Over 15 years and 33 films, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has thrown countless seemingly insurmountable obstacles and more than a few apocalyptic events at their line-up of superheroes trying to save the world, the universe and reality itself. Their villains are at the head of all of this; crazed scientists, treacherous government agents, brutal alien warlords, amoral industrialists, gods and monsters and everything in between, an MCU villain can be so many things. Some were unfortunately the weakest elements in the movies they appeared in, being either generic, poorly served by the script or misjudged in their performances, while others ended up being memorable highlights even above the title costumed characters. 

There are often multiple antagonists in these superhero stories so we’ve tried to stick to one villain per MCU film. This is except where it’s the same antagonist carried over into a sequel film, and in cases where there’s more than one threat to our heroes. In these instances, we’ve focussed on the most active baddies or the masterminds of the various diabolical plots.

This ranking will be based on the level of threat the various bad guys pose to our supremely skilled and miraculously superpowered heroes, the diabolical creativity of their respective master plans and the sheer evilness of their actions. Spoilers ahead!

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31. Malekith – Thor: The Dark World (2013)

“Look upon my legacy, Algrim. I can barely remember a time before the light.” 

A dark elf conqueror with a vendetta against Asgard for a defeat in ancient times, Malekith is reawakened and plots to snuff out the light across the universe (because his kind really like the darkness of the void).

A hugely distinct and memorable villain from the comics became one of the most boring to ever antagonise a superhero movie. Whatever Christopher Eccleston was trying to do with his performance after undergoing many uncomfortable hours in the makeup chair was lost in a brutally hacked film edit and an all-round po-faced determination to live up to the “dark” of the title.

Note: dark is not the same as interesting. 

30. Ivan Vanko/Whiplash – Iron Man 2 (2010)

“You come from a family of thieves and butchers, and like all guilty men, you try to rewrite your history.”

Whiplash is a Stark-hating, parrot-loving nuclear physicist/inventor with arc reactor-powered whips and an army of drones to carry out his revenge.

Mickey Rourke got a lot of jobs in quick succession as various shades of tough guy in this period. The Wrestler this is not, and he doesn’t exactly stretch himself as Ivan, offering a barely passable Russian accent and playing with a toothpick as a poor substitute for a more intricate characterisation as he plots vaguely defined Cold War-fuelled vengeance on Tony Stark and the American Military Industrial Complex.

29. Emil Blonsky/Abomination – The Incredible Hulk (2008)

“If I took what I had now, and put it in a body that I had ten years ago, that would be someone I wouldn’t want to fight.”

Abomination is an unstable British Black Ops asset who volunteers for a series of dangerous experimental super soldier treatments in order to capture the Hulk.

The Incredible Hulk worked best when it was Marvel’s answer to a Universal Monster movie, but one of its weakest elements was having Blonsky as its villain. Roth is fine, but he just wasn’t all that threatening, the character thinly sketched as a violent jerk with a superiority complex. When he finally transforms into his bony green alter ego Abomination for a CG smashathon in Harlem, it becomes almost impossible to care.

Recommended for you: Once More with Feeling – 10 More of the Best Remakes

28. Dar-Benn – The Marvels (2023)

“I always come back.”

Continuing what Ronan the Accuser started, Kree warrior Dar-Benn seeks to unite the two powerful Cosmic Bands in order to open portals across the galaxy to pillage resources from countless worlds to restore her dying planet of Hala and reassert her species’ dominance in the galaxy.

The problem with Dar-Benn is not her evil-for-the-right-reasons master plan or her relative threat level to our heroes (which is considerable considering that with space-magical enhancement she can hold her own against three formidable supes at once), it’s that there’s nothing else to her.

We needed more time for layers to come though Zawe Ashton’s broad, pantomimey performance and she too often feels like a retread of the kinds of villains we’ve seen in the MCU many times before, just a means to an end.

27. Ava Starr/Ghost – Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)

“It hurts. It always hurts.”

The Marvels Review

A scientist’s daughter with an unnatural condition that causes her to painfully phase in and out of the physical realm, Ghost resorts to stealing Pymtech to survive.

Ghost is an admirable attempt to make something interesting out of a gimmicky physics-based villain. The character is let down not by Hannah John-Kamen’s engaging and tortured performance but by her essential irrelevance to the film’s main plot and lack of enough meaningful screen time. It’s almost like they only decided late in the day that Ant-Man and the Wasp should have an antagonist at all, and that may have been the wrong decision for this particular movie. 

26. Ronan – Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

“I don’t recall killing your family. I doubt I’ll remember killing you either.”

Ronan is a Kree fanatic who courts war and is gathering enough power to wipe the planet Xandar from the galaxy.

Ronan, with his war paint, samurai helmet and big hammer has a strong look, and thanks to Lee Pace he is given an imposing presence and a rumbling voice. But you’d struggle to claim he had much in the way of depth as a character. He wants a weapon to destroy a planet because because he’s from a war-like race and that’s about it, though Pace’s affronted expression and confused “what are you doing?” as Star-Lord dances in front of him as he’s trying to trigger an apocalypse is pretty memorable.

25. Darren Cross/Yellowjacket – Ant-Man (2015)

“Did you think you could stop the future with a heist?”

Ant-Man Review

Hank Pym’s protégé, ouster and successor at his company, Yellowjacket seeks to weaponise and sell Pym’s shrinking technology to the highest bidder.

Marvel has a lot of evil CEOs in its rogues gallery and Corey Stoll brings plenty of punchable arrogance to his performance as Darren Cross. He murders rivals and exterminates animal test subjects without second thought, seemingly motivated by Pym not trusting him with the secrets of his technology (though really it’s because he enjoys doing it). 

Cross does have probably the most gruesome villain death in the MCU so far, and it’s no more than he deserves.

“There was an idea…”

Said idea was different to almost every version of the big screen superhero seen previously. Rather than each costumed hero existing in their own sealed-off vivariums, what if they could all share one interconnected universe containing a single ever-evolving and expansive story?

Once the idea gained traction, billions of dollars, and many “phases” of franchise continuity, the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) became the envy of every studio with a lucrative intellectual property to siphon and thus many attempts were made to replicate the success of the “Marvel Formula”.

Much like the James Bond series in the decades before it, the MCU is primarily a producer-led franchise, the ultimate mastermind behind the project being Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige, though distinct directors like Jon Favreau, Joss Whedon and Taika Waititi have certainly left their mark on their respective entries in the ongoing series.

What keeps us (and wider box office audiences) coming back, aside from the ever-increasing levels of superhero spectacle and long-form storytelling borrowing liberally from 80-plus years of comic books, is the time you’re afforded to grow to love the characters and their relationships with each other, especially in the ambitious team-up Avengers movies.

In this edition of Ranked we at The Film Magazine are assessing every entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and because fans have very different opinions on the best, the worst and everything in between regarding this series, we’ve attempted to find a balance between average critical consensus and general audience reception, as well as genre innovation and the lasting impact on popular culture, to order all of them definitively from worst to best.

Ladies and gentlemen, for your consideration… Every MCU Marvel Cinematic Universe Movie Ranked.

Follow @thefilmagazine on X (Twitter).

33. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)

“A guy dressed like a bee tried to kill me when I was six. I’ve never had a normal life.”

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Review

The Ant-Man films are probably the most inconstant sub-series in the MCU, quality wise, but because the final chapter of their trilogy tries to go both big and small, it well and truly overreaches itself.

Pitting the Lang/Van Dyne family against Kang the Conqueror in the Quantum Realm, force of nature Jonathan Majors playing a fascinating villain isn’t quite enough to save Peyton Reed’s threequel from being just an eye-catching jumble of mismatched, tonally confusing ideas.

For Kang’s first, less maniacal appearance and the start of this whole Multiverse Saga, make sure to watch Season 1 of ‘Loki’.

32. Eternals (2021)

“We have loved these people since the day we arrived. When you love something, you protect it.”

Eternals Review

Chloé Zhao (Nomadland) is a great director, no doubt, but she was just not a good fit for the MCU in this story of space gods guiding humanity’s progress. Considering the usually grounded and singular vision of her work, this was a particularly crushing disappointment for most audiences.

The ambition and epic millennia-spanning scope of Eternals sadly did not pay off in this jarring, misjudged slog of a final product that couldn’t even be saved by a stellar and diverse cast. 

31. The Marvels (2023)

“Listen to me, you are chosen for a greater purpose. So you must go. But I will never let you go.”

