Every Marvel Cinematic Universe movie ranked

❘ Published: 2024-04-29T09:58:12

Iron Man, Black Panther, and Black Widow.

Marvel Studios

Dread it, run from it; our ranking of every movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has arrived. From the bottom of the quantum barrel to Infinity (War) and beyond, this is every film ranked worst to best.

In the late 2000s, there was an idea: to bring together a group of not-so-remarkable Marvel heroes to see if they could become something more. The resulting cataclysm was the MCU, a big-screen empire that revolutionized Hollywood with unprecedented serialized storytelling and eye-watering box office returns.

Its achievement is undeniable, but it’s also the blanket covering the harsh truth: some of the movies have been pretty naff — dreadful, even, especially without the rose-tinting hype of Thanos and his finger-snapping oblivion that brought pop culture to its knees.

Yet, for those lows — and god, they are low — the highs have been extraordinary, responsible for some of the most euphoric moments in movie theater history. So, with that in mind, we have endeavored to rank all of the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

33. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)
32. Thor: The Dark World (2013)
31. The Incredible Hulk (2008)
30. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
29. Black Widow (2021)
28. Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
27. Iron Man 2 (2010)
26. The Marvels (2023)
25. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
24. Thor (2011)
23. Captain Marvel (2019)
22. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the 10 Rings (2021)
21. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
20. Eternals (2021)
19. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
18. Iron Man 3 (2013)
17. Doctor Strange (2016)
16. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
15. Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)
14. Ant-Man (2015)
13. Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
12. Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
11. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
10. Black Panther (2018)
9. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
8. Iron Man (2008)
7. Captain America: Civil War (2016)
6. Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
5. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 (2017)
4. Avengers: Endgame (2019)
3. The Avengers (2012)
2. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 (2023)
1. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

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

A strong contender for one of the most aggravatingly and embarrassingly bad big-budget movies of the 2020s to date. It’s a total misfire; an eye-meltingly ugly sludge-fest that misplaces one of the MCU’s best heroes in an environment that removes any of his novelty. Jonathan Majors’ Kang was a formidable threat… from the outset, instead rendered a puny footnote alongside the franchise’s most baffling villain: MODOK, brought to life with all the grace of a blurry, unfunny PNG. It’s appalling; don’t trust its defenders.

32. Thor: The Dark World (2013)

What is there to say about Thor: The Dark World? Very little, considering I’ve watched it a grand total of six times, and I still struggle to recall much of the plot — which is a considerable death knell, given the MCU’s pride in its interconnected storytelling. Worse yet, a film this forgettable is (apparently) essential to the Infinity Stone lore; just watch a recap on YouTube. In truth, it’s only worth watching in a post-Endgame and Loki context… or you could just watch one of the better Thor films.

31. The Incredible Hulk (2008)

The Incredible Hulk is the MCU’s biggest oddity: a post-Ang Lee (underrated, by the way) and pre-Avengers paranoid monster thriller with Ed Norton’s one-and-done turn as Bruce Banner at its gamma-hued core. It’s not as terrible as some would have you believe; the CGI is grotesque to its detriment, and its action is loud and bombastic (again, to a fault), but it’s also lean and largely unshackled to anything but itself. If only Marvel allowed itself to have a little “Hulk, smash!” fun now and again.

30. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

Thor: Love and Thunder is Too Much of a Good Thing: The Movie. Taika Waititi’s overbearing, irreverent idiosyncrasy threatens to turn the whole thing into a try-hard skit, leaving it feeling rather slight and often grating. There are some neat visual ideas, Natalie Portman’s superb return as Mighty Thor and inspired casting with Christian Bale as Gorr the God Butcher — but we don’t even see him butcher any gods! That’s enough to make you scream like one of those giant goats.

