Marvel"s 33 Cancelled Movies (& Why They Didn"t Happen)

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Summary

Marvel movies faced cancelations due to poor reception and rights issues before the MCU's success revolutionized the genre.
The impressive prior box office performance of some Marvel films did not guarantee sequels due to delays, script issues, or rights transfers.
Cancelation of planned Marvel movies like Hulk 2, Punisher: War Zone 2, and Amazing Spider-Man 3 demonstrated the challenges in comic book adaptations.

Marvel has been prolific on the big screen, but several movies in various stages of conceptualization or pre-production have been canceled for one reason or another. Prior to the rampant success of the MCU, Marvel cinema was in something of a quagmire as different studios owned the right to various Marvel characters like Spider-Man, the X-Men, and The Fantastic Four. A vast uptick in integration deals ahead of the creation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe meant whole swathes of planned Marvel movies received the ax in favor of rebooting their characters into the burgeoning MCU.
However, the MCU and its future was not the only deciding factor in taking Marvel movies off the production slate, with poor critical reception a pervading factor in many cases. Comic book adaptations before the MCU were very far from being surefire hits, with many Marvel superhero movies only reaching cult status years after their initial release. Other Marvel movies did not get so lucky, with supposed franchise starters such as The Fantastic Four and Daredevil lambasted for their lack of creativity when translating classic Marvel intellectual properties to the big screen.

Related How To Watch the Marvel Movies In Order (By Release Date & In Order Of MCU Timeline Events) Want to catch up before the next release, or just revisit the universe for a refresher? Here's the order to watch the entire MCU timeline. Deadpool 3 Almost Looked Very Different Fox Had Deadpool 3 Plans Before The Disney Sale Close Deadpool & Wolverine is set to be Deadpool's third solo movie and will see the Merc with a Mouth finally join the MCU. However, details about Fox's earlier plans for Deadpool 3 have recently come to light. Speaking with Screen Rant, Dopinder actor Karan Soni revealed that the original movie "was going to be originally a roadtrip movie where Deadpool tries to save Christmas." He didn't clarify anything beyond that bizarre tease, but it's clear that Deadpool's actual third outing is going in a markedly different direction.

Related Every Character Not Returning For Deadpool 3 Previous Deadpool movies have introduced multiple Marvel characters, but some of these will not be returning for the upcoming Deadpool & Wolverine. Shang-Chi Almost Joined The Early MCU The Hero Eventually Joined The MCU In Phase 4 Close Well before Simu Liu's successful turn as Shang-Chi in the MCU, there were plans to bring the character to the screen. An early 2000s project titled The Hands of Shang-Chi would have been a full-blown martial arts movie, with Stephen Norrington set to direct and Ang Lee signed on as a producer. By 2005, Stan Lee was an executive producer on the Shang-Chi project, with Yuen Woo-ping set to direct, but ultimately the film never happened as Marvel had difficulty securing funding.
There were also talks to include Shang-Chi as a Phase 1 MCU character after the success of 2008's Iron Man, but this idea was also scrapped. After the MCU took off, Marvel turned to focus groups to decide which of its available characters would garner the most excitement. Likely due to his lack of general pop-culture popularity, Shang-Chi was shelved in favor of more well-known names.

Related Why It Took Marvel 20 Years To Make Shang-Chi Marvel first began talks about making Shang-Chi back in 2001 - why has it taken so long for Shang-Chi & The Legend of the Ten Rings to happen? Daredevil's Poor Reception Ended Hope For Daredevil 2 Daredevil Did Get One Spin-Off In The Form Of Elektra (2005)

With Ben Affleck's 2003 turn as Matt Murdock largely panned by critics and audiences, it is little wonder that Daredevil 2 never happened. Instead, the franchise's supporting character Elektra (Jennifer Garner) received her own spin-off movie (although this was almost universally reviled). Yet, despite the Daredevil franchise's infancy and poor reviews, its death knell came courtesy of a rights transferal, with 20th Century Fox conceding their intellectual property over to Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Motion Picture Studios, respectively.
Even if a sequel were greenlit, it's possible Affleck may not have been interested. The actor has expressed regret over how the movie turned out, and, watching the final product, it's hard not to disagree. Fortuantely, Netflix's Daredevil series in 2015 did justice to the character, which has continued on and is now part of the mainline MCU.
Hulk 2 Didn't Happen Fast Enough Universal Still Owns Distribution Right For Hulk Movies

Before Mark Ruffalo's iconic Bruce Banner and even Edward Norton's turn as the Gamma-loaded professor, Eric Bana's version of Hulk existed as early as 2003. Hulk, in fact, got off to the best possible start for a new superhero franchise, with Universal's blockbuster feature grossing an impressive $245 million worldwide and almost doubling its production budget. Hulk 2, therefore, was a highly anticipated feature that was expected to follow up its predecessor as quickly as 2005, before a string of pre-production delays halted Hulk 2's seemingly inexorable advance.

