This post was updated June 2 at 4:16 p.m.
Dread it. Run from it. “Avengers: Doomsday” arrives all the same.
In March 2025, Marvel Studios announced that production on “Avengers: Doomsday” had begun. The company posted a two-minute video to their socials boasting the film’s laundry list of returning cast members – the camera panning across a seemingly never ending row of directors chairs that featured their names. Robert Downey Jr. appeared at the end of the clip, looking on with a smile. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has always featured cameos, team-ups and fan service, but those gimmicks once served a larger story with a defined purpose in mind. Across 11 years, the three phases of the overarching Infinity Saga played out on the big screen and culminated in the highly anticipated “Avengers: Endgame,” which grossed $2.7 billion and became an instant fixture of 21st-century pop culture.
With such extensive planning, “Avengers: Endgame” seemed bound to provide a rewarding conclusion to the saga: Thanos was defeated, the world was saved and the surviving Avengers were reunited with their loved ones. The MCU could have ended there and gone down in cinema history as a powerhouse that knew not to overstay its welcome. However, money talks, and franchises this lucrative are hard to come by, so after a brief pandemic pause, the MCU returned with a desperation to convince audiences why they should still care.
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When Disney+ launched in November 2019, the MCU began releasing several series on the platform along with their standard two to three movies a year. As a twice-a-year cinema event turned into weekly homework, it became easier than ever for audiences to lose interest. While some of the characters introduced and expanded on in these shows became central to the plots of future films, many of them – including Moon Knight and She-Hulk – have yet to appear again. Audiences started to realize that not all these shows were worth their time and trying to prioritize them was impossible with no clear plan for the MCU’s future in sight. Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige said Marvel is scaling back, but the promise feels like too little, too late with the studio’s event films of “Avengers: Doomsday” and “Avengers: Secret Wars” still barreling toward their December 2026 and 2027 release dates.
However, the blame isn’t to be entirely placed on Disney and Marvel executives. Any conversation about the state of the MCU since December 2023 requires addressing the elephant in the room – Jonathan Majors. Majors, who had been cast as the multiverse’s new primary antagonist, Kang the Conqueror, was fired by Disney and Marvel Studios after being convicted of reckless assault and harassment. While many audience members believe the studios certainly made the right decision by dropping Majors, the decision not to simply recast Kang seemingly revealed an internal lack of confidence in their attempts to find their footing post-”Avengers: Endgame.” “Avengers: The Kang Dynasty” swiftly fell apart, prompting a desperate course correction that reeks into the marketing for “Avengers: Doomsday.”
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Since December, Marvel has released multiple teasers to announce that Steve Rogers, Thor, Shuri – from “Black Panther” – and the X-Men will return in “Avengers: Doomsday,” but this jarring overreliance on nostalgia to attract audiences, and a simultaneous eagerness to undo the events of “Avengers: Endgame,” is more alienating than exciting. The film’s big bad, Doctor Doom – played by Downey in yet another nostalgia grab – has to date only been seen in the mid-credits scene of “The Fantastic Four: First Steps.” The character has had, thus far, no impact in the MCU, so the teasers similarly lack impact. There is virtually no reason to care about these beloved heroes coming together to fight him. With no proper buildup, the offscreen drama is glaringly obvious onscreen, and nothing feels earned – a stark contrast from the meticulously thought-out MCU of just a few years ago.
The franchise’s return to its worst habits feels especially frustrating because, just last year, “Thunderbolts*” and “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” proved Marvel excels when it focuses on character development rather than interlinking the multiverse. While neither film met box-office expectations, both were among the studio’s most compelling releases in years. That same summer, James Gunn’s “Superman” embraced a similarly character-focused approach and set the tone for his rebooted DCU by outgrossing the Marvel Studios releases. Hence, it appears that moviegoers are clearly looking for a fresh perspective on the superhero genre but are unconvinced the MCU will give that to them. Nevertheless, Marvel seems determined to replicate old recipes for success, and time will tell if they’ll come to regret that.
The clock is ticking for the MCU audiences fell in love with to return in “Avengers: Doomsday.”
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