Black Widow, Eternals & Shang Chi Delayed as Disney Announces New Marvel Release Dates
Courtesy of movieweb.com:
Marvel Studios has announced a significant delay for some of their most anticipated movies. Black Widow and the Eternals movie were due to open in theaters this year, but that will no longer be happening. Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings has also been delayed. The public health crisis is still raging on across a lot of the world, including the United States, where movie theaters are still struggling to open their doors after shutting down back in March.
The MCU’s Phase 4 was supposed to kick off back in May with Black Widow. However, the studio decided to push it back to November of this year, though many knew that had a strong probability of not happening. The movie was supposed to open on November 20th, but will instead open on May 7th, 2021, which is over one year from when it was supposed to open.
Eternals was originally supposed to open in November of this year, but was later given a February 2021 release date. Now, the long-awaited movie will open in theaters on November 5th, 2021. This puts the movie just barely over a year from its original release date. While this isn’t really too surprising, it could end up having an effect on the future MCU Phase 4 releases, though Marvel Studios has not announced anything past Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. That movie was set to open in May 2021, and it will now move to July 9th, 2021 instead, which is only a two-month difference.
As of this writing, it looks like Spider-Man 3 will still open in December 2021, though that could change at any moment now and that will ultimately be Sony’s decision. With Marvel Studios looking to pushback so many release dates, it’s beginning to look like Denis Villeneuve and Warner Bros. will more than likely pushback Dune too, which is scheduled to open in December. Christopher Nolan’s Tenet is now in theaters that have been able to reopen and it is not doing very good business, despite strong openings overseas. As of this writing, the movie hasn’t even been able to cross $100 million domestically.
Disney made the difficult decision to bring their live-action adaptation of Mulan straight to Disney+. It has proven to be a success, but it’s definitely not making the same kind of money that it would have had it opened in theaters during a normal time. The studio has made it abundantly clear that they will not be doing the same thing with Black Widow, Eternals, or Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. For now, we’ll just have to wait and see what the future holds for the rest of the MCU Phase 4 slate. You can take a look at the updated dates below, thanks to Walt Disney Studios.
- MCU Phase 4 Updated Release Dates
- Black Widow previously dated on 11/6/20 moves to 5/7/21
- Eternals previously dated on 2/12/21 moves to 11/5/21
- Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings previously dated on 5/7/21 moves to 7/9/21
- Thor: Love and Thunder 2//11/21
- Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness 3/25/22
- Black Panther 2 5/6/22
- Captain Marvel 2 7/8/22
- Untitled Marvel 10/7/22
- Untitled Marvel 2/17/23
- Untitled Marvel 5/5/23
- Untitled Marvel 7/28/23
- Untitled Marvel 11/3/23
