37) Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)
Giving Ant-Man the keys to Pandora’s box is a big lift for such a tiny hero—and most of this trilogy-ending entry just breezes through the action, like hurdles in a race to the obvious finish. The Ant Family is charming, but we barely spend any quality, non-chaotic time with them in the Star Wars–like Quantum Realm.
36) Thor: The Dark World (2013)
A nothingburger sequel and arguably the biggest dud of Phase Two, Thor: The Dark World sees Chris Hemsworth return as the God of Thunder in a forgettable outing. The only good thing about this movie is that Hemsworth admitted he was so bored of his job, it compelled Marvel to make a hard left turn called Thor: Ragnarok.
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35) The Marvels (2023)
It’s a bummer that you can’t just walk into a Marvel movie without doing your homework, because the action and onscreen chemistry in The Marvels is fun. Acting as a quasi-sequel to Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, and WandaVision, this promising all-female superhero team-up spends so much time wrapping up and teasing other story arcs that it can barely focus on its own.
34) The Incredible Hulk (2008)
Remember when Edward Norton was the Hulk and then very suddenly not? Even Marvel forgot until Captain America: Brave New World. Though it had Robert Downey Jr. show up for a buzzy cameo, The Incredible Hulk is just not incredible at all.
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33) Iron Man 2 (2010)
A middling sequel when expectations for the Marvel franchise were non-existent, Iron Man 2 is dumb fun, emphasis on “dumb” more than “fun.” The only cool part: The climactic shootout in the Japanese garden, storyboarded by animation legend Genndy Tartakovsky.
32) Captain America: Brave New World (2025)
Nearly all of Marvel’s post-Endgame efforts have a ton of pressure to perform, but Captain America: Brave New World had a lot more riding on it. Anthony Mackie as the new Captain America! Harrison Ford as a new Hulk! Unfortunately, Brave New World doesn’t meet the moment. Mackie and Ford are exceptional, but the film’s rotating cast of villains, weak conspiratorial plot, and poor CGI ground Brave New World too much. It just doesn’t take flight.
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31) Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
Taika Waititi smacks you with emotional blows you might not see coming, but Thor: Love and Thunder fumbles in this high-fantasy romp where Thor meanders in his post-Avengers career. While Chris Hemsworth is visibly comfortable as Thor, and Christian Bale as Gor the God-Butcher is a nightmare incarnate, Love and Thunder lacks the necessary voltage to feel mighty. On top of that, the excitement over Natalie Portman’s return as a worthy Jane Foster is undercut by the film’s questionable ending. It’s more of Thor: Ragnarok, but like overeating candy, it’s too much of a good thing.
30) Eternals (2021)
Eternals is decidedly a non-Marvel Marvel movie. It’s at times moody, triumphant, funny, and burdened with existential crises. You have to commend the great Chloé Zhao for managing to break through the happy-go-luckiness of the Marvel formula. Unfortunately, the end result is a bit unwieldy, with too many characters—and an astoundingly large amount of superhero space jargon—to let us truly fall in love with its story.
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29) Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
Three years after The Avengers elevated Marvel’s B-tier heroes into A-list superstars, the ensemble reassembled for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Despite a mesmerizing James Spader as Ultron, Age of Ultron foreshadowed how the MCU can fumble even in its biggest occasions. Oh, you thought everyone loved this one in 2015? Maybe we did. But like our hairstyles in high school, not everything we love has aged well.
28) Spider-Man: Far from Home (2019)
In hindsight, it’s strange to think the first movie after theEndgame dust had settled was Spider-Man:Far From Home. Back from the snap, Tom Holland swings into action once again as Spider-Man, whose Peter Parker embarks on a school trip to Europe that goes awry when he meets the deceptive Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal). It’s another fun high school movie, but maybe the first movie to follow up something as huge as Endgame should have been more momentous.