The Marvels Review

The Marvels smartly builds a lot of its appeal around its central team-up of Carol Danvers, Monica Rambeau and Kamala Khan as their power usage causes them to swap places across the universe, but their found family warmth and oodles of charisma can’t overcome all the film’s flaws.

This needed more purposeful storytelling, a villain that doesn’t feel like a retread of what came before and more direct confrontation of the darker implications of the story. The musical elements will likely make an already decisive movie more so, but the MCU overall could do with some more audacious imagery like what Nia DaCosta does with alien cats.

Watching ‘Wandavision’ and ‘Ms Marvel’ through beforehand will certainly help you connect with two of the three leads that bit quicker.

30. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

“Whosoever holds these weapons, and believes in getting home, if they be true of heart is therefore worthy, and shall possess… for limited time only, the power… of Thor!”

Thor: Love and Thunder Review

Taika Waititi is the kind of distinct voice that gave the MCU a jolt in the arm when it was most needed, and he was vital in reinvigorating the Thor series, but the tonal balance and technical polish certainly felt off in 2022 release Thor: Love and Thunder.

Good performances from Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman and Christian Bale, and some memorable set pieces aside, Thor’s latest adventure battling a god-killer with his now superpowered ex-girlfriend Jane Foster at his side feels like too many mismatched stories smashed together.

Recommended for you: Taika Waititi Films Ranked

29. Thor: The Dark World (2013)

“One son who wanted the throne too much, and other who will not take it. Is this my legacy?”

The God of Thunder’s third film appearance tries to live up to its title with a story of dark elves trying to snuff out all light in the universe. Sadly, a late change in director – Alan Taylor taking over from would-be Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins – and extensive Loki-centric reshoots didn’t help an already disjointed film feel any less so.

Thor’s dynamic with his Earthbound friends is still funny and more Loki (shoehorned in or not) is always a good thing with Tom Hiddleston in the role, but the storytelling is inconsistent at best and Christopher Eccleston under heavy prosthetics as Malekith may be the most boring villain in the MCU so far.

28. Iron Man 2 (2010)

“The suit and I are one. To turn over the Iron Man suit would be to turn over myself, which is tantamount to indentured servitude or prostitution, depending on what state you’re in.”

The MCU’s first direct sequel went bigger and darker with Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark fighting a vengeful Russian inventor, a rival industrialist and potentially fatal health problems. Unfortunately, this ended up being a much less focussed, overblown and not all that compelling movie.

Scarlet Johansson makes her debut as Black Widow here, though she’s just a generic sexy spy at this point and not yet given the dimensions other writers would later bestow. The action is decent enough, but you wouldn’t lose out on much of you skipped over Iron Man 2 on your next MCU rewatch.

27. The Incredible Hulk (2008)

“You know, I know a few techniques that could help you manage that anger effectively.”

Lacking the clear intentions and boldness of many subsequent MCU movies, The Incredible Hulk is stylistically old-fashioned but works slightly better if you view this as a big-budget tribute to sympathetic monster movies (this one was made by Universal, after all).

A movie filled with false starts and one-off appearances (most obviously Edward Norton’s Bruce Banner would be recast with Mark Ruffalo for The Avengers in 2012), very little was carried over to the wider franchise right up until Tim Roth’s reappearance in ‘She-Hulk’ fourteen years later.

This is generally uninspiring stuff, with its most interesting man-on-the-run elements cribbed from the 1970s ‘Incredible Hulk’ TV show.

Recommended for you: Where to Start with Universal Classic Monsters

On the screen, Marvel Studios’ trusted output has been received positively by critics and audiences alike, the majority of its thirty feature releases being well received and worthy of their hype, even their so-called “calculated risks” being more often refreshing to their already established formula than detrimental to their overall output.

Cinema has been forever changed by the dawn of Marvel’s big screen dominance and old-school serial approach to storytelling, Disney’s newly ordained crown jewel inspiring every rival studio and aspirational production company to gobble up trusted IPs and set forth plans for so-called Movie Universes based around everything from fellow superheroes to famous board games, reinvented children’s cartoons to horror characters.

In this edition of Ranked, we at The Film Magazine are putting the world’s most influential film franchise under the microscope to compare every feature length Marvel release with one another to determine which MCU films are the best and which are the worst, judging each on artistic merit and cultural impact.

Follow @thefilmagazine on Twitter. 

30. The Incredible Hulk (2008)

To this day, Louis Leterrier’s 2008 MCU contribution The Incredible Hulk is the forgotten member of the family. And, while this isn’t necessarily this distinctly average film’s fault and is actually more to do with Edward Norton refusing to return to his role as the Hulk following strained relationships with both director and studio, as well as how the rights to the Hulk character are locked in a contract that limits Marvel Studios from telling a standalone story with Mark Ruffalo, a lot can still be said for how dated this film is – The Incredible Hulk playing a lot more like Spider-Man 3, Fantastic Four and X-Men: Origins – Wolverine than the later and much more tasteful Marvel Studios offerings to come in this list.

Recommended for you: Every X-Men Movie Ranked

29. Thor: The Dark World (2013)

The worst of a bad bunch of uninspired sequels, Alan Taylor’s Thor: The Dark World not only seemed absent of the comedy and much of the mythology of the original Thor film but it also hit at precisely the wrong time – that being between the much more highly anticipated Iron Man 3 and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and the year after the original The Avengers.

Thor 2 was generic in a Suicide Squad “angry swirl of evil descending from the sky for no reason” kind of way; a movie so uninspired Chris Hemsworth has openly spoken about how he almost quit the role because of it; a perfectly serviceable sequel (especially at the time), but one of little consequence or imagination that few get excited to rewatch – an MCU entry that time hasn’t been very kind to.

28. Iron Man 2 (2010)

The first Iron Man was such a huge success creatively, artistically, critically and financially for Marvel Studios that a quick-turnaround 2nd movie was demanded to bolster Phase One’s launch – a period in the history of the MCU that was a lot more rocky than many are willing to admit.

Iron Man 2 was a failure in all of the ways Iron Man was a success, apart from financially, offering bland and sometimes barely comprehensible moments of action, dialogue and character. As a result, Iron Man 2 fits right in alongside the likes of The Amazing Spider-Man as a very particular brand of cheesy and uninspired comic book movie that was made more to earn a quick buck than it was to fulfil any creative or artistic need. It has its moments – which movie starring Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man doesn’t? – but thankfully the MCU has proven itself to be better than this in its other phases since.

27. Ant-Man and The Wasp (2018)

Coming between Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame – ie, post-snap – Ant-Man and The Wasp was put in an awful position to succeed, the creative minds behind the film having to choose between embracing the actions of Infinity War or ignoring them altogether. They chose the latter (at least until the film’s final moments), but what fans wanted was something of an indicator as to what was to come in Endgame, or at least a taste of post-Infinity War’s MCU landscape, and the comedy-centred light-heartedness of an Ant-Man movie was an example of Marvel Studios not taking a minute to read the room.

More than that, Ant-Man and The Wasp felt scaled down from the original, its outlandish creative ideas brought into line with the wider MCU look and feel of things, making what seemed like a promising sequel to a moving and hilarious comedy one of the studio’s most formulaic and typically “superhero movie” releases to date – the “formula” not being necessarily bad, but certainly overplayed.

26. Eternals (2021)

Eternals Review

Eternals came with a lot of hope and expectation given the nature of the original material it was being adapted from and how it was the first MCU entry to be directed by an Oscar-winning director (Chloé Zhao). Ultimately, it proved too much of a mix of the trusted Marvel formula and director Zhao’s trademark directorial style, the clashes between action and existentialism forcing a disjointed rhythm in the filmmaking that made Eternals feel way longer than it was (which was one of the longest MCU films in history) and hit home way less effectively than anyone would have hoped.

As a product of the world’s largest production arm, Eternals was hopefully diverse from cast to crew, but ultimately this release had two authorial presences that seemed to clash on screen, this already troubling combination being amplified by its position in the MCU as a part of the studio’s fourth phase and thus responsible for a number of story elements and character introductions barely relevant to its standalone narrative.

25. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

Thor: Love and Thunder Review

Despite featuring one of the most empathetic and exceptionally-performed villains in Marvel Cinematic Universe history, Thor: Love and Thunder was a messy fourth instalment in the God of Thunder’s individual franchise, a film that flipped between tones as if at a loss at how to create both meaningful drama and laugh-out-loud comedy.

