Wonder Man’s Star Just Revealed A Disappointing Truth About The MCU
After so much behind-the-scenes tumult at Marvel, “the optics are obvious” for Yahya Abdul-Mateen II.
Marvel giveth, and sometimes Marvel taketh away — but the stories that the franchise has chosen to cull lately reveal a telling pattern. It’s something that Marvel’s shrewdest critics (this writer included) have been monitoring for years now: there was a time when the studio was making a concerted push for more diverse stories, but the MCU has been walking those efforts back in earnest lately. The long-gestating Blade reboot, which had been in tumultuous development since 2019, was finally canceled in July. Then there’s Wonder Man, the critically acclaimed series that briefly got renewed for a second season before Marvel thought better of it and pulled the plug.
When Wonder Man got the axe, a smattering of optimistic theories rose up to make the best of the cancellation. Maybe the eponymous hero (played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who’s been nominated for an Emmy for his performance) would be making the jump to big-screen fare, like a West Coast Avengers movie — or, my favorite theory: a Rush Hour-inspired two-hander between Simon Williams and Shang-Chi (Simu Liu). Unfortunately, according to Abdul-Mateen himself, the reason for Wonder Man’s cancellation isn’t coming with a consolation prize.
Low viewership is reportedly responsible for Wonder Man’s cancellation — but is that a good enough excuse?
“I was told that it had something to do with the viewership numbers,” the actor recently told Vanity Fair. “I wasn’t told what those numbers were, but ultimately, for whatever reason it was, I think they decided that it didn’t make sense for business, and that’s the decision that we live with.”
That may be the reality, but it’s not one fans necessarily have to accept. In a recent video addressing the show’s cancellation, Wonder Man co-showrunner Andrew Guest encouraged conversations about “the kind of stories that we’re prioritizing, and the kind of shows platforms want to make,” between Marvel fans and TV fans alike. Those conversations have been especially fraught after the revelation that Marvel is moving on from its attempts to make Blade and instead fast-tracking a Ghost Rider movie with Ryan Gosling. Then there’s the incumbent return of Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) in Avengers: Doomsday. Many fear it will undermine the authority of the new Captain America, Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie), especially after his disappointing solo outing in Brave New World. (It doesn’t help that Marvel was reportedly courting Evans to return since 2018: did Sam Wilson as Cap ever stand a chance?)
Whether Marvel’s conscious of the pattern or not, Wonder Man is the latest in a line of Black-led stories the studio failed.
No matter where you turn in the MCU, Black-led stories just don’t seem to be a priority anymore. Black Panther created the kind of cultural moment that most studios could only dream of, but Marvel itself didn’t do much to honor that momentum. The films and shows that followed that phenomenon were either beleaguered by messy productions and bad scripts (Brave New World and Blade) or made the scapegoat for an angry fanbase (The Marvels and Ironheart). Even its leads are taking notice.
“I think the optics are obvious,” Abdul-Mateen admitted. “If I’m Disney, if I’m Marvel, I don’t want to be attached to these optics. So it should be a priority to change that narrative and to do what it takes to responsibly change that narrative with quality stories, with quality resources.”
Ironically, the blueprint to better storytelling lies within the show Marvel just canceled. “I felt that [Wonder Man] did have quality story, did have quality resources, did have quality actors and people, and did produce quality results that the viewers responded to positively,” Abdul-Mateen said. The show deserves “some study,” the actor continued — not only into why it was so successful, but why, almost in spite of that success, Marvel continues to cannibalize itself.
