to do that anymore. We learned our lesson. Maybe two to three films a year and one or two shows, as opposed to doing four films and four shows.”
For Marvel boss Kevin Feige, he’s seeing the positive side of the MCU being on the back-foot again – after all, back in Phase 1, that’s exactly where they began. “It’s nice to be able to rally behind one feature project this year,” he tells Empire. “I’m much more comfortable being the underdog. I prefer being able to surprise, and exceed expectations. So it does seem like the last year, which has not been ideal, has set us up well for that.”
With word that the X-Men and mutants are to be the main focus of the MCU for the next few phases while The Avengers take a backseat, Marvel Studios might be on the road to righting the ship that’s been seemingly sinking for quite some time. Though we doubt that Hugh Jackman will be the MCU’s Wolverine for the next decade or so (the man is 55 years old) there have been rumors that Henry Cavill has been cast to take on the role of Logan going forward at the tender age of 41.
Whether or not that’s true remains to be seen, but it will be interesting to see how Marvel Studios plans on resurrecting their dying brand now that they seem to have a game plan for the future and beyond.
What do y’all think of Marvel’s plan on scaling back on the number of projects they’ll be releasing on a yearly basis? Let us know in the comments section below.
