In many ways, Avengers: Endgame felt like a hugely satisfying series finale. If Marvel had stopped its cinematic universe there, audiences probably would’ve been happy with how the story of Earth’s mightiest heroes ended. But there’s far too much money to be made, so the MCU is charging ahead beyond the Infinity Saga.
Despite the fact that the Avengers disbanded at the end of Endgame, there will inevitably be another Avengers movie. For Disney, making Avengers movies is like printing hard cash. There will eventually be an Avengers 5 in which the team reforms to take on a giant cosmic threat.
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When a fifth Avengers film goes into development, Marvel Studios may feel obligated to top what they did with Endgame. It’s only natural for the filmmakers behind a sequel to want to go bigger and bolder than the predecessor, but if that predecessor is Avengers: Endgame, the biggest movie ever made, that’s an unwinnable battle. Endgame had more than a decade’s worth of build-up behind it, which Avengers 5 won’t have.
The reason why Endgame’s payoffs worked so well is that Marvel spent years building toward them. Steve Rogers lifting Mjolnir wouldn’t be anywhere near as glorious if Chris Evans hadn’t spent eight years demonstrating why he was worthy. Tony Stark’s heroic sacrifice wouldn’t have resonated as much if it happened in Iron Man 2 or the first Avengers movie. These things take time.
It’s way too early to have those kinds of payoffs for the new generation of Earth’s mightiest heroes – even the already-established ones like Captain Marvel and Doctor Strange. Instead of trying to top Endgame’s scale and spectacle with a jam-packed ensemble and a universe-ending threat, Avengers 5 should be more like the first Avengers movie, focused on assembling a new team and bringing them together to face a common enemy.
Joss Whedon’s original Avengers film worked so well because of its focus on the characters. For all intents and purposes, it’s a movie that shouldn’t have worked. Teaming up a Norse god, a musclebound green monster, a World War II super-soldier, a billionaire in a metal suit, a leather-clad secret agent, and a guy with a bow and arrow was certainly ambitious. But it paid off, because Whedon’s script painted those characters as real people with real relationships. The six original Avengers bicker and refuse to work together until the supposed death of Agent Coulson unites them against Loki and his faceless alien army.
If Whedon hadn’t laid this groundwork, Endgame couldn’t have been as emotionally engaging or full of fan-service payoffs as it was. Avengers 5 needs to lay down some similar groundwork with new heroes like Shang-Chi and Ms. Marvel. The movie should forge interpersonal connections among the team’s latest roster, showing us how they work together, as well as which heroes get along with each other (and which ones don’t). Then, Avengers 6, 7, etc. can start to build toward another Endgame-sized epic to pay off all those characters’ arcs.
Since Sam Wilson officially became the new Captain America in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier’s finale episode, it seems likely that he’ll be the one to reopen the Avengers Initiative. If Nick Fury isn’t too busy with S.W.O.R.D., he could help Sam to assemble a new team (or maybe a S.W.O.R.D. case will be what necessitates a new Avengers team in the first place). In addition to familiar Avengers like Captain Marvel, Doctor Strange, Spider-Man, and the Scarlet Witch, the new team could also feature Shang-Chi, Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, the Eternals, and Kate Bishop’s Hawkeye.
It’s unclear who the Avengers will come back together to fight. The Loki finale introduced a variant of Kang the Conqueror, whose control over the sacred timeline could make him an even graver threat than Thanos. The Secret Invasion series on Disney+ will establish that the MCU’s Earth has been taken over by Skrulls disguised as powerful humans. This global Body Snatchers-style threat could be what gets the Avengers to reunite.
Whoever the villain turns out to be, they can’t show all their cards in Avengers 5. The first and second Avengers movies teased the threat presented by Thanos before the third one brought him into the limelight. Like Thanos, the Avengers’ next big bad should loom larger and larger over Earth’s mightiest heroes over the course of a couple of MCU phases before finally flexing the full force of their power in an Infinity War-style event movie.
It’s likely that, if he’s figured it out yet, Kevin Feige has a great strategy for the Avengers franchise going forward. As the one who spearheaded Endgame’s setups and payoffs across the course of a decade, Feige is the last person who would want to undermine the triumph of the Avengers’ last stand against Thanos. Whatever he has planned for Avengers 5 will probably be awesome.
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