{"id":147884,"date":"2025-08-25T12:32:18","date_gmt":"2025-08-25T12:32:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/25\/kumail-nanjiani-thought-eternals-would-set-up-a-10-year-mcu-plan\/"},"modified":"2025-08-25T12:50:59","modified_gmt":"2025-08-25T12:50:59","slug":"kumail-nanjiani-thought-eternals-would-arrange-a-10-year-mcu-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/25\/kumail-nanjiani-thought-eternals-would-arrange-a-10-year-mcu-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"So You Thought Joining the MCU Was a Guaranteed Win? Think Again\u2014Just Ask Kumail Nanjiani."},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
\n

\n

When you sign up for a Marvel movie, you probably expect your career to blow up like a superhero\u2019s origin story\u2014red carpets, fan conventions, maybe even your own action figure. But for Kumail Nanjiani, who played Kingo in\u00a0Eternals<\/em>, things didn\u2019t exactly go as planned.<\/p>\n

In a recent episode of the\u00a0Working It Out<\/em>\u00a0podcast, Nanjiani got real about how the film\u2019s reception hit him hard\u2014like,\u00a0really<\/em>\u00a0hard9<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the deal:<\/p>\n

\u00a0He Signed Up for the Long Haul<\/strong>
\nNanjiani thought he\u2019d struck gold. He inked deals for\u00a0six movies<\/strong>, a\u00a0video game<\/strong>, and even a\u00a0theme park ride<\/strong>9<\/span>. He pictured the next decade of his life filled with red-carpet premieres and Marvel paychecks. In his words:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI was like, \u2018This is going to be my job for the next ten years\u2026 I\u2019ll be doing Marvel movies every year, and in between, I\u2019ll do my own little things.\u2019\u201d<\/em>9<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Then Reality Hit<\/strong>
\nEternals<\/em>\u00a0premiered in 2021 to mixed\u2014leaning negative\u2014reviews. It scored a\u00a047% on Rotten Tomatoes<\/strong>\u00a0(the lowest for an MCU film at the time) and made\u00a0$402 million worldwide<\/strong>\u2014decent for a pandemic release but underwhelming by Marvel standards3<\/span>9<\/span>. For context,\u00a0Shang-Chi<\/em>\u00a0made $432 million around the same time, and\u00a0Spider-Man: No Way Home<\/em>\u00a0crushed with $1.9 billion3<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Nanjiani was devastated:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cIt came out, it got really bad reviews, and it didn\u2019t do that well. It shattered me too much. That was when I was like, \u2018Oh, I need to go to therapy to figure this out.\u2019\u201d<\/em>9<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0Why Did\u00a0Eternals<\/em>\u00a0Struggle?<\/strong>
\nThe film had a lot going against it:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • \n

    Pacing Issues<\/strong>: At 2.5 hours, it felt long and dragged in parts5<\/span>9<\/span>.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    Too Many Characters<\/strong>: Introducing 10 new heroes (plus Deviants plus Celestials) was a lot to digest9<\/span>.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    Marvel Fatigue<\/strong>: By 2021, audiences had already seen\u00a0WandaVision<\/em>,\u00a0Loki<\/em>,\u00a0Black Widow<\/em>, and\u00a0Shang-Chi<\/em>\u2014all in the same year3<\/span>.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • \n

    High Expectations<\/strong>: Directed by Oscar-winner Chlo\u00e9 Zhao (Nomadland<\/em>), critics expected something deeper than a standard superhero flick5<\/span>.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    But hey, it wasn\u2019t all bad! Some viewers loved its ambition, diversity, and cosmic scale5<\/span>. And let\u2019s be real\u2014any movie where Angelina Jolie wears gold armor and fights space monsters can\u2019t be\u00a0all<\/em>\u00a0wrong.<\/p>\n

    \u00a0What\u2019s Next for Nanjiani?<\/strong>
    \nDespite the\u00a0Eternals<\/em>\u00a0setback, he\u2019s kept busy. He voiced a duck in\u00a0Migration<\/em>, joined the\u00a0Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire<\/em>\u00a0cast, and has projects lined up with directors like James L. Brooks and Andy Serkis9<\/span>.<\/p>\n

    Still, the \u201ctrauma\u201d of\u00a0Eternals<\/em>\u00a0lingers9<\/span>. Maybe Marvel will eventually revisit the characters (that half-born Celestial is still sticking out of the ocean, after all)9<\/span>. But for now, Nanjiani\u2019s MCU future looks uncertain.<\/p>\n

    \u00a0Over to You<\/strong>
    \nWhat did you think of\u00a0Eternals<\/em>? Was it underrated? Overhyped? And should Marvel give these characters another shot? Let us know!<\/p>\n

    For more deep dives into MCU drama, stay tuned.<\/em>\u00a0\ud83c\udf7f<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n
    \n
    <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
    <\/div>\n<\/div>\n
    \n
    \n
    \n
    <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    When you sign up for a Marvel movie, you probably expect your career to blow up like a superhero\u2019s origin story\u2014red carpets, fan conventions, maybe even your own action figure. But for Kumail Nanjiani, who played Kingo in\u00a0Eternals, things didn\u2019t exactly go as planned. In a recent episode of the\u00a0Working It Out\u00a0podcast, Nanjiani got real […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":147886,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[8947,12769,12770],"class_list":{"0":"post-147884","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-hollywood","8":"tag-eternals","9":"tag-kumail","10":"tag-nanjiani"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/showbizztoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}