Kang the Conqueror, Defined: Every thing We Know After Ant-Man & The Wasp Quantumania

Whereas the MCU began firing up the multiverse saga all the way in which again throughout Avengers: Endgame, Marvel has barely touched on the person who was really at the least not directly accountable for every thing that occurred not simply throughout Season 1 of Loki, but additionally WandaVision, Spider-Man: No Approach House, Physician Unusual within the Multiverse of Insanity, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, and Eternals.

I am speaking about Kang the Conqueror, launched in Loki Season 1, the inadvertent architect of the previous a number of years of MCU tales and the brand new huge unhealthy that our heroes must cope with for a number of extra.

Warning! This text incorporates main spoilers for Ant-Man & the Wasp: Quantumania and different latest entries within the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Thanos could also be a troublesome act for any cosmic villain to comply with, however Kang the Conqueror is greater than outfitted to take action. This man’s very existence is actually not possible for us mortals to grasp as a result of he is so outdated that he is transcended time. And there are so, so a lot of him.

That is in stark distinction with Thanos, who was just about only a actually robust boss alien who punched individuals who opposed him, and who killed half of all life in our universe utilizing the Infinity Stones. Kang is trillions of years outdated and has really destroyed numerous total universes utilizing his personal expertise that he each invented and constructed himself. And, once more, there are numerous him. This can be a complete new degree of drawback, and it’ll require loads of rationalization.

The place Kang the Conqueror started

On the finish of Loki Season 1, we met a personality performed by Jonathan Majors who was known as He Who Stays. This was not Kang, however slightly a person named Nathaniel Richards–yes, he is a descendant of Reed Richards of the Implausible 4. He instructed Loki and Sylvie that he was a scientist from the thirty first Century who found the multiverse and shortly met alternate variations of himself from different realities. Numerous these different hims have been good–many others weren’t. Warfare occurred, and He Who Stays ended it, killing each different model of himself and stabilizing his world with a single timeline that he maintained utilizing the Time Variance Authority.

He supplied Loki and Sylvie the selection to kill him and discover out if this path is really one of the best course or if they’ll discover one thing higher. Sylvie, not appreciating having to spend her complete life in distress to organize for this second, took him up on the provide. He Who Stays is gone, and a unique model of Nathaniel Richards, the one generally known as Kang the Conqueror, now controls the multiverse. And whereas he did not particularly orchestrate the occasions of these films and reveals I discussed above, every thing that has occurred within the MCU since Endgame has occurred as a result of Kang is the one in cost as an alternative of He Who Stays.

I do know what you are pondering: “In Ant-Man & the Wasp: Quantumania, there have been numerous Kangs, not only one!” Maintain that thought. It will make extra sense in a second.

How the multiverse works

The concept behind the multiverse is that it represents each potential factor that would occur in any given scenario. So, for instance, if any individual asks you to marry them, the multiverse would have a universe the place you say sure, and a universe the place you say no, and likewise a universe the place you hesitate and might’t make up your thoughts. It is a naturally occurring phenomenon.

He Who Stays created the TVA to forestall these branches from creating new variations of himself that will wreck every thing. So long as there was just one Nathaniel Richards on the market, and so long as that one isn’t one of many unhealthy ones, actuality may stay steady and all these chaotic multiverse issues which have been taking place wouldn’t be potential.

Now, whereas all proof factors to there nonetheless solely being one Nathaniel Richards, he is not one of many good ones.

Kang the Conqueror is the polar reverse of He Who Stays

In our present, post-Loki scenario within the MCU, that complete multiversal battle talked about by He Who Stays would have nonetheless occurred. However this time, Kang was the model of Nathaniel Richards who received and stood atop the multiverse with the flexibility to bend it to his will. However as an alternative of stability, he introduced solely chaos. As a substitute of stabilizing the timeline, he interfered in his personal previous and future numerous occasions.

This spawned a brand new multiverse not based mostly on naturally occurring potentialities, however slightly spawned by his countless time journey shenanigans. He should nonetheless be utilizing the TVA to maintain these naturally occurring branches in line, though–why else preserve the TVA round after He Who Stays was eradicated? Contemplating he is obtained large statues of himself up at HQ, as seen within the Loki season 1 finale, it is in all probability secure to imagine this Kang is extra fascinated with utilizing the TVA to take care of his personal energy than to avoid wasting the multiverse.

So why are there so many Kangs?

He Who Stays, by his personal account, had “lived one million lifetimes,” and he meant that actually, not within the sense that there have been hundreds of thousands of alternate variations of him all through the multiverse. This man was outdated. Older than the universe, in all probability, since he wasn’t constrained by time.

Kang is equally outdated, and he is continually doing time journey, and at totally different time limits he is held totally different identities. And these totally different variations of him from totally different time limits know one another, and every time they meet and work together, these people develop into distinct from one another and separate universes are shaped. And that is how the numerous variants of Kang, and the present multiverse, are born.

By the point we get to Ant-Man & the Wasp: Quantumania, there are literally thousands of them who’re in a bunch generally known as the Council of Kangs. It is this group that “banished” the Quantumania Kang to the Quantum Realm. We see these guys within the mid-credits scene, with one specifically, Implausible 4 nemesis Rama-Tut, seemingly taking cost as they’re about to attempt to determine what to do in regards to the obvious loss of life of one in all them. No matter it’s, it will not be good, as a result of they’re fairly upset that anyone was even capable of kill a Kang. However you possibly can wager the Implausible 4 can have their say in it now that Marvel is teasing Rama-Tut.

Not all of those Kangs shall be villains, although. There’s one within the comics, a teenaged model of Kang generally known as the Iron Lad, who actually does not just like the type of stuff Kang is into, and he results in the Younger Avengers. Count on to satisfy a few of these good ones within the subsequent couple years. And probably as quickly as Loki season 2.

The following season of Loki is teased within the post-credits scene, which reveals Loki and Owen Wilson’s Mr. Mobius watching a snake oil sort presentation within the Outdated West introduced by a Kang variant named Victor Well timed. This is perhaps the identical Kang from Quantumania–in the comics, Kang retreats to the flip of the twentieth Century and adopts the Victor Well timed alias after an enormous defeat. However, the Council of Kangs apparently consider that the Quantum Realm’s Kang is useless. Whereas I am certain it is potential that they are improper, they do not appear to be the kind of people that would make assumptions about whether or not one in all their very own is alive or useless. They’re scientists, in spite of everything.

Sadly, the comics are virtually by no means useful when making an attempt to determine what’s going to occur subsequent within the MCU, as a result of the MCU is extra impressed by the comics than actually tailored from them–they take the fundamental premises after which go in their very own route with them. So whereas it is exhausting to guess particular occasions, you could be certain of two issues: Extra Kangs are coming, and the Implausible 4 will not be far behind.

GameSpot has all of the Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania protection that any fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe may wish, together with a spoiler-free overview and a breakdown of the post-credits scenes and what they imply for the Implausible 4’s future within the MCU.