In comparison to post-2012 Marvel releases, the action was relatively poor too. Gone were the exceptionally choreographed sequences of the mainstream Avengers films or the differing styles of Black Widow, Doctor Strange and Shang-Chi, and in its place were bland and almost inconsequential battles repeated, a few moments of awe failing to rectify for a movie’s worth of oversights.

Thor: Love and Thunder is an enjoyable time at the movies. It will make you laugh and it does have some interesting moments, but these pros are simply too few and far between to make for a strong (or even meaningful) MCU entry.

24. Iron Man 3 (2013)

Adored by some and maligned by others, Iron Man 3 simply came about much too early, screenwriter-director Shane Black’s offerings of genre and trope deconstructions – most notably the choice to twist a genuinely fascinating villain into a trope-ridden stereotypical bad guy as a form of commentary – being things usually reserved for the dying days of a genre, not for one of its peaks.

This film was the follow up to The Avengers where Tony Stark had almost died, so Black’s smarts didn’t hit as they could have much later in the studio’s line-up – people wanted emotion and stakes, as well as suitable conclusions to character arcs, and Black’s work was seen to undermine that, the very strong work in several aspects of this film ultimately shunned to the background of a film dominated by a creator’s singular intention seemingly forced into the canon at the wrong time.

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We followed Thor as he returned to Asgard to find his long-lost warmongering sister Hela (Cate Blanchett) making a bid for the throne, the prophesied Viking apocalypse Ragnarok on the horizon. De-powered and enslaved to fight aliens for sport on the planet Sakaar, Thor was tasked with winning his freedom and gathering allies (both willing and reluctant) to take back his home realm.

Primarily known as a director of comedies, Waititi imbued his distinctive sense of humour into his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in a lot of the oddball dialogue exchanges, but Ragnarok was also pretty boldly iconoclastic: it fully embraced Jack Kirby’s wild comic book designs, and even snuck a fair number of big emotional beats and some weighty subtext into the film as well.

In this Movie List from The Film Magazine, we are counting down the very best moments from Taika Waititi’s first foray into superhero movies. These are the 10 Best Moments from Thor: Ragnarok.

Follow @thefilmagazine on Twitter.

10. Strange House Call

While searching for their missing father Odin (Anthony Hopkins), who Loki (Tom Hiddleston) had hypnotised and dumped in a now demolished retirement home on Earth, Thor and his trickster brother get called to the Sanctum Sanctorum at 177A Bleeker Street for an audience with Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch).

Midgard’s mightiest magician proceeds to flummox and bewilder his demigod visitors by shifting reality around the brothers, teleporting the bothersome Loki into a bottomless pit and serving Thor a bottomless beer as they talk. He eventually offers them the information they are seeking and conjures a portal to take them to Norway, but not before Loki tries to stick a dagger through him out of indignation as he had “been falling for 30 minutes!”.

9. RIP Mjolnir

Almost immediately after Odin Allfather says goodbye to his sons and passes on to Valhalla, his hitherto unknown first-born Hela (the Goddess of Death) escapes her prison, faces off with the other offspring of Odin (to Thor: “You don’t look like him” / to Loki: “You sound like him”) and puts her plot to reclaim her birth right into motion.

Her first act is to completely emasculate the overconfident Thor and essentially send him right back to his unworthy starting position by catching and crushing one-handed his unstoppable magic hammer Mjolnir (he takes this badly). Then, while they flee her in the Bifrost to Asgard, Hela easily dispatches both brothers in two hits and sends them hurtling off to the junk planet of Sakaar.

Recommended for you: Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Review

That’s fine, generally, when the movie is an original piece or a sequel to a long-beloved franchise – Jungle Cruise and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker spring to mind – but in an age in which the superhero reigns supreme in all multiplex cinemas, where Marvel stands tall among your options and DC offer more films, the blockbuster sphere’s choices in representation must face more scrutiny. Both Marvel and DC should be praised for an often interesting route of colour-blind casting, shifting the films away from a sea of white faces like their comic book counterparts, but when it comes to sexuality the cinematic multiverses of both comic book companies have been let down. 

Things change in adaptations – outfits are modified, origins tweaked, sometimes even superpowers are added or subtracted – but characters’ sexualities are often so intensely a part of who they are that taking them away is undoubtedly detrimental to their representation. What would Spider-Man be without his pining for MJ or Gwen? What would Batman be without his flirtations with Catwoman? The comic books they’re based on are filled with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender characters. But, while generally gay, lesbian or trans characters have just been flat out avoided, bisexual characters have been straight-washed into oblivion. 

From the start of the modern era of comic book movies, canonically bisexual characters have been dumped into the wasteland of being depicted as straight. The “X-Men” comics, for example, have always been political stories – Stan Lee based Professor Xavier and Magneto on Martin Luther King and Malcolm X – but under the tenure of Chris Claremont, the stories dovetailed into addressing the oppression he saw en masse: that faced by the LGBTQ+ community. 

Claremont wrote in the 80s, during the AIDS crisis, and his stories followed similar routes. Rogue is one of the central heroes of the original X-Men trilogy, and yet for the three films she is only ever presented as straight. Much was made about how Ian McKellen suggested certain scenes in X2 allude to “coming out”, and yet the sexualities of the canon characters remained ignored. This is even more interesting given that Rogue actress Anna Paquin is bisexual, and the director of X-Men and X2, Bryan Singer, is also bisexual, yet Rogue is reduced to someone pining for a boy. Notoriously homophobic director Brett Ratner, brought in to helm the third film, even forces a pointless love triangle for her, Rogue being pined after by both Ice-Man and Shadowcat. 

What becomes more perplexing is that the prequel quadrilogy – X-Men: First Class, X-Men: Days of Future Past, X-Men: Apocalypse and Dark Phoenix – pivots to focusing on the young iteration of Mystique. In the original films, Rebecca Romijn’s interpretation is a loyal, and lethal, second-in-command to Magneto until she is turned “normal” by the mutant cure. But in the prequels Jennifer Lawrence is given a much more substantial role, eventually becoming the focus of the second film. Yet, despite the prequels being even more overt in their allusion to LGBTQ+ issues (Mystique’s final line in First Class is “mutant and proud”), she is depicted as straight, First Class presenting her burgeoning romance with Nicholas Hoult’s Beast and her growing interest in Michael Fassbender’s Magneto. 

Despite going off on her own for the subsequent two films, there is nothing made of her sexuality. She is depicted as straight despite Mystique’s status as a bisexual woman. What makes this worse is that there is plenty to mine in terms of representation. Mystique’s list of powers includes shapeshifting. This provides ample chance to explore the concept of passing for straight. Had they used her sexuality properly, this could have been a way to look at how people sexually express themselves – her blue form representing her interest in men and women, her “normal” form being a way of conforming to the sexuality binary of gay or straight. 

Bryan Singer also directed Days of Future Past and Apocalypse, thus making his four X-Men films notable for being so lacking in representing their characters properly. In Apocalypse, for example, Olivia Munn’s Psylocke is reduced to a near-mute henchman of villain Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac). Munn is given nothing to do. In fact, she has the least of the four Horseman that follow Apocalypse, and by the end is the only one not to die (ArkAngel) or defect (Storm, Magneto). She skulks off into the shadows never to be referenced again. 

The argument could be made that these are films aimed at children and a large mainstream audience, and that in the early 2000s having two prominent bisexual characters would have been hard to do. But, as the world has changed, the fact that the X-Men films stuck to borrowing from LGBTQ+ culture without properly showing it becomes all the more troublesome. It extends further than just the mainline films, too. R-rated swear-fests like Deadpool and Deadpool 2 don’t offer much in the way of showing people. 

Much was made of Brianna Hildebrand’s Negasonic Teenage Warhead being shown in Deadpool 2 to be in a same-sex relationship with Yukio (Shiori Katsuna). This would be a huge step in the right direction, incorporating Hildebrand’s own sexuality into her character and staying true to the roots of the comics, if it weren’t for the fact that despite three leading appearances (once in a poor Wolverine prequel and twice in his own films) Deadpool himself is reduced to being straight. 

In the comics, Deadpool is an out, proud and extremely loud pansexual character flaunting his sexuality at any chance he gets. The first film opts, instead, to offer a love story of him trying to cure his own cancer to be with his love Vanessa. Despite Ryan Reynolds being perfect for the role, and having a very sex-positive attitude – a funny scene of him being pegged for International Women’s Day is a highlight – the first Deadpool film still presents the character as straight. Even in the sequel where Vanessa is unceremoniously killed in the opening act, the film becomes a long meditation on loss and Deadpool’s pining for his heterosexual love.

