Marvel chief creative officer Kevin Feige was stuck on how to handle the COVID-19 pandemic in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And then it hit him — Thanos.
What’s going on?
Feige recently told Variety the Marvel Cinematic Universe already had a massive, world-changing event that affected everyone — the Thanos snap. The event changed the course of the MCU, but also impacted each individual person within Marvel’s world.
Feige said the upcoming slate of Marvel films and movies — which begins with “WandaVision” later this week — will tackle the emotions of the pandemic through the lens of Thanos’ snap.
Here’s what we told Variety:
“I will tell you, because it’s a very good question, that about a year and a half ago, as we were developing all these things — maybe two years ago, I don’t remember — I started to say the Blip, the Thanos event that radically changed everything between ‘Infinity War’ and ‘Endgame,’ that gave this global universal galactic experience to people, would only serve us so well, that we need to just keep looking ahead and keep going into new places. I was wary of it becoming like the Battle of New York, which was the third act of ‘Avengers,’ which ended up being referenced as an event kind of constantly, and some times better than others. I was wary of that. As we started getting into a global pandemic last March and April and May, we started to go, holy mackerel, the Blip, this universal experience — exactly as you described it — this experience that affected every human on Earth, now has a direct parallel between what people who live in the MCU had encountered, and what all of us in the real world have encountered. And it has been quite interesting, as you will see, in a number of our upcoming projects, the parallels where it will very much seem like people are talking about the COVID pandemic. Within the context of the MCU, they’re talking about the Blip.”
However, Feige told Variety that he didn’t want the connection to be a reference. He wanted deeper thinking behind it, which led to the creative coming up with new ideas about the Blip moment.
The takeaway
Superheroes have tackled viruses and pandemics before, though. So it wouldn’t be too surprising to see aspects of the virus filter their way into the MCU. But if you don’t see people wearing masks in “WandaVision” or other Marvel projects, it’s because the events and trauma from the coronavirus pandemic were already handled through the Thanos Snap.