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For so long as the Marvel Cinematic Universe lasts (and possibly for a while after) followers can be questioning “What occurs subsequent?” That query has solely turn out to be extra urgent for the reason that launch of 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, when Thanos, first launched in 2012’s Avengers, lastly met his doom (twice).
And now that the mud has settled on Eternals, which connects some main dots by means of (what else) two post-credit scenes, it’s time to ask the query once more: Who’s the following Thanos? Do we now have any thought the place that is all going? What occurs subsequent?
[Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for Eternals.]
Picture: Marvel Studios
The character of Hollywood — or no less than of Hollywood hype — is that we now have a fairly good thought of which heroes will keep on the story of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. There’s all of the heroes who’ve already debuted, after all, plus those that’re on their method. While you ask “What occurs subsequent?” in regards to the MCU, the most important unknown is within the villains.
And after a very good seven years of build-up, culminating within the deaths of half of each dwelling factor within the universe, it’s exhausting to see how Marvel ups the stakes from Thanos the Mad Titan.
However not inconceivable! And the Marvel movies and tv exhibits of 2021 have launched their very own candidates for the villain who couldn’t solely step into Thanos’ sneakers, however exceed them.
Arishem the Choose
Picture: Marvel Studios
Greater than another of Marvel’s Part 4movies, Eternals feels prefer it’s laying groundwork for the way forward for the MCU as a complete, not simply its personal major characters. Marvel hasn’t introduced a sequel, and it’s doable that it gained’t. Eternals bucks the MCU formulation of anchoring a franchises round actors with out loads of contract negotiating clout. Angelina Jolie and Salma Hayek and all these people? It appears extra possible we’ll see a sequence of cameos or supporting roles in different Marvel motion pictures as an alternative.
However the Eternals character who has probably the most potential for crossover is Arishem the Choose, the Prime Celestial. Now there’s a risk that’s larger than Thanos, and never simply in a literal sense. Thanos needed to seize the ability over time, area, and actuality to enact his whims. However Celestials are born with it. Additionally, even in Marvel’s comics, the Celestials turned extra of a factor than the Eternals ever managed to be.
To high all of it off, Eternals has already set Arishem’s return to guage humanity on Marvel’s future timeline.
Kang the Conqueror
Picture: Marvel Studios
However the MCU has different choices for a foul man so {powerful} they will threaten not simply dwelling creatures however the material of actuality itself. This spring, the Disney Plus sequence Loki introduced Kang the Conqueror into the Marvel Cinematic Universe fold.
Kang, or some incarnation of him (he solely has — let me test my notes — a million of them) is a major temporal risk to Marvel’s heroes within the comics. We additionally know that he’ll seem once more, not simply within the subsequent season of Loki, but additionally in a future Marvel Movie.
Ant-Man: Quantumainia, with Kang’s actor Jonathan Majors alongside for the experience, presently sits on the very most fringe of Marvel’s introduced lineup, a spot ripe for a villain to ascend to a setting-wide risk.
Magus
Mark Bagley/Marvel Comics
Regardless of a distinguished function in 2021’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Adam Warlock stays certainly one of Marvel’s extra esoteric characters. And whereas he may be a long-shot for a Thanos-level risk, the potential continues to be there.
James Gunn was gung-ho to carry Adam into Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, however has stated that he ultimately dropped him from the script for lack of time (references to Adam stay within the movie’s credit sequences). Will Poulter has been solid to play him in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, so we all know he’ll undoubtedly seem.
And the place there’s an Adam Warlock, there’s a Magus, Adam’s equally-if-not-more-powerful evil self, an immortal being able to manipulating matter itself. That is probably not on par with a galaxy ending risk like a Celestial, or a timeline shattering nasty like Kang — however, hey, we’re overlaying all our bases right here!
We are able to’t say for sure who the following Thanos can be within the MCU, and it’ll in all probability be a while earlier than we discover out. However within the meantime, perhaps we will get pleasure from some MCU motion pictures that don’t all ultimately level in direction of the identical huge purple weirdo.
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