Marvel’s next superhero team in the MCU could be the Midnight Sons - the supernatural Avengers. Back in 2014, Marvel Studios wowed the world when they announced a five-year film slate. Nowadays, though, the studio prefers to be a lot more secretive. As a result, viewers know a fair amount about the next three years’ worth of plans, but the overarching direction is something of a mystery.

Probably the most important clue was provided by Disney CEO Bob Iger last year, when he participated in one of Disney’s regular earning calls. “I’m guessing we will try our hand at what I’ll call a new franchise beyond Avengers,” he observed. That gives a sense of just how ambitious Marvel’s plans really are; they’re not just building up to Avengers 5, but instead they’re aiming to launch a whole new franchise that they hope will be just as big. Naturally, there’s been intense speculation over just what this could mean, but so far there’s no solid evidence. One common guess is that Marvel could be setting up a cosmic superhero team called the Ultimates, while another possibility is a group of redeemed supervillains called the Thunderbolts.

But the truth may be hiding in plain sight, because the MCU is clearly headed in a supernatural direction. As such, it’s not hard to imagine Marvel Studios taking a risk - and introducing a little-known group from the comics, known as the Midnight Sons.

Marvel Is Following The Avengers Formula - With Supernatural Heroes

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has proved to be an unprecedented success, and rival studios have desperately attempted to repeat it. The key is that Marvel took a slow-burn approach to building their interconnected universe; they took the time to establish individual characters before bringing them together in 2012’s epic crossover movie, The Avengers. Meanwhile, another aspect - that’s less observed, but just as important - is that Marvel built their first wave of superheroes on the same foundation. They deliberately chose a scientific approach, with heroes rooted in pseudoscience rather than sorcery. The closest they came to magic was in 2011’s Thor, and even there one key scene saw Thor Odinson come close to quoting Arthur C. Clarke’s maxim, that any sufficiently advanced technology will look like magic. Marvel began subtly switching this up in 2013’s Thor: The Dark World, and in 2016’s Doctor Strange they committed to exploiting the potential of sorcery. The Masters of the Mystic Arts have proved to be a potent force, and it’s frankly impossible to imagine the heroes triumphing in Avengers: Endgame without their Sling Rings.

Doctor Strange proved to the world that audiences are ready for magic in the MCU, and all evidence indicates that Marvel Studios is building up a new wave of mystical characters just like they did the pseudoscientific heroes in Phase 1. Next year will introduce Kit Harington as the Black Knight, wielder of the magical Ebony Blade. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige has announced Mahershala Ali will play the MCU’s Blade, and they’re also working on a Moon Knight series that will bring the schizophrenic superhero to the small screen ahead of appearing in the films. There are even rumors Marvel is developing ideas for Ghost Rider down the road as well. It’s not hard to identify the pattern; introduce a range of thematically connected characters one at a time, with the potential for a major supernatural team-up at the end. This would definitely tick the box for an Avengers successor, and it’s most likely that this would be a mystic group known as the Masters of the Mystic Arts.

Who Are The Midnight Sons?

Back in 1992, Marvel Comics attempted to rebrand their supernatural books under the “Midnight Sons” label. It was an attempt to draw the various supernatural titles closely together as an analog for the X-Men and Avengers families. “On the outside of the books, this means all titles in the family will share a new cover symbol, the Midnight Sons dagger as well as similar cover treatments,” Marvel announced. “Inside, the Midnight Sons titles will have stronger continuity, making for a more exciting, tightly knit sub-section of the Marvel Universe.” Naturally, it didn’t take long for the various heroes to team up, and the Midnight Sons soon became an informal team.

The Midnight Sons should essentially be considered Marvel’s supernatural Avengers, and they spontaneously gather together whenever the universe is faced with mystical threats beyond even Doctor Strange’s ability to handle. It all began when Ghost Riders Danny Ketch and Johnny Blaze received visions of impending doom, and learned that Earth was about to come under attack from the corrupted angel Lilith. They’ve informally teamed up several times since, most recently in 2018’s Damnation event, when Doctor Strange unwittingly gave the demonic Mephisto a foothold on Earth. It’s worth noting that it’s very dangerous to be part of the Midnight Sons; they have a far higher mortality rate than the Avengers.

Could The Midnight Sons Be Marvel’s Next Avengers-Level Brand?

On the face of it, it seems a little outlandish to suggest that this lesser-known brand could ever be Avengers-level. But Marvel Studios has a history of turning B- and even Z-list comic book superheroes into blockbuster hits. The entire MCU was launched without high-profile characters like Spider-Man and Wolverine. Marvel Studios successfully turned the Guardians of the Galaxy into a household name, winning audiences over to a group who included a walking tree and a talking raccoon. So if anyone can pull this off, Marvel can.

But the Midnight Sons would be a subtly different franchise. Marvel Studios’ traditional fare is family-friendly, and relatively formulaic. This means the studio can guarantee avoiding box office disasters like 2015’s Fantastic Four, but it also means the company has never come close to the thematic complexity and dark tone of hits like Logan and Joker. The Midnight Sons would afford Marvel with an opportunity to switch things up, because they could potentially include lower-budget, even R-rated flicks. There’s clearly demand for just that kind of film; after all, Joker is officially the most profitable superhero film in film history. Thus the Midnight Sons could be Marvel’s response to the changing context they operate in, an opportunity to expand the MCU to incorporate a wider range of tone and style.

More: Predicting Marvel’s NEW Phase 4 Slate Through To 2023

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