Kevin Feige is the behind-the-scenes face of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and has played a huge role in its development, even before the first Iron Man film arrived in 2008. Feige is the most successful producer in film history, with a movie gross box-office number of $26.8 billion over the course of his career — so far. Before heading the MCU, like anyone else, he had to pay his dues and soon showed his worth in the industry. In the 90s, Feige was an assistant on various hit films, before getting hired as a producer by Marvel in 2000. Feige worked on all the early X-Men, Spider-Man, The Punisher, Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Elektra, and Hulk films during the first 8 years of his Marvel career.
However, in perhaps his most important role, Feige is credited with coming up with the idea of making multiple films that were all part of one universe, much like how the comic books these characters were based on had done already. Even though Marvel had licensed Spider-Man to Sony and the X-Men to 20th Century Fox, they still had the rights to all their other major characters and began introducing them in their own films. As everyone now knows, the MCU movies were all major blockbusters and the idea quickly began paying off. From that point on, the movie industry would never be the same. As of now, 27 MCU films have already been released in less than 14 years.
Feige is not just limited to Marvel films either. He has also been the executive producer behind most of its shows as well, including all the MCU’s projects on Disney+. The streaming shows have given a spotlight to some major Marvel background players and have further developed the MCU overall by giving time to explain the motivations behind numerous characters the films often don’t have enough time to delve far enough into. Feige has either been nominated or won numerous awards for his roles in producing Black Panther, Avengers: Endgame, and WandaVision. In 2019, Kevin Feige also became Chief Creative Officer for Marvel Comics, Marvel Television, and Marvel Animation, in addition to already being President of Marvel Studios. In only his late 40s, Feige may still have a few decades ahead of him in the industry and likely dozens more successful projects. Looking at all of his successes, the biggest question is: how did Kevin Feige create the MCU?
How Did Kevin Feige Start the MCU?
Kevin Feige began his Marvel career as an associate producer on X-Men in 2000. This was the first of 15 different producer roles he had on different Marvel films before the MCU was even introduced in 2008. The start of the MCU began with Kevin Feige’s promotion to President of Production for the then-brand-new Marvel Studios in 2007. As the MCU hits came over the next few years, Feige’s status in the company grew, and he was continually promoted into more roles within the organization. Because the projects continued bringing in big financial returns, it meant the MCU could be expanded further over the course of additional films and television shows. Feige was also part of numerous Marvel press conferences, Comic Cons, and was interviewed by news outlets worldwide each time a Marvel new project was announced or released. Because of all this international attention, Feige became kind of a star in his own right.
How Was the MCU Created?
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The Marvel comic books created by Stan Lee and dozens of others over the years gave the initial blueprint for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, these stories had to be adapted for live-action films and the stories had to be told in a compelling way for even non-comic book fans to enjoy. By no means did Kevin Feige do this alone. However, he was often involved in all his projects on a day-to-day basis, at least as much as his busy Marvel schedule allowed. It’s taken the combined efforts of the actors, directors, screenwriters, producers, set and costume designers, graphics designers, promotion departments, among hundreds (if not thousands) of others to create the MCU. Marvel has a general rule: no idea is considered too difficult or crazy, even if it comes at the last minute. Any good idea is worth exploring. This philosophy has already taken the MCU a very long way and will likely continue to pay off in the future.
What is the Future of the MCU?
There are roughly 30 MCU projects either in production or development at the moment. Most of these have been announced, although many are yet to begin filming. There are even a few movies fans hope they will see one day. These projects will be feature films and Disney+ series for the foreseeable future. Moon Knight, Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, Secret Invasion, Armor Wars, Ironheart, and Echo are scheduled to be the next Disney+ series to arrive. New films with Thor, Dr. Strange, Guardians of the Galaxy, Black Panther, and Ant-Man will be hitting the big screen over the next year or so as well. Additional projects with Shang-Chi, Blade, Deadpool, Captain America (with the former Falcon in the role), Captain Marvel, X-Men, Spider-Man, and The Fantastic Four all look to be down the pipeline.
Let’s also not forget Loki (Season 2), What If...? (Season 2), and Agatha: House of Harkness (which is a spin-off from WandaVision) have also been announced. Perhaps additional partnerships will be explored in the future (or re-explored, much like the overlooked MCU series’ that were previously created for ABC, Netflix, and Hulu). As long as the demand from fans is there, expect the MCU to keep expanding and branching off in new directions in the upcoming years. With Marvel willing to explore storylines even late into the creative development process, one thing is for certain: the future of the MCU is still being written.