Related Why Mark Ruffalo Replaced Edward Norton As Hulk In The MCU MCU debuted Edward Norton as Bruce Banner in 2008's The Incredible Hulk, but he was eventually replaced by Mark Ruffalo in The Avengers. Here's why. Despite writer James Schamus drafting a sequel that would have included a deadly combination of Grey Hulk and (the now MCU-adapted) Abomination, Marvel took over production in 2006 following a year of delays when Universal Pictures did not meet the film's deadline for principal production. Marvel Studios subsequently confirmed that all production for Hulk 2 had been canceled in favor of the rebooted The Incredible Hulk.
The Punisher Got A Soft Reboot Instead Of A Sequel Punisher: War Zone Features A New Frank Castle

While Jon Bernthal has become synonymous with the tortured vigilante Frank Castle, three separate Punisher incarnations had already been pushed by various studios by the Netflix series' 2017 release. The second of these is Jonathan Hensleigh's, which sees Thomas Jane take up the mantle of the vengeance-driven Punisher. Jane's Punisher was singled out for praise by critics, who enjoyed his steely performance, though they were less impressed by the overall tone and creativity of the film.
Every Punisher In Live-Action
Dolph Lundgren
The Punisher (1989)
Thomas Jane
The Punisher (2004)
Ray Stevenson
Punisher: War Zone (2008)
Jon Bernthal
Daredevil Season 2 (2016), The Punisher Season 1 & 2 (2017, 2019), Daredevil: Born Again (2025)
Yet, despite a modest box office haul, The Punisher 2 was greenlit by Lionsgate, with Hensleigh and Jane set to reunite and commence filming on the sequel as early as 2005. Despite all the pieces being in place for The Punisher 2 to come to fruition, the sequel project remained in development for over three years due to the lack of an acceptable script. Even after Hensleigh distanced himself from the movie after two years of increasingly stagnating discussions, it still took until 2007 for The Punisher 2 to finally be canceled, with a franchise reboot released the following year.
Marvel's Canceled Pre-MCU Slate

While the official MCU canon didn't begin until 2008's Iron Man, Marvel Studios was still trying to develop a long-term slate of movie adaptations based on their classic comic book IPs well before then. While some of these projects came to fruition, many were ultimately scrapped, reworked, or folded in once the MCU began to solidify. This vision included such titles as Man-Thing, Deathlok, Silver Surfer, and even prototype versions of Iron Man and Captain America, as revealed in the Marvel Studios 2004 film slate.
Also among the discarded titles are Fury, which would have followed the storyline of Jim Steranko's Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. series and had a script written by Andrew W. Marlowe. Ultimately, however, this project was abandoned in favor of integrating Fury into the early MCU films. In a more complicated fashion, a film version of Namor has been a possibility since the late '90s, with a slew of different writers and directors attached. The complicated movie rights for the character ultimately stopped the project from moving forward.
Marvel's Canceled Pre-MCU Movie Projects
Man-Thing (2004)
Iron Man (2005)
Namor (2006)
Silver Surfer (No Announced Release Year)
Fury (No Announced Release Year)
Captain America (No Announced Release Year)
Deathlock (No Announced Release Year)
Punisher: War Zone 2 Was Greenlit And Quickly Canceled A Canceled Sequel To A Reboot

