Posted on Aug 15, 2018 Updated on May 18, 2023, 8:37 am CDT
More than 10 years ago, the Marvel Cinematic Universe as we know it launched, creating a shared and interlinked canon complete with distinct Marvel phases, tie-ins, and epic team-ups.
Marvel phases are a way of grouping several MCU movies together. They may accomplish similar things or may all be a response to events from a previous film. It’s part of the design, Marvel Studios’ way of referencing several films at once. The first three phases (Phases 1-3) are known as the Infinity Saga, which set up Thanos (Josh Brolin) as the main villain. The next three phases (Phases 4-6) are called the Multiverse Saga, which is setting up Kang the Conquerer (Jonathan Majors) as the primary villain.
Was it a massive risk ? Absolutely. There was always the possibility that the MCU would fail even as Marvel’s early films raked it in at the box office, but it didn’t completely click until the release of The Avengers , which tied every single MCU movie released to date together for an epic showdown in New York against Loki and an alien army.
Iron Man had a tall order to fill: Not only did it have to function as an entertaining movie on its own, it had to tease something much bigger (but not too big in case Iron Man didn’t work). Luckily for us, it did that and more as it introduced us to Tony Stark, showed how he got the arc reactor placed in his chest and the birth of his first Iron Man suits, and deception from someone he trusted.
And not only did Iron Man throw the concept of a secret identity out the door with Tony telling the world that he was Iron Man, it gave us our first Marvel post-credits scene, which would soon become an MCU staple. It’s less than a minute long, and it contains a line from Nick Fury that opened a wealth of possibility : “I’m here to talk to you about the Avenger Initiative.”
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Bruce Banner’s origin story—he turned into the Hulk after a failed experiment attempting to restart the program that created Captain America—is revealed along with the Hulk’s early years as he attempts to find a way to cure himself—none of which, obviously, were very successful. Although it’s part of the MCU (albeit a movie some fans tend to skip), Marvel replaced lead actor Edward Norton with Mark Ruffalo, who’s played supporting roles in several Marvel movies since. And the Avengers thread continues with Tony Stark passing along word of making a team.
Iron Man 2 is a revenge story: The son of a disgraced physicist (who once worked with Howard Stark) tries to ruin Tony Stark’s life, but in the grand scheme of the MCU, the film is marked by the introduction of two new characters: a new James Rhodes (now played by Don Cheadle) and the first appearance of Black Widow. It also leads straight into Thor as S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Coulson goes to New Mexico to investigate Thor’s hammer Mjølnir.
Thor is the ultimate fish-out-of-water story on a cosmic scale: After being deemed unworthy of taking up the throne of Asgard, Thor is banished to Earth without his powers, which are contained within Mjølnir. (Naturally, hilarity ensues as Thor encounters a group of scientists, Hawkeye, and S.H.I.E.L.D. along the way.) But it also kicks off the start of Thor and Loki’s Shakespearean drama, which usually ends being much more fascinating than whatever forces come their way. For the first time, Thor begins to tease beyond the next film as the post-credits scene begins to lead into The Avengers .
The Captain America origin story takes us back to World War II as Steve Rogers is transformed into a strong fighter with super-soldier serum and takes on Red Skull and HYDRA forces. Featuring one of Marvel’s best romances (and one of its strongest ships ), it grounds a character that could be cartoonish complete with a heartbreaking ending . Of course, we know Captain America will eventually get out of that ice. He’s plucked out in present-day, which he quickly figures out, putting him in the right spot to be an essential part of the Avengers.
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The superhero team-up that was six movies and four years in the making, Avengers makes the impossible work. It takes most of the movie for Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk, Black Widow, and Hawkeye to work together as a united front—particularly as Loki, armed with the Tesseract and Mind Stone , successfully pits them against one another. But when it happens, you know that moment is earned. Thanos, on the other hand, is just a mysterious creature on a throne far off in space with only hints of the mass chaos he would eventually bring onto the universe.
