Ever since the introduction of characters like Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld) and Eli Bradley (Elijah Richardson), fans have been waiting for the Young Avengers, which feels like the team we’re most likely to see appear next. The most recent hint of their existence was in Daredevil: Born Again where the father of Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) told Matt Murdock that his daughter was in Los Angeles with her friends.
Many viewers made the connection to the fact that Kate Bishop has an aunt who lives in Hollywoodland, and that one of her famous recent comic arcs took her there. So if Kamala is in LA with Kate after their meeting at the end of The Marvels, then there’s a chance that Wiccan (Joe Locke), Stature (Kathryn Newton), or Eli’s Patriot might have found their way there too. The fact that they’re in Los Angeles also raises another question: could the Young Avengers be merged with the West Coast Avengers in the MCU?
With Vision and Wanda currently out of commision, the usual lineup of that team might not appear. So it would make sense that the Young Avengers could take on that mantle, especially since they’re getting older and—well, less young—by the time they’d get their own movie. Conversely, this group has at times been rumored to debut in the MCU as The Champions, an oddball ‘70s comic book team recently reimagined as cool teens.
When it comes to other teams that we might see in the lead up to Doomsday, there is also A-Force, the all-female Avengers created by G. Willow Wilson, Marguerite Bennett, and Jorge Molina. If that were the case, it could be a good home for She-Hulk, Shuri, Captain Marvel, Monica Rambeau, and other women who aren’t currently on the main Avengers roster. The end of Thunderbolts* also gave big Dark Avengers and Dark Reign vibes, so we wouldn’t be surprised to see a more obviously “evil” group of characters brought together by another of the MCU’s big bads, although Valentina’s new heroes definitely already fill that space to a point.
When it comes to weirder Avengers teams that we might see, there is of course the ’90s West Coast Avengers offshoot Force Works, which could potentially become a part of Marvel’s animated / live-action crossover plans, or the more recent Savage Avengers who were a rugged group featuring antiheroes like Elektra, Wolverine, Venom, and the Punisher.
So why would Marvel want to introduce so many new teams of heroes? Well, there is currently a power vacuum in the MCU post Thunderbolts*, and as it heads toward its next massive event movie in Doomsday you can expect the franchise to lean into the 2015 Secret Wars series by Esad Ribić and Jason Aaron—and its many spin-offs—that saw the Marvel’s sprawling comic book multiverse condensed into a single planet, which was then split into different warring realms by the villainous Doctor Doom.
