Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania writer Jeff Loveness is already working on his next MCU project writing the upcoming Avengers sequel, The Kang Dynasty. It'll be the fifth Avengers movie in the MCU, and many are hoping that the X-Men will finally find their way to the big screen since moving under the roof of Marvel Studios.
Quantumania launched Phase 5 of the MCU, and while it spent a lot of time introducing what will likely be the biggest threat any hero has ever faced, the first heroic adventure of the new Marvel era was all about family. Fans watched as Ant-Man's main motivator was keeping his daughter safe while Cassie was just trying to follow in her dad's footsteps.
Family ties bring about some of the most intriguing stories on the big screen, which the MCU's Phase 4 began leaning into with movies like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and shows like Ms. Marvel and Hawkeye.
Jeff Loveness, a Phase 5 frequent in the writers' room, seems to love this idea. Marvel's biggest family in the X-Men has yet to make its MCU debut, but that may change very soon as the Avengers 5 writer is saying that Marvel's many mutants are already having a major impact on his work.
Avengers 5 Writer Wants More Marvel Family Ties
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania writer Jeff Loveness is now hard at work writing the upcoming Avengers: The Kang Dynasty, and he recently admitted to Collider that the element of "family" is going to be a constant in his MCU work thanks to teams like "the X-Men:"
"In a superhero movie, that’s make or break. The reason I love the X-Men is because they are a family. The Avengers are coworkers. The X-Men are a family. Or like the Fantastic Four, obviously, are a family."
Loveness went on to explain that writing an Avengers movie that can include family ties "even between their villains" will be "really exciting to see:"
"And so, I think to write an Avengers movie that has a bit more of a tender family kind of personal connection, even between their villains, I think will be really exciting to see."
Speaking of Marvel villains, Loveness just helped introduce the MCU's new overarching bad guy (again) with Jonathan Majors' Kang the Conqueror.
When asked about which parts of Quantumania he'll apply to The Kang Dynasty, all Loveness could talk about was Kang and how unique he'll be as a villain with human ties and tendencies.
He told Variety that he's "trying to make [a] revenge story and a bit of a self-discovery story" for Jonathan Majors' Kang and that he wants the new villain to be "more human than Thanos:"
"I just feel like we have such a great launching pad with Jonathan Majors. He’s so down for stuff. Every time I talk to him, he’s got a new insight. We’re trying to build out new and engaging forms [of Kang] that are hopefully just as good as the ones that we saw. I’m trying to make this a revenge story and a bit of a self-discovery story. I’m trying to make him more vulnerable than Thanos, more human than Thanos."
His plans for the scale of Kang's might, however, seem far greater than that of any villain in the MCU thus far, as Loveness described "the fun thing about Kang" is that "he's more about the bigger game" and represents a "fun existential challenge to even the idea of superheroes:"
"That’s kind of the fun thing about Kang in the comics. The Avengers are more just a thorn in his side. He’s basically trying to handle his own shit, but it’s always like, Thor kind of gets in his way. He’s more about the bigger game. He represents a fun existential challenge to even the idea of superheroes — and if they’re necessary or not."
The Avengers 5 writer credited the X-Men villain "Magneto" as "his favorite villain in storytelling," explaining how effective he is as a villain because fans "sympathize with him so much."
Loveness admitted that Magneto is a big source of inspiration for Kang to be "a passionate, vulnerable villain on a crusade against himself:"
"I guess it’s the X-Men fan in me, but Magneto is maybe my favorite villain in storytelling. He’s such a compelling villain, because you just bleed for this guy and you sympathize with him so much. So I think we really have an opportunity [with Kang] to have a passionate, vulnerable villain on a crusade against himself, and the Avengers are in the way."
Can the X-Men Make Avengers Movies Even Better?
When taking the X-Men into consideration for how Loveness wants to continue with The Kang Dynasty, the family element surrounding the super team is anything but simple. It invites interesting elements that may otherwise not be possible--like having a bunch of heroes living under the same roof.
Seriously, though, the iconic love triangle involving Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Wolverine that was featured in the original X-Men movies is a great example of the complex bond that's held together under the roof of Charles Xavier's mansion.
However, Professor X's ties to his foe Magneto are a better example of how complicated family ties can get in X-Men comics. The comics have always painted the two mega-mutants as the ultimate form of "frenemies," if you will. An allegory of sorts to the different Civil Rights approaches of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, Professor X, and Magneto are brothers of the common cause that mutants must be protected; however, their methods are often vastly different from each other.
It's unlikely that Kang will have a cause that the Avengers can relate to in the upcoming sequel, but fans have already seen The Conqueror appear to want the same thing as the heroes in the movie, only to have a much bigger plan in mind.
Kang the Vulnerable?
Not to say that the first batch of Avengers movies didn't bring their fair share of emotion, but each villain was rather removed from the emotion of human life. Past big bads of the franchise include Loki, Ultron, and Thanos, who all viewed human life as beneath them and never understood the perspective of the common man.
Kang is anything but common; however, he is just a man. When his tech is taken away, even Scott Lang can put up a fight against the Tyrant of Time. Seeing that Jeff Loveness is keen on digging into Kang the Conqueror's human vulnerabilities to make him more compelling is an exciting notion for an Avengers movie.
It's exciting to think about Kang continuing to interact with new heroes like Cassie Lang and young veterans like Peter Parker, as fans have already seen the time-traveling menace manipulate the good nature of heroes to get what he wants.
Another thing fans already know is that there's at least one major moment in Kang's backstory that was removed from Quantumania to avoid making the story too much about the villain. It's exciting to think about what a pivotal scene that must be.
When remembering that Kang exclaimed in Ant-Man 3 that he had lost a lot in his life, it's a good indication that fans may find themselves sympathizing with Kang the Conqueror and his quest for multiversal destruction.
Avengers: The Kang Dynasty comes to theaters on May 2, 2025.
