“Avengers: The Kang Dynasty” has been retitled with a full-tilt pivot. The next Avengers films will be “Avengers: Doomsday” and “Avengers: Secret Wars” and they will both be directed by the Russo Brothers.
Directors Joe and Anthony Russo —who helmed four films in the MCU, including 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame” — are uniting with Marvel Studios once again to helm the next superhero team-up feature. On Saturday evening, they made their return official by taking the stage at San Diego Comic-Con‘s Hall H to thunderous applause.
“When we directed ‘Avengers: Endgame,’ we really believed it was the end for us in the Marvel Cinematic Universe,” said Joe Russo to the crowd. “That four-movie run was incredible, and it left us creatively spent.” However, in the time since, the duo found a “very special story” that convinced them to come back. In fact, “it’s the biggest story that Marvel comics ever told. It’s the reason that Anthony and I are standing up here.” And that film is “Avengers: Secret Wars.”
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But to build towards the epic battle that is “Secret Wars,” the story would need the kind of instrumental character that is “required” to do “Secret Wars” justice. So, enter Dr. Victor von Doom, to be played by Robert Downey Jr., the man who helped put the MCU on the map with his devilish turn as Iron Man/Tony Stark. The first film is titled “Avengers: Doomsday” and will premiere in May 2026 with “Avengers: Secret Wars” following in May 2027.
The Russo brothers’ independent studio, AGBO, is co-producing the film in a rare partnership with Marvel. Stephen McFeely, who co-wrote all four of the Russos’ Marvel films (including “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” “Captain America: Civil War” and “Avengers: Infinity War”), is taking over script duties on both “Doomsday” and “Secret Wars.” He takes over from Michael Waldron (“Loki”), who was originally tasked with writing the script to “The Kang Dynasty” and “Secret Wars.”
The Russo brothers step in for Destin Daniel Cretton, who left “Kang Dynasty” in November 2023 to focus on other Marvel projects on his docket, including a prospective sequel to his 2021 film “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.”
After making the “Avengers” movies, which both earned more than $2 billion at the box office, the Russos left Marvel to direct “Cherry,” a gritty crime drama that starred Tom Holland, Netflix’s “The Gray Man,” an action-thriller with Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans, and the streamer’s upcoming film “The Electric State.”
Many observers felt the decision to retitle “The Kang Dynasty” was inevitable after Jonathan Majors— the actor who’d been playing the titular Marvel supervillain Kang for two years — was convicted in December of misdemeanor assault and harassment of his now ex-girlfriend. The studio parted ways with the actor less than two hours after the verdict was announced, capping nearly a year of uncertainty about Majors’ future with Marvel following his arrest in March. But the studio had remained quiet about whether losing Majors also meant saying goodbye to the character of Kang.
Majors portrayed Kang several times, including on the first and second seasons of “Loki,” and as the main villain in 2023’s “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.” In the mid-credits scene of that movie, Majors even appears as an army of Kang variants; taking over all of those performances would be a tall order for any new actor.
More importantly, audiences haven’t exactly embraced Kang as a character, or the multiverse as a storytelling engine, in the same way that Thanos and the Infinity Saga served as sturdy narrative spines in the 2010’s. The Season 2 finale of “Loki” tied off Kang’s storyline so that Marvel could move on without unduly disrupting their wider plans for the Multiverse Saga. With this new title, that appears to be exactly what the studio is doing.
This story was updated to note AGBO’s role and Stephen McFeely’s involvement.
