A new report suggests Loki supervillain Kang the Conqueror will return several more times throughout the Marvel Cinematic Universe.Industry insider Daniel Richtman recently offered an explanation for why Kang the Conqueror is set to appear as the villain in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. He stated, "There will be different variants of Kang appearing in multiple MCU projects. That's the point."
Loki's season finale introduced Kang the Conqueror to the MCU. Played by Jonathan Majors, he was revealed as He Who Remains, the Kang variant who won a Multiversal War against his evil counterparts. To prevent another Multiversal War from ever taking place, he formed the Time Variance Authority. When confronting Loki and his female variant Sylvie, he offers them a choice to kill him or take over the TVA, reasoning that he's gotten tired of being He Who Remains. Kang is ultimately killed by Sylvie, but not before he tells her that he will see her soon, indicating the return of his evil counterparts.
Majors himself later confirmed the Kang in Loki is different from the one to appear in Ant-Man 3. "The character is different so you move a different way; my psychology has shifted because of the character. He's just a different guy," the actor clarified. "He Who Remains is not in Ant-Man. It's Kang. But the people surrounding us – the cast, my leading man, Paul Rudd – that's different. Because Paul's not Tom [Hiddleston]. This is a movie, not a TV show. I've been here since the beginning and I came in at the end on Loki."
Loki writer Michael Waldron also shed light on the different versions of Kang the Conqueror and why he introduced the character through his softer variant, He Who Remains, and not an evil counterpart. "The [Time Variance Authority] shifted to like, 'O.K., these guys are actually guarding against a multiverse,'" he explained. "And so that's when He Who Remains is just kind of an old creepy guy in the comics, and I pushed and Marvel was very receptive to it, the idea, this should be a variant of Kang."
Waldron further added, "Because I knew Kang was coming down the pipe as a villain in the MCU and it just felt too delicious to not have him intertwined in our time travel story somehow. And so then it was just been coming upon us to justify his role in this place, but Marvel was very supportive of all that."
Majors will return as Kang the Conqueror in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, arriving in theaters on Feb. 17, 2023.
Source: Twitter