How 'Avengers: Endgame' Sets Up 'Hawkeye', 'Loki', and More on Disney+
How the latest movie lays the groundwork for four new Disney+ shows.
In many ways, Avengers: Endgame feels like the definitive end of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, offering a fitting send-off to many of the core heroes we’ve all loved in the last decade and more. But as much as it completes the Infinity Saga, Endgame is already building to more stories featuring Marvel characters. Not only will Spider-Man: Far From Home take place in the same universe when it released in July, but there’s also word of Black Panther 2, Doctor Strange 2, and other films on the horizon.
When Disney launches the Disney+ streaming service later this year, it’ll establish a new home base for big-budget TV shows that complement the MCU in a way that the Marvel Netflix shows never could, mostly because they’ll feature some of the same actors we’ve already seen on the big screen.
Based on everything that went down in Avengers: Endgame, here’s how that story could help launch four different series coming to Disney+:
Huge spoilers for Avengers: Endgame follow, specifically how it sets up several MCU television shows.
Loki wielding a couple knives with his iconic helmet on.
How Avengers: Endgame Sets Up the Untitled Loki Series
“Sources say the show will follow Loki as the trickster and shape-shifter pops up throughout human history as an unlikely influencer on historical events,” The Hollywood Reporter wrote of the Disney+ Loki series from showrunner Michael Waldron. If that’s the case, then this show takes place long before even Captain Marvel. Yet, Avengers: Endgame opens up an opportunity for something much more interesting.
Loki was strangled by Thanos early in Avengers: Infinity War, and like everyone else who died that wasn’t dusted in the Decimation, he remains dead when Endgame ends with one huge caveat involving time travel.
During Endgame, Tony Stark travels to the Battle of New York with Steve Rogers, Bruce Banner, and Scott Lang to claim three Infinity Stones: Mind, Space, and Time. They successfully take Loki’s Scepter and the Time Stone from the Eye of Agamotto, but in a moment of chaos, the Loki from that time period grabs the Tesseract and teleports away with it. So the heroes have to try something else. (In the original timeline, Thor took both Loki and the Tesseract back to Asgard at the end of The Avengers, and we didn’t see them again until Thor: The Dark World.)
Loki might eventually wind up where he needs to be to maintain the correct timeline, but the god of mischief probably won’t do what he should. If that’s the case, then the Loki series could take place after The Avengers in a divergent timeline caused by this plot hole, giving the character free reign to explore the universe in an alternate reality we’ve never seen before.
Then again, maybe the entire Loki show will take place ever further in the past and nothing that happens in Avengers: Endgame will matter at all.
Winter Soldier and Falcon in 'Captain America: Civil War'.
How Avengers: Endgame Sets Up Falcon & Winter Soldier
Bucky and Sam were both dusted by Thanos during Infinity War, but it should surprise nobody that they’re back when the heroes undo the Decimation in Endgame.
A supposed leak from MCU Cosmic claims that Falcon & Winter Soldier is a spy thriller akin to Captain America: The Winter Soldier and takes place immediately after Endgame once S.H.I.E.L.D. recruits these two for a new spy team.
There’s also a hugely important revelation in Endgame: Steve Rogers passes the Captain America mantle on to Sam Wilson. You can bet that Falcon & Winter Soldier will explore the repercussions of this big reveal.
At the very end of Endgame, Rogers goes back in time again to return the various Infinity Stones to their correct points in history. Then, instead of coming back to the present afterwards, he instead decides to live out his days with Peggy Carter in the past, appearing as an old man in the present day. He bequeaths the Captain America shield to Sam, who’ll now take up the mantle like he does in the comics.
Even if the show is called Falcon & Winter Soldier, it’ll still very much so be a Captain America story in some fashion.
Vision and Wanda making some paprikash in 'Captain America: Civil War'.
How Avengers: Endgame Sets Up WandaVision
“There’s quite a few other comic books that we’re pulling from and it’s going to be Wanda and the Vision, and I think at the Disney+ launch chat, they showed a photo of us in the ’50s,” Scarlet Witch actress Elizabeth Olsen told Variety of her new show.
Of all the Disney+ Marvel shows, this 6-episode series is perhaps the most confusing.
Like others that were dusted, Wanda Maximoff is resurrected in Avengers: Endgame, but Vision remains dead. After Scarlet Witch killed him once to destroy the Mind Stone, Thanos reversed time so he would rip the stone out of his head, killing him again. Endgame plays things a bit fast-and-loose with time travel, so the rules are a bit wibbly wobbly.
Does Wanda go back in time to rescue Vision and then they retreat and settle down in the ‘50s? It’s possible, we guess.
Some of us had hoped that WandaVision might be an interlude between Civil War and Infinity War, chronicling their “stolen moments” together over two years in places like Scotland. Endgame doesn’t offer any easy answers as to how WandaVision works, but we can’t wait to learn more.
Hawkeye training his daughter in archery at the start of 'Avengers: Endgame'.
How Avengers: Endgame Sets Up the Untitled Hawkeye Series
The most recently announced MCU spin-off series focuses on Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye after the events of Endgame. When the film opens, he’s training his daughter in archery. Then, when his entire family is dusted by Thanos, he goes on a rampage, cleansing the world of criminal organizations. Clint Barton finds some measure of redemption by the end of the movie, returning to quiet retirement with his family after the Snap is undone.
So what does that mean for the Hawkeye series? Variety reports the show will star Renner as he trains his protégé, Kate Bishop, to replace him as Hawkeye. In the comics Bishop is instrumental in forming the Young Avengers group. It seems possible that Marvel is setting up something similar, especially with several other candidates for younger heroes in Endgame, but we’ll have more on that later…
Disney+ launches November 12. Avengers: Endgame is in theaters now.
