If you were hoping to see Wolverine, Cyclops, Jean Grey, or the rest of the X-Men in the Marvel Cinematic Universe any time soon, you're out of luck. Even though the live-action rights for all off mutantkind now reside at The Walt Disney Company and Marvel Studios, studio boss Kevin Feige insists that characters won't be appearing in the shared cinematic universe for "a very long time." Speaking with io9 at a recent Avengers: Endgame press event, the studio exec dashed any hope of the characters appearing any time soon.

“It’ll be a while. It’s all just beginning and the five-year plan that we’ve been working on, we were working on before any of that was set,” Feige says about the characters join the shared entertainment universe. "So really it’s much more, for us, less about specifics of when and where [the X-Men will appear] right now and more just the comfort factor and how nice it is that they’re home. That they’re all back. But it will be a very long time.”

As expected, Feige and company methodically plan movies years out and weave a complex series of interconnecting films and tales. By the time the Disney and Fox deal finally closed last month, Marvel Studios had already had the majority of their "Phase 4" planned prior to their ability to use the characters acquired in the merger. In addition to the hundreds of X-Men characters the Burbank-based studio regained control of, Marvel Studios also now owns the film and television rights those under the Fantastic Four umbrella, including Marvel's First Family and iconic villains such as Dr. Doom, Galactus, and Annihilus.

With two X-Men franchise titles leftover from the Fox days yet to be released, Marvel Studios would likely choose to tap into the Fantastic Four library first, with a character like Galactus being a prime candidate for the next Thanos-level buildup over the course of a decade.

Captain Marvel is now in theaters. Other upcoming Marvel Studios films include Avengers: Endgame on April 26th and Spider-Man: Far From Home on July 5th.

When do you think the X-Men and Fantastic Four will join the Marvel Cinematic Universe? How do you think they'll be introduced? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below or join the conversation on Twitter by hitting me up at @AdamBarnhardt!

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