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A universe of Marvel (and not so marvellous) ventures
The Independent
|July 26, 2025
The unenviable task of ranking every single MCU movie to date falls to Jacob Stolworthy, Louis Chilton, Adam White and Kevin EG Perry. Let the arguments commence...
The Marvel Cinematic Universe: is it the gift that keeps on giving? Or a bloated embodiment of everything wrong with modern cinema?
Over the course of nearly two decades, the comic book franchise has released a staggering 37 interconnected films of wildly varying quality, making over $31bn at the box office.
Regardless of whether you eagerly await a new Marvel film like Christmas or you see the studio as a wayward freight train that needs to be stopped, the buck invariably stops with studio president Kevin Feige.
The episodic nature of the film series – with post-credits stings setting up the next blockbuster-to-be - may have started out as a costly experiment, but is now a formula other studios clearly view as a terrific business model.
While some MCU films are the best example of what they are - CGI-heavy superhero adventures – some are not so successful. An MCU ranking is a challenging ask for the sole reason that no fan could ever agree on the placement of certain films – but we’ve given it a go anyway.
From Iron Man to Doctor Strange and Captain Marvel to The Fantastic Four: First Steps, here is our ranking of every MCU movie to date.
37. Deadpool & Wolverine (2024); 36. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022); 35. The Marvels (2023); 34. Ant-Man & the Wasp: Quantumania (2023); 33. Iron Man 2 (2010); 32. The Incredible Hulk (2008); 31. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021); 30. Captain America: Brave New World (2025); 29. Eternals (2021); 28. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022); 27. Black Widow (2021); 26. Captain America: Civil War (2016).
25. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
This story is from the July 26, 2025 edition of The Independent.
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