Marvel Studios’ Head of TV, Streaming, and Animation, Brad Winderbaum, has been there since the beginning. Beginning his career as an assistant to Marvel big wig Louis D’Espositio on Iron Man, Winderbaum has served as an executive producer on over a dozen projects and was promoted to his new role in August 2021. Since then, he’s found himself in the spotlight more frequently, including being the mouthpiece for the studio’s rebranding which moved them away from the “it’s all connected” era that seemed to overwhelm newer fans.
There was a lot of pressure post-Avengers: Endgame on the public to feel obligated to watch absolutely everything in order to watch anything. Part of the rebranding was a signal to the general audience that we’re creating a lot of options, and you can follow your tastes within this brand. Some will be more comedic, some will be more dramatic, some will be animated, some will be live-action. Marvel is more than just one thing — it is actually many different genres that just happened to coexist in a single narrative.
-Brad Winderbaum on Marvel Studios rebranding of projects, May, 2022
Now roughly halfway through their Multiverse Saga, the studio is reticent to make fans feel as though they have dozens of hours of required reading to do before watching a new project. “The hope is that, like the comics, you can just pop in anywhere and have a satisfying experience,” said Winderbaum in a May 2024 interview with Variety. “We’re trying to dispel the idea that you need to do any kind of setup work to watch anything else.” So while “the characters still live and breathe in the same universe…the interconnectivity is not so rigid that you need to watch Project A to understand Project B.” For example, even though the events of the Netflix Marvel series from the mid-2010s are canon to Marvel Studios’ Sacred Timeline, audiences should not need to watch the 39-hour-ish long episodes of Netflix’s Daredevil in order to enjoy the upcoming Disney Plus streaming series, Daredevil: Born Again.
So, I can say that up until this point, we’ve been a little bit cagey about what’s Sacred Timeline and what’s not. That was born, frankly, out of a period at the studio where we were like “we have to stick the landing with Avengers.” It was another part of the company developing the Netflix stuff; we were aware of what they were doing, they were aware of what we were doing, but it was a lot.. it was a lot to balance anyway. But now that some time has passed, now that we actually see how well-integrated the stories are, I personally, Brad Winderbaum, will confidently say that they are part of the Sacred Timeline.
-Brade Winderbaum on the canonicty of the Marvel Netflix series, January 2024
With Marvel Studios so readily retroactively placing the events of the Netflix Defenders-verse into their Sacred Timeline, fans have been anticipating another TV series to be officially given the same treatment. Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., the first Marvel Television show of the modern era, continues to have a fervent fanbase of supporters who believe it deserves to be given Winderbaum’s seal of approval as well, despite some mixed signals about just how it might fit into the Sacred Timeline; however, Winderbaum isn’t quite ready to sign off on that just yet.
“I want to go down this road with you, you know I do, but we’re just gonna take a deep breath for a second,” said Winderbaum when asked if he considered Marvel Television’s ABC melodrama as canon to the MCU’s Sacred Timeline. “I think that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is a really great show and there was a long time where some of the best reveals in that show were during the Winter Soldier era where Hydra emerges and you’re like, ‘Oh my gosh!’,” said Winderbaum about the early seasons of the series that clearly crossed over with Marvel Studios’ big-screen adventures. “I remember that feeling, even knowing what was happening, just being a fan, [going] ‘It really is connected!’,” he continued. “I think that there is, in a crazy way, like you said, it does feel like it fits into The Multiverse Saga in an incredible way.” Before finishing his evasive maneuvers, Winderbaum gave props to the cast of the series saying, “Just know that I love that cast, I love Clark Gregg and I love that show.“
Winderbaum seems to have been heavily schooled in Feigespeak 101 because he said a whole lot without saying anything at all. Loving the series and the cast and admitting a nostalgic connection to the “It’s All Connected” days is a far cry from “I personally, Brad Winderbaum, will confidently say that [the Marvel Netflix series] are part of the Sacred Timeline.” Part of the studio’s hesitancy to officially canonize Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. despite the obvious connectivity of early seasons likely stems from some of the crazier adventures that took place in later seasons. Of course, no matter what Winderbaum or other studio execs say, the best part about fandom is and always has been the ability of fans to choose their own adventure and enjoy things as they please. Nothing anyone says or does not say should deter from that.
All episodes of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. can be found on Disney Plus under the “Agents and Inhumans” section which is obviously and intentionally quite separate from the section titled “MCU Complete Timeline.”
Source: Screen Rant
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