Marvel Studios' Avengers: Doomsday

[Casper Gutman]

If so, that’s terrible. That’s not Doom. He’s certainly not Evil Tony.

What makes Doom Doom?

He hates Richards. He went to college with Richards. He’s incredibly vain. He’s incredibly arrogant. He’s a brilliant scientist. He’s a brilliant sorcerer. He rules Latveria.

Tony checks three of those boxes out of the gate. The college, Richard’s hate, and mastery of sorcery slips neatly into a slightly rewritten backstory. The only tricky bit is the Latverian connection, and I’m sure they’ll figure a way to make that work.

A lot of what endears Doom to comics fans, the things that distinguish him from a generic baddie, has taken decades and decades of monthly storytelling to establish. Having Tony be Doom allows a lot of that to be established much more quickly and lets MCU fans immediately have some of the same emotional attachment to the character comic fans do. The alternative is that Doom shows up briefly as an entirely new character in FF and immediately becomes the primary antagonist of two Avengers films.

 

[Jedijax719]

There are so many people that could have been cast as Doom such as Cillian Murphy and Adam Driver that there is a very specific reason they have RDJ in that role. It is clearly based somehow on the multiverse. We'll see how it plays out but they didn't just cast RDJ "because".

 

[MarvelCharacterNerd]

It seems a bit of a Hail Mary casting, but RDJ is always terrific to watch on screen and I do think he'll make an excellent Doom.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

There are so many people that could have been cast as Doom such as Cillian Murphy and Adam Driver that there is a very specific reason they have RDJ in that role. It is clearly based somehow on the multiverse. We'll see how it plays out but they didn't just cast RDJ "because".

I think you’re probably correct that it’s a multiverse tie in but I also wouldn’t be surprised if it’s as simple as Disney bringing back a fan favorite to reignite the Marvel fandom.

Marvel was a money printing machine during the Infinity Stones storyline, it’s struggled to make money since Endgame, I’m sure Disney misses those consistant billion dollar Marvel movie days.

 

[MoonRakerSCM]

Isnt Fantastic Four confirmed to take place in an alternate universe?

 

[doctornick]

Isnt Fantastic Four confirmed to take place in an alternate universe?

I don't think its every been officially confirmed, but seems pretty likely based on hints. Also, seems like it will be set (at least initially) in the past like the 1950/60's given the aesthetics of the promotional materials. "First Steps" as a title feels to me like a likely oblique reference to Neil Armstrong's words from the moon.

 

[MisterPenguin]

I don't think its every been officially confirmed, but seems pretty likely based on hints. Also, seems like it will be set (at least initially) in the past like the 1950/60's given the aesthetics of the promotional materials. "First Steps" as a title feels to me like a likely oblique reference to Neil Armstrong's words from the moon.

Feige complimented fans who noted that the 1960s NYC in the promos was not the NYC we all know, which is the setting of 616's main MCU timeline/dimension.

FF will be set in some universe that isn't 616.

 

[Hawkeye_2018]

Have mixed feelings on the RDJ casting. But I love the switch of the big bad from Kang to Doom. Also having the Russos back is huge. The MCU really needed this kind of positive buzz after the last year.

 

[doctornick]

Have mixed feelings on the RDJ casting. But I love the switch of the big bad from Kang to Doom. Also having the Russos back is huge. The MCU really needed this kind of positive buzz after the last year.

Agree with all of that. I think getting Dr. Doom finally in the MCU will be awesome and he's great as the next big bad (and they can also bring back Kang down the line with a different actor if they wanted).

But the RDJ news has me skeptical because I feel it will detract from the awesomeness of Doom. Even if he isn't related to Tony Stark in any way - and it would be very odd to use RDJ if they were planning to have this be a completely different character - it just seems like an unnecessarily and distracting feature to use him when plenty of other quality actors could do the role.

Furthermore, I would strongly prefer that Dr. Doom be in a mask full time, at least after a basic original story and once the mask is used. And using RDJ in that role makes me think they will have him take off the mask regularly to show the actor's face which takes away from the character (who is so vain that he doesn't let anyone see his face without the mask).

 

[Hawkeye_2018]

Major's troubles will end up being the best thing that could have happened. Kang was not moving the needle the way they had hoped.

