10 HUGE Problems Facing The Future Of The MCU

Though the MCU has touched on the Multiverse prior to Phase 4, it's with Spider-Man: No Way Home that the franchise started to go all-in on introducing parallel dimensions and alt-universe iterations of existing characters.

This followed through into the multiverse-faring Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania's many iterations of Kang, leading up to the ultimate multiversal event that will be Avengers: Secret Wars.

As fun and exciting as the Multiverse can be to offer up near-limitless story potential, it's also something of a Pandora's Box situation because, when you can do literally anything, and characters can be resurrected with different-but-very-similar variants, why should we care what happens to anyone?

No Way Home proved what a spectacular vehicle the multiverse can be for fan service, but the recent Doctor Strange sequel offered up a disappointingly unadventurous look at an alt-Earth, and one suspects that by the time the Multiverse Saga comes to an end, audiences might be feeling a little sick of the anything goes storytelling.

Limitations can be a good thing, and tangible dramatic stakes certainly are, both of which can be so easily undermined by having basically unlimited access to a huge number of parallel universes.

And given the relatively shaky standing the MCU is on right now, it's tough to believe that Kevin Feige will take the restrained approach over hurling every last fan-serving fantasy on the screen without much narrative substance to accompany it.