Marvel’s Eternals was planned to be the first movie in the MCU’s slate of Phase 4 movies to place after Avengers: Endgame. Black Widow would hit the theaters and The Falcon and The Winter Soldier would release on Disney Plus. Eternals would go to the theaters and advance the MCU timeline.
Eternals Place Will Be Set In Present Day and Also In Various Points in History
But the “multiverse” had different plans. Things have changed since. Several Disney Plus shows from Marvel Studios have come before Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings released in theaters first.
With all the schedule changes and movie delays due to the pandemic, the Eternals place in the MCU’s timeline remains unaffected. Comicbook.com learned during a set visit where Eternals would actually take place in the timeline.
“It could be concurrent to Spider-Man: Far From Home,” Eternals producer Nate Moore said. “Again, they sort of operate on a different system. Although, Far From Home does take place in London, ironically. So it’s sort of an undefined time. I don’t think it’s, years have not passed, I will say that.”
Eternals would take place in different areas throughout the history of the universe. And that would include present day London. Moore estimates that 60% of the runtime of Eternals would be in the present while 40% of it would be in various points in history.
“So it’s a big cosmic crazy movie set on earth over 7,000 years,” Moore continued. “[The events of Avengers: Endgame] don’t directly affect [Eternals], although the Eternals are quite aware of what happened in the Endgame and what happened with Thanos, and you sort of get to hear their opinion about what happened and why maybe they didn’t get involved. So it is both in a post-Endgame world, but isn’t a direct line, as far as storytelling.”
Many of the Avengers members are around where Eternals place in the timeline like Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, and Captain Marvel, but Moore warned the fans they shouldn’t expect to see them as part of the mix in Eternals. Especially with 10 cosmic heroes sharing the screen already.
“These characters have been around for all of the movies that we loved and know the characters that we know to some degree,” Moore explained. “So, there is a notion that it re-contextualize a couple of characters and how you view them. But again, it also is very self-contained to some degree.”
Eternals Future In The MCU
During a recent interview with Fandango, Eternals director Chloé Zhao (Nomadland) also talked about how the latest Marvel Studios film will place in the MCU. “The film completely stands alone. If you know half the universe disappeared and it came back, that’s all you need to know to watch this film. But what happens in this film will have huge implications on the future.”
Marvel’s Eternals premieres November 5th, 2021 in theaters only.
