Phase Seven Reportedly Has No Avengers Movie, but the Avengers Title Is Not Going Anywhere

A trusted industry insider and Twitter scoopster reported that Phase Seven of the MCU will not contain an Avengers movie, with Marvel reportedly moving away from the Avengers title after Avengers: Secret Wars. I do not think that means the end of the franchise, and I think it does not make sense, from outside the fandom or from within it, for Marvel not to make another Avengers film.

This is not the first time this has been said about the Avengers franchise. I had to go back years through my own past coverage to find the last round of it. But with the landscape changing going into Phase Seven, and with Secret Wars acting as a so called soft reboot for the MCU, the question is back. There are two ways of looking at any title, from outside the fandom and from within, and both matter here.

The insider says Phase Seven will focus on the X-Men and other team films

The update came from a Twitter scoopster with a proven track record, which is why many fans may recognise the name. Keep in mind that no scoopster has gotten everything right, so take this as you will. According to this insider, after Avengers: Secret Wars and in Phase Seven, there will not be any Avengers films. Instead, Marvel is reportedly going to focus on other team films.

We know that means the X-Men, but it most likely also includes a Fantastic Four 2. Very quickly, this headline was turned into no more Avengers films, as I saw it re-reported in editorials and across social media.

Phase Seven is only one part of a saga that could still end with Avengers

Notice that the insider only said Phase Seven specifically. Very generally, sagas are at least two, if not three, phases long. Kevin Feige has confirmed that the new plan will take Marvel from 2028 to 2032, so that stretch will most likely contain two phases, a Seven and Eight, or perhaps three, a Seven, Eight and Nine. An Avengers film could be scheduled outside of what this update covers.

In other words, we just would not be seeing one in the first phase of the new saga, and that is not a surprise at all. Very generally, Marvel is going to save those films for the end of its sagas now. My view is that no matter how you cut it, and no matter the logic, there will be an Avengers 7 and 8 well unless one thing happens with Doomsday and Secret Wars

Why Marvel needs to let the MCU breathe after a peak like Endgame

As I mentioned at the start, it feels like we had this same conversation after Avengers: Endgame. When you reach one of these pinnacles in a major franchise, not just the Avengers title but the entire MCU, it seems like a good idea to put it down for a while and let things breathe. I would argue, as I have many times before, that the lack of breathing room may have been what plagued the Multiverse Saga.

Marvel Studios itself acknowledged this was the problem. After one TV show after another and two or three movies a year, the studio decided to release only Deadpool and Wolverine in its calendar year, against the better wishes of the upper crust of Disney, who obviously wanted Marvel Studios to turn over more money. As it turned out, Deadpool and Wolverine did more than okay to make up for no other releases that year. Still, letting it breathe is not a luxury Marvel Studios has often had, especially after Endgame.

Even so, Marvel did not put out another Avengers title until Avengers: Doomsday, which at the time was set for December 2026, letting more than half a decade pass. I might argue that without a concise plan, and with an Avengers film originally possibly intended to arrive much sooner, since Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars were announced to come out well before this, the studio was allowed to meander. So there is a fine line, and real nuance, to how long should pass between Avengers titles.

The Avengers name is the billion dollar crossover brand Marvel cannot rebrand

Look at the other team films. Marvel already released a Fantastic Four film that did well with the fandom but did not perform the way the studio had hoped at the box office. At the time I wrote this, an X-Men film under the X-Men title was due right after Avengers: Secret Wars. While I do expect X-Men to do extremely well at the box office, it is the Avengers title that Marvel has invested in.

The Avengers title has become known as the huge crossover event, the same way Secret Wars was known as a crossover event in the comics. That is just what the Avengers title has become. Maybe it does not make sense in a Phase Seven and Eight, in a saga that explores mutants on Earth and reportedly maybe the cosmic side of the MCU, for an Avengers film to be the major crossover for the X-Men. I could definitely see that being the case.

But this is the outside the MCU side of things. It is not the inside the story argument that a title does not fit. It is the fact that everyone already knows an Avengers release is a major event. Disney and Marvel cannot afford to rebrand that at all. "There's no way, no time, no how." That is the way things are now.

Avengers: Dark Phoenix would not work, but the title still drives the box office

It might be weird, at the end of a saga focused on mutants, to call the next movie Avengers: Secret Wars II, Eternity Wars, Annihilation, or whatever it ends up becoming. But given what Disney and Marvel have built with the Avengers title in marketing and branding, it is going to be very hard for them to find a reason and a way forward not to call it something like that.

Some fans have suggested that the next crossover might not need X-Men, Fantastic Four or Avengers in the name at all, and could simply let a title stand on its own, something like Marvel Studios Annihilation Wave. I do not think that will work the same as the next Avengers film, Avengers 7 or Avengers 8.

To be fair to the other side, I know you cannot call a movie Avengers: Dark Phoenix, not that Marvel will ever do the Dark Phoenix saga again, or Avengers: Age of Apocalypse. That does not make sense, and I get that. Still, at the end of the day, "it's the Avengers title that's going to drive the box office." It is the Avengers title that signals a huge event you need to go to the movies for. I just cannot see it going any other way.

Should Marvel keep the Avengers name on its next big crossover, even in a saga built around mutants, or is it time for a new banner?