Why Marvel's What If Show Is Ending After Season 3

Summary

Marvel Studios’
What If…?
is expected to end after its upcoming third season.
What If…?
is one of the MCU’s most popular projects, so its cancelation is curious.
What If…?
may be ending with the rest of the MCU’s multiverse stories following
Avengers: Secret Wars
.

Marvel Studios will be bringing its animated What If…? series to an end after its upcoming third season. Set adjacent to the main timeline of the MCU, and releasing after the destruction of the Sacred Timeline in Loki season 1, What If…? provided the perfect opportunity for alternate stories to be told and variant characters to be introduced to the MCU. Two seasons of What If…? have currently released on Disney+, but despite the series’ huge popularity, What If…? season 3 is expected to be the last.

So far, What If…? has introduced the likes of Captain Carter, Doctor Strange Supreme, a Hulk-like Happy Hogan, and an MCU original hero in Kahhori, among many others. What If…? season 3’s cast will debut even more unusual variants, and has already been confirmed to be putting twists on stories involving Sam Wilson’s Captain America, Monica Rambeau, Bucky Barnes’ Winter Soldier, and the Red Guardian. However, it seems season 3 will be the series’ final chapter, causing some confusion about why What If…? is ending so soon.

10 Marvel Comics What If Storylines The MCU Needs To Adapt In What If…? Season 3

Marvel Comics’ What If series has explored many alternate storylines that may be perfect to adapt into the MCU’s animated What If…? for season 3.

Marvel’s What If…? May Have Always Been Planned As Three Seasons

Even though Marvel Studios hasn’t confirmed that What If…? season 3 will be the last, comments from Head of Streaming Brad Winderbaum seem to suggest that this may be the case. Speaking on The Official Marvel Podcast in July 2024, Winderbaum noted that season 3 “feels like the completion of a trilogy,” and he also suggested that the upcoming season would lead to an “extremely moving and fulfilling culmination for the Watcher.” While this raises anticipation for what stories could be told in season 3, the prospect of What If…? ending so soon is unexpected.

Feels like the completion of a trilogy. It goes beyond the first two seasons in its exploration of the multiverse, and it pulls in characters that are very unexpected, and has what I think is an extremely moving and fulfilling culmination for the Watcher.

Brad Winderbaum’s suggestion that What If…? season 3 is the final chapter in a trilogy suggests that Marvel Studios may have always been planning for the series to end after three seasons. This is already setting records for Marvel Studios, as What If…? will become the only Disney+ series related to the MCU to include three seasons. Nevertheless, it seems as though there is much more of the multiverse that hasn’t yet been explored, so What If…? could easily continue, but there may be another reason the series will be ending.

The MCU’s Multiverse Saga Ending May Explain What If…?’s Cancelation

The biggest event that would contribute to What If…?’s cancelation would be the ending of the MCU’s Multiverse Saga itself. Speculation has suggested that Avengers: Secret Wars could feature the destruction of the multiverse and the establishment of a new primary timeline for the MCU’s future. This would make it impossible for What If…? to continue to explore alternate realities and variant characters, meaning the series may come to a natural end just in time for the MCU’s live-action projects to shake up the franchise.

When Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige first announced Avengers: Secret Wars in 2022, the Multiverse Saga’s final project was scheduled for release in November 2025. Since then, there have been several major delays, most prominently during 2023’s WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, which means Secret Wars is now intended to release in 2027. It’s possible that What If…? season 3 was always intended to release shortly before Secret Wars destroys the multiverse in November 2025, which means its three-season run makes perfect sense.

Avengers: Secret Wars
has been heavily rumored to end with a soft-reboot of the MCU, which could perhaps bring multiversal characters from
What If…?
and live-action stories into the MCU’s new primary continuity.

How What If…? Season 4 Could Still Happen

The Watcher showing Captain Carter Yggdrasil in What If...?

Avengers: Secret Wars
may not actually destroy the multiverse, even if Marvel Studios chooses not to explore the concept as regularly.

Since production delays have pushed Avengers: Secret Wars to its current release date of May 7, 2027, it’s possible Marvel Animation could develop another season of What If…? to fill the gap. This would allow the series to perhaps fulfill its original purpose of exploring the multiverse before Secret Wars destroys it, and could even allow the roster of Secret Wars itself to expand, should characters who debuted in animation make the move to live-action. This would perhaps mean What If…? season 4 could premiere in 2026 or 2027.

It’s also possible that Avengers: Secret Wars may not actually destroy the multiverse, even if Marvel Studios chooses not to explore the concept as regularly in the MCU’s Phase 7 and beyond. This means that What If…? could continue after Secret Wars, acting as a way for the MCU to explore the multiverse while Marvel Studios’ live-action projects deal with adventures in the same continuity. What If…? could continue as an animated series, or could even be converted into live-action to expand the multiverse further, meaning the series doesn’t actually need to end after season 3.