I dunno. Someone’s saying so.

That would be Badass Digest, who I guess has a little more credibility than the gazillion other fanboy sites claiming to have “sources” telling them this and that every other day, 99% of which never happen, and frankly, were likely made up for traffic and we, like the other gazillion websites, fell for them hook, line, and sinker cause, well, we’re suckers.

Anyways. Here’s BD with their own maybe/maybe not/someone told them scoop:

Marvel isn’t spltting Avengers 3 into two movies, but they are planning Avengers 3 as the springboard to… something else. And they’re going to use their biggest characters in that something else, keeping them out of Avengers 3.

Imagine an Avengers 3 without Thor or Captain America, maybe without Black Widow. It’s a movie where the secondary characters from the MCU get to stand up and prove their worth, possibly even setting up their own spin-offs. With Guardians Marvel has shown that their brand is the star, and by the time we get to A3 clearly people will be on board with the entire universe. Keep Iron Man – Robert Downey Jr’s renegotiated contract seems to specify Avengers 3 as his next film – and you have a new launching pad for characters to take over from the current big guns.

Storywise this is all easy to do – Cap will be very busy with the fallout of Captain America 3, and I wouldn’t be shocked to see Steve Rogers give up the shield at the end of that movie. Thor 3 is going to wrap up all the Asgardian drama, and could very well end with Thor forced to sit on his father’s throne. Black Widow is easy to write out on another adventure. Hulk… well, Hulk’s planet of residence could well be up in the air by 2018 or so.

Basically, they’re saying that because all the actors playing Avengers are wrapping up their currently contracts with Marvel, and since re-signing them would probably cost Marvel more money than the notoriously frugal studio (at least when it comes to star paychecks) is willing to part, it makes sense for the line-up to be revamped.

I do like the idea of keeping Robert Downey Jr. ala Iron Man around as the bridge between the two rosters, though. It would be cheaper to just pay RDJ a ridiculous salary and make up for it with the chump change they’ll be throwing at the other young/new stars.

And really, after two “Avengers” movies, it might be a good idea to rework the roster. How many times can Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, and the Hulk get together to save the world before it gets a little tedious, after all? It works for the comics, of course, but this ain’t the comics.