The MCU has now released more than 40 movies and TV shows over the last fifteen years, with almost as many again coming in the next three years. With that in mind it is not surprising that some people are happy to be harbingers of doom for the Marvel franchise in the near future, saying that “Superhero fatigue” is coming, and the entire franchise is going to implode on itself. Kevin Feige doesn’t buy into that line of thinking, especially having been asked how long the franchise is capable of lasting since pretty much its conception. Speaking on The Movie Buisness podcast, Feige explained:
"I've been at Marvel Studios for 22 years now, over 22 years, and most of us here at Marvel Studios have been around a decade or longer together. And from probably my 2nd year at Marvel people were asking, 'Well, how long is this going to last? Is this fad of comic book movies going to end? And I didn't really understand the question. Because to me it was akin to saying after 'Gone With The Wind', 'Well how many more movies can be made off of novels? Do you think the audience will sour on movies being adapted from books?'"
Feige certainly has a point to make, as with more than 80 years of comics having been published by Marvel Comics, and DC having an even longer history, there are very few fans who have become bored with the endless stories that have been told over the decades, so why should movies based on them be any different. Feige continued:
"Well you would never ask that because there is an inherent understanding among most people that a book can be anything. A novel can have any type of story whatsoever, so it all depends on what story you're translating. None comic readers don't understand it's the same thing in comics. There're 80 years of the most interesting, emotional, groundbreaking stories that have been told in the Marvel comics and it is our great privilege to be able to take what we and adapt them."
Marvel Studios Is Just About to Kick Off the MCU’s Phase 5
While Marvel’s Phase 4 caught many moviegoers off guard, mainly because it pulled back a lot from the high of Avengers: Endgame and didn’t attempt to outdo its predecessors. That is something that comes down to each “saga” being a self-contained story and it just happens to feature some characters from the previous phases. As Feige explained:
"Each of our sagas are broken into phases and we now find ourselves on the precipice of Phase 2 of the Multiverse Saga. And there are two ways to do it. One, we look at an overarching narrative, always using the comics and the 80-plus years of Marvel comic history as our guide of what general, long-term story we want to do. But really, it comes down to each individual film or series, and what type of genre we want to do."
The MCU may be set to deliver some tried and tested blockbusters over the coming years, with a culminating Endgame scale event with Avengers: Secret Wars, but there are many other less expected pieces in play. The last year has seen the release of Werewolf at Night, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law and Moon Knight, all of which have delivered something different to the norm. There is obviously more of that to come too, and as Kevin Feige says, coming from 80 plus years of Marvel stories, there is no reason to think it is going to stop anytime soon.