When Marvel Studios announced ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ in 2012, the general public was confused because this team was practically unheard of.
Although Iron Man’s popularity skyrocketed after his first slate of films, he was still a decently popular hero prior to his theatrical debut. The Guardians were a completely different story, because almost nobody outside of some hardcore fans knew they existed, let alone who was on the team. Nevertheless, James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy would go on to be massively successful, loved by fans and critics alike, and spawn one of the most popular series in the MCU. Now everyone knows formerly obscure characters like Groot and Gamora. This is an excellent example of a film changing the public perception of an unknown comic property.
However, there are much more well-known characters that haven’t been given their own film, and some of them haven’t even appeared in live-action. Sometimes these projects are repeatedly pitched but fail to settle on a solid idea. Other times, the films are fully announced, only to get stuck in Development Hell. Regardless of the reason, the public never gets to see these fascinating characters grace the big screen due to behind-the-scenes chaos. These are 5 Marvel projects that we wish we’d gotten to see.
X-Men Origins: Magneto
The iconic arch-nemesis of the X-Men has an extremely heart-wrenching backstory which would make an excellent plot for a feature film. Magneto is a Holocaust survivor who fights against mutant hate because he knows the true damage a hateful group can cause. After Magneto stole the show in the first three X-Men films, it was rumored that he would have his own origin movie produced after X-Men Origins: Wolverine. However, that movie was deeply panned by fans and critics alike while also being widely leaked online months before the film’s release. The whole ordeal seemed to have tainted the idea of Magneto receiving his own film, so his origin was instead folded into X-Men: First Class. This film did an excellent job at exploring Magneto’s childhood along with his burdening friendship with Charles Xavier. While it seems like they came to a comfortable compromise, it would have been fascinating to have the full run time of a film dedicated to the Master of Magnetism.
Blade
The new Blade film has not officially been cancelled but at this point it might as well be. Academy Award Winner, Mahershala Ali, apparently expressed interest in playing Blade to Marvel Studios in 2019. Several months later, Marvel Studios announced to the public that Ali would play Blade and he even made a voice cameo in the post-credit scene of Eternals (2021). While production was set to begin in 2020 with a release date in 2024, the film was simply unable to finalize a script. Six different writers attempted to write a solid Blade story but reportedly each one was denied by either Marvel Studios or Ali himself. As of today, two different iterations of Blade have appeared in Deadpool & Wolverine (in which original Blade actor Wesley Snipes boldly proclaimed “There’s only been one Blade!”) and “Marvel Zombies”, neither of which are played by Ali. Blade is supposed to be ageless, so Ali’s time to play the character has diminished with each passing year. Blade is nowhere on any current Marvel Studios release schedule, Ali has stated that he has moved on at this point, and Marvel head Kevin Feige recently expressed personal disappointment in not being able to pull the trigger on the movie, so it is safe to say that the project is probably never happening.
“Armor Wars”/War Machine Project
Bringing in Don Cheadle to play War Machine is possibly one of the best decisions Marvel Studios made in its early years. Cheadle is able to perfectly balance humor with the militaristic tone that is needed for the character. For over a decade now, Cheadle has passively mentioned that a War Machine solo project is in the works, but it was never anything set in stone. Then, in 2020, “Armor Wars” was announced as a Disney+ original series that would heavily focus on War Machine after the death of Iron Man. The project was supposed to begin production in 2021, which got pushed back to early 2022, and was later delayed again to 2023. In late 2022, Marvel Studios was doing some major restructuring to its production slate, and “Armor Wars” was upgraded to a theatrical film. It has been nearly 4 years since that announcement, and there has been no progress made in the production. Marvel seems to have given up on this project, and War Machine in general. In the 2023 miniseries “Secret Invasion”, it was revealed that James Rhodes has been a shapeshifting alien for several years, which really sets the character back. Cheadle has been in the MCU for 16 years. It would be amazing to see him finally take center stage, but it is unlikely to happen anytime soon.
“New Warriors”
In 2017, Disney+ had not yet been conceived, and Marvel was producing shows on various networks, which included Freeform. After the mild success of “Cloak & Dagger”, Freeform was ready to take another swing at a Marvel property with “New Warriors”. Loosely based on the comic of the same name, this single-camera comedy would have focused on a team of young adult superheroes whose wacky powers helped them make a positive difference in the world. The most notable casting is Milana Vayntrub as Squirrel Girl. She must have been amazing because she still voices the character in several Marvel properties to this day. The completed pilot reportedly scored very high in test screenings, but Freeform was unable to fit it into its 2018 release schedule. Marvel was antsy to have this project completed and released, but they were unable to find a network that was interested. This struggle continued through 2019, and the show was finally announced dead after Disney’s own streaming service refused to pick up the series. It is a shame that a seemingly unique show was never given the opportunity to grow, and a true Marvel comedy would have been a great way to add some diversity to its catalogue.
While Marvel Studios has found incredible success over the years, not every promising idea makes it through the trials and tribulations of the production process. Whether they were cancelled because of creative differences, scheduling conflicts, or studio restructuring, these projects remain some of the biggest “what ifs” in Marvel history.
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