Deadpool is never shown as anything other than straight. Flirting with men sure, but never expressly showing himself engaging in sex with men. Given that the film is excessively violent, and filled with bad language, showing Deadpool having sex with a man would not be out of the realm of doable and certainly negates the excuse of avoiding such to reach large family audiences.

Marvel Studios, under the guidance of Kevin Feige, have tried in part to offer better representation. It’s clear that, for a period of time when Feige answered to Ike Perlmutter, there was a tension between Feige’s desire to show the full spectrum of the universe and Perlmutter’s bottom-line decisions to not make black or women-focused films, meaning that the time it took to get Black Panther and Captain Marvel are indicators as to why no LGBTQ+ characters appeared until Chloe Zhao’s Eternals, released in 2021.

This excuse can only extend so far, however. Perlmutter has been ousted for some time, and yet the Marvel Cinematic Universe has still not done much to course-correct this oversight. Loki, perhaps one of the MCU’s most popular characters, is a prime example. Having first appeared in Kenneth Branagh’s 2011 film Thor, Tom Hiddleston has played the role across five additional films and a spin-off Disney+ series. In the films, little is shown about Loki’s internal life, the focus being squarely on the family dynamics of him, his brother Thor, and his parents Frigga and Odin. 

The issue arises in his self-titled series ‘Loki’. While much was made about showing variant versions of Loki, the exploration of his sexuality boils down to one conversation in which he summarises his companion Sylvie’s sexuality as both, before confirming that his is also both. The focus on looking at Loki falling for his female variant undoes what was genuine chemistry between Hiddleston and Owen Wilson as his mentor-figure Mobius. Showing a more sensitive side to Loki, and him being the central character, could have allowed for his sexuality to come into its own. 

Even when variant versions of Loki are introduced, none are afforded any insight. A sexually liberated Loki, replete with both male and female partners, could have been presented to offer an insight into Loki’s head and heart. It is telling that, for all the potential Lokis we are presented with (an ageing one, an arrogant one, one that is a crocodile), they opted for one of them to be a child, as doing so has long been a guaranteed way for comic book adaptations to avoid inevitable questions regarding sexuality representation.

Kid Loki actor Jack Veal, at 14, is much too young to be depicted as sexually liberated. And he’s not alone. X-Men spin-off Logan took bisexual character Rictor and made him a child too, robbing him of his sexuality. But even within the MCU this tactic has been used multiple times…

‘WandaVision’ explores the world of Wanda Maximoff, and her creation of her two sons Billy and Tommy. Both are shown primarily as children around the age of ten. For anyone familiar with the comics, both children are a part of the LGBTQ+ community. Julian Hilliard’s Billy/Wiccan is gay in the comics, while Jett Klyne’s Tommy/Speed is bisexual. Putting them into the world as children might mean there is longevity for their arcs, but we are yet to see any representation of these fundamental character traits in their appearances across ‘WandaVision’ and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. 

What appears to be the changing status of the MCU is Taika Waititi’s Thor: Love and Thunder in which Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie will be searching for a Queen to rule alongside her. Thompson and Waititi confirmed before the release of Thor: Ragnarok that Valkyrie is bisexual, but a scene depicting her leaving her room with a woman was cut for “pacing”. Even so, introducing your first proudly bisexual character after 29 films feels a little too late given that Valkyrie isn’t the main character of the film anyway. 

The rival to the MCU, the DC Extended Universe, is not much better, despite a rich history of bisexual characters to choose from. One of the cornerstones of the DCEU is Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman, first introduced in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Diana Prince has gone on to star in two versions of Justice League and two solo films. Her first solo film, Wonder Woman, plays out like an epic war story romance, with director Patty Jenkins opting to tell a story of compassion and love during World War I. Diana is shown to have been raised on the mythical island of Thymescira, populated only by Amazon women. Chris Pine’s Steve Trevor is the first man she has ever seen. 

Their romance forms the backbone of the narrative, allowing her to see the contradictions of mankind, and his heroic sacrifice convinces her that mankind has redeeming qualities. In the follow up, Wonder Woman 1984, Trevor is resurrected via a wish. The main point of contention is that his resurrection means he possesses the body of a totally different man. Despite the film’s epic runtime, WW84 underdeveloped one aspect of its narrative: the clear flirtations between Diana and Kristen Wiig’s Barbara (who becomes the villainous Cheetah). In the comic books, all Amazons engage in same-sex relationships. As such, Diana has been portrayed consistently as bisexual, as has Cheetah. Their relationship or, more aptly, their lack thereof, seems dismissive of a fundamental part of each of these famous comic book characters.  

Jenkins’ exploration of love could have extended to showing Diana and Cheetah falling in love and Cheetah’s villainous turn being the emotional point of contention. While the comic code authority put a stop to most explicit depictions of Diana’s attraction to women for some, her creator William Moulton Marston was a professor who theorised that the world would be better under the loving authority of women. Diana herself was based on two women, his wife Elizabeth Holloway Marston and their mutual lover Olive Byrne. Byrne was also the daughter of radical feminist Ethel Byrne and niece of Margaret Sanger. The fact that Wonder Woman was explicitly based on two bisexual women, and radical feminists, is as key to her character as the lasso of truth, yet in Wonder Woman and WW84 it is absent.

Similarly, the DCEU’s other consistent character is Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, first introduced rather unfortunately as the abused and lovelorn sidekick of The Joker in David Ayer’s Suicide Squad. As one of only two female members of the team, Harley is the sexual object, the one who walks into battle against an ancient witch in hot pants and a crop top.

Given that the most praised aspect of the negatively reviewed film was Harley Quinn, it’s not a surprise a spin-off was green-lit. For some reason, instead of taking her away from a team and allowing her to shine on her own (or at least with her on/off girlfriend from the comic books Poison Ivy), DC pushed her into a group, the all-girl Birds of Prey. Director Cathy Yan begins the film with Harley narrating her life story over animation, including her lamenting failed relationships. Here, an image of her with another female is shown briefly and then nothing is made of it. 

Despite Yan’s best efforts to subvert the tropes of many women-centred comic book films – practical outfits, decent fight scenes, etc. – the film falls into queer-baiting tropes. Despite the prominent role for Rosie Perez’s lesbian detective Montoya (who is shown to have an ex-girlfriend briefly), the film does nothing with its LGBTQ+ characters. There are no references made to Harley’s sexuality outside of the opening animation, and given that this is entirely her emancipation, that is noticeable by its absence. It should also be noted that there is heavy queer-baiting on the part of villains Black Mask (Ewan McGregor) and Victor (Chris Messina), without ever properly exploring it. 

It’s this lack of care shown to Harley’s sexuality that best illustrates how studios continue to consider bisexuality as something to be erased. And this is made worse in James Gunn’s R-rated gore fest The Suicide Squad in which Harley’s subplot is based entirely around her falling in love with her captor (a nondescript Latin-American fascist). Gunn’s genuine attempt to inject emotion into the caper is admirable, but making her subplot entirely about this romance with another man once again robs us of the full spectrum of her sexuality. 

Much of the erasure comes in the midst of these large multi-film franchises, but 2005’s Constantine is not such a film. Francis Lawrence’s take on the main character from the ‘Hellblazer’ comics is so radically different it should be laughed at. Alan Moore’s creation, a Sting-lookalike Liverpudlian occultist, dons a trademark pale trench coat and red tie to do battle with the forces of the unnatural. In Lawrence’s film, Keanu Reeves plays him as an American, black haired guy in a black suit. What’s more, the film makes no reference to his bisexuality which is ever-present in the comics. 

Given that Constantine was an action-horror aimed at adults, there is no excuse for this to happen. Moreover, Constantine wasn’t tied to any ongoing franchise so did not need to curtail to bigger universe needs. While the film is interesting for casting Tilda Swinton as Gabriel, giving the angels an androgynous look, it’s still questionable why sex is barely present. There is a hint that Peter Stomare’s underused Lucifer is sexually interested in everyone (he is also bisexual in the comic books), but nothing is made of it. 

More so than any other comic book character, John Constantine has been a symbol of the punk era, showing Moore’s ability to imbue a subculture with stakes. His bisexuality, at a time when AIDS was a very real threat to the LGBTQ+ community, makes him more than just a cool guy who fights demons, he’s one of the first comic book characters to proudly have that sexuality. This is lost in his film translation. 

