Mr. Fantastic Will Lead The Avengers In ‘Doomsday’ – What About Sam And Yelena?

There seems to be a whole lot of confusion about what’s going on with the state of the Avengers in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, though at this point, I can’t tell if it’s on purpose or not.

Now, a new interview has thrown a wrench into things further. Fantastic Four director Matt Shakman is talking about Reed’s journey. Per Variety:

“He goes from being the nerdy scientist who’s locked away in the lab, to the husband and the father who’d do anything to protect his family, to the guy who’s leading the Avengers,” Shakman says. “I realized that the version we were building had to have all of those elements.”

On the one hand, sure, this makes sense. The Fantastic Four will be central to Doomsday given that it’s about their main rival, Doctor Doom. On the other, Marvel is giving incredibly mixed messages about what’s going on with the Avengers here.

First, Captain America: Brave New World ended with Sam Wilson, the new Captain America, being tasked with re-assembling the Avengers. That presumably includes his buddy Falcon, but besides that? Which of the old members are left? Hulk, Mark Ruffalo, is not listed as appearing in Doomsday. Neither is Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye or Benedict Cumberbatch’s Dr. Strange. Thor is still there, so is Ant-Man, but past that? Who is he recruiting? Shuri’s Black Panther? Shang-Chi? It’s a weird scenario.

Then we have the other Avengers, the “new” Avengers, which were assembled as the Thunderbolts changed their name at the end of their film (which ended up, stupidly, being used a spoiler marketing campaign). There’s a joke in the film about Sam copyrighting “The Avengers,” but it’s clear there’s some conflict between the two groups. This one includes, Yelena, Bucky, Red Guardian, Ghost and Bob/Sentry, if he ever decides to be Sentry/Void again.

Now we have this third idea of an Avengers group led by a guy who’s not even in the right MCU dimension yet, Mr. Fantastic. Who is he leading besides his own team? Is a conflict between these presumably three Avengers groups part of the Doomsday story? Because it’s not like there’s another film that will resolve it before then. I suppose the idea is that all of these people will combine into being the new Avengers, but I’m not sure why they’re doing all this strange separation and declarations beforehand.

Doomsday is a huge moment for the MCU as it attempts to recapture its glory days, but heavily relying on new characters, or ones with new mantles, or for some reason, half of FOX’s X-Men who debuted 25 years ago. We’ll see what that’s about. Oh, and Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr., is playing Doctor Doom in a baffling mystery decision. This is all going to be something, that’s for sure.

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