A surprising cameo in The Marvels hints at significant plans for a returning franchise in the MCU continuity.
While it can’t be denied that The Marvels dire box office isn’t cause for any celebration at Marvel, the silver lining is fan reaction to a post-credits scene that opens the door to a potentially huge MCU franchise:
SPOILERS AHEAD!
The X-Men. Having not been seen on-screen since 2019’s Dark Phoenix, the characters seemed primed to make a significant comeback in 2024 and beyond. While the initial plan seemed to have been to recast all of the most iconic roles, Patrick Stewart’s cameo as Professor X in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Hugh Jackman’s co-starring role as Wolverine in Deadpool 3 seems to hint this is no longer the case.
Indeed, The Marvels’ post-credit sequence reveals another icon X-Men actor reprising their role…
MORE SPOILERS!
…none other than Kelsey Grammer as Dr. Hank McCoy, aka Beast! This may strike some as a surprising cameo, as nowadays, Nicholas Hoult is more identified with the part, having played him in the X-Men prequels. Grammer played Beast twice, once in Brett Ratner’s disastrous X-Men: The Last Stand and in a small cameo role in Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Days of Future Past. While pretty much everyone despised The Last Stand, even its harshest critics seemed to agree that the casting of Kelsey Grammer was spot-on. The fact that Singer included Grammer in Days of Future Past seemed to indicate that he also approved of the casting, and with the X-Men returning to the MCU, it seems Dr. Frasier Crane is once again in the building as far as the MCU is concerned.
Of course, being the multiverse, anything can happen, but it certainly seems Grammar’s McCoy is being given a significant build-up, with him greeting Teyonah Parris’s Monica Rambeau in an alternate world, that also includes a version of her mother, Maria, once again played by the great Lashana Lynch. This paves the way for Lynch’s Maria to take the mantle of Binary (from the comics) and maybe indicates a place in the X-Men for the character. Many also think that Jackman’s Wolverine may play a massive role in the MCU in the future, even if he’s maintained that his return as Wolverine following the character’s definitive end in Logan is a one-off. Time will tell.
What did you think of Kelsey Grammer’s cameo in The Marvels? Let us know in the comments.