Following the guilty verdict in his assault trial on Monday, Jonathan Majors has been fired by Marvel Studios. On social media, fans have a lot of thoughts about it.
It’s not only a spectacular career imposion for an actor who less than a year ago seemed headed for permanent stardom. It’s also a massive headache for Marvel and the future of its cinematic universe.
And that’s on top of the fact that Majors, who continues to deny any wrongdoing, was found guilty of assault and harassment against his ex-girlfriend. He’ll be sentenced in February and has signaled plans to appeal.
About that latter point, ScreenRant writer Alisha Grauso called the whole thing “a damn shame.”
As for Marvel, Majors’ character, Kang the Conqueror, was the lynchpin of what Marvel is calling “the Multiverse Saga,” the company’s ambitious post-“Endgame” storyline. Kang, for now at least, is being set up as the MCU’s new Thanos-level threat. But unlike Thanos, who made just three appearances prior to “Avengers: Endgame,” two of which were mere cameos, Kang has been one of the main characters in every MCU project Majors appeared in.
Marvel has not announced how it will deal with the situation — be it recasting Kang or pivoting in an entirely new direction. But more than a few fans are now pointing out that Marvel has other as-yet unused villains that could replace Kang. Such as Doctor Doom who, like Kang, started as an enemy of the Fantastic Four.
For what it’s worth, Marvel finally got access to “Fantastic Four” when Disney purchased 20th Century Fox back in 2019, but the company has yet to announce cast for the live action version. All we know for sure is that Pedro Pascal is in talks play Reed Richards, and the film is still scheduled for release in May 2025. Which means we can probably expect an announcement by no later than Comic-Con 2024.
But if Doom doesn’t take over as Marvel’s new main villain, what if they brought back a legend?
Meanwhile, as other fans noted, thanks to the (absolutely bizarre) ending of “Loki” Season 2, Marvel might have an easy, narratively coherent way out of Kang entirely.
Of course, on “Loki,” Kang was officially referred to as “He Who Remains,” which led to quite a few puns.
And still others who are wondering about troubling accusations made against another Marvel star, Tenoch Huerta.
