With all due respect to Steve Rogers, some news means not worrying about language. Holy shit. The Iron Man who launched the MCU is returning to the franchise, but not as Tony Stark. Marvel Studios dropped a true stunner at its Hall H panel at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con. Robert Downey Jr. is officially coming back to play Doctor Doom, the big baddie of the next two Avengers movies.
The MCU’s multiverse can be frustrating, but it can also be incredibly rewarding. Today it’s definitely the latter. With Disney abandoning The Kang Dynasty for Avengers 5, Marvel needed an even bigger villain to anchor Phase 6. Who better to fill that role than Victor Von Doom, one of the most famous, best villains in comic book history. And who better to play that role of a brilliant, charming, arrogant larger-than-life figure than Academy Award winner and MCU stalwart Robert Downey Jr. He’ll now be a huge part of the newly named Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, which the Russo brothers will both direct as they are also returning to the franchise.
Robert Downey Jr. recently opened up about how the casting as Doctor Doom came about. Downey recalls, “[Feige] said, ‘It just keeps occurring to me, if you were to come back… ‘… Susan was like, ‘Wait, wait. Come back as what?’” And that turned out to be the question of the hour.
Robert Downey Jr. adds that he and Feige thought long and hard about how he might return to the MCU, “How can we not go backwards? How can we not disappoint expectations? How can we continue to beat expectations?… And [Feige] brought up Victor Von Doom. I looked into this character. Later on, he goes, ‘Let’s get Victor Von Doom right.” Disney CEO Bob Iger, too, was onboard. “I like it,” Downey recalls him saying.
Like we said: holy sh*t. Sorry Cap, but even you’d forget about language at a time like this.