Marvel today have dropped the veil on phase three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with 9 new movies on the roster.
After what many had assumed for some time the third Avengers film will be titled ‘Infinity War’ and ultimately split into two parts airing one year apart. We will try and keep the following breakdown as spoiler free as possible!
After Ant-Man phase three will kick off with Captain America: Civil War in May 2016, which would be unsurprising if it follows certain events in the comic arc considering the next (already established) Avenger outing is over a year later in Summer 2017 with Thor: Ragnarok.
Before Thor’s third outing we will finally have a Doctor Strange movie in November 2016 with an as of yet unnamed lead and a follow up to this years surprise box office hit – Guardians of the Galaxy in May 2017 with Director James Gunn reportedly returning to the helm.
The next new Avenger to be given their own movie is Black Panther in November 2017, it’s surprising that given the characters popularity that he is only being introduced 9 years after the canon film series began. As a welcomed addition this will also be only the second Marvel Franchise (and first in the Marvel Cinematic Universe) to see a black lead actor on screen, the first being the Blade series.
Black Panther is the also the last member to be added to the roster before the last 10 years comes to a head in Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (May 2018). The Aether from Thor: The Dark World, the Tesseract from Captain America and The Avengers, the Power Stone from Guardians of the Galaxy have all been planted to lead to this point. A build up so big that you’ll have to wait a year afterwards for the final part!
The full release schedule for the next few years of Phase Three is as follows;
- May 6, 2016 – Captain America: Civil War
- November 4, 2016 – Doctor Strange
- May 5, 2017 – Guardians of the Galaxy 2
- July 28, 2017 – Thor: Ragnarok
- November 3, 2017 – Black Panther
- May 4, 2018 – Avengers: Infinity War Part 1
- July 6, 2018 – Captain Marvel
- November 2, 2018 – Inhumans
- May 3, 2019 – Avengers: Infinity War Part 2
With that being said and done, can Marvel keep up the streak that they’re already on or will they falter like Pixar has in recent years? Only time will tell, and there’s a lot of time to come.
