Deadpool & Wolverine Quietly Set Up Doctor Doom's Endgame for Avengers Doomsday

Deadpool & Wolverine may not have felt like a movie built to establish the rules of the Multiverse Saga, but I think it actually did exactly that. By the end of the film, Deadpool was placed back into his own home universe, Earth-10005, which was seemingly saved by giving that timeline a replacement anchor being in the form of a new Wolverine. I want to break down how two core elements highlighted in that film actually explain why Doctor Doom is headed to the mainline universe, Earth-616, and what his plan is once Avengers Doomsday and Avengers Secret Wars arrive.

Rule One: Anchor Beings and the Problems They Create

The first rule is the idea of anchor beings, a concept I know some purists have attacked because it was not lifted from the comics but was reportedly something Kevin Feige wanted to introduce for the films. As it was explained by Mr. Paradox during Deadpool & Wolverine, an anchor being is a person whose death eventually causes their entire timeline to die as well. In his own words, it may take a thousand years, and he did not want to wait that long, but the anchor being is ultimately responsible for the life of that timeline.

That idea creates some potential plot holes if you dig into it. What was happening with a timeline before its anchor being was even born? A lot of characters do not live nearly as long as Wolverine, so are they simply going to die of natural causes anyway? Are we really meant to believe a timeline never extends more than a thousand years past its anchor being's death? On top of that, He Who Remains referred to the 31st century as being in the past when speaking to his original self, Nathaniel Richards, which tells us some timelines stretch far beyond where we currently are in the main MCU timeline.

If you want to nitpick, you can absolutely poke holes in this. But for the sake of the theory, I am taking it at face value that anchor beings exist and that when they die, their timeline eventually goes with them.

Rule Two: Saving a Timeline by Swapping Its Anchor Being

The second rule comes from the ending of the film, when taking Wolverine out of his original timeline and placing him into Earth-10005 actually saved that timeline. You could try to credit what happened with Cassandra Nova and the Time-Keepers for saving it instead, but I think the clear intention is that because Wolverine could be pulled from his original timeline into this one, he was able to replace the Wolverine who had died there.

That creates its own tension with rules already established earlier in the Multiverse Saga. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness set up the idea that when a being exists outside the dimension they are supposed to be in, it destabilizes things and can lead to incursions, which is exactly why it was a problem that Monica Rambeau ended up in an unestablished timeline at the end of The Marvels, something I am sure is eventually going to be revealed in a future Marvel film. Despite that earlier rule, Deadpool & Wolverine seems to say this particular swap is fine. That leaves us with two rules: anchor beings are responsible for the health of their timelines, and a replacement anchor being can be used to stabilize a timeline that has lost its own.

Doctor Doom's Plan: Weakening Loki Instead of Rising to His Level

So how does this apply to Avengers Secret Wars and Avengers Doomsday? Doctor Doom is eventually going to have to take on the God of Stories, Loki, and to do that he needs to become tremendously powerful. My theory is that instead of trying to raise himself up to Loki's level, which may be impossible, Doom wants to bring Loki down to his level, and the way he does that is by killing off enough anchor beings to weaken him.

Going timeline to timeline to eliminate anchor beings one at a time could prove tricky and extremely time consuming. In the same way Thanos wanted to gather all the Infinity Stones, I think America Chavez's power, if harnessed in a way we have not seen her display yet, is the power Doom would need to traverse the Multiverse at will.

Why America Chavez's Power Is the Real Prize

As I have discussed in earlier theories, America Chavez's ability seems to go beyond simply hopping between dimensions. Her real superpower is being where she needs to be when she needs to be there. That kind of precision would serve Doctor Doom extremely well if he is trying to hunt down anchor beings across the Multiverse to defeat Loki.

We already saw Doctor Strange demonstrate that one being can assume the power of another during Multiverse of Madness, which was the entire premise of what Scarlet Witch was trying to do. I believe that on the road to defeating Loki, Doom is going to assume America Chavez's power, and that is the whole point of his plan. The reason he needs to head to Earth-616 in the first place is that Multiverse of Madness established she is unique across the entire Multiverse, meaning that is the only place he could find her, presumably training at one of the temples under Wong, currently one of the most powerful sorcerers on Earth. Getting her power would be the first step in bringing Loki down to a level Doom can actually defeat.

A Galactus Scoop and the Idea of Anchor Beings Across the Whole Multiverse

I want to issue a light spoiler warning here, since there has been a lot of information circulating. There is a scoop suggesting Galactus may also share that same unique quality America Chavez has, meaning he too could be one of a kind across the Multiverse, or at least that this will eventually be revealed. That immediately creates a wrinkle, since a version of Galactus already appeared in a previous non-MCU Fantastic Four franchise, one that Deadpool & Wolverine seemed to canonize into the multiverse through its cameos. I am not going to try to untangle how that older Galactus fits with the idea of him being unique, I would rather just set that problem aside for now.

If Galactus does share that same one-of-a-kind quality with America Chavez, then there is a separate theory worth considering: instead of anchor beings only existing within each individual timeline, there could also be anchor beings across the entire Multiverse, meaning beings who are the only version of themselves anywhere. If Doctor Doom can hunt down and kill these Multiverse-wide anchor beings one by one, he could both assume their power and weaken the Multiverse enough to defeat Loki. I think that ties into a separate theory about what is going on between Doom and possibly the Celestials that have already been set up in the MCU.

Do you think Doctor Doom's plan really comes down to hunting down anchor beings, and could Galactus end up being one of them?