Blade
The film that proved a Marvel adaptation could work, two years before anyone else tried.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Marvel Cinematic Universe · Release Order
Doomsday is not out yet, so this is a reading of what matters going in, not a ruling.
- 77Total
- 0Watched
- 77Remaining
- 6Essential left
- 303 hoursLeft to watch
The 1990s 1 title
The 2000s 16 titles
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X-Men
Two men who agree about what is coming and about nothing else run rival schools for people born different.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Blade II
A truce with the things he hunts, against something that hunts them.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Daredevil
The first go at the blind lawyer, twelve years before the good one.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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X2: X-Men United
A military scientist convinces a president that the problem needs solving, and old enemies have to work together.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Hulk
Ang Lee's version, cut like a comic page and much stranger than its reputation.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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The Punisher
A man loses everything and works through a list. Sunnier than it sounds, which is the problem.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Blade: Trinity
The third one, with a team he did not ask for.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Elektra
A spin-off nobody asked for, out barely two years after the film it spun off.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Man-Thing
A swamp horror film that went straight to cable. Included for completeness, not enthusiasm.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Fantastic Four
The 2005 one. Bright, silly, and much less embarrassed about it than what came later.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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X-Men: The Last Stand
A company announces a cure, which is one word for it, and the question splits everyone.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Blade: The Series — Season 1
Twelve episodes on cable, then nothing. Very few people have seen it.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Ghost Rider
A stunt rider sells his soul and gets a flaming skull out of it.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
The sequel, and a chrome figure on a surfboard who is better than the film around him.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Punisher: War Zone
A reboot four years later, far nastier, and quietly the best of the three.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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X-Men Origins: Wolverine
How Logan got the metal, told at length.
Reaches back to the 1840s.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
The 2010s 28 titles
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X-Men: First Class
Before any of it, two young men find each other and try to stop a war nobody else can see.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
A sequel that gives up on being a normal film about twenty minutes in.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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The Wolverine
Logan is summoned to Japan by a man he saved a long time ago who wants to return the favor.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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X-Men: Days of Future Past
The future has gone as badly as possible, so someone is sent back far enough to stop it starting.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Daredevil — Season 1
A blind lawyer works Hell's Kitchen by day and does something less legal about it at night.
- Matt Murdock
- Karen Page
- Foggy Nelson
- Claire Temple
- Wilson Fisk
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Fantastic Four
The grim one. Famously troubled, and it shows in every frame.
A separate continuity with its own version of these characters. Listing them beside the MCU's would merge two people who share a name and nothing else.
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Jessica Jones — Season 1
A private investigator who would rather not be anything else is forced to deal with a man she got away from once.
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Deadpool
A mercenary takes an experimental cure, comes out unkillable and disfigured, and goes looking for the man responsible.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Daredevil — Season 2
Two people arrive in the neighborhood with methods Matt cannot live with, and one of them he used to love.
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X-Men: Apocalypse
Something very old wakes up under Cairo and starts recruiting.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Luke Cage — Season 1
A man with unbreakable skin who wanted a quiet job in Harlem is pulled into what the neighborhood is actually run by.
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Legion — Season 1
A man in a psychiatric hospital is told he is not ill. The show refuses to confirm anything.
Fox's mutant television, in its own corner of that continuity.
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Logan
An old man, a dying mentor, and a girl who needs driving across a country that has no use for any of them.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Iron Fist — Season 1
A man declared dead fifteen years ago walks back into his family's company barefoot.
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The Defenders — Season 1
Four people who all work alone are pushed into the same room by the same conspiracy.
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The Gifted — Season 1
A suburban family goes on the run when the children turn out to be mutants.
Fox's mutant television, in its own corner of that continuity.
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The Punisher — Season 1
A man everyone believes is dead goes looking for the truth about the operation that killed his family.
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Jessica Jones — Season 2
Jessica finally looks into the accident that changed her, and would rather not find what she finds.
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Legion — Season 2
Still refusing to confirm anything, now with a full year of dance sequences.
Fox's mutant television, in its own corner of that continuity.
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Deadpool 2
Wade assembles a team, badly, to protect a boy from a soldier who has come a long way to kill him.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Luke Cage — Season 2
Harlem has a new problem, and Luke has become something the neighborhood expects things from.
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Iron Fist — Season 2
A shorter, sharper season about what the fist is actually for.
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The Gifted — Season 2
The underground splits over how hard to fight back.
Fox's mutant television, in its own corner of that continuity.
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Daredevil — Season 3
Matt is presumed dead, which is convenient for the man being released from prison.
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The Punisher — Season 2
A road trip, a girl who needs protecting, and a man who cannot leave anything alone.
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Dark Phoenix
A rescue in orbit goes wrong and one of the team comes back holding far more than she can carry.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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Jessica Jones — Season 3
The last season, and the most personal antagonist the show ever gave her.
