Phase 4 of the MCU is set to introduce a whole lot of new material to the franchise. We’re going to see a raft of new characters in The Eternals and there are high hopes for whatever Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings brings to the table. But, as exciting as all these new heroes will be, there’s a part of me that just wants to catch up with old friends. We have Black Widow coming out in early 2020, and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and a new Spider-Man film in 2021. But perhaps the most anticipated is Thor: Love and Thunder.
Director Taika Waititi reinvigorated the Thor solo movies with Ragnarok, with Love and Thunder promising us the delicious prospect of Natalie Portman’s Jane Foster taking up Mjolnir and becoming the Mighty Thor. But now, it’s sounding as if they’re exploring some other interesting possibilities for the film.
Fans being what they are, they’ve started pairing off characters together, with a common request being to see Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers in a relationship with Valkryie. And when Waititi was asked about this in a recent interview with Wired, he said:
“The thing is, I think it’s dangerous for people to say too much about what they want with Marvel, because then they will tend to go the other way. You want to listen to the fans to a point. But also you don’t want to have a completely fan-made film because then it doesn’t feel like there’s any point. You want to have people surprised.”
You might think that this does seem a bit like just another fan fantasy, but it really does appear as if influential people at Marvel are sitting up and taking notes.
Captain Marvel producer Mary Livanos recently said:
“It’s so charming and so fun to see the actor’s themselves get excited about the potential mashup so that as a creative makes you start thinking.”
Brie Larson is also game, saying:
“We’re here to ship, ya’ll! We can dig into it, I’m just telling you we’re shipping.”
As is Tessa Thompson, who recently told fans:
“Brie is my real-life queen, in general. If it becomes canon, that’s cool, too.”
It just sucks that we may have to wait until Thor: Love and Thunder arrives on November 5th, 2021 to find out if it’ll happen or not.