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27) Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
We knew the Marvel singularity would come eventually—the moment when all the callbacks, cameos, teases, and interconnected superheroing threatens to sink an MCU entry. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is almost a disaster, being overloaded with cameos that excite, confuse, and snooze fans almost all at once. Despite a brilliant third act that is signature Sam Raimi, the overwhelming majority of Multiverse of Madness dumbs down its main players (save for one great America Chavez) into action figures who bicker in an empty CGI landscape.
26) Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
I hope you like hearing the word quantum. Ant-Man’s second entry has so much nonsensical technobabble that it makes Star Trek sound like Steinbeck. Compared with Avengers: Infinity War, which came out a month earlier, Ant-Man and the Wasp is a breezy, inconsequential entry in the MCU, though a refreshing comedic detour. Jimmy Woo, where are you?
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25) Thor (2011)
Despite the work of Shakesperean filmmaker Kenneth Branagh, who brings an unusually artistic eye to a superhero tentpole that had a Burger King promotion, the 2011 Thor ultimately winds up feeling like a lesser Lord of the Rings. It’s one hell of an introduction to Chris Hemsworth’s God of Thunder, but it would be awhile before Hemsworth feels actually confident swinging his hammer.
24) Ant-Man (2015)
In one scene, Ant-Man shrinks down to a microscopic level and then Neil deGrasse Tyson ruins the movie magic by explaining how that’s not actually possible. If you close your eyes for that scene, it’s a fun heist film about a guy who is the size of a bug.
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23) Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
Leading up to release, it was becoming impossible for Spider-Man: No Way Home to live up to the hype. Director Jon Watts and star Tom Holland, with the grace and heart of Peter Parker himself, basically delivered on all of Reddit’s theories. If only they remembered to make a great movie. Though fans lost their marbles seeing Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire step through Doctor Strange’s portals, No Way Home is a litmus test that gauges how much one can tolerate movies becoming reduced into fan-oriented guessing games. But hey: In December 2021, it had been too long since we all gathered in a movie theater and yelled at the screen. Even if the movie isn’t much of anything, we’ll remember the feelings we had when we watched this for a long, long time.
22) Captain Marvel (2019)
Novel ’90s setting aside, Captain Marvel exists in that frustrating subspace where everything is firing on all cylinders, but it hardly feels “higher, further, faster.” While Brie Larson is assured in her cinematic superheroine debut, and indeed her performance in Captain Marvel elevated the character into the higher echelons of Marvel’s hierarchy, it’s just too muddled in its confusing space politics to feel like it’s saying anything.
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21) Doctor Strange (2016)
Trippier than any of its psychedelic Steve Ditko-inspired visuals is the sound of Benedict Cumberbatch’s American accent. There’s nothing awfully wrong with Doctor Strange, helmed by the skillful Scott Derrickson. But for a movie that tries to blow your mind, its exploration of Stephen Strange’s beginnings as the Sorcerer Supreme is just too typical of superhero origin stories than anything truly original.
20) Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
Sorry, but I have to kick it to Taylor Swift for this one, because she got it right: Deadpool & Wolverine is a “joy portal.” Sure, Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman’s grand arrival in the MCU is a little lacking in the story department. But the film’s sharp jokes, fulsome performances, and cameos (!!!) make up for its shortcomings. Deadpool & Wolverine is the ultimate crowd-pleaser—and there’s nothing wrong with that. Cheers to director Shawn Levy for making a damn hit.
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19) Black Widow (2021)
Even though the pandemic zapped some of the hype from Black Widow, the Jason Bourne-like action thriller is a more-than-fitting farewell to Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff. It also gave us Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, who went on to become the unlikeliest MCU MVP in Thunderbolts* a few years later.
18) Iron Man 3 (2013)
Even now, MCU fans are split over Iron Man 3. Was it a good movie or a bad movie? Allow us to fall in line with the former. Though this third installment of the Iron Man trilogy was hardly the last appearance for Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, it does give the character some unexpected closure.
After flirting with death in The Avengers, Stark’s paranoia over his mortality and insignificance is some of the most emotionally smart storytelling to ever come out of the MCU. It’s a Marvel movie, but it’s also a Shane Black movie: A portait of manic men in distress, doing all they can to keep their demons at bay with lightness and levity.
