Kevin Feige delighted and confused Marvel Studios’ fans with the announcement that Avengers: Secret Wars is targeting a November 2025 theatrical release. Though the project had been teased as early as June of 2021 in Season One of Loki, the debate about whether or not something on the scale of Secret Wars could be put together in less than a decade raged on amongst fans.
That debate hasn’t ended with the announcement of the film, but some attention has been diverted to who might be directing Avengers: Secret Wars. When it was announced that Destin Daniel Cretton signed on to helm Avengers: The Kang Dynasty, which will debut just six months before Avengers: Secret Wars, it was also revealed that Cretton was not on board for Secret Wars. It’s hardly uncommon for a Marvel Studios’ film that’s over 3 years away to be without a director, but for one of this magnitude, it’s become a talking point and most of the discussion seems to center on directors who have worked with Marvel Studios in the past.
One such director, Scott Derrickson, who directed 2016’s Doctor Strange and served as an executive producer on Doctor Strange in The Multiverse of Madness, has been mentioned as a possible candidate, but according to Derrickson, it’s not in the cards. When asked if there were any possibility of him landing the gig, Derrickson promptly replied with a GIF that provided a firm “NO” as an answer.
If Derrickson is truly out of the running, the pool of candidates who have worked with Marvel Studios in the past is still pretty deep. While Feige has said the Russo brothers aren’t on board for the project, it had the “they aren’t on board YET” feel. Other candidates could include Ryan Coogler, Sam Raimi, Peyton Reed, Nia DaCosta and Jon Favreau, who while he’s been busy with Star Wars, could return for a project the size of Avengers: Secret Wars. And there’s no reason to close the door to directors who haven’t worked with the studio before, as a big project like this could attract the interest of some big names in the industry. Whoever they land, Marvel Studios could have an announcement as early as this September at their D23 presentation in Anaheim.
