The 74-year-old Harris is one of Hollywood’s most well-respected method actors and capable of turning any role into a memorable one. Harris has played memorable villains in The Rock, Enemy at the Gates, The Truman Show and National Treasure: Book of Secrets as well as a chilling performance in A History of Violence. And now, a trade report confirms the years-old rumors about his Wonder Man role.
According to Deadline, Harris will indeed portray “Hollywood agent Neal Saroyan” in Wonder Man, which will premiere this December on D+.
Created by Gerard Jones and Jeff Johnson in 1991, Neal Saroyan was Simon Williams agent used mostly as a Hollywood caricature, designed to satirize the kind of awful behavior industry veterans have long been known for, making him a perfect fit for Marvel Television’s take on Wonder Man. Later, Peter David ramped up Saroyen’s baddie status, revealing him to be a supervillain in charge of a cadre of assassins known as The Nobility.
By choosing not to put together a big Hall H presentation at this year’s San Diego Comic Con, Marvel Studios seemed content letting Thunderbolts* and The Fantastic Four: First Steps do its talking this Summer. Both films were a hit with critics and fans and generated plenty of discussion; however, with a year-long wait until the next MCU film, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, hits theaters, there will need to be some additional topics of conversation. And while production on Destin Daniel Cretton‘s Spidey film has been making headlines, it’s likely to move inside for a significant chunk of time, disappearing from the spotlight. That leaves Marvel Animation’s Marvel Zombies and Marvel Television’s Wonder Man on the docket and, so far, neither have drawn much interest from fans. So, what can Marvel Studios do to make some noise?
Without its every-other-year D23 convention on the calendar, it looked as though the studio may have intended to go the rest of the year without showing off its future slate; however, over the past week, the revelation that the studio will have a presence at a pair of events has provided some hope for a look at Marvel’s plans for 2026!
First up, Destination D23
Destination D23 is a Disney fan event, specifically a smaller, biennial event held in Walt Disney World that alternates with the larger, flagship D23 Expo. This year, it’s taking place from August 29-31 at Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort. The event offers fans a chance to celebrate Disney’s past, present, and future through exclusive presentations, behind-the-scenes looks at upcoming projects, special guests, and unique shopping experiences. On Saturday, August 30th, the Walt Disney Studio’s Showcase will give fans in attendance “an exclusive look at the movies fans love, and a glimpse into what to look forward to from Disney’s film studios,” which, of course, includes Marvel Studios.
While Marvel has not been confirmed to have a presence, it is possible that the event will include an appearance by Kevin Feige. And with no films on the slate until next year, the panel could contain some information about Avengers: Doomsday, which remains in production in the UK.
New York, Neeeeeew Yoooooork…Comic Con
Held at the Javits Center from October 9-12, NYCC will be “Four jam-packed days of pop culture, film and TV studios, studio and brand activations, comics, celebs, authors, voice actors, panels, and geeky goodness right here in NYC. And most importantly, a home for heroes, villains, and nerds to be accepted and embraced,” and Marvel Studios WILL be there.
On October 11th, fans are invited to “join special guests for a look behind the scenes at Marvel’s upcoming Disney+ shows from Marvel Television and Marvel Animation.” With Marvel Zombies streaming on September 24th, only Wonder Man remains on the 2025 slate. It is possible–perhaps even likely–that Marvel uses the panel to roll out the first full trailer for that project but that’s almost certainly not all that they’ll get up to.
With Season 2 of Daredevil: Born Again set to hit D+ in March, Marvel could wow the NYCC crowd with a first look at the upcoming episodes. Additionally, given Marvel Animation’s presence, a look at Season 2 of X-Men ’97 and/or Season 2 of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man could be in order. It’s possible the studio could also provide a first look at the Paul Bettany-led Vision series and reveal additional animated projects in the works.
Seven months before it’s scheduled release on Disney Plus, Wonder Man remains largely shrouded in mystery. The Destin Daniel Cretton-created series will feature Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Simon Williams with Ben Kingsley reprising his role as Trevor Slattery and Demetrius Grosse filing the role of Eric Williams, brother to Simon and, in the comics, known as the villain The Grim Reaper. Beyond that, the roles of the rest of the cast haven’t been made clear and much of the cast hasn’t been revealed at all. However, one new name did emerge following Disney’s Upfront presentation.
According to Variety, Béchir Sylvain (Black Summer, BMF and Diarra from Detroit) has joined the eight-episode series in a “mysterious role.”
Based on the character of Wonder Man, one of Marvel’s oldest characters, first introduced in 1964 in the pages of Avengers No 9. Known as Simon Williams, a celebrity actor and stuntman. In a nutshell, it is a story of two actors struggling to make it in the Hollywood of the MCU, [asking] the big question what does Hollywood look like in a world where super heroes are real?
