2019 will bring "The End" of several major Hollywood franchises... if you believe the marketing. Next year's film slate is a massive one that features many of the biggest franchises delivering tentpole blockbusters, including Marvel Studios, Star Wars, and even James Bond. Not just regular entries, though, these all are promising endings in one form or another, but it's simply untrue that any of these movies are really "The End" of their franchises.

The year 2019 itself could be one of the culprits for this glut of fatalistic movie marketing. It's the last year of a tumultuous decade (but a record-setting one for Hollywood) and it's natural to want to signal some sort of conclusion, especially for long-running film series on the cusp of change. "Change" is really the keyword here. Each one of the blockbusters hyping up the end of their wildly successful series is merely paying lip service to the idea that a culmination is coming. While some sort of conclusion indeed will be the case in some fashion for each franchise, the series themselves are blatantly set to continue in a new or different way.

Related: The Winners and Losers of Summer 2018's Box Office

One thing that's been evident in our current age of shared universes, reboots, and never-ending film series is that, to quote one of the last lines of Zack Snyder's Watchmen (which is about to be reimagined as an HBO TV series little over a decade after it was in theaters), "Nothing ever ends." Nor is marketing "The End" necessarily a bad idea, it's simply a tactic that's a little disingenuous. With this in mind, let's look at 2019's blockbuster movies promising that The End is coming for their franchise, even though we all know better.

Avengers 4 Is The End Of The MCU... Until It Isn't

Just earlier this year, Avengers: Infinity War hyped itself as the end of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as we know it, but even with the universal death caused by Thanos, it didn't provide conclusion as much as it set up the inevitable Avengers 4, as well as the prequel and origin story of Captain Marvel, both due in 2019. Now, Avengers 4 is being established as the end, and it could be, in a way, since some of the longest-serving actors in the MCU are expected to leave the franchise (though a complete departure may also not hold for some actors; for instance, Scarlett Johansson will likely star in a Black Widow prequel film even if Natasha Romanoff's present story ends in her death). So, yes, Avengers 4 does mark the conclusion of Phase 3 and the 22-cycle film series of the MCU so far.

But it also sets up a new future. Obviously, there'll be more movies, but they're going to still be connected to the story we've just finished. Avengers 4 will undoubtedly undo the deaths Thanos caused in Infinity War, bringing back full roster of heroes to immediately open the door for Phase 4. Indeed, next up are movies linked to pre-existing heroes: Spider-Man: Far From Home, the web-slinger's sequel, is the only officially dated MCU film post-Avengers 4 but Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is inevitable, James Gunn rehiring or no.

The secrecy of their upcoming film slate is a different tack for Marvel Studios, which had been known for announcing movies many years in advance. However, just because they are hush about what's coming next doesn't mean Marvel doesn't have lots of movies in development (in addition to those discussed, there's expected to be The Eternals, and very likely Avengers 5). The MCU may look a bit different, but it's definitely not over.

Related: Everything We Know About MCU Phase 4

Hyping up "endings" is nothing new for Marvel. The Avengers was the culmination of Phase 1 back in 2012, Captain America: Civil War was the end of the Avengers as they had been, and Avengers: Infinity War was repeatedly sold as a "culmination". These are all transient payoffs. Of course, fans don't really mind because Marvel's movies are beloved, critically-acclaimed box office smashes. Audiences happily play along with Marvel because no matter what, they deliver solid stories featuring characters audiences have come to love.

Star Wars 9 Is The End... From A Certain Point Of View

Disney's other golden goose is Star Wars. Despite the sting of Solo: A Star Wars Story's disappointing box office performance and the ongoing backlash from Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Lucasfilm has an ace in the hole for Star Wars 9: per the casting announcement, it's the "final installment" in the Skywalker saga, which has been the primary focus of the movie franchise since 1977. No doubt this will be a key hook throughout the marketing, with the studio no doubt declaring "Every Saga Has An End". It's pop culture history.

Of course, however Episode IX concludes the Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker/Kylo Ren family circle (likely with the last appearances of Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher), it by no means marks the end of Star Wars itself. Quite the opposite, in fact. The Skywalker saga is now only one branch of Star Wars; when that's over, the franchise will begin diversifying across multiple announced film and television projects. Rian Johnson was given his own new film trilogy to oversee, as were David Benioff and Dan Weiss, the creators of Game of Thrones, so that's two new Star Wars movie series in the works, not counting any future spinoffs, like the rumored Boba Fett film to be directed by Logan's James Mangold and the ever-wished-for Obi-Wan Kenobi film that would hopefully star Ewan MacGregor. In addition, Episode IX may not even be the end of the current trilogy's heroes Rey, Finn, and Poe Dameron; Lucasfilm has talked of "plans" for those characters to continue in some form after Star Wars 9. Star Wars will not only be alive and well at the movies in the 2020s but also on television, with Star Wars: The Clone Wars set to return and the new live-action series by Jon Favreau also in the works.

