It’s official, Kang the Conqueror is done and he will not star in any more movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This comes after the character has been in limbo for the past year because of Jonathon Majors’ legal issues. Last March, Majors was arrested on assault, strangulation, and harassment charges. The case would go to trial, and Majors would be convicted of assaulting his ex-girlfriend after a two week trial. After the conviction, Disney dropped Majors signifying his end playing Kang.
The expectation was that Kang would be the next great Marvel villain, and for many reasons, not just Majors alone, Marvel is deciding to scrap the character altogether instead of recasting him like many hoped. One reason he won’t be recast is because Marvel believes there wasn’t much interest in the villain anyway, and this was speculated before all of Majors‘ legal drama.
Many fans have expressed dissatisfaction with Marvel’s execution of Kang’s character. His debut film, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, underperformed at the box office and received primarily negative reviews. Many fans hated that Kang was defeated solely by a hero as weak as Ant-Man in the film, which is understandable. Marvel’s last great villain, Thanos, was a certified menace and even beat the heroes in his debut movies. Fans were expecting a similar storyline with a villain as powerful as Kang.
Marvel has already introduced its next villain, generating significant excitement among fans. The studio announced that actor Robert Downey Jr. would transition from his role as Iron Man to portray the villainous Dr. Doom. This revelation was met with enthusiastic fan approval. It appears that Marvel will assess audience reaction to Dr. Doom’s debut in the upcoming Avengers movie before finalizing plans for the MCU’s next central antagonist.
