Marvel's Grip Is Slipping: MCU Roles Are No Longer Hollywood's Hottest Ticket
Once the hottest ticket in town, Marvel roles are losing their shine. A new report says enthusiasm has cooled since the Infinity Saga, with shifting casting trends seeing fewer A-listers lining up while lesser-known actors step forward.
Remember when getting a Marvel gig felt like winning the career lottery? That rush has cooled. A new round of industry chatter says actors aren’t chasing MCU roles the way they did during the Infinity Saga peak, and the studio’s recent results aren’t exactly making the case for them.
Actors aren’t begging for capes like they used to
The temperature check comes via Variety, where reps and insiders say the MCU is still a big swing, just not the automatic dream job it was pre-Endgame. One top agent put it this way:
'Joining the MCU is still a crazy, life-changing opportunity, but I don’t have as many clients asking to do one as they were five years ago.'
Translation: the shine hasn’t disappeared, but the frenzy has.
The post-Endgame wobble
Variety points to how the landscape shifted after Marvel ramped up output in the early 2020s across theaters and Disney+. Their franchise scorecard pegs the MCU as having the heaviest market saturation across movies, shows, and spinoffs. That wall-to-wall presence hasn’t always meant heat.
Case in point: Marvel’s run of 2025 releases — Thunderbolts*, Captain America: Brave New World, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps — reportedly underperformed compared to earlier entries and only squeaked out profits. Inside baseball note: executives are now admitting things you did not hear in 2019. One studio voice says the standalone entries feel skippable. A director puts it even blunter: nothing is a sure thing anymore.
What’s still working (and what isn’t)
- The exceptions are the mega-crossovers: Deadpool & Wolverine and Spider-Man: No Way Home popped largely because they brought back big characters and delivered event-level cameos.
- The Infinity Saga had A-lister anchors — Robert Downey Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans — driving the machine.
- The current Multiverse Saga leans harder on lesser-known characters; entries like Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings haven’t matched past profitability.
- Variety’s read is that the sheer volume of MCU content made the brand feel omnipresent, but not every chapter feels essential. When audiences think they can skip one, the calculus for actors changes too.
- Marvel’s internal bet for a reset: the next two Avengers movies. Executives are calling Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars 'bulletproof' — basically, the tentpoles they expect to steady the ship and re-energize the crowd.
So where does that leave the MCU as a gig?
Still a big platform, just not the automatic golden ticket. The brand alone isn’t carrying standalone titles like it used to, and the roles that once felt like instant career upgrades are now more of a 'depends on the project' decision. Fair or not, it looks like Marvel’s next real test — and the thing that could flip the narrative — is how those Avengers event movies land. If they hit, the scramble to suit up probably returns. If not, the days of everyone begging for a Marvel slot might be officially over.