The Marvel Cinematic Universe is constantly expanding, and we’re reaching a point where it’s becoming increasingly difficult to keep track. Disney is trying to deal with this problem by launching a newly introduced Marvel Spotlight banner, but what does this really mean for the future of the MCU?
The Marvel Spotlight banner is meant to include TV shows and movies that don’t necessarily fit into the MCU’s larger continuity. It’s possible to watch them without having extensive knowledge about previous Marvel projects, including over 30 movies and several TV series.
Marvel Spotlight will launch with the upcoming Disney+ series Echo, set to premiere this January. It was developed as the spinoff of Hawkeye, and it sees the deaf superhero Maya Lopez returning to her hometown and reconnecting with her Native American roots.
According to Marvel’s head of streaming Brad Winderbaum, this series will focus on street-level stakes over larger MCU continuity. It will be the first series to premiere under the Marvel Spotlight banner, and the viewers won’t have to see any other MCU shows or films to figure out what’s happening in Maya’s story.
Winderbaum also said the Marvel Spotlight banner will “bring more grounded, character-driven stories to the screen” and compared it to Marvel Comics’ own anthology series of the same name, which introduced us to such characters as Ghost Rider and Spider-Woman.