It remains to be seen if proper strides are going to be taken to change this kind of flawed ideological process. With films taking on long-form narratives now, and no sign of the big superhero machine stopping, it’s probably time to question if we’re really “respecting canon” by not representing a key aspect of any given character. After all, the importance of people being represented has been spoken about time and time again.

For now we have to settle on the promise that something might become of people gesturing to an interest in “both”, that superhero cinema will one day be brave enough to take a stand against sexuality inequality and discrimination just as it has long taken a stand against demons, aliens and gods. 

Written by Paul Klein

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The brother of Thor, played by Tom Hiddleston since Thor in 2011, has been central to the God of Thunder’s solo franchise and has even become a go-to name for Avengers movies, most notably playing the villain in the studio’s debut team-up The Avengers in 2012.

His entanglement with the centre-most characters of Marvel lore have made him one of the most recognisable and highly respected characters in the whole of superhero cinema. In this article, we’ll follow the development of this now iconic character from a brother to a man lacking a place to belong, to the meanest guy in the galaxy and right back around again.

Warning: this article contains spoilers for Thor, The Avengers, Thor: the Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Infinity War.

Thor (2011) – Loki’s Debut

We first see Loki in a flashback of Thor as a child, the two brothers joyfully playing and then listening to Odin talk about the future and the responsibilities of being a good king. Both kids are eager to be worthy of Odin’s expectations to defend Asgard, but Thor’s destiny is made clear from the beginning: he is to be the king of Asgard.

Child Loki is shown, importantly, to be more shy than his somewhat obnoxious sibling, planting seeds for his dastardly tactics later in life, but it’s quite clear that during his youth he did not hate his brother. It’s pointed out that most of what we are to see will be the result of the parenting of their King and Queen father and mother, that the circumstances which cause them to grow apart will not be the choice of the brothers themselves.

In the film’s present day, Loki arranges a break out of Frost Giants in Asgard during Thor’s coronation, something forcefully pushed home by the choices of director Kenneth Branagh behind the camera and actor Tom Hiddleston’s acting choices in front of it. It’s assumed Loki doesn’t believe his brother is wise enough to be a king, with the underlying nature of Loki’s self-assurance and ego coming to the fore when he reinforces Thor’s ambitions for revenge to his face and then lambasts the plans as “madness” in public – welcome, the God of Mischief.

Even here, Loki doesn’t hate Thor (telling his brother he loves him dearly), but resentment is soon set alight by the revelation that Loki is not Asgardian but instead an adopted Frost Giant bound to a life away from the throne he has sought all his life. Loki is quickly established as an outcast, the core to his relateable villain persona, with his actions from this point seeming more understandable even in the midst of his viciously resentful motivations. To Loki, it’s easier to start over than to adapt to his newly realised standing within his adopted family.

There’s a scene where Loki confronts Odin about his birth – an acting masterpiece by Hiddleston. With tears in his eyes, he yells at Odin that he was just another tool in his hands ready for when he would have needed him. Odin’s reaction is also very emotional, which we know is somewhat out of character, with him falling into the so-called “Odin’s sleep” out of the shock and distress caused by his son’s actions. If the two had been afforded the opportunity to finish their confrontation, perhaps things would have gone very differently, perhaps the events of Thor would not have occurred.

This event is in fact a turning point for Loki’s character, as from here he only cares about gaining more and more power, getting back at Thor in the process by taking away his throne and ‘his precious Earth’ (as he says in The Avengers – 2012). Loki was used to form an alliance, so why shouldn’t he be angry? His entire existence is a political convenience – this is understandable to us, sympathetic even. This cannot condone his actions or be an excuse for how nasty and evil he became, but it does accurately illustrate his internal turmoil and the reasons for him to become how he eventually is in The Avengers (2012).

Thor is filled with moments that showcase Loki’s unique and mischievous talents, the Prince convincing Thor that Odin is not in Odin’s sleep but is in fact dead, and that Thor is to blame. By the time Thor learns of the truth, Loki has unravelled to the point of utter viciousness and desperation, his self-harming behaviour pushing him further and further into darkness, the rage and lack of control Hiddleston presents in the scene being key to illustrating the desperation beneath the bad. Here, he surrenders to his anger and rage, effectively stamping his ticket to his own demise.

The crux of Loki’s story occurs in the film’s conclusion however, where even after abandoning himself to evil and rage he still reaches out for Odin’s approval, the King of Asgard’s refusal to accept Loki causing his son to cast himself into the abyss of the universe both physically and metaphorically. Loki’s decision to fall into the unknown of space ends Thor’s journey but he only becomes worthy at the cost of his closest ally, a theme that will replay itself in future movies. Loki, like Thor, must learn to accept his duty, albeit a different one to that he first saw for himself…

The Avengers (2012) – Evolution Into A Complete Villain

The Avengers was always going to be about the heroes at the centre of the concept, but the picture actually opens with its villain Loki. The God of Mischief, angry and fallen into madness from his last confrontation with Odin, has found a new purpose in avenging Thor, ironically the mirror image of the Avengers’ task. Most importantly, Loki’s choices in this film will lead to his death in Infinity War, The Avengers acting as something of a 2nd act for the character.

It’s established fairly early on that Loki’s pact with the Chitauri is one in which he does not have control, the group threatening to kill him if he does not succeed. Loki is determined to take Thor’s treasure of Earth, but he remains somewhat sympathetic in doing so because of this, endearing himself to us even in the midst of his apocalyptic anger.

The most emotional and meaningful scenes featuring Loki in The Avengers are, much like in his other films, his dialogue with Thor. Though fleeting, the exchange between Loki and Thor on Earth when Thor attempts to take Loki back to Asgard is based in brotherly love, Thor pleading with his brother even in spite of his recent actions. It’s clear that Thor still considers Loki to be his brother even if Loki can no longer see it, but Loki is lost to misplaced ambition or, more accurately, to his pursuit of belonging – he even says in the scene that he’ll prove himself as Odin’s son.

As the film progresses and Loki establishes the upper hand in his war with Earth, he has another important confrontation with his brother, Thor this time offering one last opportunity for redemption during the movie’s climactic battle.

“It’s too late”, Loki claims as Thor pleads with him to stop. It is through these three words that we’re given insight into his own perception of the universe he inhabits; one that is deeply unkind to him. This not only enforces his villainous status in this picture but also issues reminders of his previous arc in Thor, Loki still suffering the effects of losing his life purpose, family and sense of belonging.

In this confrontation, Loki almost hesitates, the Joss Whedon directed close-up showing him to be almost crying. This scene, which illustrates the struggle inside of Loki, helps us to link the wars he rages with the wars within himself, the God in a man’s world having otherworldly power to play out his inner turmoil on a planetary scale. Loki expresses that Thor can no longer appeal to sentiment, Loki’s position as outcast son and prince brought to the fore ahead of his decision to maintain his fight, to seek control.

Loki of course loses in his battle to control earth, owing to the unforeseen bravery of Tony Stark (Iron Man), and is whisked away to Asgard by Thor to face punishment for his crimes. By the end of The Avengers Loki is down and he’s lost everything, but he’s home. And home is where we find him in Thor: The Dark World.

Thor: The Dark World (2013) – Loki’s Path of Growth

In this film, we find Loki where we left him: in chains, brought to face Odin’s judgement for his crimes committed on Earth.

We don’t actually see him in action until about the 35 minute mark when we are immediately aligned with his point of view, the somewhat endearing villain (by this point a fan favourite) looking out from a cell towards other prisoners in one of Asgard’s jails.

The first contact Loki has is with his mother, this choice to quickly realign Loki with his central family group offering hints at fixing the broken relationship caused in the first Thor movie. He rejects her pleas, but his reestablished presence in their lives is brought to the fore, Loki reaching out for his mother’s hand as the hologram disappears.

The point that lights the match in The Dark World is the death of the Queen, Thor’s mother and Loki’s adoptive mother. This event, which sends Asgard into mourning, reunites the two brothers as Thor requires Loki’s assistance to leave Asgard through a secret path in search of revenge. The meeting between the two brothers here perhaps shines more of an insight into Loki than at any other point in the movies, his true sadness and grief masked to his brother via a more confident hologram, the real Loki trapped within his own image, the fulfilment of his wish to be truly excommunicated from his family feeling much more brutally horrific in reality than he had anticipated. When the hologram disappears, Thor bares witness to the rubble that remains of Loki’s life, the villain of two previous movies now the most sympathetic character in this second franchise entry.

