Superheroes Marvel Studios Can't Use

So far, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been an unstoppable media juggernaut. Of course, for the first 11 years or so of its existence, that had to be spelled with a lowercase "j," because the mutant villain Juggernaut was one of many characters the company didn't own the rights to include in their films. That changed in 2019 when Marvel's parent company Disney purchased Fox, along with the many Marvel characters they owned. That acquisition, along with a few other deals, has recently opened up the MCU to a whole multiverse of potential new characters, but there are still many left in legal limbo.

If all of the weird licensing and distribution issues surrounding superhero cinema aren't already making you dizzy, the constant output of superhero movies from other studios certainly will. Fortunately, you don't need your own legal degrees like Matt Murdock or Jen Walters in order to figure out who belongs to whom — we're here to help sort it all out with this handy guide.

Sony kept Venom off the big screen for years following his underwhelming debut in Spider-Man 3, but luckily, he returned in 2018's standalone feature "Venom" and its sequel "Venom: Let There Be Carnage." Yet despite his long-anticipated revival on the big screen, the lethal protector's rights are still firmly in the hands of Sony, who has used the character as one of the tent poles to its own Sony Spider-verse. This is a shame, really. Getting the rights to Venom would give the MCU the rights to the symbiote, too, which means very versatile storytelling potential.

Many casual fans think of Venom as Eddie Brock, the journalist-turned-villain who sometimes takes a turn as an antihero. But the symbiote has also bonded with Mac Gargan, also known as the Scorpion (another Spidey villain), who's worked with the Avengers as part of the Thunderbolts (pretty much Marvel's version of the Suicide Squad). Later, the symbiote bonded with Peter Parker's old frenemy Flash Thompson, and he used it to help the military — and, even the Guardians of the Galaxy — in various adventures. Through all these hosts and stories, Venom has gained greater prominence in the comics over the years, but for now at least, we won't be able to see his collaborations with our favorite MCU heroes and villains onscreen.

The 2018 animated feature "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" was a phenomenal critical and commercial success, and transformed Miles Morales from a semi-popular character among comic book readers into an almost household name. The movie was immediately green-lit for two sequels, "Across the Spider-Verse" and "Beyond the Spider-Verse," as well as a female-led spinoff (per Vanity Fair), all of which are sure to make mountains of money for Sony, and Sony only.

Like his mentor Parker, the rights to Morales' on-screen appearances belong to Sony, but unlike Parker, Sony has yet to agree to any sort of partnership that would bring the young hero into the MCU proper. Morales' star has risen steeply in recent years, in his comics, video games, and film, and the issue of his ownership is a significant one. On the one hand, Morales only exists at Sony as an animated character, and one independent from its fledgling Sony-verse, so allowing Disney to produce their own wholly separate, live-action Morales seems entirely possible. On the other hand, the almost $400 million and Academy Award for best animated feature earned by "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" could also — understandably — ensure that Sony keeps Morales right where he is.

Of all the Marvel characters that Disney and Marvel Studios still don't have the movie rights to, the Living Vampire Morbius has by far the bleakest outlook. The vast majority of characters that Marvel Studios still doesn't own the rights to have either never appeared in a movie, only played a supporting role, or have been animated. On top of that, the very few who have played live-action lead heroes and main villains have mostly been successful — both non-Holland Parkers, for example, as well as the majority of their villains (Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus, Carnage, etc).

Among the less-successful live-action leads, none have received even close to the level of hard-earned scorn and mockery that the 2022 movie "Morbius" has. The movie's abysmal ticket sales and critical reviews have undoubtedly tainted the character Morbius' worth dramatically. For that reason, and only that, the MCU is unlikely to seek out the rights to Morbius at any point in the near future. The one possible exception to that rule is if Sony faces hard times and decides to raise money by throwing a movie-rights yard sale.

A few years back, Sony had big plans for a Spidey-free Sinister Six film that might have featured Doctor Octopus, Green Goblin, and other villains (remember how all of those cameos were shoehorned into the end of "Amazing Spider-Man 2"?). They also had plans for a Black Cat and Silver Sable team-up, another Tobey Maguire Spider-Man, and possibly two more Andrew Garfield Spider-Mans. None of these projects came to be, and between them all, they've left dozens of Marvel characters in the lurch and off the big screen.

Sony's choice to keep so many characters off-screen is too bad, as many of them could be great fits for the MCU. Doctor Octopus and his Sinister Six, for instance, have been world-league threats in the comics, often clashing with powerful teams like the Fantastic Four and the Avengers. Doc Ock also has a weird heroic streak, as evidenced by the time he swapped his brain from his own dying body into Spider-Man's body and then dedicated his life to being a "superior" Spider-Man. That's right — he became a hero out of sheer, petty spite.

Meanwhile, Green Goblin once gained an indescribable amount of power when he inexplicably became the new director of S.H.I.E.L.D. In this role, he was able to bring almost unlimited resources to bear on his superhero grudges, and it eventually took an alliance between the Avengers and many other heroes to defeat him — yet another powerful Marvel story that we're unlikely to ever see in the MCU, at least any time soon.