Punisher: War Zone 2 is one of the swiftest Marvel movie cancelations to date. Lexi Alexander's Punisher: War Zone is a movie that seemingly revels in its absurdity, with the film leaning far more into its comic book roots than its predecessor. Despite poor critical reception and average box office numbers, Punisher 2: War Zone was initially greenlit by Lionsgate almost solely off the back of Alexander's confidence in the franchise. This confidence would prove short-lived, with Marvel taking back the rights to the Punisher properties in early 2009 ahead of their more successful Jon Bernthal-led Netflix series.
Spider-Man 4 Could Still Be In The Cards Rumors Swirld About Spider-Man 4 Still Happening Close Of all the canceled Marvel movies on this list, Spider-Man 4's eventual scrapping is perhaps the most galling, given the cult status Sam Raimi's trilogy has since garnered. Raimi's Spider-Man 4 simply collapsed under its own weight of expectation, with the film's pre-production halted by disagreements over which antagonists should be used in the fourth Spider-Man installment. Jim Carrey as Carnage, Bruce Campbell as Mysterio, and John Malkovitch as Vulture were all prominent names being pushed by Sony, with Raimi instead preferring the inclusion of Morbius Lizard.
Despite a plethora of compelling villain options, Raimi left the project in 2009, with leading man Tobey Maguire subsequently following him out the door. Perhaps hardest to swallow of all, however, is that Sam Raimi confirmed years later that had Spider-Man 4 entered production, Spider-Man 5 would have been immediately greenlit and entered pre-production, with Sony also keen to conclude his film series with a sixth Spider-Man installment. However, rumors swirl that Spider-Man 4 could still happen after Maguire returned to the role in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Venom Almost Got A Spin-Off The Character Was Introduced To Live-Action In Spider-Man 3 Close First introduced in Spider-Man 3, Topher Grace's version of Eddie Brock/Venom was originally going to have his own spinoff movie, which was in active development in 2008 alongside other sequels to Spider-Man 3. Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese had a completed script by 2009, which was described as a dark and grounded take on the Spider-Man villain. Shortly thereafter, director-producer Gary Ross was hired to rewrite Venom, as he was already doing with drafts of Spider-Man 4.
This version would have made Venom more of an antihero along the lines of Tom Hardy's Venom movies. By this point in late 2009, Topher Grace was also said to be unlikely to return to the role of Eddie Brock. In the end, Venom went the way of Spider-Man 4 when Raimi finally walked out of his own Spider-Man franchise, and the studio instead announced a reboot in what would become the Andrew Garfield The Amazing Spider-Man movies.
X-Men Origins: Magneto Transformed Into A New Franchise Wolverine's First Solo Movie Was Bad News For Other Prequels Close Although X-Men Origins: Wolverine birthed two subsequent Logan-centric movies, the actual X-Men Origins series began and ended with telling Wolverine's backstory. This is a shame, as concepts for telling other key X-Men characters' histories appear genuinely enthralling. The pick of this bunch is X-Men Origins: Magneto movie.
David S. Goyer was also hired to direct Magneto's origin story in 2007 following Turner's final script approval, but production on the film itself was paused as 20th Century Fox waited to evaluate X-Men Origins: Wolverine's critical performance. Despite X-Men Origins: Wolverine's box office success, Fox's sprawling Origins plans were scrapped to use Turner's story as the base of X-Men: First Class, which contains many of the World War II references X-Men Origins: Magneto was initially built upon.
The Amazing Spider-Man 3 Never Happened The Amazing Spider-Man Is The Shortest Spider-Man Franchise So Far

The Amazing Spider-Man 3 goes down as very much a victim of its own success, with the film's confirmation (alongside a fourth Amazing Spider-Man installment) announcement bizarrely made 11 months before The Amazing Spider-Man 2's theatrical release. This early proclamation left Sony in a bind when, shortly after the release of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Andrew Garfield publicly confirmed that not only did he not want to play Spider-Man past a third movie but that he also would not renew his expiring contract with Sony.
This contractual standoff meant that while the film was originally scheduled to be released on June 10, 2016, Sony was forced to announce in the summer of 2014 that they had decided to push back The Amazing Spider-Man 3 by four years. This large delay would prove fatal for the project, with The Amazing Spider-Man series instead scrapped by Sony as part of the deal to bring Tom Holland's Spider-Man into the MCU. Years later, Garfield did don the suit again in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
The Sinister Six (2016 Version) Never Formed A New Version Of The Movie May Be In The Works Close This aforementioned new 2018 release date for The Amazing Spider-Man 3, while frustrating for Sony, allowed the studio to ramp up their efforts for a Sinister Six movie, which was eventually scheduled to premiere on November 11, 2016. Due to its scheduling change, Sony's Sinister Six was well-placed to directly follow the events of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which saw Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan) admitted to Ravencroft and Sytsevich's (Paul Giamatti) prison break as The Rhino. However, The Sinister Six was scuppered by Sony's rights deal with Marvel.
However, the idea may be gaining new life with Sony's Spider-Man Universe. The franchise focuses on Spider-Man villains and side characters but has not yet featured Peter Parker himself. It would seem that Sony may be giving villains and antiheroes solo movies before revisiting the idea of a Sinister Six movie in this new continuity.
Potential Sinister 6 Members In Sony's Spider-Man Universe
Venom
Morbius
Vulture
Ezekiel Sims
Kraven The Hunter
Rhini
Fantastic Four 3 Was Scrapped For A Reboot Marvel's First Family Has A Rough Big Screen History

