We Want These 6 MCU Characters to Come Back Soon

At this point, the MCU has introduced hundreds of named characters, both prominent and supporting. And we always look forward to seeing who returns to this universe and how/why it happens. But some characters are gone for so long, it feels like there’s no way they’re coming back… unless they suddenly do. For example, Captain America: Brave New World’s cast includes Tim Blake Nelson and Liv Tyler, who reprise their roles as Samuel Sterns/The Leader and Betty Brant, respectively. They are returning a remarkable 17 years after the one and only time we saw them in the MCU in 2008’s The Incredible Hulk. Considering their return, here are six more characters that we think the MCU should bring back.

Important Note Alert: We’re sticking to Phase 1-3 of the MCU. Yes, there are huge question marks about so many characters more recently introduced in Phase 4 or Phase 5 (Hercules, Clea, Starfox, etc.) who seem poised for more but have yet to actually show up again, but this list is reserved for those earlier days. Also, the animated series What if…? deserves applause for including some deepcut characters, including a couple on this list, but that show—and any other multiverse shenanigans—don’t count in this list. We’re talking about characters in the core MCU. You know, the Sacred Timeline! 

Poor Leonard’s gotta feel left out at this point! After Mark Ruffalo replaced Edward Norton as the MCU’s Bruce Banner, it felt like the supporting characters from Norton’s one and only Hulk film might all be discarded. But then Thunderbolt Ross popped back up in Captain America: Civil War, Emil Blonsky/Abomination eventually returned in She-Hulk, and now the Leader and Betty are back too. That leaves Leonard as the most prominent character from The Incredible Hulk to still not return. In the comics, psychiatrist Leonard becomes Doc Samon, a gamma-powered superhero with great strength. (It is not Hulk-sized strength, which is reflected by him only having green hair and not green skin.)

For those who knew his comic book history, Ty Burrell was an offbeat choice to play Leonard in The Incredible Hulk to be sure. But look, if they can turn Indiana Jones into a huge red monster, the MCU can finally turn Phil Dunphy into a buff dude with long green hair. 

Iron Man 2 is a mess of a movie. But there were still some good elements that came from it. One of the more entertaining aspects of the film was Sam Rockwell’s Justin Hammer. It was an inspired bit of casting because Rockwell was able to bring his own weird energy to the role of a guy who’s very much a wannabe Tony Stark. He was lacking the same genius or inspiration but willing to pay to try and replicate it. 

Hammer’s plans were thwarted in Iron Man 2, but he made one surprise cameo since in the 2014 short All Hail to the King, which explained how his fellow prisoner at Seagate Penitentiary, Trevor Slattery, would come to be abducted by the Ten Rings (and return himself in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings years later). 

Yes, we saw a variant of Justin Hammer on What If…? but it feels like it’s time to bring the original version back. Tony Stark is now dead in the MCU. A guy like Hammer seems like someone who’d be doing his best to exploit that vacuum. 

We’ve got a situation where an actor returned playing a different (or in this case false) version of their character. In actuality, the Collector hasn’t really been seen since his role in 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy. The guy Star-Lord and Gamora encountered in Avengers: Infinity War was actually an illusion created by Thanos after he got one of the Infinity Stones from Collector. 

There’s been one mention of the Collector since in The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special. We learned he sold Knowhere to the Guardians, so he did survive his encounter with Thanos at the least. But you can’t have Benicio Del Toro as one of Marvel’s Elders of the Universe and Jeff Goldblum playing another and never have them meet, right?! We have to experience the weird energy of that team-up on screen! 

When Captain America: The First Avenger first hit theaters, there was some talk about the possibility of doing more stories of Cap during his World War II battles. Those stories would be told independently from Cap’s modern-day Avengers adventures. Obviously that didn’t come to be. But there is still plenty of promise left in exploring more in this era, both during and after the war, via the Howling Commandos. 

Introduced in The First Avenger, this special international unit fought both alongside Cap and Bucky and on their own. After that movie, we saw different groupings of the Commandos pop up in flashback form in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter, though the most consistent presence was Dum Dum Dugan (Neal McDonough). 

The Howling Commandos allow us access to a specific time period and type of adventure the MCU could benefit from, featuring a group of characters with plenty of potential. (One of their team members, James Montgomery Falsworth, becomes the hero Union Jack in the comics.) Whether alongside familiar faces like Peggy Carter, Bucky, Cap, or on their own, it feels like there’s plenty more that could be done with them.

One of the more blatant “Oh, this guy’s gonna become a big deal supervillain” set ups to be ignored so far, Spider-Man: Homecoming introduced Mac Gargan (played by Michael Mando). The determined criminal sporting a scorpion tattoo on his neck who got sent to jail thanks to Spidey. A mid-credits scene then showed him plotting his revenge in prison, clearly planting more seeds for him to return in his comic book guise as the Scorpion.

Except we’ve never seen Gargan again. It is wild considering his fellow prisoner, Adrian Toomes / Vulture did briefly pop up again in, sigh, Morbius, thanks to some bizarre multiverse-hopping wackiness. The current animated series, Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, does include Gargan going full Scorpion, so he is at least being kept in mind by Marvel Studios. Here’s hoping we get to finally see him use that lethal tail in live-action at some point. 

If you’re thinking “But wait, we did see Mordo again in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness,” that’s not quite true. Yes, Chiwetel Ejiofor was in that movie, but he only appeared as a variant of Mordo who Strange encountered in the same universe where Scarlet Witch decimated the cameo-packed Illuminati. 

This is, well, strange (forgive the pun), because the first Doctor Strange film spent considerable time building up Mordo. That film depicted his disillusionment with his fellow sorcerers and their misuse of powers, in his opinion. The movie gave fans a post-credit scene depicting his new quest to strip magic from those he deemed shouldn’t have it. 

Multiverse of Madness has Strange acknowledge Mordo and he have fought since, but we never see the actual Mordo, so Doctor Strange is having an entirely offscreen ongoing war with one of his primary foes. It’s time to remedy that and bring this MCU character back!