Black Widow, The Eternals, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings – three of the biggest new IPs set to enter the Marvel Cinematic Universe come Phase 4.
Put together with hugely anticipated sequels like Captain Marvel 2, Black Panther 2, and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and it makes for quite a tantalizing future for the franchise, though you’d be forgiven for wondering why Ant-Man 3 was totally absent from both Marvel’s SDCC and D23 presentations.
Admittedly, it could just be because the studio isn’t ready to announce the threequel yet, or maybe the Powers That Be are holding fire until Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly can clear out their schedules. After all, we know that the former has signed up for Ghostbusters 2020, and may not be available until early 2021. Not to mention that Lilly has two sizeable projects – namely Dreamland and Happy Life – on her plate as well.
But if a new rumor is to be believed, then it looks like the reason Marvel hasn’t mentioned anything about Ant-Man 3 yet is because it’s not happening. According to Cosmic Book News, who are citing scoopster Mikey Sutton on this one, the film isn’t moving forward and may end up as a limited series on Disney Plus instead. And that’s because of a few reasons.
For one, it’s said that the studio is simply too busy to develop another feature for the hero, with the recent acquisition of the X-Men and Fantastic Four taking up a lot of their time. The report also claims that Kevin Feige is more interested in “pursuing new genres with Shang-Chi and Blade.” Not to mention that the Ant-Man films do tend to target a bit of a younger audience than most other MCU movies, which is why Disney Plus would make sense in regards to where to continue the series.
And while all this remains filed firmly in the rumor cabinet for now, it’s not too difficult to believe. After all, we’ve heard on several occasions now that the future of Ant-Man and his supporting characters is up in the air with multiple sources saying they’ll only show up in small cameos from now on and if a third film ever did happen, it wouldn’t be for a long, long time. In other words, it’s not a priority for the studio.
Obviously, that’s pretty disappointing to hear, but when you look at where the MCU is headed and how busy Feige and co. must be right now with all that they’re juggling, we can’t say we blame them if they feel Disney Plus is the best place for Scott Lang moving forward.
