The Marvel Cinematic Universe is probably one of the most important parts of modern movies we can think of. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, and even then, chances are that you’ve seen at least a couple of this so-called cinematic universe. But it’s been so many years since it started that it may be a little hard to keep track of everything on it, so let’s try to sum it up in 5 minutes or less.
How it all started
Superhero movies have been around for over half a century, but in the last couple of decades, they’ve become the most popular and easy pick for the industry. Marvel, as you know, is one of the most popular comic book publishers in the world, and this means that their characters are among the most popular out there.
In the early 2000’s we got Sam Raimi’s fantastic rendition of the web-swinging hero Spider-Man. And even though those were some truly amazing superhero movies, it wasn’t the start of the Cinematic Universe we know. But they helped to place superheroes and Marvel Comics as a serious name in the film world. And the third movie in Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy, released in 2007 was pretty much the last Marvel movie (setting aside Sony’s and Fox’s) to not be a part of the MCU. In 2008, Phase One started.
Divided by Phases
Originally this was not revealed, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been divided by phases. Phase one actually started off with The first Iron Man movie, with Robert Downey Jr. The movie was a complete success, superhero movies were no longer just for the comic book fans.
They became fun movies for the whole family to enjoy. Tony Stark would, later on, appear in 2008’s The Incredible Hulk in an after-credits scene. Even adding a sequel to Iron Man before going on to introduce more characters, but this works great for establishing S.H.I.E.L.D. This includes introducing Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury’s as well as Scarlett Johanson’s Black Widow and a small preview of Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye.
This first phase also introduced the main avengers Chris Hemsworth’s Thor, Chris Evans’s Captain America, and ended up on a high note with the first Avengers movie with all the characters previously mentioned join forces, even though Hulk’s no longer Edward Norton and has been replaced by Mark Ruffalo. This first phase wasn’t even that interconnected, but it laid out the base stones for all the cinematic universe. The characters, organizations and even the infinity stones were there.
Friends or foes
Phase II is where things got really tangled up together in most movies, with every movie featuring at least one other character. This phase also introduced the Guardians of the Galaxy to the mix. This was a pretty important moment, as this movie would forever change the visual aspect in most MCU movies after that. It included Iron Man 3, which is arguably one of the word movies in the MCU, probably the worst to feature Iron Man at least.
This phase didn’t end with Avengers: Age of Ultron, but rather with an extra movie, Ant-Man. Even though the latter one wasn’t too important at the moment, later on, it became a key character in the franchise.
Even though Iron Man didn’t have any movie with him as the main character after 2013’s Iron Man 3, most of the MCU pretty much revolves around him. But not evenTony Stark could be everybody’s friend. Phase II started off with Captain America: Civil War, one of marvel’s darkest movies. In this one characters pretty much divided into two sides with different ideals, not only personal issues between them were the matter, but the whole conception of a hero was at stake here.
This third phase introduced more characters than ever before, with a new Spider-Man played byTom Holland first appearing in Captain America: Civil War. The introduction of Doctor Strange, one of the most important characters at least plot-wise. BlackPanther, Captain Marvel and The Wasp were also introduced here.
This Phase II also marked the end of the Infinity Saga, the final fight that’d been boiling up for over a decade between all the heroes and Thanos finally took place in Avengers: Endgame.
The Future
Marvel seems to have it all laid out for the future, but even though they have announced a lot of movies and shows coming to this ever-expanding universe, it may start slow. Avengers: Endgame stays as the highest-grossing film of all time, but important characters are gone. It’s tough for Tom Holland’s Spider-Man to replace huge characters such as Iron Man in the MCU. SO the future, even if announced, is still uncertain for the world’s most famous heroes…