Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Entertainment
  3. News

Disney pushes back MCU releases for Black Widow, Eternals, and more

By

As more and more movies were delayed by the coronavirus pandemic, we expected Disney’s carefully managed plan for the Marvel Cinematic Universe may be shaken up — and now we finally have a good idea what the MCU calendar looks like going forward.

Recommended Videos

Disney revealed a new list of release dates for its upcoming MCU films, as well as several big projects outside Marvel Studios.

Please enable Javascript to view this content

The release date for Black Widow, Scarlett Johansson’s first solo adventure as Marvel’s superspy, has been moved to November 6. Fellow MCU film The Eternals, which had previously been slated for that fall release, was bumped to February 12, 2021, the date when Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings was originally intended to premiere.

Related

#BlackWidow in theaters November 6 pic.twitter.com/vPi6YMeTMC

— Marvel Studios (@MarvelStudios) April 3, 2020

That domino effect continues throughout the MCU calendar, with most of the upcoming films sliding into the release date of the movies that were initially intended to follow them throughout 2021.

The new calendar ends with a trio of release dates in 2022 for Thor: Love And Thunder and the still-untitled Black Panther 2, and Captain Marvel 2.

Here’s the full list of upcoming MCU films and their new release dates:

  • Black Widow: November 6, 2020
  • The Eternals: February 12, 2021
  • Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: May 7, 2021
  • Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness: November 5, 2021
  • Thor: Love and Thunder: February 28, 2022
  • Black Panther 2: May 8, 2022
  • Captain Marvel 2: July 8, 2022

Along with revealing new release dates for its MCU films, Disney also announced new release dates for tentpole films Mulan (July 24) and Jungle Cruise (July 30, 2021). The untitled fifth Indiana Jones film was also pushed back to July 29, 2022.

At this point, it’s unknown how the pandemic will affect any of MCU television series, which also play a key role in establishing the timeline of events for the Marvel movies. Production on The Falcon and The Winter Soldier remains on hiatus, for example, while the schedule for WandaVision and other series remains unclear at this point.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Sony Pictures’ plans for the third film in its Spider-Man solo franchise are also unknown at the moment.

The Sony franchise was tightly integrated into the MCU with Spider-Man: Homecoming and Spider-Man: Far From Home.

The third Spider-Man film currently has a July 2021 premiere on the calendar, but that could change as Sony figures out where it will fit within the new Marvel schedule.

Editors’ Recommendations

Topics
Rick Marshall
Rick Marshall
Former Digital Trends Contributor
A veteran journalist with more than two decades of experience covering local and national news, arts and entertainment, and…
The scariest MCU characters ranked
Elizabeth Olsen as the Scarlet Witch looking to the distance in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.

The MCU is famous for its lighthearted and kid-friendly vibe. Most of its films are notorious for their abundance of jokes and low stakes, amounting to colorful and visually dazzling but unimpactful stories. The heroes are all clean-cut and safe, paragons of correctness and physical beauty. Meanwhile, most of the villains in the MCU are somewhat forgettable, posing only a fleeting challenge to Earth's Mightiest Heroes and acting more like nuisances than genuinely dangerous threats. All in all, there seems to be no room for weird or unconventional in the MCU, much less scary.

Still, some MCU figures have enough creepy qualities to come across as scary. These characters are chilling, whether because of their eerie behavior, imposing physical appearance, wealth and influence, or a mix of all these. And while they might not send anyone running for the hills, they successfully unsettle audiences, especially considering the colorful and low-stakes universe they call home.
5. Wilson Fisk

Read more
Shang-Chi director to return for sequel and new Disney+ series
The cast of Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.

Earlier this year, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings proved to be a box office superhero by bringing fans back to theaters at a crucial time and raking in more than $432-million worldwide to date. Now, Marvel is officially moving forward with a sequel to Shang-Chi.

Deadline is reporting that director Destin Daniel Cretton has signed a multiyear overall deal with Disney and Hulu’s Onyx Collective that includes both Shang-Chi 2 and a new Marvel Studios series on Disney+. Cretton is also launching his own production company, Family Owned, which will "focus on building a slate of projects in film and TV that highlight the experiences of communities that have traditionally been overlooked by pop culture."

Read more
Black Panther 2: Everything we know about the sequel so far
Black Panther review

Marvel Studios made the entire world shout "Wakanda Forever!" when Black Panther hit theaters in February 2018, kicking off a spectacular run that has made the film one of the highest-grossing movies of all time and the best-reviewed of any movie in Marvel's cinematic universe.

Of course, Disney is making a sequel. While Black Panther 2 missed Marvel's big Phase 4 reveal at Comic-Con International 2019, the film was confirmed at Disney's D23 convention a month later.

Read more