Fortnite will host another Marvel-themed season, this time centered around Doctor Doom, joined by more superhero faces for Epic Games’ timeless battle royale.
Details for Fortnite’s next season, called Fortnite x Marvel: Absolute Doom, were announced this morning during Disney’s D23 fan event and livestreamed on Fortnite.
Marvel boss Kevin Feige was joined on stage by Star Wars legend Dave Filoni and Pixar chief Pete Doctor, who also outlined a treasure trove of Disney franchises set to get crossovers into Fortnite in the coming months as Epic Games’ integration with the House of Mouse deepens.
Fortnite x Marvel: Absolute Doom launches this Friday, August 16, and will include Marvel heroes Gwenpool, War Machine, Emma Frost, Mysterio, Shuri, and Doctor Doom in its battle pass. Two Fortnite favorites are also included with new Marvel looks: Captain Jonesy, wearing a version of Cap’s suit and wielding his shield, plus Peelverine, the latest iteration of Fortnite’s favorite banana, now dressed as Logan.
A trailer for the new season also showed off a furrier look for Fortnite’s beloved muscle cat Meowscles, seemingly inspired by Marvel’s Sabretooth, while fans at the event reportedly learned that a Fishstick variant of Deadpool, called Fishpool, is also in the works. Meanwhile, an Epic blog post says the Fantastic Four will also be added. All of these skins will likely be sold separately to the battle pass, either through the game’s item shop or Crew subscription.
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It’s been a busy 24 hours for Fortnite, which is currently wrapping up its Mad Max-inspired wasteland season. In a mini live event held in-game last night, around a million players were in-game as this season’s villain Megalo Don received his comeuppance when his powerful Nitro fuel pipeline exploded in spectacular fashion. The theory was that Doctor Doom had intervened to cause the explosion, while the aftermath also saw the return of Pandora’s Box, a menacing threat that has plagued Fortnite’s battle royale island throughout its current Chapter 5 storyline.
Perhaps more pertinent to all of last night’s announcements is Epic Games’s $1.5 billion real-world deal with Disney to integrate its Fortnite metaverse with the power of entertainment. I can’t remember the last time Disney trotted out a trio of senior executives to announce multiple skins for a video game, but such is the importance — and opportunity — of Fortnite as a part of popular culture.
Leaks suggest that the next season will add a permanent, separate Disney store to Fortnite, along with its own Item Shop, as a way to sell and track your vault of purchased Disney content. This could also perhaps be used to mark compatibility with a future Disney mode for Fortnite.
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In addition to adding the aforementioned numerous Marvel heroes, Fortnite will be expanding its character roster to include IG-88 and Moff Gideon from the hit Star Wars series The Mandalorian, as well as a new Grogu back bling, starting next week.
Fortnite’s first Pixar crossover is also coming, in keeping with the animation studio’s superheroes, with Frozone, Mr. Incredible, and Elasticgirl from The Incredibles coming this fall. Finally, classic Disney villains like Cruella de Vil, Hook, and Maleficent will also be coming this fall.
The announcement of a Doctor Doom-focused season of Fortnite is well-timed with Marvel Studios announcing that it will focus on the character, played by Robert Downey Jr., in the upcoming Avengers movie. It’s unclear how – if at all – this season will tie into that, or acknowledge that Doctor Doom was already part of Fortnite’s storyline several years ago when its first dedicated Marvel season aired. That season featured Thor, She-Hulk, Groot, Storm, Dr. Doom, Mystique, Iron Man, and Wolverine – characters that Epic Games has pointedly avoided repeating with new skins here – and it ended memorably with a spectacular major live event where Marvel heroes banded together to defeat Galactus, something that will require some patience.