Tony Stark faces off against another villain who’s set out to destroy him as he attempts to grapple with the events of Avengers as well as the panic attacks he’s now having as a result of them. After the Mandarin is revealed to be a sham, Tony and Rhodes (with help from Pepper Potts, who’s been infected with an experimental treatment called Extremis ) take down the true mastermind. Tony eventually has surgery to remove the shrapnel in his heart. But at least one post- Avengers relationship has endured as the movie is bookended by Tony relaying the film to Bruce Banner, who ends up nodding off.
With Loki locked away on Asgard—for part of the movie, anyway—Thor has an even bigger (albeit not as interesting) threat on his hands with the dark elf Malekith, made much more pressing after Thor’s girlfriend Jane Foster accidentally gets hold of the Aether (aka the Reality Stone ). Malekith is stopped, but not before Thor is led to believe that Loki died in the effort. Meanwhile, Loki, while impersonating Odin, takes control of Asgard. Now removed from Jane, the Reality Stone is handed over to the Collector for safekeeping.
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Captain America: The Winter Soldier is a political thriller that puts Steve Rogers on the run—not for the last time—as he discovers that the threat of HYDRA he fought decades earlier is still thriving right under everyone’s noses. And with a mind-controlled Bucky Barnes, Steve (alongside Black Widow and Falcon) has his biggest fight yet. But HYDRA and Bucky’s experimentation only scratches the surface. He’s far from the only human to be experimented on as we’re briefly introduced to Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver.
Thanos and the Infinity Stones come into the limelight for the first time after Peter Quill (aka Star-Lord) unknowingly gets his hands on the Power Stone . The ensuing chase, attempt to sell the stone to the highest bidder, and the battle once Ronan gets his hands on it transforms five strangers—Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax the Destroyer, Rocket Racoon, and Groot—into a dysfunctional family. It also opens the MCU up even further as it showcases the infinite possibilities by featuring a film set almost entirely in space.
After teaming up for another mission, Tony Stark attempts to build an AI called Ultron to operate as a peacekeeper for Earth. Naturally, everything goes awry: Ultron determines the best way to do that is to wipe out all of humanity, and the Avengers are forced to take Ultron and his army out with help from Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, and Vision, a synthetic body with J.A.R.V.I.S.’s AI and the Mind Stone. Thanos, however, is impatient with his effort to obtain the Infinity Stones and vows to get them himself.
Ex-con Scott Lang is recruited by physicist Hank Pym to wear his old Ant-Man suit and steal his company’s own technology after Hank’s protege attempts to make a suite based on his old tech. Although Hank’s daughter Hope van Dyne is more capable in practically every way, Scott manages to stop Yellowjacket and discovers the Quantum Realm for himself. And while Hope does eventually get her own suit, Ant-Man’s world is about to get even bigger.
Sometimes referred to as “Avengers 2.5,” most of Marvel’s superheroes have to choose a side after superheroes are required to register as superheroes under the Sokovia Accords. We’re introduced to Black Panther and Tom Holland’s Spider-Man for the first time while the fight between Iron Man and Captain America (with Bucky Barnes right in the middle) quickly gets personal for both of them. Many of the heroes end up going into hiding while Bucky is put under while Wakanda’s best figure out how to remove his brainwashing.
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After his hands are damaged in a car accident and medicine and therapy fail him, Dr. Stephen Strange discovers Kamar-Taj and starts to learn sorcery under the tutelage of the Ancient One. With the use of the Time Stone, Dr. Strange is able to stop the efforts of Kaecilius and Dormammu in the dark dimension while breaking the laws of time and space in his efforts.
Peter Quill comes face-to-face with Ego the Living Planet and begins to bond with the father he never knew while the family dynamic of the Guardians of the Galaxy—complicated by Gamora and Nebula’s estranged relationship and Peter’s guardian Yondu—begins to fracture. But just as the Guardians become aware of Ego’s true intentions with Peter, they save each other (and the galaxy once again) from total annihilation.
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After the exhilaration of fighting alongside the Avengers in Civil War , Peter Parker finds it hard to get back into the swing of things as he juggles school, keeping his secret identity under wraps, being mentored by Iron Man, and a looming threat from the Vulture.
