For the past decade and change, Kevin Feige has made the characters of the Marvel Comics universe all household names as head of Marvel Studios. Thanks to his impressive accomplishments with the 23 MCU movies, your grandpa now knows who Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Black Widow are. But until now, his role has been as head of Marvel Studios only. That is all changing, however, as according to Deadline, Feige has the new title of Chief Creative Officer at Marvel. This basically means that he is not only in charge of Marvel Studios, but Marvel Comics and Marvel Television as well. In terms of all things Marvel, the buck stops with him.
Marvel Comics
Dan Buckley will continue his role as President of Marvel Entertainment, and Ike Perlmutter will stay on as Chairman. But the creative decisions will all fall to Feige. So what does this mean for the fans? It means that the relationship between the comics and Hollywood will be closer than ever. Feige will be able to use the comics to test out different storylines and ideas to see what “clicks” with the fans, and then use those ideas for future films and TV shows.
Marvel Studios
To a certain extent, Marvel Studios has always done this. Characters like the Thanos’ Black Order—which were used in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame —were created in recent years by writer Jonathan Hickman with at least some eye on how they might be used in the MCU down the line. But now the connection between publishing and other media will be stronger than ever.
This also means that the weird distance between the Marvel TV side and the MCU will probably evaporate. Although technically shows like Agents of S.H.I..E.L.D. and the Netflix Defenders series were connected to the MCU, those connections were loose at best. Going forward, expect anything that appears on the Marvel TV side to have much stronger ties to the overall story of the MCU. One would imagine this doesn’t just apply to to the Disney+ streaming series, either. Series like Runaways on Hulu will probably start to tie into the overall MCU a lot more with Feige now operating as the man in charge of everything.
Marvel Studios
As far as we know, Feige will also continue his role in producing a Star Wars film for Kathleen Kennedy as well. Whether or not that makes his Star Wars move a Marvel Studios project in unknown. But there has been a very long relationship with Marvel Comics and Star Wars, so it wouldn’t be shocking to see the Marvel Studios logo go up in front of whatever his Star Wars film turns out to be. His taking on new responsibilities at Marvel probably means that the rumors of his taking over Lucasfilm when Kathleen Kennedy steps down are probably just that—rumors. It looks like Feige is in with Marvel for the long haul. And that is probably a good thing for the brand overall.
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