Civil War Can Still Work In Marvel’s Movies Without Spider-Man Or Stamford. Here’s How.

Ever since it was announced tha Robert Downey Jr. would be playing Iron Man in Captain America 3 and that his appearance there would begin a Marvel Cinematic Universe version of Civil War, some fans have been questioning how we’d get to the point where heroes would be at odds with each other by 2016. Namely, people have wondered how there would be any need for a Superhero Registration Act in the MCU when there are essentially only six heroes, all of whom worked alongside S.H.I.E.L.D. and are known quantities.

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On top of that, it doesn’t seem likely that we’ll see the incident in Stamford from the comics that helped the public get behind registration or that Spider-Man, whose public reveal of his secret identity was one of the main story beats, will be involved, despite those rumors of Marvel and Sony talking.

Those are all good points if Civil War was starting tomorrow, or if the Marvel movies did straight adaptations of stories from the comics. But it isn’t, and Marvel Studios doesn’t work like that. Here’s how and why I don’t think we need Stamford or Spider-Man and can still end up with a conflict thematically similar to the one from the comics:

• Things are going to be different after Ultron

Marvel is like a chess player, always thinking a few moves ahead, and I firmly believe the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron are going to change the climate in the MCU. Up until now, pretty much all of the people in costumes with super powers have been on the side of the angels. There really aren’t any super villains in Marvel movies, as all the bad guys are from elsewhere: Loki, the Chitauri, the Dark Elves, etc. Iron Man’s foes have been technology-based, and Captain America battled the Red Skull back in World War II and then a spy organization in the present. We’ve seen some bad eggs with powers on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., but those have mostly been hidden from the general public. For the most part, it’s been super heroes against aliens.

I think Age of Ultron is going to represent a very scary event for the Marvel masses, as they see a bunch of killer robots and some more superhumans like Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver and Vision, whose loyalties and motives aren’t as cut and dried as the Avengers. If Ultron causes a lot of destruction, which it’s safe to assume he will, it’s easy to imagine that regular people will demand some oversight of people in costumes, as they just won’t trust them as much.

On top of that, it’s easy to see how Ultron would convince Tony Stark to back registration if he ends up being the robot’s creator, as it would be a comeuppance for him. Remember, in the comics, he was initially against the Superhero Registration Act as well, but Stamford changed his mind so dramatically he ended up leading the pro-registration side. Make the initial event even more personal and you’ve got all the reason he’d need to believe in accountability.

• By 2016, there are going to be more than six heroes

Along with the Age of Ultron trio I’ve already mentioned, Ant-Man is going to be on the board by Captain America 3, and there are rumors of other heroes showing up toward the end of the Avengers sequel. Marvel’s Netflix shows will be underway, and even if Daredevil and company don’t figure into the movies right away, they will out there in the public eye.

It also seems as if the Civil War we see in the movies will extend beyond just one movie, meaning even more capes will arrive while it’s going on. You don’t think regular Marvel movie Earth citizens will freak out when Doctor Strange shows up and starts slinging magic around? There should be plenty of bodies to fill out both sides of the fight, each of them a potential reason for the public to be concerned.

• Someone else can easily fill in the Spider-Man role

As cool as it would be for Spidey to feature in all this, that doesn’t seem realistic. There appears to be a long way to go before Sony would agree to share him with Marvel, and having him waltz into an ongoing story and be in the center of it right away with his secret identity as a plot point wouldn’t make much sense.

But as my good friend Jim Squires of Gamezebo pointed out to me yesterday, it would be simple for Marvel to substitute someone else in that role and to be conflicted over registration. He thinks it might be Ant-Man, which is why Marvel is so determined to get that movie made despite its initial difficulties. Assuming Scott Lang’s daughter is in the picture in the MCU, he’d be a perfectly logical choice to struggle with revealing his identity before having second thoughts down the line.

Marvel could elect to skip that part of Civil War altogether, but the point is that there are ways to write around not having Spider-Man available, and they wouldn’t even be that difficult to pull off.

I’m fully prepared to be completely off-base about all of this and have Marvel surprise me. Maybe the whole Civil War thing is a big smokescreen and we’re all barking up the wrong tree. If the studio does go for it, though, it’s certainly possible to envision how it would fall into place.