Jonathan Majors was quickly dropped by Marvel in the wake of his assault conviction — but as it turns, the studio was already inclined to move on … at least according to a new report.
As everyone knows, the actor was cut loose just minutes after word came down from a NYC jury in December that he was guilty on two of four counts — including harassment and assault — as it pertained to charges that he’d harmed his ex-girlfriend, Grace Jabbari.
Granted, he only ended up getting convicted on what happened outside of the car — not inside, where prosecutors claimed he’d really roughed her up — and yet … Marvel immediately announced he wasn’t working with them going forward. They didn’t skip a beat.
Welp, per a new THR story … Marvel is now in the cleanup process of their next chapter — as they were originally planning on hitching their wagon to Majors’ star as the new big villain … but those plans changed once he got caught up in this DV case.
They say the next ‘Avengers’ movie — which was going to be called ‘The Kang Dynasty’ — is now not going to include Majors’ character’s name at all … and they’re rewriting the next slate of films to either cut out Kang altogether, or to seriously sideline him and make him a footnote in the larger plot. It’s a heavy lift, but everyone expected that to be the case.
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12/18/23
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The more interesting tidbit here in this report is the notion that Marvel/Disney had apparently already made a decision in terms of where they wanted to go with Kang and Majors.
THR, citing sources, says Marvel was already making moves to minimize Kang’s involvement in future movies — and the apparent reason … money. It sounds like Majors’ appearance in ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’ wasn’t a financial success (it definitely wasn’t) and because of that … they felt audiences just weren’t in the mood for more Kang.
The movie made $476 million globally through its theatrical run … but by superhero movie standards, that’s pretty trash. So, on its face … it sounds like Majors’ fate was sealed.
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Of course, Majors hasn’t been sentenced yet … and his team is trying to have his conviction thrown out. Either way though … it almost feels like Marvel’s closed the door on all this.