With the ever-expanding narrative of the Marvel Cinematic Universe comes the burden of mystery.
There are many unanswered questions about the MCU, some of which have simmered on the
back burner since almost the very beginning.
Here are a few of the biggest lingering questions.
Both Ant-Man films offer some of the lightest, most comedy-centered fare in the MCU, so it
would be understandable if the kinds of fans who always have their ears and eyes open for
potential "secrets" let their guard down and missed a couple of things.
But with the release of Ant-Man and The Wasp, one of the biggest unanswered questions of
the MCU may have something to do with who the new Big Bad of the MCU will be after Thanos
is finally defeated.
Early in the film, both Wasp and Ghost easily dispatch the thugs of the ruthless Sonny Burch,
yet Burch just keeps coming back because he's working for someone who doesn't take no for
an answer.
"Really?
This guy again?"
In case you were too busy laughing and didn't notice, Burch never reveals exactly who it
is he's working for.
He mentions his employer to Wasp and we hear him talking on the phone with them, but we
never get a name.
Obviously, it's too early to tell.
It may be that director Peyton Reed was simply setting up the villain for the third Ant-Man
film.
But considering the possibilities of Hank Pym's quantum technology, whoever's hunting
for it probably isn't looking to rob banks and knock over drug stores.
A heavy hitter is coming for Pym's tech, and they might occupy Thanos' empty chief villain
throne after Avengers 4.
In Avengers: Infinity War, we learn that Thanos captured the first of the Infinity Stones
off-camera: the Power Stone, also known as the Orb.
We see Nova Prime put the Orb in a vault on Xandar in the last few minutes of Guardians
of the Galaxy.
The Mad Titan already has the stone when he and the Black Order attack the Asgardian refugee
ship in Infinity War, and later in the film, we learn that Thanos "decimated" Xandar.
But the word "decimate" isn't always used with precision, particularly not when it comes
to Thanos.
We know his usual way of doing things is to wipe out half the population of a planet.
If half the population of Earth were wiped out, you could use the word "decimate" without
sounding too dramatic.
So did Thanos and the Black Order literally destroy the whole population?
Or did they just bring it to its knees?
Is it possible we might see Nova Prime or Corpsman Dey again?
Whatever happens, it would seem strange to not have the events on Xandar trigger more
events further down the road.
It may even be the narrative tool Marvel Studios uses to bring the hero Nova into the MCU.
Sif was not only missing from Avengers: Infinity War, but she was out of action for Thor: Ragnarok
as well.
According to actress Jaime Alexander, she didn't show up for the third Thor because
of a scheduling conflict with her NBC action series Blindspot.
Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige gave a narrative explanation that leaves the door
open for Sif's return, saying Loki would want Thor's closest allies far away from him.
Just as we find out from Skurge in the beginning of Ragnarok that Heimdall was falsely accused
of treason, Loki probably also used his Odin disguise to get rid of Sif.
Feige went so far as to speculate that the God of Mischief had her banished.
If Sif wasn't on Asgard when Surtur destroyed it at the end of Ragnarok, then she wasn't
on the refugee ship either.
That means Sif could still be alive out there in the cosmos, waiting to hear back from a
world that's long gone and a people who aren't doing much better.
Strangely, a term we haven't heard used at all in the MCU yet is "Elders of the Universe,"
in spite of the fact that three of the Elders from the comics have appeared in the films.
One of the elders from Marvel Comics, Ego the Living Planet, was a major villain in
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
In the comics, the Elders are a group of powerful cosmic beings who share three common traits:
each is powerful, each is the last surviving member of their respective race, and each
is obsessed with a specific pursuit.
For some it's collecting, for others it's gaming, gardening, or in some cases, just
good, old-fashioned killing.
Though neither the Collector nor the Grandmaster have been shown to have any overt relationship
to one another in the films, in the comics they're both counted among the Elders.
Physically, they've both been given similar marks on their chins.
It may be that they're both meant to be related to another in some way, but that it's just
a footnote for the fans, not something that will ever matter that much in the overall
story of the MCU.
But there are reasons to think the two could be much more connected than we think.
Both potentially have some kind of relationship with Loki.
Remember that it was Loki disguised as Odin who sent Volstagg and Sif to deliver the Aether
to the Collector in the mid-credits scene of Thor: The Dark World.
And in Thor: Ragnarok, we never learned exactly how Loki won Grandmaster's favor.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 gave us the answer to the origin of Peter Quill.
We learned who his father was, and how that lineage allowed Quill to hold an Infinity
Stone without dying.
It was good to get answers about Peter, but there's another Guardian whose origins remain
shrouded in mystery.
We know very little about Rocket.
We know he's the product of scientific experiments.
We know the Nova Corps refers to him as
"Subject 89P13.
Calls itself Rocket."
in the first Guardians film.
And of course we know Rocket isn't exactly thrilled about the nature of his existence.
We don't know the identities of the scientists who made him, why they did what they did,
or how Rocket escaped them.
Guardians writer and director James Gunn has said he doesn't plan to stick to Rocket's
comic book origin, but even with that in mind, we still don't know exactly what direction
he's going with the story.