-Official Synopsis for Marvel Television’s Wonder Man
Once dismissed by The Avengers and Avengers: Age of Ultron director Joss Whedon, longtime Avenger Wonder Man will finally join the MCU this summer and it sounds as though the studio will be strongly influenced by the comics. “If you’re a fan of the West Coast Avengers, you know a little bit about Simon Williams…you’re going to be very excited to see how much homage to the source material there is actually in the show,” said Marvel TV boss Brad Winderbaum. However, as the studio continues to work to keep the new series a mystery, we’ll have to wait to find out just what that influence will be.
Marvel Studios unveiled its first official look at Wonder Man during its portion of the Disney upfronts on Tuesday. While the studio has been rather quiet regarding the series, which stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Ben Kingsley, it did confirm the series will debut on Disney+ sometime in December. The studio also confirmed that the series will consist of eight 30-minute episodes.
Brad Winderbaum, Marvel’s head of television and animation, revealed that the studio is looking to take a tighter approach with its Disney+ offerings. The goal for the studio is to focus on shows that have the possibility of having multiple seasons. Per Winderbaum, Marvel is looking to release two live-action shows a year, along with two animated shows a year. This year, Ironheart and Wonder Man will serve as the show’s live-action titles, with the former releasing next month and the latter debuting later this year. As for whether or not the shows will have multiple seasons, they’re being developed with multiple seasons in mind. However, it ultimately depends on how they perform before the studio confirms multiple seasons of either title.
As of now, an official release date for Wonder Man has not been released. That should, hopefully, change as it nears closer to the end of the year.
Those rumors included buzz that Wonder Man, which was produced under the Marvel Spotlight banner, would consist of ten episodes. With both WandaVision and Agatha All Along rolling out nine episodes, Wonder Man looked poised to have the highest episode count of any live-action streaming series in Marvel’s D+ era; however, as it turns out, that will not be the case.
“It’s a two-hander between two amazing characters, this odd couple of Simon Williams and Trevor Slattery and you get a little bit of glimpse of that in the trailer,” explained Winderbaum, referencing Marvel Studios D+ Look Ahead teaser that was released on October 30th. While Winderbaum’s comments about Slattery’s role in the project were a little revealing, the TV boss wasn’t giving much else away. “I don’t want to go too much into the story details,” he said. “It’s very fun to see people speculating about what they think the plot is. That is part of the fun of it.” To this point, very little information about the plot of the series has made its way online with only an official logline really providing any insight into what to expect.
Based on the character of Wonder Man, one of Marvel’s oldest characters, first introduced in 1964 in the pages of Avengers No 9. Known as Simon Williams, a celebrity actor and stuntman. In a nutshell, it is a story of two actors struggling to make it in the Hollywood of the MCU, [asking] the big question what does Hollywood look like in a world where super heroes are real?
-Reported longline for Marvel Television’s Wonder Man
[Wonder Man will] be definitely influenced by the comics. One of the things that we’re excited about it is that it’s going to feel very unique. It’s not going to feel like anything you’ve quite seen in the MCU before. And the kind of stories we can tell on Disney+, which has been fun. Like streaming, serialized storytelling is a totally different muscle. So, we’re having a blast making that one.-Stephen Broussard
Winderbaum did take the opportunity to give fans a little bit of homework to do ahead of the series’ 2025 release. Illuminating comments made by Broussard, Winderbaum revealed which comics provided inspiration for the Wonder Man series. “If you’re a fan of the West Coast Avengers, you know a little bit about Simon Williams…you’re going to be very excited to see how much homage to the source material there is actually in the show,” teased Winderbaum.
With over a year to go until its release on Disney Plus, it’ll be interesting to see just how much Marvel reveals about Wonder Man and how much they choose to continue to keep under wraps about the mysterious series.
With Bob Iger‘s return to the Disney throne came a mandate that the company’s largest production studios take a hard look at their project pipelines. During a May conference call with investors, the big boss made it clear that the studios were to scale back the number of streaming projects being developed and that the ones that did make their way to Disney Plus needed to be of the quality customers had come to expect, adding the mandate was “particularly true with Marvel.” Following a three-year run in which both theatrical and streaming projects failed to land with audiences, Iger pumped the brakes on the monster Multiverse Saga slate Marvel Studios One Above All, Kevin Feige, revealed at SDCC ’22 in which Phase 6 alone was comprised of 11 projects.
We’re slowly going to decrease volume and go to probably about two TV series a year instead of what had become four and reduce our film output from maybe four a year to two, or a maximum of three. And we’re working hard on what that path is.
Bob Iger
While there’s no reason to doubt that Iger fully intends to accomplish the plan he laid out in May, it would seem as though the decrease in volume will indeed be a slow process. With a backlog of projects, both animated and live-action, already in the can and ready to roll out, Marvel Studios has officially revealed its 2025 Disney Plus slate and it is one of its most ambitious yet with six series on the way next year.
