Marvel is Considering Ditching Kang

Movies

Marvel understands they have a Kang problem. According to a new article from Variety, a big part of Marvel’s annual retreat this year – which took place in Palm Springs in September – was discussing what to do about Kang the Conqueror, the central villain of the MCU’s phases 4, 5, and 6. The most immediate problem is that Jonathan Majors, the actor who plays Kang (in all his many variant forms), is going on trial in New York for assaulting a woman, and more accusations have surfaced since the initial one. Additionally, Kang is not appealing to audiences the way Marvel hoped he would, with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania bombing. Marvel is supposedly considering several options, such as recasting the role or “pivoting to another comic book adversary, like Dr. Doom.” But someone identified as a “top dealmaker” thinks that, because of his strong presence in the MCU and the inability to change direction during the writers’ strike, they’re stuck with him; as he puts it, “Marvel is truly fucked with the whole Kang angle.”

Jonathan Majors’ legal issues and Quantumania’s underperformance are certainly factors, but Variety fails to mention the main reason why Kang has been such a disaster for the MCU: he’s been written poorly. In all his appearances so far, he’s been either silly or ineffectual, and he’s died each time. How many times can your next big villain be defeated before the final battle, when he will be defeated again? There are no stakes with Kang now that we’ve seen Ant-Man one-shot him to death. The idea of a multiverse of Kangs doesn’t matter either because every time a Kang variant shows up, he’s killed. You can’t keep saying, “But wait till you get to the next one!” Thanos was in the background of the MCU until he finally took action in Infinity War, and he never loses until the finale of Endgame; even when he dies at the beginning of that film, it’s on his own terms, having secured his victory. He felt like an unstoppable force, something the Avengers could not defeat, and it took Tony Stark laying down his life to finally beat him. Kang doesn’t approach that level of threat; we’ve seen him lose big, and not through his emissaries but on his own. This is the same problem that plagued Kylo Ren in the Star Wars sequels; we’d seen Ray clean his clock already, so he never felt like the threat the movies needed. Now, Marvel has its own Kylo, and unless a massive change – or series of changes – is made soon, they’re stuck with him for several more years.