Marvel Studios has been building out its cinematic universe for nearly 20 years now, but the franchise has yet to fully master the art of seamless worldbuilding. The bigger the MCU gets, the harder it gets to organically establish things that should have been there all along. After the 20th Century Fox merger of 2019, Marvel regained the film rights to the Fantastic Four and the X-Men — two of its absolute biggest properties — but integrating those teams into the MCU at large requires the use of clunky, confusing narrative devices, like the multiverse.
Even without the threat of incursions looming, there are still storylines native to Marvel’s “Sacred Timeline” that feel totally disconnected from the main universe, despite most taking place within New York City limits. And it also doesn’t help that the studio is also doubling down on its aversion to origin stories. That’s created an even more annoying habit: that of the “Human MacGuffin.” Nearly every Marvel story, from Doctor Strange 2 to Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, has introduced a new, powerful character as a kind of mystery box torn between recognizable heroes and the villains chasing them for one reason or another.
