Marvel drops massive 'Avengers: Doomsday' casting news: X-Men, Fantastic Four and more

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Marvel Studios has announced which superheroes will be appearing in Avengers: Doomsday in a livestream that was broadcast to YouTube and its social media channels with the caption: “It all leads to Doom.”

So far, the returning stars unveiled as a camera panned down a long line of director’s chairs with a star’s name on the back include: Chris Hemsworth (Thor); Anthony Mackie (Sam Wilson/Captain America); Sebastian Stan (Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier); Paul Rudd (Scott Lang/Ant-Man); Letitia Wright (Shuri); Winston Duke (M’Baku); and Tom Hiddleton (Loki).

Meanwhile, new superheroes are being added to the action, including Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm/Invisible Woman, Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm/Human Torch and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm/Thing (who will all make their debut in this summer’s Fantastic Four movie); along with Wyatt Russell (John Walker/U.S. Agent); Tenoch Huerta Mejía (Submariner); Danny Ramirez (Joaquin Torres/Falcon); Simu Liu (Shang-Chi); Florence Pugh (Yelena Belova); David Harbour (Red Guardian); Lewis Pullman (Bob Reynolds/Sentry); and Hannah John-Kamen (Ghost).

Several key stars from Fox’s early 2000s X-Men films will also make appearances, including Kelsey Grammer (Beast); Patrick Stewart (Charles Xavier/Professor X), Ian McKellen (Magneto); Alan Cumming (Nightcrawler); James Marsden (Scott Summers/Cyclops); Rebecca Romijn (Mystique); and Channing Tatum’s Gambit, who debuted in last summer’s Deadpool & Wolverine.

But some of Marvel’s most anticipated names were not part of the announcement, with Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool, Tom Holland’s Spider-Man, Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk, Charlie Cox’s Daredevil, Chris Pratt’s Star-Lord and Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange all left off the list.

Robert Downey Jr., who played the heroic Iron Man in 10 Marvel films, from 2008’s Iron Man to 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, is set to portray the villainous Victor von Doom/Doctor Doom this time around.

“New mask, same task,” he told the crowd at San Diego Comic-Con last summer announcing his return.

At the end of Thursday’s reveal, Downey appeared in his chair and turned to shush the camera.

After directing Captain America: Winter Soldier, Captain America: Civil War and the last two Avengers flicks, Anthony and Joe Russo are returning to helm Doomsday and its follow-up, Avengers: Secret Wars.

During an appearance on an episode of The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast last summer, Downey said he was convinced to return to Marvel after getting a pitch from studio boss Kevin Feige.

“He said, ‘It just keeps occurring to me, if you were to come back …’” Downey said. “He brought up Victor von Doom. I looked into this character. Later on, he goes, ‘Let’s get Victor von Doom right.”

In an interview with Postmedia earlier this month, Anthony said the brothers got an inkling to rejoin Marvel after they had a chance to “go away and do some other wonderful work over the past few years.”

“In order to do Infinity War and Endgame justice, we really had to think we really were concluding our journey through the MCU, and we were concluding other characters’ journeys through the MCU,” Anthony said. “A portion of the MCU was ending with those stories, and I think that helped us deliver something that was emotionally impactful, because we did believe that and we treated it that way.”

As Marvel continued with films and TV shows that explored a new roster of heroes, as well as expanding the adventures of older characters from its Infinity Saga, the siblings say they were intrigued by returning for a new team-up that will feature superheroes from across Marvel’s parallel universes.

“The narrative just started to re-seed itself in our brains,” Anthony added. “We started to find a road forward through the work Marvel had done since Endgame. It was just a very natural process of a sort-of regrowth of us finding a story that we wanted to tell, and really needed to tell.”

Last summer, sources close to the upcoming film predicted it will be the biggest Marvel movie ever telling Deadline “more than 60 MCU characters could reprise their roles.”

Originally titled Avengers: The Kang Dynasty, the fifth Avengers movie was set to follow the time-travelling villain Kang the Conqueror, who was introduced in the Season 1 finale of Loki and before being cast as the main antagonist in 2023’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. 

Following early screenings, Kang star Jonathan Majors became Marvel’s “highest-testing villain.”

But after Majors was found guilty of assault and harassment, the film underwent a rewrite with Stephen McFeely penning the most recent draft.

Avengers: Doomsday is currently in production in London and is set to hit theatres on May 1, 2026, with Avengers: Secret Wars due out the following year.

mdaniell@postmedia.com