Before I jump into talking about the MCU, I want to address a recent change to my list of films this project is going to cover. With Deadpool & Wolverine featuring a couple more characters from them besides the leaked-but-well-known Elektra, I’ve decided to cover the rest of the Marvel movies from Blade to before Iron Man. The project page is updated with what’s been added, and what’s still not on the list.

Superhero movies were in a rough place in 2008. Sure, Batman Begins had been popular, turned into a hit after a disappointing opening weekend, and excitement for The Dark Knight was high. But everybody else was faltering. X-Men: The Last Stand and Spider-Man 3 had been successful, but weren’t beloved; the Spider-Man series would be rebooted with a different director, actor, and continuity, while X-Men would soft reboot with prequels. A Superman revival had failed to stir much interest. The Blade, Daredevil/Elektra, and Fantastic Four franchises were dead. Hulk, The Punisher, and Ghost Rider had failed to take off (all would receive new movies – Hulk as part of the MCU – but only Ghost Rider’s was even remotely in continuity with the first movie).

All this is to say, if Iron Man hadn’t succeeded, it’s hard to say where superhero cinema would be today. There probably would have been an even bigger trend toward darker superhero movies, which would have seen the same backlash the Snyderverse DC and Webb/Garfield Spider-Man movies did. Without the MCU proving it can be lucrative, there probably wouldn’t be the big push for shared universes.

Thankfully – grumbling by cinema veterans aside – Iron Man was a hit. And now we have a bunch of great movies to thank for it.

Iron Man

It all started with nailing the casting. Robert Downey, Jr. is a talented actor who was set for a comeback; he just needed the right role. (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang was excellent but underseen.) A man who sees that his life’s work hasn’t been as good for mankind as he’d believed, has a crisis of conscience, and finds a better way was perfect. Add a villain to represent the old way, some basic worldbuilding to create what would become the MCU (this is a little awkward with the way SHIELD is handled – it seems to be a new organization, or at least one with a new name, when later films would establish it dating back to shortly after World War II with the name) and you have as good a start to the franchise as you could hope for.

The Incredible Hulk

The Incredible Hulk is a fun man-on-the-run movie, with Bruce (eventually with Betty) trying to get to New York to see if he can be cured of the Hulk persona, while Thunderbolt Ross wants to lock up the Hulk and figure out how to make more of him, only maybe a little more controllable. Neither goal can succeed, of course – Ross’ limited attempts at recreating the experiment that led to Banner becoming the Hulk results in an already bloodthirsty soldier becoming the Abomination, and if Banner gets rid of the Hulk… well, no more sequels. (Or appearances in Avengers movies.) It’s been largely forgotten by the rest of the MCU – Ross has come back, but the sequel hook with Sterns becoming the Leader is only being addressed in the next Captain America movie, sixteen and a half years later – but it’s a better movie than it’s remembered as.

Iron Man 2

If the first Iron Man was about Tony confronting his own legacy, Iron Man 2 has him sorting out his father’s. The main villain (sorry, Justin Hammer) is the son of a man who worked with Howard Stark and felt wronged about how that partnership ended. The other major conflict – Tony facing mortality because the arc reactor keeping him alive is also slowly killing him – is solved when Tony comes across a design Howard wasn’t able to realize with the technology in his lifetime. And while all this is going on, work setting up The Avengers begins with more serious discussion of the Avengers Initiative and the introduction of Black Widow.

Thor

The central conflict in Thor is not Thor vs. Loki or Asgard vs. Jotunheim, it’s Thor vs. his worst instincts. Even after his incursion into Jotunheim ends in disaster and Odin realizes Thor is not ready to rule Asgard and banishes him to Earth, Thor thinks all he needs to do is get Mjolnir back and everything will be fine. It takes being unable to move Mjolnir for him to realize he’s colossally screwed up and needs to change, he finally grows a bit and gets his powers back, and everything’s easy from there. That’s not to say Loki isn’t important; he’s an excellent foil for Thor and played well by Tom HIddleston, and it’s quite easy to see why he became so popular and eventually got his own series.

Captain America: The First Avenger

There are better MCU films, but The First Avenger is still my favorite and a big part of why Captain America has become my favorite Marvel character. We spend time with Steve Rogers, establishing that the core characteristics of Captain America – courage, determination to do what’s right, unwillingness to back down – were there all along. (As Erskine said of the serum’s effects, “good becomes great, bad becomes worse.”) I questioned casting Chris Evans – who was great as Johnny Storm – as Steve, but by now it’s hard to imagine anyone else in the role. The First Avenger also introduced the delightful Agent Peggy Carter, who would keep the era alive as the star of her own show.

The Avengers

Everything had been building to this, bringing together the stars of the five previous films, plus Black Widow from Iron Man 2 and Hawkeye from an uncredited cameo in Thor, and SHIELD agents Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, and newcomer Maria Hill to fight the biggest battle any of them had seen yet.

Next: Because of the expansion of the project to cover more pre-MCU films, I take a step back to look at the Blade trilogy, Hulk, The Punisher, the Fantastic Four movies, and Ghost Rider.