Why Disney+'s Falcon And The Winter Soldier Has Fewer Episodes Than WandaVision

With WandaVision's first and likely only season of TV now over, all eyes are on the upcoming debut of Falcon and the Winter Soldier on Disney+, which stars Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan, reprising the roles they have played elsewhere in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Interestingly, though, Falcon and Winter Soldier is only six episodes long, compared to WandaVision's nine installments.

According to Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige, however, there's a reason for that. Appearing at the TCA winter press tour, Feige addressed the season lengths of all of the upcoming MCU shows.

"Six hours is what we've sort of landed on as, the best way to tell our stories," he explained. "Six hours, whether it's six episodes as it is in the case of Falcon and the Winter Soldier, nine shorter episodes as it is with WandaVision, is just what we landed on early."

Of course, money also plays an issue. After all, while standard network shows can have as many as 24 episodes in a single season and many streaming series release 10 or more episodes at a time, they likely don't cost as much as a Marvel Cinematic Universe project. "The shows are not inexpensive, so [the] per episode cost is very high," he said. So six [episodes] felt like the appropriate number."

Feige also revealed why Marvel Studios chose to team the two up for a show. "Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan are spectacular actors that we felt like we hadn't explored their stories or their backstories or their personal stories enough, as Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes," he said. "So it was always the thought that we wanted to learn more about both of them and in the little interactions they had with each other in the [Captain America:] Winter Soldier and [Captain America:] Civil War--from the dailies of Civil War seeing, them interact with each other as friends of a mutual best friend in Captain America--it was a very fun dynamic and we thought if we ever had that opportunity, you know, we've watched a whole show with the two of them and Disney plus finally gives us that opportunity."

Falcon and the Winter Soldier premieres on March 19 on Disney+. It will be followed by the premiere of Loki on June 11.