As with Marvel, there's precedent for this. In fact, the Star Wars franchise helped pioneer movie trilogies and their endings; Return of the Jedi concluded the first trilogy in 1983 and Revenge of the Sith did the same for the prequel trilogy (and then-six-movie saga) in 2005. Episode IX may be the end of the current trilogy and of the nine-film Skywalker saga, but what it really marks is the beginning of a new kind of cross-pollination of Star Wars that fans have never quite seen before. At this point, Star Wars will probably never really end.

Page 2: "The End" of Bond and X-Men... For Now

James Bond Daniel Craig

Bond 25 Is The End... Of A Character Fans Are Already Recasting

Bond 25 will likely be the final time Daniel Craig appears as 007, and this could very well become a focal point of the marketing of the yet-untitled film directed by Danny Boyle. Craig reinvigorated James Bond starting with Casino Royale in 2006 and took the venerable spy franchise to new heights with Skyfall in 2012. Even Spectre, which was considered a disappointment compared to its $1-billion-grossing predecessor, made significant bank by earning $880-million globally. Daniel Craig finally retiring his tuxedo is a major event... if Bond 25 really is his last (after all, Craig has threatened to quit before and then returned). Even if it is, though, everybody knows it's really only the end of a chapter.

Like the question of who should play Batman, fan casting James Bond is a game that never seems to end. Every Bond fan has an opinion on who would best fit his tuxedo. Indeed, Craig himself was a controversial pick for the role a decade-and-a-half ago, but with his retirement on the horizon, fans choosing the next James Bond has commenced in earnest (just ask Idris Elba, among many others, about the rumors that they'll play Bond next).

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James Bond has changed actors a half-dozen times since Sean Connery pioneered the role in 1962 (Connery even left and came back), yet never really had an ending to his saga. Some argue Pierce Brosnan's Die Another Day in 2002 wound up finishing the uninterrupted series of films where every actor - Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore, and Timothy Dalton - was playing the same character, but that doesn't delineate Craig or any successors from the legacy. Similarly, the ending of Daniel Craig's wildly successful tenure by no means results in the end of James Bond. Like it says at the end of every 007 film's credits, "James Bond Will Return".

Fox's X-Men Is Ending... But Marvel Is Going To Reboot

Dark Phoenix and New Mutants

X-Men: Dark Phoenix finds itself in a bizarre position as a lame duck tentpole. It's the seventh X-Men team movie, the fourth since the soft reboot of X-Men: First Class in 2011 introduced a younger cast of mutants, and the second attempt at filming "The Dark Phoenix Saga" comics story. Most importantly, it's the last movie about the core X-Men team made by Fox, which sold its film and TV properties to Disney, with the only other set movie being Josh Boone's New Mutants. Regardless of what happens in these movies, nothing more will follow with this cast of X-Men. Their story is over.

It's unlikely X-Men: Dark Phoenix will market itself as "The End" of the X-Men, but it is indeed the final bow of the saga as it's been since director Bryan Singer made X-Men back in 2000. Already, Hugh Jackman ended his incredibly popular tenure as Wolverine with 2017's Logan, so X-Men fans have already grown accustomed to witnessing conclusions.

After Dark Phoenix and New Mutants, Marvel Studios takes the reins of X-Men, bringing them into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That will entail a full reboot, with new actors taking over the roles of Wolverine, Magneto, Jean Grey, Storm, etc. and new histories specific to the MCU to follow suit, but it's still a continuation in some form - not that it makes the final Fox entries any less the end of an era.

Related: Don't Believe Those X-Men: Dark Phoenix/New Mutants Cancelation Rumors

Other 2019 Films That Are The End... But Really Aren't

These aren't the only 2019 purportedly delivering endings to their franchises, if not as blatantly. Toy Story 4, How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, and even M. Night Shyamalan's Glass are all culmination films for their respective sagas in one way or another. However, there's no guarantee that will stay: Toy Story 3 already ended the saga and that spawned a series of Toy Story Toons and television specials before a fourth entry; meanwhile, How To Train Your Dragon has also expanded into short films and a TV series called DreamWorks Dragons.

As for Glass, it may mark the collision of the Unbreakable and Split characters into one shared universe, but Shyamalan has not indicated that it's the definitive ending of David Dunn, Kevin Crumb, and Mr. Glass by any means. If Glass is as successful as its predecessors, inevitably more stories about those characters will follow.

Finally, there is producer James Cameron and director Tim Miller's Terminator 6, which sees the return of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton to the franchise they launched in 1984. Terminator is no stranger to endings; each attempt to restart the robot franchise since Terminator 2 in 1991 has inadvertently turned out to be an ending, with audiences rejecting the films and the next reboot ignores the previous attempt. Terminator 6 itself is ignoring Terminator 3, Terminator: Salvation, and Terminator: Genisys while hoping to successfully recharge the franchise at last. But if audiences also dismiss T6, the fate Terminator makes for itself would be yet another ending.

Next: The Highest-Grossing Movies of 2018 (So Far)

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