Ever since Avengers: Infinity War landed in cinemas in April, Marvel fans have been eagerly looking forward to the next instalment in the franchise.
We’ve had other MCU films in the meantime: Ant-Man and the Wasp arrived in July, while Captain Marvel has already had its first trailer released ahead of its March 2019 unveiling.
There’s also Spider-Man: Far From Home on the way, with the first few images finding their way onto the internet and sparking plenty of theories, while Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 will resume development as soon as a replacement for fired writer-director James Gunn has been identified.
But back to the fourth Avengers film – what do we know about it so far? It goes without saying that some Infinity War spoilers will follow.
When is it out?
The US release date was set as 3 May, 2019, but that announcement was first made all the way back in 2014.
As things stand, the slated UK release date is one week earlier, on 26 April, with France (24 April) set to be the first country to get a glimpse.
Mark Ruffalo, who plays Hulk in the MCU films, revealed the cast were headed for reshoots in September, saying “We’re not just doing reshoots; we’re going to finish the movie, which we really didn’t get to finish totally when we left it last year.”
With that in mind, it feels like we ought to still be on track for the original scheduled date, or at least very close to it. Bear in mind Infinity War was originally slated for 4 May, 2018 and arrived in cinemas a week earlier.
Still, some other estimates weren’t quite as close (if they were forced to stick rigidly to the dates mentioned in 2014, Captain Marvel would have already been out by now).
Who is in it?
Ruffalo is confirmed, of course, while we’ll also be welcoming back a fair few more familiar faces from previous Avengers films.
Brie Larson is also expected to be involved as Captain Marvel, just a few months after playing the character for the first time on the big screen in the eponymous film, while Evangeline Lilly will reprise her role as The Wasp after starring in, you guessed it, Ant-Man and the Wasp.
Other returning cast members include Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), Drax (Dave Bautista) and Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr).
Those not thought to be returning include Tom Hiddleston, whose character Loki was one of many to die in the last film.
When is it set?
We’re going to jump five years into the future. Five. This has led to some speculation that we won’t get to see what happened in the immediate aftermath of the Infinity War finale, but we’ll just have to wait and see.
Of course, characters being five years on from the snap means they’re five years closer to reversing it, maybe? Or perhaps we just getting too optimistic.
It could mean some of those characters who died at the end of Infinity War could yet return – we’re looking at you, soon-to-be-sequelled Spider-Man.
What will it be called?
We don’t know about you, but we get the feeling the name ‘Untitled Avengers Project’ doesn’t really have the ring of finality to it. They’ll probably replace it.
There has been plenty of speculation about the title, with Avengers: Endgame emerging as an early frontrunner (and perhaps a clue to how things might pan out), but that was all but ruled out earlier in 2018.
Could we have a different title which conveys the same element of finality, though? Quite possibly.
Insiders have suggested Avengers: Annihilation will be the *real* title, though be warned – those involved in the film have spread alternate endings in the past, so what’s to stop them leaking alternate titles too, just to throw us off the scent? Or are the two As in the image below meant to be a clue?
When will the trailer be released?
If Avengers 4 follows the same schedule as Infinity War, then according to NME we can expect a full trailer for this latest film some time in November 2018.
Will there be time travel?
According to Popbuzz, footage of the film that was shown to a select group of fans at a top secret screener in June sees Tony Stark and Scott Lang talking about a technology that would allow the Avengers to bend space and time to grab the infinity stones back from Thanos.
Some sleuthing fans have suggested this could be related to the Quantum Realm, which is featured in Ant-Man, Doctor Strange and the upcoming Captain Marvel.
What else do we know?
Chris Hemsworth, who plays Thor (oh yeah, Thor’s back too) has claimed the new film will be even more distressing than the last one, which sounds difficult, but we’re keeping an open mind.
“If you were shocked by [Infinity War], I think the second one is even more shocking, for other reasons entirely,” he told Esquire.
Meanwhile, Karen Gillan – who plays Thanos’ ‘daughter’ Nebula in Guardians Of The Galaxy and Infinity War – teased the idea that Nebula will have a big showdown with her father.
The 30-year-old wrote on a Instagram post in September 2018: “You know what this means… Nebula has some unfinished business with Daddio” alongside a bunch of early alarm calls for reshoots. Intriguing!
An early synopsis claims “Our beloved heroes will truly understand how fragile this reality is and the sacrifices that must be made to uphold it,” which sounds like more death and uncertainty if you ask us.
And finally, for fans of Infinity War, we’ve got some more good news: the Russo brothers are back as directors, having helmed both Infinity War and Captain America: Civil War, which is nice.
(Images: Marvel/Getty)
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