 

[peng]

RDJ as doom feels like a bad idea, I am not a fan of probably having yet another villain becoming another "Tony Stark made fun of me, I must be evil now" character. Sadly, I know that it won't matter as it will make another billion+ at the box office.

 

[Jedijax719]

Doom with a twist.

In the universe where RDJ is Doom, Tom Cruise must be Stark.

 

[Casper Gutman]

The Avengers: Doomsday logo is green and silver.

The Avengers: Secret Wars logo is red and yellow.

 

[Hawkeye_2018]

RDJ as doom feels like a bad idea, I am not a fan of probably having yet another villain becoming another "Tony Stark made fun of me, I must be evil now" character. Sadly, I know that it won't matter as it will make another billion+ at the box office.

That won't be Doom's orgin story. Again, I trust the Russos but this is kinda dumb how a few years we celebrated RDJ and gave him a big sendoff for his exit in the MCU only to bring him back and appear to make him THE major chacter in the next big event MCU films.

 

[Disney Irish]

That won't be Doom's orgin story. Again, I trust the Russos but this is kinda dumb how a few years we celebrated RDJ and gave him a big sendoff for his exit in the MCU only to bring him back and appear to make him THE major chacter in the next big event MCU films.

Well its not the first time that an actor has played multiple characters in the MCU.

Having RDJ come back for another character (even if it ends up being a variant) I don't think diminishes anything that he brought to Tony or his death.

 

[BrianLo]

Well its not the first time that an actor has played multiple characters in the MCU.

Having RDJ come back for another character (even if it ends up being a variant) I don't think diminishes anything that he brought to Tony or his death.

Ya the lower hanging fruit was him as a back up AI. I think this takes way less away from Tony and it seems strongly like he’ll just be playing an entirely different (and mostly masked) character.

With the obligatory mask get knocked off when one of our hero’s has the upper hand… causing them to hesitate. Then onto the next movie.

 

[MarvelCharacterNerd]

I thought this article made a lot of good points about the concerns in casting RDJ:

Robert Downey Jr. Electrified Comic-Con, but Will He Energize the Marvel Universe?

In one of the biggest surprises in the convention's history, the actor was revealed to star as Doctor Doom in a pair of 'Avengers' movies. What happens now?

www.hollywoodreporter.com

Personally, I'll ride with it and see how it goes and hope it's really good. And if not, well, we'll always have Endgame.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

Major's troubles will end up being the best thing that could have happened. Kang was not moving the needle the way they had hoped.

The multiverse in general has been very confusing, at least to casual comic book fans like myself, hopefully the switch to Doom also comes with a less confusing story.

My biggest complaint with the Kang story is it didn’t matter if the heroes won or lost because there were endless variations of Kang waiting to replace him if he lost. It didn’t feel like there was an end goal.

 

[doctornick]

The multiverse in general has been very confusing, at least to casual comic book fans like myself, hopefully the switch to Doom also comes with a less confusing story.

My biggest complaint with the Kang story is it didn’t matter if the heroes won or lost because there were endless variations of Kang waiting to replace him if he lost. It didn’t feel like there was an end goal.

Time travel and multiverses always make things way too messy. I enjoyed what they did in Endgame and No Way Home, but always felt it would be a steep price to pay by making the future movies so convoluted.

 

[MisterPenguin]

I thought this article made a lot of good points about the concerns in casting RDJ:

Robert Downey Jr. Electrified Comic-Con, but Will He Energize the Marvel Universe?

In one of the biggest surprises in the convention's history, the actor was revealed to star as Doctor Doom in a pair of 'Avengers' movies. What happens now?

www.hollywoodreporter.com

Personally, I'll ride with it and see how it goes and hope it's really good. And if not, well, we'll always have Endgame.

That article made a hard swing from reporting to armchair studio management.

Anyhoo, the author made the point that since RDJ's character is named "Victor Von Doom," then he can't be a Stark variant because they don't share the same name.

There are dozens of counter examples in the MCU and comics in which a variant has a different name. E.g., Kang variants often had differing names.

So, this could be a Tony Stark variant with a different name (and background and upbringing).

Or not.