New AVENGERS: DOOMSDAY Leaked Photos Appear to Confirm Some Massive Rumors
Trying to figure out whether a Marvel leak is real has basically become its own internet detective game. AI-generated images have made it ridiculously easy to create convincing fakes, but lately, some of the photos fans wrote off as bogus have turned out to be the real deal.
That now appears to be the case with another batch of leaked images from Avengers: Doomsday, and these are pretty damn interesting. The photos feature Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, and, most surprisingly, Tobey Maguire back as Spider-Man.
There’s been good reason to be skeptical. Images from Spider-Man: Brand New Day showing Jean Grey alongside The Punisher and Tombstone fighting Spider-Man were initially dismissed as fakes before being confirmed as legitimate.
The same thing happened with Avengers: Doomsday. Late last year, a large collection of character portraits surfaced online and was quickly labeled fake. Since then, footage from the movie and the D23 Special Look have confirmed that material was genuine, including leaked footage showing the Multiverse's heroes coming together to fight Doctor Doom's Sentinels.
Now we have another piece of that puzzle. The newly surfaced Avengers: Doomsday photos not only shows Deadpool, but another image captures Wolverine fighting Maguire's Spider-Man.
Maguire can be seen wearing a motion-capture suit during the confrontation, while Jackman doesn't have Wolverine's mask on during filming, suggesting that part of the costume will be added digitally in post-production.
What makes this especially interesting is that versions of these images have actually been floating around for months. The problem was that they were low-resolution and had been enhanced using AI, which made them look even more suspicious. With so much fake material floating around, fans had plenty of reason to dismiss them.
But the images are reportedly legitimate, with trusted industry insiders also backing their authenticity. That potentially gives us a major clue about how Avengers: Doomsday begins.
The movie is believed to open with an Incursion involving Earth-10005, the universe associated with the X-Men, and the reality inhabited by Maguire's Peter Parker. If that's accurate, Wolverine fighting Spider-Man could be part of the chaos surrounding those two worlds colliding.
According to plot leaks, the X-Men have created a device capable of destroying other worlds that are on a collision course with their own.
Comic book fans will recognize the idea as being similar to what the Illuminati faced in Jonathan Hickman's New Avengers, where the Incursions forced Earth's heroes into some brutal decisions about how far they were willing to go to save their universe.
Deadpool reportedly manages to escape the destruction, while Wolverine and Spider-Man are believed to die during the Incursion.
It would be pretty wild to bring Jackman's Wolverine and Maguire's Spider-Man into a massive Multiverse Avengers movie only to permanently wipe them out near the beginning.
With Doomsday bringing together characters from across Marvel's cinematic history, it's easy to imagine both heroes finding their way back into the action for the eventual showdown.
Of course, the exact circumstances surrounding these leaked photos and the rumored Incursion plot should still be treated cautiously until Marvel officially reveals more. The images may be legitimate, but that doesn't automatically confirm every plot detail connected to them.
Still, Wolverine throwing down with Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man while Deadpool gets caught in the middle of a collapsing Multiverse sounds exactly like the kind of comic book insanity this movie should be playing with.
Avengers: Doomsday arrives in theaters on December 18.