When Jeremy Renner tweets, the Internet pays attention. Renner has now raised eyebrows with a post that seems to suggest he’s doing some reading in preparation for a new MCU project. We don’t know if it’s a series or a movie, but it appears to be an adaptation of the classic West Coast Avengers comic.
Who are the West Coast Avengers, and why might they be getting the MCU spotlight now? Let’s quickly break down what you need to know.
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Who Are the West Coast Avengers?
In this case, the name is pretty self-explanatory. The Avengers are traditionally located in New York, where they generally operate out of either the Avengers Mansion or Stark Tower (or both). The idea with West Coast Avengers was twofold – spotlight some of the heroes who weren’t getting their due in the main Avengers comic, and give the Marvel Universe’s version of America a superteam that wasn’t based in the same major metropolis.
The team officially made their debut in 1984’s The West Coast Avengers #1, created by Roger Stern and Bob Hall. The initial lineup included Hawkeye, Mockingbird, Iron Man (Rhodey, not Tony), Tigra, and Wonder Man. While the first series only spanned four issues, it was quickly followed by an ongoing series that lasted a full decade and brought in new members like Moon Knight, Tigra, U.S. Agent, Vision, and Scarlet Witch.
Art by Todd Nauck. (Image Credit: Marvel)
In the years since, Marvel has revived the West Coast Avengers a number of times with different lineups. They even went through a phase after 2006’s Civil War where Iron Man instituted the 50-State Initiative and gave every single US state its own team. Yes, even Iowa.
The original series has added a lot to the larger Avengers mythology, including elevating Hawkeye to team leader status. It’s also significant for delving deeper into the romance between Vision and Scarlet Witch and the creation and destruction of their magically generated children. You don’t get WandaVision and its spinoffs, or Paul Bettany’s White Vision, without first having West Coast Avengers.
Why the MCU Needs the West Coast Avengers
So why is Renner reading up on this classic Marvel team? It stands to reason that Marvel is looking to make a West Coast Avengers project a priority in the next phase of the MCU. And just as in the comics, it appears that Hawkeye will be a major force in spearheading the team.
Honestly, now is probably the right time to move forward with West Coast Avengers. We currently have two different Avengers teams in the MCU – the New Avengers are operating out of the old Stark Tower in New York, and Anthony Mackie’s Captain America is currently leading a small team, but there’s still the problem that the western half of the country is badly underprotected. Why should the East Coast get all the superheroes?
More importantly, West Coast Avengers is valuable in its ability to bring together a number of Disney+ MCU characters who are currently stuck in limbo. Marvel continues to drag its heels on greenlighting a second season of Hawkeye. Perhaps a West Coast Avengers series could be its replacement, bringing back not just Renner’s Clint Barton but also Hailee Steinfeld’s Kate Bishop? Both characters did headline the 2018 West Coast Avengers comic, after all.
There are plenty of other characters who would make sense as team members. What about Tatiana Maslany’s She-Hulk (easily the MCU’s most prominent California-based hero) or Oscar Isaac’s Moon Knight? Or how about Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Wonder Man? It still stings that Marvel opted to cancel Wonder Man Season 2 after the strong critical reception to Season 1, but maybe they did so to make room for Simon Williams’ inclusion on an Avengers team instead? We can certainly hope.
Then there are Vision and Scarlet Witch. We don’t yet know where VisionQuest will leave Bettany’s character, nor whether those rumors about Elizabeth Olsen’s Wanda Maximoff getting resurrected will pan out. But assuming the two characters are kicking around after the events of Avengers: Secret Wars, it would make sense to include them and their now-adult children in West Coast Avengers as well.
Basically, West Coast Avengers can allow Marvel to finally dust off these underutilized characters and give them a new home with a more marketable brand. Ideally, the project would be a series rather than a movie, just based on the number of characters it would need to juggle. And, hey, MCU fans need something more than just Zodiac to look forward to on the live-action MCU series front.
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Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.