29. Black Widow (2021)

Florence Pugh and Scarlett Johansson in Black Widow

Black Widow is a prequel… that also takes place after Captain America: Civil War… that comes before Infinity War and Scarlett Johansson’s Soul Stone freefall in Endgame… that kind of acts as an epilogue before the story’s even over. Its incongruous, surely unplanned story placement and dodgy CGI aside, the cast is terrific, particularly Florence Pugh’s Yelena and David Harbour’s Red Guardian (both of whom, funnily enough, will return in Thunderbolts).

28. Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

We were promised multiversal madness. Instead, we got a smattering of somewhat wacky New York Cities, wish-fulfillment cameos, and a villainous turn shallows the impressive, still-unmatched depth of WandaVision. Thank goodness for Sam Raimi, then, who galvanizes a messy script with his knack for lively, rollicking horror. Alas, for all of its spaghettification and undead fun, there’s still a tedious sense of it needing to slot comfortably into the Marvel machine.

27. Iron Man 2 (2010)

Without Iron Man 2, “Next time, baby” wouldn’t be half as funny as it is. Nevertheless, despite its rock-em-sock-em spectacle and pivotal introductions of Johannson’s super spy and Don Cheadle’s recast Rhodey, not to mention Sam Rockwell’s scene-stealing turn as Justin Hammer, there’s an emptiness to this sequel that’s hard to shake; almost like it’s nothing more than a retread of Tony Stark’s initial arc and set-up for The Avengers.

26. The Marvels (2023)

The Marvels is not bad. It’s almost entirely harmless, strengthened by Brie Larson’s charisma and Iman Vellani’s irresistibly charming big-screen debut as Ms Marvel and slick direction by Nia DeCosta. So what’s the problem? How about the paper-thin villain, the super-speed plotting, and two pre/post-credits teases that should have been exciting but earned little more than a shrug? Enjoyable, much like ice cream with sprinkles — but certainly not rich.

25. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2019)

Evangeline Lilly and Paul Rudd in Ant-Man and the Wasp

The MCU had just been dealt its heaviest blow: Thanos’ snap and the on-march of death that followed. Perhaps the world wasn’t ready for Ant-Man and the Wasp, an admirably small-scale (sorry) palette-cleaner without any universe-culling stakes — or maybe it was too light for its own good, a victim of storytelling whiplash in the wake of such enormous loss. Still, Randall Park is hilarious, and it has one of the best post-credits scenes in the MCU.

24. Thor (2011)

The fish-out-of-water hijinks are amusing (“Another!”), Kenneth Branagh’s direction is grand and otherworldly (something too easily lost in other sights of Asgard), and Chris Hemsworth’s nascent performance as Thor showed potential. However, if we try to ignore all the boring Earthbound stuff (which we can’t), the first movie in the trilogy has to be hailed for one reason above all else: giving us Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, the MCU’s greatest character. “For you, for all of us.”

23. Captain Marvel (2019)

Earth, or as Captain Marvel‘s galactic characters call it, “C-53”, is a “real sh*thole”. How else can you explain how it took 11 years for the franchise to deliver a female-led solo superhero movie? Brie Larson is perfectly cast as Carol Danvers, but it ended up being a distinctly Phase One pre-Endgame appetizer: progressive, thematically powerful, but missing a little wonder.

22. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the 10 Rings (2021)

A still from Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

How did the MCU manage to bag Tony Leung as The Mandarin? How did Destin Daniel Cretton shoot that bruising, terrific bus fight, with Simu Liu displaying serious martial arts gusto? How did the movie weave enchanting spectacle and folklore — particularly that Crouching Tiger-inspired ‘dance’ in the Bamboo Forrest — while being mindful of the MCU’s future? And why did it descend into a grey, bland finale after so much promise? These are all valid questions.

21. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

The NEW Black Panther.

Chadwick Boseman is Black Panther, and while his passing rightly shook the world, it’s hard to imagine how Ryan Coogler honed and overcame his grief to create not just a watchable blockbuster but — at its best — a moving, spectacular elegy that honors a pop culture icon. Its bloated ambition is worthy of criticism — did we really need another death? — as are its murkier deep-sea visuals, made worse by Avatar: The Way of Water, but even if it doesn’t invite much desire for a rewatch, it feels like its own miracle.

