Right now, two of the highest grossing movie franchises still active are the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Star Wars. Thanks to Disney buying both Marvel and Lucasfilm in 2009 and 2012, respectively, both properties live under the House of Mouse, so technically they could be brought together for an epic story. Right now there are no plans for such a crossover, but Marvel legend Stan Lee thinks that we could one day see the Avengers and Star Wars together in a movie
In an interview with The Big Issue, Lee pitched the following case for the ultimate franchise crossover:
Obviously the people who produce these [movies] are looking to be as successful as possible. If they feel that incorporating Star Wars with the Marvel characters will be very successful, they’ll find a way to do it. Can you imagine Spider-Man saying, 'May the force be with you'? It may come to that! I created the Avengers by taking many of our characters and making a team out of them. We can have as many characters join the Avengers as we want to for future movies. That might be fun, all of a sudden Luke Skywalker is an Avenger!
Stan Lee also conveyed how expensive such a movie would be, but if it was something the public would want to see, then Disney would find a way to make it happen. It’s hard to even imagine what a movie starring Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and the protagonists from a galaxy far, far away would look like, but I imagine it would resemble something like Patton Oswalt’s vision for Star Wars: Episode VII from that 2013 Parks and Recreation episode.
While Stan Lee’s comments are certainly optimistic, it’s extremely unlikely that we’ll see the Avengers and Star Wars share screen time anytime in the near future; in other words, at least a decade. Even with Phase Three concluding in 2019, Marvel still has a Phase Four planned, so their attention will be focused on that. As for Star Wars, they just kicked off their new era of movies, and while those plans are only officially scheduled until 2020, you can bet there will be more after that, be it another trilogy or more spinoffs. So dipping into Marvel would be a jarring break. However, speaking hypothetically, it would be a better fit if the Star Wars characters and the Guardians of the Galaxy were the first ones to cross paths. After all, the Guardians are spacefarers, so they’re more likely to come across a realty-bending wormhole that leads into the Star Wars universe.
If we’re ever going to see a crossover between Marvel and Star Wars, it would probably occur in the comics first. Marvel only just started republishing regular Star Wars books last year, so it may be a long time before the creative brass decides to pair all those characters together. That said, if an Avengers/Star Wars crossover were well received by fans on the printed page, maybe Disney would consider taking it to the big screen. Without a doubt, it would have to be an exceptionally great story to kick off such an event, as anything less would be disappointing to fans of either universe.
