Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige addresses Wanda's future in the MCU following Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. After first being introduced in 2016's Doctor Strange and featuring in several Avengers team-up movies, Benedict Cumberbatch's titular hero returned for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness earlier this year. The film, which is directed by Sam Raimi, earned mostly positive reviews from both audiences and critics and performed well at the box office, bringing in over $955 million. In a surprise twist for fans, Elizabeth Olsen's Wanda Maximoff, who was first introduced into the MCU in the mid-credits scene in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, returns not as a hero, but as a villain.
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The Doctor Strange sequel sees Wanda and Doctor Strange pitted against each other, as the former ruthlessly pursues America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez) in order to reach her children in another dimension. After slaughtering sorcerers at Kamar Taj and the Illuminati in Earth-838, Wanda, who has fully become the Scarlet Witch at this point, is moments away from killing Chavez in order to absorb her powers. The ending to the Doctor Strange sequel features Wanda finally seeing reason and sacrificing herself in order to destroy Wundagore Castle, seemingly being buried under heaps of rubble as Doctor Strange and Chavez escape.
In a new interview with Variety, Feige teases Wanda's future in the MCU after her fate in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, hinting that she may be alive after all. Feige teases that, with Wanda, there's "so much more to explore," coyly noting that audiences never actually saw Wanda under the rubble. Although Feige doesn't reveal anything concrete, he does say that "Anything's possible in the multiverse." Checkout Feige's full comment below:
“There really is so much more to explore. We still haven’t touched on many of her core storylines from the comics. I don’t know that we saw her under rubble? I saw a tower coming down, and a little red flash. I don’t know what that means. I’d work with Lizzie for another 100 years if we could. Anything’s possible in the multiverse! We’ll have to see.”
When Could Scarlett Witch Return In The MCU?
While Feige may not offer an entirely straight answer one way or the other, it's looking very likely that Wanda will indeed return in another MCU project down the line. With Black Panther: Wakanda Forever concluding MCU Phase 4, the earliest fans could see Olsen's return is in the recently announced Phase 5, which includes projects like The Marvels, Agatha: Coven of Chaos, Captain America: New World Order, and Thunderbolts. Although it's possible that Wanda could appear in any number of MCU Phase 5 projects as a supporting character, it seems likely that the character will be teased in a post-credits scene before making her official return.
Few details are currently known about Agatha: Coven of Chaos, but considering the upcoming Disney+ series acts as a spinoff from WandaVision, it's possible that fans could be treated to news of Scarlet Witch's MCU return when the series premieres later next year. Although Wanda was definitively the villain in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, her valiant actions at the end of the film suggest that fans may be treated to a less murderous version of the character upon her return. For now, though, Feige's comments should ease fan concerns about Wanda's future in the MCU, with it looking very likely that Olsen will indeed be back at some point in the future.