Many quips, witty exchanges and sarcastic comments later, and it’s clear that the issue between Thor and Loki is that neither man can trust one another given their histories of keeping monumental secrets from one another.

Thor’s “I wish I could trust you again” is responded to with “trust my rage” by Loki in the midst of their reconciliation, the foundations of their life-long brotherhood holding strong even after such horrendous events. Thor can’t trust anything Loki says or does, but he can trust that he knows the parts that form the foundations of Loki’s character, and trusting Loki’s rage is something he can do.

Thor: The Dark World wasn’t as well received as a lot of other Marvel Cinematic Universe entries, but seeing Loki and Thor team together against the Dark Elves was very good fan service and perhaps the best example of Marvel pulling off a loveable anti-hero. It is because of this and the question of whether Loki was motivated by love and respect for his brother or his own selfish pursuit of freedom and the throne that the film’s conclusion, which sees Loki embody Odin’s likeness to finally take rule of Asgard, brings so much intrigue and joy.

We will also know soon what Loki did to Odin in Ragnarok…

Thor: Ragnarok (2017) & Avengers: Infinity War (2018) – A Path Towards Redemption

Thor: Ragnarok picks up where the last Thor instalment left off – Loki is on the throne of Asgard.

As ruler, he is careless about state matters and does not bother at all about the chaos of the nine realms; he just has fun impersonating Odin and painting himself as a benevolent ruler and the savior of Asgard – a hilarious addition to the Odin-son saga that sought to quickly erase much of the second film (which Thor actor Chris Hemsworth reportedly hated). Almost immediately Thor discovers that Loki is performing as Odin and the reset button is well and truly hit, comedic shenanigans set forth with Thor’s insistence upon Loki taking him to wherever he has deserted their father.

In the reuniting of the two sons with their father, Odin makes the point of calling both Loki and Thor “my two sons”, firmly bringing the Loki story-arc to a conclusion and affording the character the opportunity thereafter to find redemption with regards to Asgard and, most importantly, with regards to Thor. Unbeknownst to us, it would be the satisfying arc conclusion we didn’t see killing the character in the movie that followed… Infinity War.

Infinity War is the final stage of Loki’s character arc, Tom Hiddleston’s character already undergoing redemption in Ragnarok and needing that one last act of honourable defiance to solidify him as an ally to Thor once and for all.

At the beginning of the film, Loki chooses the life of his brother over that of the Tesseract knowing that he may plunge the universe into chaos by doing so and embracing his death in turn. Coloured with typical Loki trickery, the act of sacrificing himself to his former master Thanos in order to save Thor illustrates Loki’s overcoming of his darkness, the demons that plagued him quite literally exchanged for the light of the love given to him by his adoptive family. Here, Loki effectively tells Thor that above Earth, the Tesseract or indeed the universe, it is family (or more accurately his brother) that means the most to him, and that he’s willing to give his life to prove it.

Prove it he does, and Loki becomes one of the first casualties of Thanos’ reign of terror, the God of Mischief playing his final trick.

Or has he?

Perhaps the biggest question to come from the scene – other than “is he really dead this time?” – is “why did Loki take the Tesseract in the first place? Was he not redeemed in Ragnarok like we thought he was? Does he know something we don’t know?

Perhaps this is something to be theorised over in the future or, perhaps more realistically, this moment simply serves as the final reminder of Loki’s ongoing internal struggle, the taking of the Tesseract emblematic of a character eternally at odds with himself, the good overcoming the bad at the most testing of moments to prove that evil may have consumed him at different stages but that it never owned him.

“I assure you brother, the sun will shine on us again.”

Will Loki’s death be another fake one, or will his inclusion from here on out be played out in flashbacks? Can a character this remarkable be truly gone for good? Let us know your opinions in the comments!

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We’re all interested to see how the big M will adapt as they move into the post-Endgame era. Will the universe sit in a holding pattern until the X-Men arrive? What will the next event be? How will new streaming platform Disney+ change the amount of film content they release?

Here are 10 things we could and probably should see from the Marvel Cinematic Universe over the next 10 years. 

1. T’Challa’s Character Development

As we move into a new era of Marvel, likely to be without Steve Rogers and Tony Stark, it’s unclear how the group dynamic will change. Who will be an Avenger? Who will be the leader? Will any of that even matter?

Of course, the team-ups will have to continue – the culmination of the films to an event blockbuster is Marvel’s thing – but what will T’Challa’s role be?

We’ve seen his leadership ability, we’ve seen his strength and we’ve seen how valuable he is in technological terms. That’s all secondary to character, though…

In Black Panther, we saw T’challa change his outlook on his family, country and the world. How will he handle the consequences of his actions if it leads to another incident like Ultron? What flaws will develop over his next appearances, and how will he respond? Or will he get the Captain America treatment, where his flaw is that he’s just way too good? I hope for the former as the best characters in the Marvel films are the ones that go through lots of change.

2. Reincorporating Characters Into New Roles

Hero identities change all the time in comic books. How many Robins has Joker killed now? The first one became Nightwing…

We just saw all the different Spider-Man iterations in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, so film audiences are familiar. Plus, Marvel isn’t a stranger to changing actors for a role. The only difference is the new character.

It has been theorized (based on contracts) that Bucky is set to become Captain America. Like Steve, he’s a super soldier, and he’s been turned from being a sleeper agent into a good guy now. Shuri’s technological proficiency could give her an upper-hand in becoming Iron Heart, Iron Man’s female successor. Thor, assuming he survives Endgame, is still the protector of eight realms, which would make it cool to see him appear in cameos just as Fury does. Thor theoretically has the ability to travel to any character in the MCU, so seeing him deliver exposition in post-credit scenes would be fun. Don’t completely eliminate what we’re familiar with, even if they are relegated.

3. A Good Ruffalo Hulk Film

The Incredible Hulk is a weird movie. Edward Norton stars in it, its cinematography dates it in the mid-2000s and it shows us that Bruce can’t have sex. There are some good things contained within it, like editing in rhythm with Banner’s rising heart rate and seeing how he learned to control himself, but overall the execution is lacking compared to what has followed. While it’s possible Mark Ruffalo could fulfil his contractual obligation to Marvel by featuring in upcoming film, I would prefer to see him sent off (if he is) in his own feature. It could be a way to introduce a new recurring character or technology while also bringing closure to the Hulk we know and love. Unfortunately, I think it’s much more likely that he appears in something like Black Widow because of the relationship between Universal and Marvel that has caused tensions across all these years regarding solo film rights.

4. More Cosmic Marvel

Between Guardians 1 & 2, Thor 2 & 3, Doctor Strange, Avengers: Infinity War and Captain Marvel, it’s fair to say we’ve seen some excellent output from Cosmic Marvel.

There are so many different settings to explore and weird characters to meet. Of course we’ll see more in the sequels to the aforementioned films (crossing my fingers for a Thor 4), but an Eternals film is also in development which has the potential to incorporate space (the Eternals are superhuman beings created by Celestials tasked to protect Earth against the Deviants), though it’s likely an Eternals film is more akin to Thor or Captain Marvel than a straight cosmic adventure. There’s also a chance we could get a lot of it in a future Fantastic Four film now that Disney own the rights to that franchise. The color and set design of cosmic films give us all a good break from the typical Marvel look, so in an age where intrigue will inevitably be tested, I say the more the better.

5. More Visual Variety

Marvel’s best possible next step in its cinematic evolution is growing beyond its formulaic standards of cinematography. Don’t get me wrong, the movies look good and achieving this kind of visual cohesion is certainly impressive, but the camera, lighting and editing mostly lack a personal touch. With the universe firmly established, Marvel should allow more room for creative freedom. I think Thor: Ragnarok and the Guardians films are each proof that giving a director allowance to execute their vision can still bring in money, so please give us Edgar Wright and Ava DuVernay’s superhero movies (we were promised them with Ant-Man and Black Panther respectively). Give Spike Lee or Quentin Tarantino a call. You have the money to convince them.

More different is a good thing.

“There was an idea to bring together a group of remarkable people to see if we could become something more. So when they needed us, we could fight the battles that they never could.”