Thor’s sister Hela (who was imprisoned for millennia) escapes after Odin’s death to claim the throne of Asgard, destroys Mjølnir, and sends Thor across the galaxy, where he’s captured and forced to fight the Hulk gladiator-style. Only by teaming up with the Hulk, Valkyrie, and Loki (with an assist from Ragnarok) can Thor, who’s still learning just what he can do, take his sister down.
After his father’s death in Civil War , T’Challa becomes king of Wakanda and gets ready to rule the country. But his cousin, whose existence was hidden for years, emerges to stake his claim, sending the royal family into hiding while Killmonger’s first plan of action as Wakanda’s king threatens to tear Wakanda apart.
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Thanos’ plan to obtain the Infinity Stones and wipe out half the universe goes into overdrive as he travels from planet to planet and overwhelms the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy. A final standoff in Wakanda ends in disaster after Thor’s new ax injures Thanos but doesn’t kill him, allowing the Mad Titan to set his plan into action and turn many of Marvel’s heroes into dust. With his final act before succumbing to his fate, Nick Fury sends out a distress call to Captain Marvel.
Hank Pym and Hope van Dyne enact their plan to rescue Janet van Dyne from the Quantum Realm after Scott Lang discovers a connection to her during the final days of Scott’s house arrest. But their plan faces a threat from Ghost, who wants to use the Quantum energy Janet will possess to help stabilize her own body.
Largely taking place in 1995, Captain Marvel is an origin story for Air Force pilot Carol Danvers, who is caught in the middle of a war between the Kree and the Skrulls. When she crash-lands on Earth, she meets S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Nick Fury, discovers the life she once had on Earth, how she came into her powers, and learns that there is much more to the war than meets the eye.
With half the universe (and Marvel’s heroes) obliterated by Thanos’ snap, the remaining Avengers team up for one final attempt to reverse what Thanos did by traveling back in time to obtain previous versions of the Infinity Stones. And while they succeeded, it came with immense consequences: Black Widow gave up her life on Vormir to obtain the Soul Stone, Iron Man’s snap wiped out Thanos for good (but the effort killed him), and Captain America stayed in the past and grew old before he gave the shield to a new hero.
After the events of Endgame, a still-grieving Peter Parker just wanted to go on his European summer vacation with his classmates. Thanks to an intervention from Nick Fury (who’s actually the Skrull Talos in disguise) and the appearance of Mysterio and the Elementals, it’s anything but; along the way, Peter and MJ’s romance grows with the latter eventually figuring out Peter’s secret. The movie builds up to Peter defeating Mysterio in London, but the disgruntled ex-Stark Industries employee-turned-villain gets the final laugh: after his death, Mysterio’s crew released a doctored video insinuating that Spider-Man killed Mysterio along with revealing his secret identity to the world.
WandaVision, which is set just weeks after Endgame, uses the pastiche of the family sitcom as a means to explore grief and loss after Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) created her own bubble inside of a New Jersey town where she and Vision (Paul Bettany) get the life they always envisioned. It doubles as an origin story for Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), who first appeared as a young girl in Captain Marvel and has gone by the names Captain Marvel, Photon, and Spectrum in the comics.
With the absence of Steve Rogers, Falcon and the Winter Soldier examines the legacy of Captain America—and asks who is worthy of carrying the shield. Set months after Endgame, Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) and Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) team up to face a number of adversaries including John Walker (Wyatt Russell), the newest Captain America; Karli Morgenthau (Erin Kellyman), the leader of a group known as the Flag-Smashers; and the reemergence of Captain America: Civil War villain Baron Zemo (Daniel Brühl).
Loki (Tom Hiddleston)—who escaped his own timeline with help from the Tesseract in Endgame—is captured and brought before the Time Variance Authority, where he’s given the chance to either aid the organization with capturing bigger forces or face deletion. Along the way, he meets several variants of himself, most notably Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino), who unleashes the Multiverse after killing He Who Remains (Majors), who oversaw it, and turning their world as they knew it into chaos. Loki has been renewed for a second season, which is set to debut in 2023.