January 29, 2025: Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (Marvel Animation)
March 4, 2025: Daredevil: Born Again (Marvel Television)
June 24, 2025: Ironheart (Marvel Television)
August 6, 2025: Eyes of Wakanda (Marvel Animation)
October 2025: Marvel Zombies (Marvel Animation)
December 2025: Wonder Man (Marvel Television)
A leaked sizzle reel that was likely intended to launch online following the two-episode finale of Agatha All Along revealed both the slate and first looks at each of the projects.
The inclusion of Wonder Man on the 2025 slate opens up an intriguing, although perhaps too early, conversation about the studio’s 2026 plans. With the Paul Bettany-led untitled Vision series filming next year along with Season 2 of Daredevi: Born Again, it seems as though Marvel may have a surprise or two in store for fans.
A dozen years after The Avengers and Avengers: Age of Ultron director Joss Whedon dismissed the character, Simon Williams’s time in the (Marvel) spotlight is almost here. Revealed to be in development in the summer of 2022, Marvel Studios Wonder Man streaming series has been shrouded so heavily in mystery that some fans have questioned its existence. Developed for Disney Plus by Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and Spider-Man 4 director Destin Daniel Cretton and Brooklyn Nine-Nine writer Andrew Guest, the streaming series has never been included in any of Marvel Studios’ head honcho Kevin Feige’s convention presentations despite originally being slated for a late-2023 release.
Pretty much everyone but Wonder Man. I never did figure out what he was for.
-Joss Whedon on which Avengers he’d like to add to the roster of a sequel to 2012’s The Avengers
Based on the character of Wonder Man, one of Marvel’s oldest characters, first introduced in 1964 in the pages of Avengers No 9. Known as Simon Williams, a celebrity actor and stuntman. In a nutshell, it is a story of two actors struggling to make it in the Hollywood of the MCU, [asking] the big question what does Hollywood look like in a world where super heroes are real?
Given Marvel Studios’ current plan to slow the development and release of Marvel Television’s streaming series, a 2025 release for Wonder Man is a pleasant surprise. With Daredevil: Born Again debuting on D+ on March 4, 2025 and Ironheart expected later in the year, Wonder Man, which was expected by many to kick off the streamer’s 2026 slate, would become the third streaming series of the year.
[Wonder Man will] be definitely influenced by the comics. One of the things that we’re excited about it is that it’s going to feel very unique. It’s not going to feel like anything you’ve quite seen in the MCU before. And the kind of stories we can tell on Disney+, which has been fun. Like streaming, serialized storytelling is a totally different muscle. So, we’re having a blast making that one. –Marvel Parliament member Stephen Broussard
Coming out of the 2024 summer convention circuit, Marvel Studios’ plans for 2026 were almost a complete mystery. Short of Avengers: Doomsday being slotted in for a May 1st release, the studio’s schedule was mostly the subject of speculation. However, over the course of a few hours, that’s all changed as a pair of projects have been tabbed by the trades as having been slated for release in 2026.
Shortly after the news that Sony set Spider-Man 4 for a July 24th release, a trade report indicated that another Avenger is set to join the fray with a solo project in 2026. According to THR, Paul Bettany‘s untitled Vision streaming series is “reportedly set to arrive on Disney + in 2026.”
While at the premiere of his new film Here, Bettany was asked about the Vision series, which will see him return to the role for the first time since 2021’s WandaVision. “We’re cooking up something that I’m really excited about,” said Bettany before adding that “snitches end up in ditches” and refusing further comment.
Marvel’s 2026 Theatrical Slate
As it stands, there will be four MCU-set films in theaters in 2026. However, at this time only Avengers: Doomsday and the Untitled Sony/Marvel Studios Spidey collaboration have been identified. Marvel Studios still has stakes placed in the ground on February 13th and November 6th although it’s unclear what projects will occupy those dates.
Our most recent best guess was that the studio would continue to try to have Blade ready to get in front of cameras early in 2025 and in theaters for February 2026. That said, it’s easy for Disney to continue to kick that can down the road until the project is ready and eventually choose another date.
February 13, 2026 (Untitled Marvel Studios)
May 1, 2026 (Avengers: Doomsday)
July 24, 2026 (Untitled Sony/Marvel Studios Spider-Man sequel)
November 6, 2026 (Untitled Marvel Studios)
Marvel’s 2026 Streaming Slate
Since debuting on the streaming service in 2021 with WandaVision, Marvel Studios has been notoriously stingy with details about release dates for Disney Plus projects. At this time, the only known release date for an upcoming project is Daredevil: Born Again‘s planned March 4, 2025 premiere which was just revealed. Ironheart, which has been in the can for some time, is expected to join Born Again on the 2025 release slate though Disney has not officially confirmed a release window. Keeping all that in mind, it’s hardly surprising that there’s no official word about what projects will stream in 2026 but it’s not incredibly difficult to take some educated guesses.