Marvel Studios have been the standard bearer for all superhero films for the past 10 years, presenting 20 movies to increasing audiences the world over and earning around $17.3billion at the worldwide box office. The studio has created 10 separate franchises since its debut film Iron Man in 2008, digging into the once exclusive comic book properties of the likes of “Ant-Man” and “Guardians of the Galaxy” to present fresh and always entertaining takes on a genre that they have come to master above even their most intimate of contemporaries. In this edition of Ranked, we have judged each of the 20 Marvel Studios Avengers-related movies from worst to best based on their quality and historical importance. As always, we encourage you to share your thoughts on social media and in the comments below, but for now it’s on with the list…

20. The Incredible Hulk (2008)

Director: Louis Leterrier
Starring: Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, William Hurt, Ty Burrell, Tim Blake Nelson, Lou Ferigno

When The Incredible Hulk went into production, the characters of Bruce Banner and his gamma radiated alter ego were perhaps the biggest pop culture icons left at the behest of Marvel Studios after auctioning off their X-Men, Fantastic Four and Spider-Man to other companies. The duality of Banner’s character therefore seemed like the perfect choice for an audience-grabbing introductory film; one which would feature more fun and chaos than the Ang Lee presentation from 2003. If audiences didn’t see Iron Man earlier in the year, then they’d surely see this. History would have it that audiences did turn up to see Iron Man, and as such the lack of quality on offer in The Incredible Hulk was more obvious than it may have otherwise been. The movie was up and down, offering some half-decent fan service in amongst the rage and chaos but failing to deliver in terms of an interesting story or reason to care. In the aftermath of the release, it became clear that Leterrier was never entirely confident in directing the picture and had only taken the job after being rejected for his passion project Iron Man, and star Edward Norton threw the whole production under the bus by claiming he had ‘basically written the movie’. The Incredible Hulk now stands far afoot the bottom of the Avengers list in terms of quality, and can be considered as perhaps the only severe misstep of the studio’s entire universe. The film remains canon, with William Hurt’s continued presence being evidence of this, but having switched out Norton for Ruffalo it’s clear that this is the one film on this list Marvel are trying to forget about.

19. Iron Man 2 (2010)

Director: Jon Favreau
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Mickey Rourke, Sam Rockwell, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Scarlett Johansson, Samuel L. Jackson, Paul Bettany, Jon Favreau

Iron Man 2 felt like a big deal back in 2010. It was the third movie of the would-be Avengers universe and had cast the recently reconciled Mickey Rourke hot off the back of his triumphant return to prominence in The Wrestler. Underneath the hype there were grumblings of malcontent however, with Don Cheadle being substituted in for Terrence Howard following a pay dispute in which Marvel reportedly refused to offer Howard the same money for the 2nd movie as they had offered Downey Jr., and the story of Edward Norton’s future within the universe seemingly putting an end to early plans to have Iron Man and the rest of the Avengers team-up to take down a rebellious Hulk (as hinted towards in the post-credit scene in The Incredible Hulk). Ultimately, this landed Iron Man 2 in the zone of “safe sequel”; a film which delivers on all of the original movie’s promises but did little to exceed expectations. Still useful in how it was offering an appropriately colourful take on a superhero genre in the midst of Nolan’s darker Dark Knight trilogy, this Jon Favreau follow-up is perhaps less well remembered now than it was way back when, and we can all see Marvel’s biggest faults – presenting believable threats to their heroes – poking their ugly heads, but this is by no means a bad movie in the same sense that The Incredible Hulk was; just more of a forgettable one.

18. Thor: The Dark World (2013)

Director: Alan Taylor
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Christopher Eccleston, Idris Elba, Stellan Skarsgård, Kat Dennings

Speaking of forgettable; is there a movie on this list that has as few special moments as Thor: The Dark World?

For the 2nd instalment of the Thor standalone franchise, and coming in the aftermath of The Avengers in 2012, The Dark World felt safe in many of the ways that Iron Man 2 did, though it also shared The Incredible Hulk’s unique trait of being a universe instalment that Marvel would look to move on from, resetting many of the lingering story threads in the first few minutes of its follow up Ragnarok in 2017. The Dark World did its job, presenting fans with more of the beloved relationship between Thor and Loki, and worked to introduce more of the unique planets and beings from the comic books, but it was lacking in anything beyond the typical faceless villain stereotype as a threat, and the film suffered significantly as a result of this. Thor 2 was very much the Iron Man 2 of the Thor franchise, only the relationship between Thor & Loki as well as the presence of a few characters that have since been forgotten about – as played by Natalie Portman, Stellan Skarsgård and Kat Dennings – were just enough to pip the Iron Man sequel in this list.

17. Iron Man 3 (2013)

Director: Shane Black
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Ben Kingsley, Jon Favreau, Rebecca Hall

Iron Man 3 is one of the more controversial entries into Marvel’s Avengers universe of films, and the entirety of the reason as to why is the film’s twist. Warning, there are spoilers ahead…

Screenwriter-director Shane Black had previously worked with Downey Jr. on Kiss Kiss Bang Bang in 2005 and therefore seemed like an easy, creative alternative to the Iron Man franchise’s exiting Jon Favreau. The issue was that Black was noteworthy for tackling genre conventions and therefore sought to deviate from the typical ‘rise of an ultimate villain’ character arc, seeing it as too much of an obvious path for Iron Man 3 to walk down. As such, the movie developed a believable, identifiable threat in the form of Ben Kingsley’s Mandarin, only for Tony Stark/Iron Man to discover that the character was simply an actor relaying lines on behalf of another villain, a villain who turned out to be much less identifiable and interesting, and much more like the lacklustre villains that had populated the universe to this point. In 2013 audiences had grown tired of under-developed villains with little to identify with, so Iron Man 3’s tease of a great villain proved too much for many. It was a moment which overshadowed the film and became the topic of discussion regarding the movie itself, which other than this moment was actually quite fun though somewhat forgettable.

Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
Director: Taika Waititi
Screenwriter: Craig Kyle, Eric Pearson, Christopher L. Yost
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett, Idris Elba, Jeff Goldblum, Tessa Thompson, Karl Urban, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Hopkins, Taika Waititi

When Taika Waititi, the New Zealand born director who helmed What We Do in the Shadows (2014) and Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016), was announced as the man to helm Marvel’s latest Thor movie, it seemed like an uphill struggle for the mostly independent director regarding his power to assert his laugh-out-loud funny yet innocent and easy-going style onto the film amidst a universe filled with interlocked stories, presentation and an ever-growing list of characters. To the credit of both himself and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it was a challenge that he overcame with the same great might as the hammer of Thor, destroying some of the more tiresome Marvel tropes in the same hilarious manner he had presented his most recent movies, ultimately creating an unmissable Marvel release that worked to breathe new life into the Thor franchise and may have a more profound wider effect on the Avengers franchise, too. Ragnarok was so funny it may just change the fabric of the universe forever…

First things first, Thor: Ragnarok is by no means a game-changing film with profound effects on the overall presentation and reception of superhero movies in any way beyond its impressively strong comedic chops. In fact, the story borrows a lot from the vastly similar plots of both The Avengers (2012) and Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) in that a group of misfits are brought together in the pursuit of doing some good, only to be locked in an inescapable situation they inevitably escape in order to take down a faceless army led by an underwhelming villain with little more credibility than an early story beat that seems to come out of nowhere in the wider scheme of the universe. The visual presentation is similarly as samey, with the exotic worlds being different to Earth, yes, but lacking in real creativity or the colourful spectacle the Guardians films so excellently offered. These are elements barely noticeable under the freshness of the movie’s outright comedy, but they’re indicative of a universe recycling the same things with new faces and new directors in the hope that we shan’t notice. We notice, sure, but do we really care? I’d say not.

Ragnarok excels in ways that most superhero genre films do not. It’s exceedingly funny. Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man: Homecoming are perhaps the only mainstream superhero films in recent years to boast comedy as one of their sub-genres to anywhere near the same degree as offered in this picture, and it’s more than enough to push Ragnarok way beyond Thor 2 and, dare I say it, Thor (1) in terms of quality. Of course, the task in Ragnarok is entirely different to that of Thor, and a comparison is therefore perhaps unfair, but it remains a debate to be had which is a compliment in of itself.

