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'What If?' Introduces Jeffrey Wright To The MCU, Features Return Of More Than Two Dozen MCU Actors [Comic-Con 2019]

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By Ben Pearson

Several months ago, we exclusively revealed that Marvel Studios was developing a What If? animated anthology series that would explore alternate stories in the MCU like "what if Thanos had joined the Avengers?" Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige announced some new details about the series from Comic-Con's Hall H stage tonight, including the fact that over two dozen MCU actors are coming back to lend their voices to the show and that Jeffrey Wright has joined the cast as The Watcher. Read on to find out what we learned.

What If? is coming to Disney+ in summer 2021, and they showed a brief teaser which was narrated by Jeffrey Wright (Westworld, Casino Royale) as The Watcher.

There's the list of actors who are reprising their roles – and it's not just the main Avengers heroes, either. Michael B. Jordan is coming back, which means we're getting more Killmonger (yessss), and even Stanley Tucci will return for the first time since playing Dr. Abraham Erskine in Captain America: The First Avenger back in 2011.

"It's really exciting to be a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It's also for me a way to get my son to return my texts," Wright cracked on stage. "This is modern myth-making."

He's playing The Watcher, a non-Earthly being who observes all things. He's watching over the multiverse and occasionally may or may not intervene with the happenings of Earthlings. "Other than that, he's off doing his own things which I can relate to," Wright said. "Today is the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing so the watcher first appears in 1963 in Fantastic Four and he turns up on the moon because although today's the 50th anniversary, The Watcher had a crib up there ages ago. We'll see where we'll take it, we'll take it anywhere."

Sounds like this show is full of promise, and we're looking forward to checking it out in summer 2021 on Disney+.

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