Though it has yet to be included in any of Marvel Studios’ presentations, Wonder Man completed production some time ago and with the studio slowing the rate at which its streaming series release, it’s likely to be the first live-action series on Disney Plus in 2026. With Bettany confirming that production on Vision is set to get underway next year (earlier reports have indicated that it should kick off in the UK in July) it’s possible it will be ready for release in late 2026.
First half of 2026 (Wonder Man)
Second half of 2026 (Untitled Vision series)
Obviously this does not include any of a number of animated series being developed at the studio. In the case of those projects, any sort of predictions feel unsafe given thattwo series set for release by Disney in 2024 are apparently no longer on the docket.
From 2013 to 2019, fans grew used to Marvel Television churning out seasons of traditional and streaming TV series that mostly consisted of 22 (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) or 13 (Netflix’s Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist and Luke Cage). As Marvel Studios began to produce their own series for Disney Plus, episode counts dropped significantly as did total runtime. The studio’s first series, WandaVision, was made up of 9 episodes that added up to only just about six hours of content. To date, with the exception of the five-episode Echo, the studio’s live-action series have had either six or nine episodes that have been structured more like films than TV series. Moving forward, the studio’s production practices are said to be changing and a series that the studio has hardly addressed at all may be one of the first examples of those changes.
First reported to be in development in June 2022, Wonder Man will finally introduce one of Marvel Comics’ classic Avengers to the MCU. Yahya Abdul-Mateen ll will play stuntman turned super hero Simon Williams in the series which was written by Community and Brooklyn Nine-Nine scribe Andrew Guest and overseen by Shang-Chi and the Legend of The Ten Rings director Destin Daniel Cretton. Despite photos of the production making their way online, fans have questioned if the series truly existed or if they were experiencing the Mandela Effect. Now, another trade has provided an update on the series that should help alleviate any concern.
[Wonder Man will] be definitely influenced by the comics. One of the things that we’re excited about it is that it’s going to feel very unique. It’s not going to feel like anything you’ve quite seen in the MCU before. And the kind of stories we can tell on Disney+, which has been fun. Like streaming, serialized storytelling is a totally different muscle. So, we’re having a blast making that one.
Release slates have never been more fluid than they are now. As productions get up and running again around the world, projects that were supposed to drop in 2024 have already been moved to 2025 and the butterfly effect is in full…effect. Only a crazy person might try to hypothesize when projects might actually see the light of day…so let’s look at one possible Marvel Studios’ release slate for 2026
January: Wonder Man
After a little creative retooling, Wonder Man resumed production in mid-January which means it will likely complete principal photography no later than Summer. With that in mind, it could easily be ready to roll out in 2025 but with Marvel Studios looking to space out their D+series and with very few new streaming projects far enough in development to get in front of cameras anytime soon, we’ve decided to put the Simon Williams solo series here.
Initially revealed to be a streaming series, Armor Wars is now a feature film and the first one on any of our hypothetical calendars to not have a release date set aside by Marvel Studios. That makes this spot as purely hypothetical as it gets. With the news that Marvel Studios’ search for a director is underway, it seems likely that cameras could roll on this one in either late 2024 or early 2025 since the script seems to have been in place for some time. IF that’s the case (that’s the nature of these hypothetical calendars, after all), this one would have no problem making this May 1st date…which was most recently set aside for Avengers: The Kang Dynasty.
July 24th: Spider-Man 4
Nobody knows it better than me: Sony sets the date for the Spidey movies that they make in collaboration with Marvel Studios. So why are we placing Spidey 4 on one of Marvel Studios’ tentative release dates? Because it seems increasingly likely that Spidey 4 (once believed to be a 2025 film) will be released in 2026 and it also seems increasingly unlikely that Marvel Studios will be able to roll Avengers 5 out in 2026.
September: Vision Quest
Even with Marvel Studios pumping the brakes on their streaming projects while they figure out how to make TV, it does seem Vision Quest is still going to happen. Who is making it and what exactly it will end up looking like are still questions we all have. Originally, it was going to be heavily influenced by Tom King’s excellent 12 issue Vision book but it’s been some time since anyone has had an update. Because this project COULD serve as a sequel to WandaVision and a prequel to the rumored Scarlet Witch solo project, it seems like something the studio would want to make happen and make happen right.
November 6th: Shang-Chi 2
Another project that has yet to be officially given a spot in Marvel Studios Multiverse Saga, Destin Daniel Cretton’sShang-Chi sequel seems like a priority for the studio. Cretton dropped out of Avengers 5 to spend more time preparing this which, hypothetically, could be because the studio wants to roll it out first. Interestingly enough, that’s consistent with info we heard a couple of years ago which makes us inclined to buy it.
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