Now we’re in this very strange place where the “Young Avengers” are no longer particularly young. Hailee Steinfeld is 29, pushing 30, and has just announced she’s pregnant. Iman Vellani is growing into her career. Kathryn Newton isn’t exactly a teenager anymore. Even the concept of them being the scrappy younger generation starts to wobble when they look about the same age as the original Avengers roster.
This isn’t about shaming actors for aging, that’s just how humans work. The real issue is Marvel’s pacing. They introduced an entire generation of successors and then… did nothing with them. Years passed. Phases changed. Multiverses opened and collapsed. Kang came and went. And the kids just stood there, waiting patiently off-screen for their moment that never arrived.
Now Marvel is stuck. If they make the Young Avengers movie they clearly intended, they’ll be asking the audience to accept a team of “young” heroes who look, feel, and sound like people who have LinkedIn profiles and lower back pain. If they reboot and introduce brand-new, actually young characters, everyone is going to ask the obvious question: what was the point of all that setup?
But here’s the thing. There is a version of this movie that could work. And honestly, it might be the most relatable superhero story Marvel could tell right now.
What if the Young Avengers movie is about being too old to be the Young Avengers?
Not in a jokey way, but in a painfully real one. A group of people who were told they were the future, trained for it, prepared for it, waited for the call… and then watched the world move on without them. Kate Bishop isn’t the new Hawkeye, she’s just someone who almost was. Kamala isn’t the fresh face, she’s competing for relevance in an overcrowded universe. Cassie Lang grew up expecting a legacy that never quite materialized.
Instead of getting their moment in the spotlight, they watch from the bleachers as a group of has-been failures are crowned “The New Avengers”. It's devastating.
That feeling, being promised a future that never arrives, is deeply familiar to an entire generation. Being young enough to still be called “up and coming,” but old enough to feel like you missed your window. Feeling like you’re running out of time before you even got a real shot to prove yourself.
That’s not a failure of the concept. That’s the concept.
If Marvel has the courage to lean into that, to make a movie about a team that was supposed to be next but got stuck in the waiting room of history, they might accidentally make something honest. Something that actually reflects how young people feel right now. Not bright-eyed rookies anymore, not established legends either, just people caught in between, wondering when life was supposed to start.
Ironically, that might be the only way to finally make the Young Avengers movie feel young.
