Jonathan Majors appearance as Kang, or He Who Remains, in Loki was pretty unexpected to many fans, as was his somewhat gentile, if slightly deranged characterization of the villain of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, who has been described as a big deal. However, we now know that the Loki variant of Kang is a completely different version to the one that will be causing havoc in the future of the MCU’s multiverse, and in a new interview with Variety, Majors has been discussing – without getting into Marvel jail by revealing too much – the difference between playing the two iterations of the same character.
Majors was originally cast in the role of Kang in 2020, when he was announced as the time-traveling supervillain of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, except he was never officially announced as playing that role until the character turned up in Loki. Once he appeared in the Disney+ show, never being named as Kang and always as He Who Remains, it was made clear in the closing moments that Majors would be returning to the role again in the MCU, and that next time the version of Kang we see will not be quite as jovial, and may not actually be the only other version out there.
Currently filming on the Ant-Man sequel, Jonathan Majors elaborated as much as he could on the gaps between the Kang we have seen in Loki and the one that is coming. As the actor puts it:
“He Who Remains is in the world now, and so there’s so much we know about him. There’s 40 minutes of that guy and that narrative, so it really set me up to tell a story and add another canvas, with more players. This time, it’s not the incredible Tom Hiddleston; I’m dealing with Paul Rudd and Evangeline and the likes of the Ant-Man family, so it’s a whole different world and I’m just exploring and trying to do the best I can.”
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is one of the later movies in Phase Four of the MCU, not arriving until July 2023 as the last confirmed movie release of the current slate and with so long to go before the movie arrives, we are not expecting any big reveals about the plot or ramifications of the film’s outcome for quite some time. We do know that Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly will be back as the title duo, along with Michael Douglas and Michelle Pfeiffer reprising their roles, while Emma Fuhrmann’s Cassie Lang will be played by Kathryn Newton. Recently, Bill Murray has also been linked to an undisclosed role by his own admission.
In the grand scheme of the MCU, there is always a plan, and Loki writer Michael Waldron, who also co-wrote Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, has referred to Kang as “the next big crossover movie villain,” suggesting that while Kang has been confirmed for Quantumania, just like Thanos before him, we could see a variant of the character appearing in numerous other movies in the way to the next “Avengers-style” movie, which Marvel Studios will be building up to in the coming years. There have already been reports that one such event will be a Secret Wars movie, which had huge multiverse connections in the comic books, and could be heading down the line as the next Avengers: Endgame board sweeper. This comes to us from Variety.
Source: movieweb.com