Marvel Delays ‘Deadpool 3,’ ‘Fantastic Four,’ And More

It sure seemed overly ambitious to release two gigantic Avengers movies in the span of like six months. Who would attempt such a deranged endeavor? If anyone would, it would probably be Marvel. And that was the initial plan for Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars — both movies would open in 2025. But, alas, it shall not happen after all.

Marvel has shuffled up their upcoming release calendar, and delayed several of their biggest upcoming titles. The instigator of all the movies seems to be the issues behind-the-scenes of Blade, which just lost its director, Bassam Tariq. That will require the search for a new filmmaker to take over the project, and will also mean the movie won’t be able to hit its previous release date, November 3, 2023. Instead, that movie will now open in theaters (hopefully) on September 6, 2024.

As often happens with Marvel and their release calendar, when one movie gets pushed back, it moves into the release date previously planned for another film, which then moves back to another date for another MCU movie and so on. Blade inherited the date previously held by Deadpool 3 starring Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman. That movie now opens on November 8, 2024 — which was when Fantastic Four was going to come out. That film, which has had its own creative shakeups and could probably use a bit more pre-production time, now opens on February 14, 2025.

Meanwhile, Marvel also delayed the second of its two upcoming Avengers sequels. The big Avengers: Secret Wars will now debut in the summer of 2026 rather than the fall of 2025.

After all those moves, here is the updated MCU release calendar for the next four years:

Sure, it’s a bummer to wait a few extra months or a year to see some of these things. But there are now so many Marvel movies and shows all the time, that really, no delay is that upsetting. There’s a new thing coming every few weeks. We are smack dab in the middle of a never-ending cinematic universe.