Marvel Is In Serious Trouble As Tons Of Projects Getting Major Delays, Here’s Everything Being Affected
Secret Invasion, Echo, and Agatha: Coven of Chaos are among the many Disney+ series that are showing signs of being delayed.
After Marvel’s first phase 5 film, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania, had poor reviews and a disappointing box office showing, there are signs of widespread delays among other Phase 5 projects. While the next film, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, is still set to release this May, Disney+ has removed the release date windows for many of its upcoming shows, hinting at a shake-up behind the scenes.
Secret Invasion, the Skrull-centric Disney+ series starring Emilia Clark, Ben Mendelsohn, and Samuel L. Jackson, was supposed to be the next Marvel project to get released — instead, it might be the first to get a major delay. The show’s Spring 2023 release date has been replaced by a generic “Coming Soon” marker, signaling that things might not be on track for its arrival.
Other Marvel series, including the Hawkeye spin-off Echo, the second season of Loki, the return of Charlie Cox in Daredevil: Born Again, the Wandavision spin-off Agatha: Coven of Chaos, and the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever spin-off Ironheart show similar signs of delays. Like Secret Invasion, the release dates for those series are all now listed as “Coming Soon,” including those that previously had set release dates.
It’s not just the live-action Marvel series that show signs of delay. Animated series such as X-Men ’97 and What If…? Season 2 are also part of the possible mix-up. What If‘s previous “Early 2023” release date is now nowhere to be seen, and neither is the “Fall 2023” release date for X-Men ’97.
Marvel has already admitted it has too many shows in production, so some of these delays are to be expected. However, if either Loki or Secret Invasion gets pushed back beyond the end of 2024, then things might be going even worse for the company than previously known.
It remains to be seen when we can expect any of Marvel’s already-announced slate of Disney+ series will be released after these delays.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been absolutely dominating the box office since the release of the original Iron Man back in 2008, and this recent slate of delays is no doubt intended to stop the franchise from backsliding by oversaturating the market. And there have been signs of backsliding: Quantumania was the worst-performing movie in the already low-performing Ant-Man series, and yet its box office numbers were about par for the course for movies in Marvel’s previous phase, such as Shang-Chi, Eternals, and Black Widow. In fact, outside of Phase 4, Quantumania has been the worst-performing Marvel movie since Phase 1, with the original Thor, Captain America, and The Incredible Hulk films bringing in lower numbers.
Not all is doom and gloom in the realm of the MCU, though you have to look toward Sony to find a marvel-related product that hasn’t shown signs of delays. The animated series Spider-Man: Freshman Year, which was created as a joint venture between Sony and Marvel, appears to be on track to be released in late 2024. This is the same date that was announced for the series at San Diego Comic-Con in 2022.