The second and final season of Netflix's Iron Fist ends with a tease.
Danny Rand and Ward Meachum are globetrotting together to find a man named Orson Randall.
In the comics, Orson is an Iron Fist who turned his back on his duties to protect the sacred
city K'un-Lun.
The Netflix series ends with the reveal that Danny Rand acquired Randall's pistols, which
appear to be infused with Iron Fist energy.
Though Randall's pistols don't exactly have special abilities in the comics, the scene
is a clear reference to those stories.
Unfortunately, we may never know what happens to Danny.
In October 2018, Iron Fist became the first of the Netflix Marvel series to get the axe.
Danny Rand's travels are briefly mentioned in the final season of Jessica Jones, but
not in a way that provides closure or any details.
Perhaps Disney could revive the show someday, but if they do it won't be for a while.
Avengers: Endgame brought the Gamora from 2014 into the present, filling Star-Lord with
the hope that he could have the love of his life back in spite of her untimely death during
Infinity War.
Unfortunately, this Gamora has never met Quill and their first meeting doesn't exactly go
well.
She's nowhere in sight after the battle with Thanos and his armies, leading some to wonder
if Tony Stark's snap unintentionally killed her along with her adoptive father.
We know now that a scene was filmed with Gamora after the battle, showing she did survive
Tony's snap, but it was deleted.
So where is Gamora, and what are her plans?
Shortly after Endgame's release we made some educated guesses, but it's still just speculation.
At this point we can only guess that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 will be the film that
finally sheds some light on what happened to her.
"Where's Gamora?"
"Yeah, I'll do you one better.
Who's Gamora?"
"I'll do you one better!
Why's Gamora?"
The fact that this is a Gamora from the past also fills her return with a lot of potential.
This new/old Gamora could go in any direction.
She could rejoin the Guardians, she could become a villain, or something in between.
This is a Gamora who never met Peter Quill and who never fought alongside him and the
other Guardians.
Who knows who she'll become?
In 2016's Captain America: Civil War, Bucky Barnes is treated like the most dangerous
person alive.
With enhanced abilities and skills that make him a match for Captain America, a metal arm
strong enough to tear through Iron Man's armor, and mental conditioning that can turn him
into a killing machine, Bucky is a potential time bomb.
By the end of the film, T'Challa agrees to keep him in cryogenic stasis in Wakanda.
By the end of Black Panther we see Bucky is unfrozen and living among T'Challa's people,
which suggests he's made quite a bit of progress.
Strangely, we have yet to get a confirmation that Shuri was able to erase Bucky's mental
triggers.
When the paralyzed Everett Ross is brought to Wakanda for her help in Black Panther,
Shuri briefly mentions helping another "white boy," but that's it.
We've yet to hear any definitive word on whether or not Bucky can still be turned into a weapon
with that list of random phrases Zemo finds in Civil War.
Considering we know Zemo is set to return in the Falcon and the Winter Soldier miniseries,
it could be that Shuri was never able to complete her task.
Daniel Brühl may even have hinted this is the case when, during the 2019 San Diego Comic-Con,
he posted a first look of himself as Zemo for the new series on Instagram.
In the caption for the photo, Brühl added the ten-phrase pass code that turns Bucky
back into the Winter Soldier in Civil War.
Carol Danvers ended up being pivotal in the battle against Thanos.
She saves Tony Stark, destroys Thanos' ship Sanctuary before it can kill the other heroes,
and in a one-on-one fight, she proves to be very capable against the Mad Titan.
In spite of her importance, she's gone for most of Avengers: Endgame.
While communicating with Black Widow via holographic image, she lets her know not to expect her
for a while, and then she's gone until the final battle.
We probably won't know until Captain Marvel 2 where exactly the hero spent her time for
most of Endgame, but a good possibility is that she was trying to stop everyone else
in the galaxy from killing one another.
"There are a lot of other planets in the universe, and unfortunately they didn't have you guys."
While we get to see how the Snap impacts Earth, we have yet to see how the rest of the galaxy
responds to losing half its population.
It's possible, if not likely, that when it comes to some of the interstellar empires
out there in the cosmos, there are a lot of power shifts in the wake of Thanos' snap.
After all, most of the galaxy has no way of knowing in the immediate aftermath why half
its people simply disappeared.
Confusion is probably reigning all over the spaceways after the conclusion of Infinity
War, and that's probably what Captain Marvel is dealing with.
That said, we still don't know for sure.
The aftermath of Infinity War is so drastic that one of the biggest changes in the MCU
in the years before Thanos' snap seems utterly forgotten by the time of Avengers: Endgame.
There's no mention of the world-changing laws known as The Sokovia Accords in either Endgame
or Spider-Man: Far from Home.
That means no one has clarified whether \or not international law still requires the Avengers
to operate under the watch of the United Nations.
After five years, Captain America is regularly visiting the Avengers compound and attending
a support group, so it doesn't seem like he's a fugitive anymore.
Ant-Man's in the Quantum Realm, Hawkeye's gone rogue, and the rest of Captain America:
Civil War's anti-registration heroes are erased by Thanos' snap.