The Fantastic Four 3 was a bridge too far for 20th Century Fox, whose Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer did little to convince Fox executives of the franchise's continued worth. The original Fantastic Four movie series was hampered by its insistence on using a PG rating, which limited what could be done. The harsh critical reception for Fantastic Four 2, despite being an improvement on the first film, confirmed the need for a changing of the guard. 20th Century Fox announced a costly reboot for 2015 despite the original actors being under contract for one more movie.
Fantastic Four 2 (FANT4STIC Reboot) The Reboot Missed The Mark

It says something about how poor a film the rebooted Fantastic Four is, considering that the 2015 movie led to a positive re-examination of the previously slated Fantastic Four (2005) and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. Yet, Fantastic Four 2 remained in the pipeline far longer than it should have given its predecessor's reception and troubled production. Fant4astic 2 was canceled in December 2015, with Marvel reclaiming their classic intellectual properties for future MCU use.

Related Film Disasters: 9 Things That Went Wrong While Making Fantastic Four 2015's Fantastic Four is mostly remembered now for the troubled history of its production. Here are some of the things that went very wrong. Silver & Black Couldn't Quite Team Up The Two Anti-Heroes May Debut In Another Project

Centered on Spider-Man femme fatales Black Cat and Silver Sable, the Sony project Silver & Black began development in 2017, with production intended to start in 2018. Gina Prince-Bythewood was set to direct, and Silver & Black was intended as part of Sony's Spider-Man Universe. However, script issues delayed the film indefinitely by the end of 2018, and it was ultimately canceled outright. It remains to be seen whether Silver & Black's eponymous leading ladies will make it to the big screen any time soon.
Inhumans Quickly Fizzled The Inhumans TV Show Has Been Ignored By Marvel Since Release

Marvel's Inhumans movie receives the ignominy of being the only film on this list to be scrapped by Marvel after the MCU's formation. Originally slated for inclusion into the MCU's phase 3, the Inhumans project failed to capture the continued imagination of Marvel executives, who instead used their time wisely to immortalize the MCU with the Infinity Saga. This left Inhumans in limbo, with discussions to potentially include the Inhuman saga into phase 4 before the film was eventually relegated to a television series. This decision proved prescient by Marvel, with ABC's Inhumans being canceled after one season in 2018.
The only reference to the Inhumans TV show in the MCU is a variant of Black Bolt appearing and quickly being killed in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Gambit Has Been Rumored For Years Channing Tatum Pushed For The Movie To Happen, But It Never Worked Out

Gambit may be a popular mutant in the pages of Marvel Comics, but he's struggled to find footing in live-action. The hero made his big screen debut in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and after that, Channing Tatum pushed for a solo movie. Various versions of the movie have reportedly entered pre-production and been canceled due to script or scheduling issues, with one version written by Josh Zetumer coming closest to production. Gambit was rumored to cameo in several X-Men movies after that, but it now seems like he'll have to wait for the MCU X-Men reboot to see the light of day.
Other Fox Marvel Movies Disney's Acquisition Of Fox's Entertainment Properties Stimied Several X-Men Movies

In addition to Gambit, several other Marvel projects were affected by Disney's acquisition of 20th Century Fox. These include Dark Phoenix and The New Mutants sequels, a spinoff featuring X-23 from Logan, and even Doctor Doom, Kitty Pryde, and Multiple Man solo films (with James Franco reportedly starring in the latter). Likewise, plenty of projects featuring new X-Men teams had been in the works at Fox, such as Alpha Flight, Exiles, and X-Force, the latter of which would have been headed up by Deadpool.
Ghost Rider 3

Columbia Pictures' Ghost Rider 3 is a blink-and-you'll-miss-it style cancelation, with directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor stating during Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance's release that they were set up for an immediate third installment, again starring Nicolas Cage. Cage reversed this optimism in the aftermath of Ghost Rider 2's awful reviews, however, with the actor stating that he is unequivocally done with the role of Johnny Blaze. This sentiment was backed up by Marvel Studios' President Kevin Feige, who announced in 2013 that the film rights to Ghost Rider had reverted to Marvel.

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