The first transgender character in a Marvel movie will probably appear in a film released next year. Speaking at an event at the New York Film Academy, Marvel president Kevin Feige said that a trans superhero would appear in a film “very soon, in a movie that we’re shooting right now”. He said that more transgender characters will feature in the future.

Such a development was expected from the post-Avengers: Infinity War iteration of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with many expecting that the character will debut in Thor: Love and Thunder, released in 2021.

Fans have speculated that the only existing character who fits the bill exists in the Thor universe: Sera, who descends from a group of all-male angels but who has transitioned to a female identity.

Last summer, reports emerged that Marvel was planning to cast a transgender woman in Thor: Love and Thunder, to be filmed this year. A full cast list for the film has not yet been released, but it will be directed by Taika Waititi and see the return of series regulars Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman and Tessa Thompson.

Thompson’s character Valkyrie, who identifies as bisexual, was crowned the new king in the last Avengers film. Thompson has said her “first order of business” in Love and Thunder will be “to find her queen”.

Tessa Thompson, centre, as Valkyrie in Thor: Ragnarok, with Chris Hemsworth and Mark Ruffalo. Photograph: Walt Disney Studios

This November sees the release of The Eternals, which will introduce a new Marvel ensemble cast including Angelina Jolie, Richard Madden, Kit Harington, Kumail Nanjiani, Salma Hayek and Brian Tyree Henry.

The film, about an ancient race whose powers derive from alien experiments, will introduce Marvel movies’ first gay character. Richard Madden will play Ikaris, “a levitating immortal with teleporting and vaporising powers and abundance of cosmic energy” who also, said Feige, is “married, he’s got a family, and that is just part of who he is.”

Marvel’s first deaf superhero will feature in the same film, while its first Asian-American superhero will come in 2021, with Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.

Disney’s track record on LGBT representation came in for renewed criticism after a hotly billed same-sex relationship in the latest Star Wars film turned out to be a fleeting kiss between two women – one of whom was never introduced – in the background of a single scene.

Some fans sensed that a long-brewing connection between Oscar Isaac’s Poe and John Boyega’s Finn had been censored, with Isaac conceding that “the Disney overlords were not ready to do that”.

Avengers: Endgame and Beauty and the Beast also included gay characters but these too did not involve leading characters, and scenes were cut from versions of the film shown in some countries. A lesbian kiss in Star Wars: The Last Jedi was also edited out of showings in Singapore and Dubai.

Some activists have been angered by what they perceive as the studio paying lip service to diversity while ensuring final products can screen as widely as possible.