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Legion — Season 3
The last one, and the one that finally says what it has been about.
Fox's mutant television, in its own corner of that continuity.
The 2020s 32 titles
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The New Mutants
Five young people are held in a facility for their own safety, which is not what is happening.
A separate universe from the main line. Deadpool & Wolverine made that connection explicit rather than tidy, so this order is a reading of it, not a ruling.
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WandaVisionEssential
A sitcom that is not a sitcom, in a town that should not exist.
Set three weeks after Endgame.
- Wanda Maximoff
- Vision
- Billy Maximoff
- Agatha Harkness
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The Falcon and the Winter SoldierEssential
Two people who both knew the same man are made to work together and to decide what a shield is for.
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Loki — Season 1Essential
A version of Loki who escaped is arrested by an organization that polices the timeline itself.
- Loki
- Mobius M. Mobius
- Ravonna Renslayer
- Sylvie Laufeydottir
- He Who Remains
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What If…? — Season 1
Animated. Familiar stories with one thing changed, and then followed honestly to the end.
Alternate universes, so it does not sit on the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
An anthology. Every episode has a different cast, so a single list would be a lie.
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Hawkeye
Clint wants to be home for Christmas. A young archer with his old suit makes that difficult.
- Clint Barton
- Kate Bishop
- Maya Lopez
- Wilson Fisk
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Moon Knight
A museum gift-shop worker with blackouts discovers what has been using them.
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Ms. Marvel
A teenager in Jersey City who writes fan fiction about the Avengers finds she can do something herself.
- Kamala Khan
- Carol Danvers
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She-Hulk: Attorney at Law
A lawyer who now has the same problem as her cousin would like to keep practicing law, thank you.
- Jennifer Walters
- Bruce Banner
- Wong
- Matt Murdock
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The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special
Two Guardians go to Earth to find Peter a Christmas present and pick a very specific one.
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Secret Invasion
Fury comes back to Earth for a problem that has been quietly building since the nineties.
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Loki — Season 2Essential
The consequences of the first season's last shot, and someone having to hold the whole thing together.
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What If…? — Season 2
More of the same idea, and rather more confident with it.
Alternate universes, so it does not sit on the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
An anthology. Every episode has a different cast, so a single list would be a lie.
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Echo
Maya Lopez goes home to Oklahoma, and the man she ran from follows.
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X-Men '97 — Season 1
Animated, and a direct continuation of the nineties series.
Its own universe, not the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
A continuation of the nineties series with its own large ensemble, not yet listed.
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Agatha All Along
A witch with nothing left walks a road that grants a wish to whoever finishes it.
- Agatha Harkness
- Rio Vidal
- Billy Maximoff
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What If…? — Season 3
The last run of the animated series.
Alternate universes, so it does not sit on the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
An anthology. Every episode has a different cast, so a single list would be a lie.
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Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man — Season 1
Animated. A different first year for Peter Parker.
Its own universe, not the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
Its own universe with its own versions of familiar people, not yet listed.
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Daredevil: Born Again — Season 1
Matt Murdock has given up the other job. The man running for mayor has not given up anything.
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Ironheart
Riri Williams is back in Chicago building something she cannot afford, and someone offers to fund it.
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Eyes of Wakanda
Animated. Wakandan agents recovering stolen artifacts across history.
An anthology spanning centuries, with a different cast each time.
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Marvel Zombies
Animated, and not for children.
An alternate universe, not the main timeline.
An alternate universe, so it does not sit on the main timeline. Placed at the end.
An anthology in its own universe, with a rotating cast.
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Wonder Man — Season 1
An actor auditions for a superhero part in a Hollywood that already has real ones.
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Daredevil: Born Again — Season 2Essential
The mayor's grip tightens and the lawyer stops pretending the law is going to be enough.
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The Punisher: One Last Kill
A man who thought he was finished is pulled back in. Under an hour, and it does not let up.
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X-Men '97 — Season 2
The animated series continues, still picking up exactly where 1997 left off.
The 1990s animated continuity. Same names as the films, different people.
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Spidey and the Avengers: Halloween Team-Up!
A Disney Junior Halloween special. Made for small children and not part of the main story at all.
A preschool special in its own continuity. The characters share names with the films and nothing else.
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VisionQuest — Season 1
Announced for October. Nothing here spoils it, because nobody has seen it.
Not out yet. A cast has been announced; until the show exists, printing one here would be repeating rumour as fact.
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Avengers: DoomsdayEssential
The one everything has been pointing at. Out in December; nothing here spoils it, because nobody has seen it.
Not out yet. Marvel has announced a cast; until the film exists, printing one here would be repeating rumour as fact — and the reveals are exactly what this site is for.