- Primary Subject: Kevin Feige's comic inspiration for Avengers: Secret Wars and multiverse reboot theories
- Key Update: Avengers: Secret Wars is expected to draw primary inspiration from Jonathan Hickman's 2015 comic storyline, using Battleworld as a narrative bridge to soft-reboot the MCU and integrate Sony's Spider-Verse and Fox's Marvel franchises.
- Status: Confirmed Feige's words / Speculation on Secret Wars outcome
- Last Verified: July 22, 2026
- Quick Answer: Avengers: Secret Wars draws mainly from Jonathan Hickman's 2015 comic event, using Battleworld to consolidate alternate Marvel franchises into a unified MCU timeline.
As Marvel Studios prepares to conclude Phase 6 and cap off the ambitious Multiverse Saga, all eyes are on Avengers: Secret Wars.
With iconic heroes colliding across realities, comic readers and moviegoers alike are questioning how the major event will unfold on the big screens, and how it might reshape the cinematic universe forever.
What Marvel Comics Is Avengers: Secret Wars Based On?
While Marvel Comics published two landmark events bearing the same name, Kevin Feige recently confirmed that Avengers: Secret Wars looks primarily to Jonathan Hickman's 2015 Avengers: Secret Wars run as a blueprint.
In Hickman's story, multiversal "incursions" destroy parallel realities until pieces of shattered worlds are bound together into a patchwork planet known as Battleworld.
Speaking on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Feige highlighted Hickman's 10-year-old storyline, noting that Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars were "largely inspired by the storylines of Marvel Comics' Time Runs Out and Secret Wars."
In Time Runs Out, the alternate Earths collide into one another, and the only way to save their own universe is by destroying another. Secret Wars, on the other hand, refers to 2 major crossover events: one, wherein heroes and villains get abducted by a cosmic entity to battle on an alien planet, or version two, where Doctor Doom forges a patchwork planet called "Battleworld" from dead realities.
Despite having zero idea yet on how Doomsday will fall into Secret Wars, the comic books Feige referenced might just have spoiled the vision of what the MCU is shaping up to be.
How Kevin Feige Plans on Rebooting the MCU Through Avengers: Secret Wars
Despite persistent industry rumors that Marvel Studios plans to hit the "factory reset" button on the entire franchise, Feige directly debunked claims of a hard reboot (via the Happy Sad Confused podcast with Josh Horowitz). When asked if Secret Wars would wipe the slate clean, his answer was simple: "No."
Instead of erasing two decades of continuity, Feige intends to use Hickman's ending as a roadmap to convert the fractured multiverse into a single cohesive timeline.
Much like how the 2015 comic folded alternate imprints (like Miles Morales' Ultimate Universe) into Earth-616, Secret Wars will act as a structural "reset" rather than a hard reboot.
This would then allow Marvel Studios to permanently merge the Fantastic Four, Fox's X-Men, and Sony's Spider-Verse elements onto one primary Earth-616 timeline, which would streamline the universe's future without throwing away its past once and for all.
This theory makes sense after Feige's recent comments during his Shanghai press tour visit, where he said the following: "It [Avengers: Doomsday and Secret War story] will establish a streamlined, simplified, single universe that we can keep up with. Some things will be familiar, but many, many things will be entirely new."
Avengers: Doomsday premieres on December 18, 2026, while Avengers: Secret Wars comes out on December 17, 2027.
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