After four years of drought, the MCU will finally make its return to China as Marvel has confirmed through their Weibo account that Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania have both secured theatrical release dates in the Middle Kingdom next month according to Deadline.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which was originally released in the United States and other parts of the world back in November 2022, has secured a February 7 release date in China while Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania will arrive on February 17, the same day as the North America release.
This marks the first time that an MCU movie will get a Chinese theatrical release since Avengers: Endgame and Spider-Man: Far from Home back in 2019.
Before Wakanda Forever, none of the MCU films in Phase Four were able to secure a China release such as Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and Eternals, both due to past remarks regarding the country by their star and director, respectively. The reason for the absence of the other films was unknown.
This is certainly exciting in terms of the films' box office performances since a release in China could help them gain a boost in their numbers and MCU fans in the Middle Kingdom can also finally experience the franchise again on the big screen after a few years of absence.
The respective Chinese releases of the first Black Panther film and Ant-Man and the Wasp back in 2018 helped a lot at their box office since they were able to earn $105 million and $121 million respectively from the country alone. It could potentially be the same case for the upcoming films.
It would be interesting if this actually marks the "unbanning" of MCU movies in China and whether we will see the other upcoming films secure a release in the country as well which is something that Marvel and Disney need for bigger box office results.
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