Set in the time between Civil War and Infinity War, Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff is forced to confront her past after running into her estranged sister Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh) again. Together, they help take down the Red Room, the Russian spy program that indoctrinated them as girls and turned countless women into soldiers, and Dreykov (Ray Winstone), the man who ran the program from the shadows.
Jeffrey Wright portrays the Watcher in an animated series that explores alternate timelines of MCU events and features a wide selection of MCU alums reprising their roles. The episodes seemed to work as standalone stories until they connected in the finale. It’s been renewed for a second season, which will have nine episodes, but no release date has been announced.
Simu Liu stars as Shang-Chi, who is reunited with his estranged family—who he left when his father Wenwu (Tony Leung) made Shang-Chi kill the man said to have been responsible for his wife’s (and Shang-Chi’s mother’s) death—wants to find the mysterious and hidden village that his late wife once called home in hopes of bringing her back.
A group of immortal and empowered beings known as Eternals is tasked with protecting Earth from creatures called Deviants for thousands of years. But after they learn the true nature of their mission and that it will lead to the destruction of the planet, they’re split on whether to stop it.
Heavily inspired by Matt Fraction and David Aja’s comic run, Clint Barton’s (Jeremy Renner) holiday trip to New York City goes horribly awry after Kate Bishop—who hero-worships Clint after he saved her during The Avengers—wants to follow in his footsteps and his and his wife Laura’s (Linda Cardelini) past comes back to haunt them. It’s also notable for introducing Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio, reprising his role from Netflix’s Daredevil), and Echo (Alaqua Cox) into the MCU; the latter is getting a spinoff series.
After his identity is doxxed by J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons), Peter Parker convinces Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) to make the world forget it. The spell goes haywire, resulting in a tear in the multiverse that brings both previous live-action Peter Parkers (Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield), along with almost every villain they faced in their respective movies, into the MCU. It also marks Charlie Cox’s first appearance as Daredevil, another role reprisal from the Netflix series.
Oscar Isaac plays a man with multiple personalities—Marc Spector, a mercenary who operates as the avatar for an Egyptian god, and Steven Grant, the awkward Brit who becomes a fish out of water when he discovers what his other self gets up to. But they have to work together to stop a religious zealot (played by Ethan Hawke) from freeing a malevolent goddess with the power to judge and potentially punish all of humanity.
Doctor Strange has to stop a post-WandaVision Wanda Maximoff from utilizing America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez) to travel through the multiverse to find a universe where her “kids” with Vision exist. It’s also notable for its horror elements, as well as a plethora of cameos including Patrick Stewart’s Professor X, Anson Mount as Blackbolt, and John Krasinski as Dr. Richard Reed, leaning into the popular fancast.
Iman Vellani stars as superfan Kamala Khan, a Pakistani American teen in Jersey City whose cosmic powers are unlocked after putting on a pair of bangles once owned by her great-grandmother. It’s a deeply personal exploration of intergenerational trauma, along with opening the potential to the existence of mutants in the MCU.
Operating as both a return and a sendoff for Natalie Portman’s Jane Foster, Thor (Chris Hemsworth) teams up with Jane (now wielding Thor’s hammer) and Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) to take down Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale), who’s intent on taking out every single living god.
After getting in contact with her cousin Bruce Banner’s blood, Jennifer Walters (Tatiana Maslany) obtains Hulk powers of her own. But a law firm looking to capitalize on Jen’s viral fame as a Hulk hires her to argue cases involving superpowered beings, offering a more comedic and meta-take on superhero life.
Directed by longtime composer Michael Giacchino and visually evoking Universal monster movies, Gael García Bernal stars as one of several monster hunters (and a secret werewolf) pitted against one another to compete for the chance to take over a global monster hunting group after the death of its previous leader.
After the death of King T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman, who died in 2020), Wakanda faces a new threat from Namor (Tenoch Huerta), the leader of a people who dwell underwater with caches of vibranium who wants to destroy the tech built by Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) from helping other countries from discovering them.
In an homage to TV Christmas specials of yore, Drax (David Bautista) and Mantis (Pom Klementieff) travel to Earth looking to bring some Christmas cheer to a depressed Peter Quill (Chris Pratt). But Drax and Mantis know very little about Earth or Christmas, so hijinks ensue—especially once they kidnap Kevin Bacon to deliver him as a gift to Peter.
Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) and his daughter Cassie (Kathryn Newton) get sucked into the Quantum Realm after Cassie’s tech opens a portal, with Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and his family also getting caught in the crossfire. But Janet Van Dyne’s (Michelle Pfeiffer) decades spent there threaten to bubble up with the emergence of Kang, who was stranded there in exile and is looking for a way out.
The final entry in James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy puts Rocket Racoon (Bradley Cooper) front and center after someone from his mysterious, tumultuous past threatens the life that the Guardians have built together Knowhere.
Skrulls, the shapeshifting alien race first introduced in Captain Marvel, return in a big way as Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) tries to stop a Skrull faction from invading Earth and embedding themselves into positions of power.
Loki season 2 will likely pick up where the first season left off after Loki ended up in a different part of the multiverse, and likely reference the Quantumania post-credits scene in the meantime.
Carol Danvers (Brie Larson), Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), and Kamala Khan become embedded in each other’s lives—literally—after a wormhole causes them to swap bodies with one another.
Marvel’s Hawkeye spinoff will be centered around Maya Lopez, aka Echo, who has familial ties to Kingpin.
The fourth Captain America film will follow Sam Wilson after he accepted the shield Steve Rogers left him in Falcon and the Winter Soldier. It will also introduce us to Harrison Ford as U.S. President Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, who’s taking over the role from the late actor William Hurt and see the return of Liv Tyler’s Betty Ross.
In Thunderbolts, an all-star team of Marvel antagonists introduced across dozens of projects—Bucky Barnes, Yelena Belova, Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), John Walker, Red Guardian (David Harbour), Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko), and Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus)—will converge.
After his voice briefly appeared in an Eternals post-credits scene, Mahershala Ali will make his on-screen debut with a new take on the character first introduced to viewers by Wesley Snipes.
The MCU’s first big animated series is set to tell even more stories about alternative realities within the framework of the MCU.
The series will follow Riri Williams, the MIT grad student who built her own version of the Iron Man suit and came up with a way to track the presence of vibranium, presumably after the events of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn), the main antagonist of WandaVision, is getting her own spinoff that will involve musical numbers and theater legend Patti LuPone playing a 450-year-old Sicilian witch named Lilia Calderu.
With a title referencing one of Daredevil’s most famous comic book runs, much of the Netflix Daredevil cast—Charlie Cox, D’Onofrio, Jon Bernthal as the Punisher—will return for a new spin on the brooding character.
Marvel’s fourth-wall-breaking wisecracker is getting the MCU treatment—this time with Hugh Jackman coming out of superhero retirement to play Wolverine again to square off with Ryan Reynolds. And yes, fans have been repeatedly assured that it will be rated R.
After Fox made three different franchise films (and two different casts) with Marvel’s most famous quartet, the MCU is taking a crack at the Fantastic Four. While a cast announcement is forthcoming, it doesn’t appear that Krasinski will return to the role after his Multiverse of Madness cameo.
Little is known about the fifth Avengers movie other than Kang appearing in it. Jeff Loveness (Quantumania) is set to write the film while Cretton (Shang-Chi) is set to direct.
Michael Waldron, who wrote Loki season 1 and Multiverse of Madness is set to write the concluding film in Phase 6. No director is attached to the film, which appears to be in reference to one of several Marvel Comics crossover events.
Right now, two Marvel movies have been announced without any attachment or designated Marvel phase. A sequel to Shang-Chi was announced in 2021 with Destin Daniel Cretton returning to direct. Armor Wars, which would be centered on War Machine (Don Cheadle), was originally pitched as a TV series headed by Yassir Lester. But in 2022, Marvel changed course and decided to make it a film instead; Lester will still work on the film version.
Neither project has casting updates apart from the return of established characters, confirmed dates around when it might film or be released, or a connection to a phase in the MCU.
Aside from the 2008 Incredible Hulk and both Spider-Man movies, you can watch all of the Marvel phases in order on Disney+. This post was last updated in May of 2023.
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