Telling the tale of Thor reuniting with Loki to overcome the sadistic goals of a long-lost sister that has returned to Asgard, the movie is, of course, led with the same charismatic charm as has become apparent across the career of its director Taika Waititi, who even ends up stealing the show in a cameo as side-character Korg, a creature made of rocks (but falling apart one stone at a time). The overall tone of the film is very similar to that of the trailer, which gave a real sense of the tongue-in-cheek nature of much of the film. Take one scene for example, where Thor crosses a stage-play designed to praise the supposed death of Loki. In it, the actor playing Thor is Chris Hemsworth’s real-life brother Luke, and the actor playing Loki is Matt Damon. It’s barely referenced, and only highlighted as much as it needs to be, reinforcing the much less serious and much lighter version of the universe and particularly the Thor character than we’ve perhaps seen before, even for a franchise in which he is often used for comedic effect. Jeff Goldblum’s Grandmaster – a planet ruling tyrant with more fluff than evil – is similarly designed, offering a threat to protagonist Thor while remaining likeable and almost too nice of a person to be carrying out the sort of acts we witness him carry out. It is only through the ever-serious presence of Hela, the Goddess of Death (Blanchett), that the only serious threat to Thor’s world, heritage and existence exists, and though she does become the force behind much of the destruction the events in the film cause, and though she technically plays a larger part in Thor’s character-arc than any other character in the movie and perhaps in the franchise (other than Odin), the gravitas of Blanchett’s performance, the foreshadowing of her failure in her task and the overall up-beat tone of the film do play her off to be less than important in the grander scheme of things, playing her ultimately terrifying destruction off as something altogether less scary.

Ragnarok seems often to play with the idea of the Marvel universe itself, and the ultimately awkward encounters that can occur within it due to the over-the-top characterisations at its heart. Playing like a sit-com, a particularly noteworthy moment in the film features a prominent character cameo whose powers are met with confusion and awkwardness by Thor himself as the Asgardian has never crossed paths with said character in the universe before. But how would he know what to expect? It’s a simple question that seems to be skimmed over in other, lesser, superhero films but is excellently explored in Ragnarok. Similarly, character traits we’ve become accustomed to over the years, such as Loki’s ability to appear in multiple locations at once, are highlighted for their absurdity through comedy, which actually brings the powers to the forefront of the characterisation, placing a greater emphasis on superhero abilities than we’ve perhaps seen before in a franchise so often striving to be human, identifiable.

While Ragnarok offers very little in terms of imaginative and overwhelmingly impressive CG effects as well as its overall visual presentation, nor in terms of its seemingly by the (Marvel) books story formula, the movie does bring the typical Waititi sense of community and heart-felt personality that was unknowingly missing from Marvel movies and particularly the Thor franchise, which seemed the perfect fit for the director’s very particular style. Musically, the film gave birth to a new theme for the Thor character that we’re sure to see in the movies ahead, and the relationship between himself, Loki and Hulk was taken to a new level that is sure to bring something extra to the already very full table set for Avengers 3 (Infinity War) in 2018.

Conclusively, Waititi has taken a could-be stale formula and transformed it into something heartfelt and with a key sense of community that has helped to build the out-of-this-world nature of Thor’s life/upbringing as something entirely more relatable than it has been in the past, all the while expressing his terrific sense of comedic presentation for what is undeniably the funniest Marvel movie yet – an innocent, loving comedy you’re bound to fall in love with.

18/24

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The rules were simple: any film based on a comic book or graphic novel was eligible. As always let us know what you think.

Number 30: The Crow (1994) 

Director: Alex Proyas
Cast: Brandon Lee, Ernie Hudson, Michael Wincott

Number 29: Scott Pilgrim vs The World (2010)

Director: Edgar Wright
Cast: Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans, Anna Kendrick, Alison Pill, Brandon Routh, Jason Schwartzman, Ellen Wong

Number 28: Superman II (1980)

Director: Richard Lester
Cast: Gene Hackman, Christopher Reeve, Ned Beatty, Jackie Cooper, Sarah Douglas, Margot Kidder, Jack O’Halloran, Valerie Perrine, Susannah York, Terence Stamp

Number 27: Batman (1989)

Director: Tim Burton
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Michael Keaton, Kim Basinger, Robert Wuhl, Pat Hingle, Billy Dee Williams, Michael Gough, Jack Palance

Number 26: Kick-Ass (2010)

Director: Matthew Vaughn
Cast: Aaron Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Mark Strong, Chloë Grace Moretz, Nicolas Cage, Lyndsy Fonseca, Clark Duke, Evan Peters 

Number 25: Blade (1998)

Director: Stephen Norrington
Cast: Wesley Snipes,Stephen Dorff, Kris Kristofferson, N’Bushe Wright, Donal Logue

Number 24: Ant-Man (2015)

Director: Peyton Reed
Cast: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Corey Stoll, Bobby Cannavale, Michael Peña, Tip “T.I.” Harris, Anthony Mackie, Wood Harris, Judy Greer, David Dastmalchian, Michael Douglas

Number 23: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)

Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Jesse Eisenberg, Diane Lane, Laurence Fishburne, Jeremy Irons, Holly Hunter, Gal Gadot

Number 22: Sin City (2005)

Director: Frank Miller & Robert Rodriguez
Cast: Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Benicio Del Toro, Jessica Alba, Brittany Murphy, Elijah Wood, Alexis Bledel, Josh Hartnett

Number 21: Men In Black (1997)

Director: Barry Sonnenfeld
Cast: Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith, Linda Fiorentino, Vincent D’Onofrio, Rip Torn

Number 20: Watchmen (2009)

Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Malin Åkerman, Billy Crudup, Matthew Goode, Carla Gugino, Jackie Earle Haley, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Patrick Wilson

Number 19: Thor (2011)

Director: Kenneth Branagh
Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Stellan Skarsgård, Colm Feore, Ray Stevenson, Idris Elba, Kat Dennings, Rene Russo, Anthony Hopkins

Number 18: Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Directors: Anthony and Joe Russo
Cast: Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Anthony Mackie, Cobie Smulders, Frank Grillo, Emily VanCamp, Hayley Atwell, Robert Redford, Samuel L. Jackson

Number 17: V For Vendetta (2006)

Director: James McTeigue
Cast: Natalie Portman, Hugo Weaving, Stephen Rea, John Hurt

Number 16: Dredd (2012)

Director: Pete Travis
Cast: Karl Urban, Olivia Thirlby, Wood Harris, Lena Headey

Number 15: X-Men (2000)

Director: Bryan Singer
Cast: Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Bruce Davison, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Ray Park, Anna Paquin

Number 14: 300 (2006)

Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Gerard Butler, Lena Headey, David Wenham, Dominic West, Giovanni Cimmino, Vincent Regan

Number 13: The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Morgan Freeman

Number 12: Deadpool (2016)

Director: Tim Miller
Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, Gina Carano, T.J. Miller, Leslie Uggams, Brianna Hildebrand, Stefan Kapičić

Number 11: X-Men: First Class (2011)

Director: Matthew Vaughn
Cast: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones, Oliver Platt, Kevin Bacon, Nicholas Hoult, Lucas Till

Number 10: Batman Begins (2005)

Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes, Gary Oldman, Cillian Murphy, Tom Wilkinson, Rutger Hauer, Ken Watanabe, Morgan Freeman

Number 9: The Avengers (2012)

Director: Joss Whedon
Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston, Clark Gregg, Cobie Smulders, Stellan Skarsgård, Samuel L. Jackson

Number 8: Superman (1978)

Director: Richard Donner
Cast: Marlon Brando, Gene Hackman, Christopher Reeve, Ned Beatty, Jackie Cooper, Glenn Ford, Trevor Howard, Margot Kidder, Valerie Perrine, Maria Schell, Terence Stamp, Phyllis Thaxter, Susannah York

Number 7: Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

Director: James Gunn
Cast: Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Lee Pace, Michael Rooker, Karen Gillan, Djimon Hounsou, John C. Reilly, Glenn Close, Benicio del Toro

Number 6: X2 (2003)

Director: Bryan Singer
Cast: Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Brian Cox, Alan Cumming, Bruce Davison, Anna Paquin

Number 5: Batman Returns (1992)

Director: Tim Burton
Cast: Michael Keaton, Danny DeVito, Michelle Pfeiffer, Christopher Walken, Michael Gough, Pat Hingle, Michael Murphy

Number 4: Spider-Man 2 (2004)

Director: Sam Raimi
Cast: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Alfred Molina, Rosemary Harris, Donna Murphy

Number 3: Captain America: Civil War (2016)

Directors: Anthony Russo and Joe Russo
Cast: Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Anthony Mackie, Don Cheadle, Jeremy Renner, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Rudd, Emily VanCamp, Tom Holland, Frank Grillo, William Hurt, Daniel Brühl

Number 2: Iron Man (2008)

Director: Jon Favreau
Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Terrence Howard, Jeff Bridges, Shaun Toub, Gwyneth Paltrow

Number 1: The Dark Knight (2008)

Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Morgan Freeman