The Last Avengers: Doomsday Teaser Finally Unites Two Super Teams
Wakanda is going back to its roots.
Marvel is doing everything previously thought impossible with Avengers: Doomsday. First, it brought back the Russo brothers and Robert Downey, Jr. Then, it brought back Steve Rogers and Thor. What’s more, it brought them back in not one, not two, but four different teasers, even though there’s still a year to go before we can see the movie itself.
Paired with theatrical showings of Avatar: Fire and Ash, these four trailers were presumedly supposed to entice Marvel fans to buy tickets every week. In actuality, it just stoked fan interest in those trailers when they eventually hit YouTube. But that doesn’t lessen the excitement over these reveals. Now, we see what Marvel has been saving for last, and it’s a first meeting that has deep ties in comics canon. Check out the teaser below:
The teaser shows Shuri, the Black Panther, and M’Baku, King of Wakanda, walking along a vast desert. “I've lost everyone that matters to me,” Shuri says in voiceover. “The king has his duties to prepare our people for the afterlife. I have mine.” We see clips of Namor and the other Talonkanil watching over this desert, and then we see King M’Baku introduce himself to Ben Grimm, finally bringing the Fantastic Four into the MCU after their arrival was teased in The Fantastic Four: First Steps and the post-credits scene of Thunderbolts.
Though this meeting may seem unusual — something that’s underlined by Ben’s introduction of the street he lives on in the Lower East Side. (Yancy Street, by the way, is a very iconic location in Marvel comics.) But the pairing of Black Panther and The Fantastic Four is about as old as it can be — the Black Panther made his comics debut in Fantastic Four #52, published in April 1966.
Ben Grimm introduces himself in the fourth teaser for Avengers: Doomsday.
So what does this mean for Avengers: Doomsday? Well, first we know that Marvel’s First Family did in fact make it to Earth safely. But it also reveals that these two corners of the MCU may be working together in Doomsday. With the massive cast involved, it’s unlikely all the characters will be working with everyone, so pairing the Wakandans and the Fantastic Four would be a great way to establish a subplot of heroes who aren’t used to the ways of the MCU’s Earth.
If it’s tempting to read a lot into this short clip, good. The Russo Brothers posted the teaser on Instagram with a cryptic caption encouraging just that. “What you’ve been watching for the last four weeks… are not teasers. Or trailers,” the post reads. “They are stories. They are clues…Pay attention.”
These four teasers, or rather, “stories,” may have been short and often sparse, but apparently there’s some greater meaning we’re all missing. We’ve got less than a year to figure it out.