It seems clear that after the end of Infinity War either the Sokovia Accords were repealed
or that no one was willing to enforce them.
Either possibility makes sense.
After all, Bruce Banner is allowed to roam free and take selfies in diners even though
the last time he was on Earth he was wanted for destroying half a city.
Regardless, we never learn exactly why Cap is allowed to roam free or what the UN thinks
about the Avengers' new talking raccoon and blue-skinned cyborg.
Taneleer Tivan, also known as The Collector, remains one of the most mysterious figures
in the MCU.
Adding to his mystery is the simple fact that we have no idea whether or not he's alive.
While we see the Collector in Infinity War, it isn't actually him.
When we see Thanos torturing the Collector for the location of the Reality Stone, it's
an illusion the Titan creates to fool the Guardians.
The Collector is long gone by the time the Guardians arrive on Knowhere.
Thanos has already captured the Stone and Tivan's famous collection is ablaze.
Thanos might have killed the Collector before the Guardians arrived, but it's also possible
that the obsessive Tivan escaped and leaves left the Reality Stone behind.
Without the Stone, Tivan meant nothing to the Titan, so perhaps The Collector decided
to ditch the valuables and escape with his life.
We just don't know at this point.
We don't get to see what happens to Mjolnir in the resolution of Avengers: Endgame.
Captain America has the hammer with him when Hulk sends him back in time, but it isn't
there with him when he reappears as an elderly man.
Presumably, he would have returned the hammer to Asgard circa 2013 along with the Aether.
That was clearly the intended mission.
Otherwise, he would have left the Thor of that time hammerless when he still had Malekith
and the Dark Elf army to deal with.
Still, we don't see it happen.
It's doubtful that Steve would be selfish enough to keep Mjolnir for himself.
But it's possible something went wrong.
Did Steve find the Thor of that time and hand Mjolnir to him, or did he just leave it standing
on the ground somewhere, trusting that it would answer Thor's call when needed?
Now that we know Jane Foster is coming back for Thor: Love and Thunder, and that she's
somehow going to gain the power of Thor, the question of what happened to the hammer seems
more important.
It could be that whatever method Steve chooses chose to return the hammer is what will lead
to Foster becoming the MCU's new thunder god.
Spider-Man: Far from Home's post-credits scene has inspired a lot of fan speculation about
who we've been calling "Nick Fury."
The scene reveals that for at least part of Far from Home, if not longer, the real Nick
Fury wasn't even on Earth.
Talos the Skrull replaced Fury while Soren replaced Maria Hill.
In the meantime, the real Fury is shown on some kind of space station or remote facility
with a bunch of other Skrulls.
The first and most obvious question is how long Talos and Soren have been playing their
roles.
Since the Skrulls are introduced in Captain Marvel, which is set in the '90s, it's possible
Talos and Soren have been disguised as Fury and Hill for multiple films.
Talos could have been disguised as Fury as early as 2015's Avengers: Age of Ultron.
That's his first appearance after Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and it's doubtful
that film's Fury could've been a Skrull, because Talos probably wouldn't be able to retain
his disguise after being nearly killed by Bucky.
There's another burning question, too: What exactly is Fury working on with the Skrulls?
Talos and his brethren likely feel indebted to Fury after he helps save them from the
Kree, but that doesn't tell us what they're doing with him.
Speaking of the Skrulls we know have been hiding in plain sight, what about the ones
we don't know about?
Fans have speculated for a long time about which MCU characters could be replaced by
Skrulls, and it turned out that Nick Fury was officially one of those characters.
But that Spider-Man: Far from Home post-credits scene did more than reveal that both Fury
and Maria Hill were replaced by Skrulls.
It also showed us the Skrulls have been working with Fury for a while.
And if that's the case, then what are the odds this is the only time Fury's asked them
to use their shape-changing abilities for his benefit?
They don't seem terribly high.
If that's the case, then there are likely more Skrulls out there on MCU's Earth, strategically
placed and disguised as regular humans.
If you saw Spider-Man: Far from Home, then you know it gave us the return of a very minor
character from 2008's Iron Man.
William Ginter Riva, a scientist working for Stark Industries in Iron Man, returns in a
very different way in the Spidey sequel.
In Far from Home, Quentin Beck recruits Riva as part of a small army of disgruntled Stark
employees.
Unlike Beck, Riva survives the events of the film.
And he apparently does more than survive.
In a mid-credits scene, we learn that an altered video has been released which seems to prove
that Spider-Man murdered Quentin Beck, but not before Beck could reveal Spidey's true
identity.
Since Riva was recording the events remotely, he's likely the person who fed the doctored
video to J. Jonah Jameson.
"Spider-Man's name is Peter Parker!"
If Riva is the one who sets up Spidey, we have to wonder why.
Is Riva just trying to get back at Spider-Man, or does he have something bigger planned?
He doesn't come off as a guy with the stiffest backbone in the MCU, so it doesn't seem like
he's gunning to be Mysterio's successor.
Maybe Riva didn't release the information to the public.
Maybe he sold it to someone else we haven't met yet.
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