20. Eternals (2021)

So, there’s a movie where Angelina Jolie slices and dices lava rocks falling from the sky, and people think it’s bad? They’re fools because Eternals is actually one of the most underrated movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: epic, intimate, and flawed in ways that make it feel singular, reckoning with cosmic forces more thoughtfully than anything before or since. Also, it has the best-ever portrayal of super-speed in live-action.

19. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Age of Ultron is muddled and overstuffed; an exercise in planting seeds that do pay off, eventually, at a dramatic cost in the present (and that Black Widow “monster” line… woof). But here’s the thing: it is a helluva good time at the movies, filled with laughs (“Language!”), thrills, some exceptionally giddy teases (in hindsight, Cap shifting Mjolnir), and the SPADER-9000 delivering an ultra-menacing turn as a rogue, homicidal AI.

18. Iron Man 3 (2013)

Iron Man 3 is, bafflingly, one of the most divisive movies in the MCU — when it’s easily in the higher tiers. Admittedly, it had to follow the box-office-blazing exploits of The Avengers, but this isn’t an insignificant entry: it dealt with the mental consequences of Tony Stark’s wormhole heroics, boasted a standout “barrel of monkeys” set-piece and boasted a notorious (and hilarious) twist.

17. Doctor Strange (2016)

The implications of Doctor Strange’s entry into the MCU were tremendously exciting: magic, multiple dimensions, and a war between sorcerers. That, and the movie was pretty great (barring the criminal underuse of Rachel McAdams), with Benedict Cumberbatch making for a loathsome-until-he’s-likable hero and inventive, Inception-y action that makes immersive use of CGI.

16. Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)

Spider-Man in Mysterio's dimension in Far From Home

Spider-Man’s rogues gallery is famously wacky and wonderful. So, it’s rather fitting in a post-Thanos — and, importantly, post-Tony Stark world — that the perfect character to help explore the vulnerability and future of our favorite web-slinger is a fish-bowl-wearing, cape-donning eccentric with a knack for VFX. Far From Home may be the weakest of the Spidey trilogy (so far), but it has one of the best sequences in the hero’s live-action history, plus a jaw-dropper of an ending.

15. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

Steve Rogers in Captain America: The First Avenger

Now we’re into the crème de la crème of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Joe Johnston’s star-spangled origin story has an unbelievable supporting cast – Haley Atwell! Stanley Tucci! Tommy Lee Jones! Hugo Weaving! — and it’s earnest and entertaining in ways that the franchise seems to have forgotten; there’s an older-school verve to the story… until it bracingly, brilliantly enters the present. Chris Evans was the perfect Human Torch, but he was born to play Captain America.

14. Ant-Man (2015)

Who knows what Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man movie would have looked like — but Peyton Reed’s first effort ensured we wouldn’t spend our time pining for the film that never happened. Not only is it a zippy, highly watchable superhero movie with well-constructed, visually nifty set pieces, but it’s also genuinely funny, thanks to Paul Rudd’s innate charisma (and Michael Peña’s “But I got the van!” deserves a nod too).

13. Thor: Ragnarok (2017)

If the Thor entries once felt like the franchise’s weak links, that changed in 2017 with Ragnarok, a colorful, delightfully raucous breath of fresh air with riotous belly laughs, epic set pieces, and the last truly great version of the Hulk, quickly cementing itself as one of the greatest and most outrageous entries in the series.

12. Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)

Peter Parker and Iron Man in Spider-Man Homecoming

After his “underoos!” debut in Civil War, Tom Holland was fully introduced to the MCU in Spider-Man: Homecoming, an incredibly charming, low-stakes adventure sharing more DNA with John Hughes’ high school comedies than Spidey movies of yesteryear. It also boasts an all-time nail-biter of an MCU scene: Michael Keaton’s Vulture realizing Peter Parker’s wall-crawling pastime. “Good ol’ Spider-Man.”

11. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

All three Spider-Men in Spider-Man: No Way Home

No Way Home is, often, an ugly film (even for a pandemic production), one that depends on borrowed nostalgia and the dramatic, emotional weight of its superior predecessors. So, why is it one place from the top 10? It’s quite simple: for someone who grew up with all three Spider-Men, it was one of the most euphoric cinema experiences of my life — that’s what I’ll remember, not its shortcomings.

10. Black Panther (2018)

Black Panther is arguably the most culturally enriching movie in the MCU; second only to the enterprise itself. It’s a heady, almost-pure expression of a directing voice; sauve, intricately Afrofuturistic, and transcending any prescribed constraints of franchise filmmaking, a perfect marriage of director, story, and star power with Chadwick Boseman and Michael B. Jordan’s iconic Killmonger. All hail the king.

9. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Bucky in Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Captain America: The Winter Soldier has it all: it’s a high-octane, paranoid actioner that smartly, boldly inverts SHIELD as a clandestine umbrella for Hydra, with crunching fights — the elevator fight, and that little flip Bucky does with the knife! — and grown-up tone that feels both contemporary and indebted to the spy thrillers of the ‘70s. And this is an important part: it’s a great movie, not just a big event.

8. Iron Man (2008)

Not just the world’s introduction to Robert Downey Jr.’s inimitable genius, billionaire, playboy philanthropist, but the launch of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The star’s megawatt performance, right up to his emphatic “I am… Iron Man” declaration, literally transformed his career (and superhero movie casting forever), but it’s more than that: it’s a blockbuster with tangible, slick style and clarity of vision from the get-go. Essential and still tremendous.

7. Captain America: Civil War

Captain America and Iron Man in Civil War

Civil War — aka Avengers 2.5 — isn’t just the best Captain America movie: it’s the magnificent, stirring pinnacle of what the MCU can accomplish when it wants to interrogate something seriously, with a centerpiece whoop-worthy battle royale between Earth’s mightiest heroes. “Divided we fall,” was the tagline, and watching Iron Man and Cap’s rift widen and darken was riveting — until it became heartbreaking.

6. Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

Lower your Quad Blasters – all of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies are amazing, and the first entry established the trilogy’s offbeat, loveable heroes with undeniable style and heart. Vol 1 remains an extraordinary feat: James Gunn transformed a Z-list team into household names — and Awesome Mix Vol 1 may be the most influential jukebox soundtrack of the 21st century to date. In other words, ooga ooga ooga chaka!

5. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 (2017)

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 has aged beautifully since its release; a poignant, contained spectacle with heart-rending emotional depth. The visuals are spectacular, the soundtrack — dare we say it — may be the best out of the three, and while it overdoes certain elements from the first (the humor doesn’t connect quite as consistently), the ending is an absolute whopper. “He may have been your father, boy, but he wasn’t your daddy.”

4. Avengers: Endgame (2019)

Captain America holding Mjolnir in Avengers: Endgame

How do you follow one of the most devastating cliffhangers of all time? After two hours of somber heartache and timey-wimey superheroics, the Russo Brothers deliver an unbelievable, fist-pumping extravaganza of geeky delights; the hitherto undreamt euphoria of seeing Cap finally wield Mjolnir may be the theatrical moment of the 21st century. A pitch-perfect conclusion; Avengers dismissed.

3. The Avengers (2012)

The Avengers had to work; four years of carefully plotted, interconnected movies led to this moment — and the gamble paid off big time. It is truly a marvel: hilarious, rousing, sprawlingly but immaculately envisioned, and enough to enter Alan Silvestri’s cue into the echelon of spine-tingling themes. We cannot allow this to feel like a lesser work compared to the multiverse-hopping, ginormous toybox movies on the horizon — if this was as good as it got, we’d be incredibly lucky.

2. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 (2023)

Vol 3 is the best of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies. It has everything: heart, soul, laughs, tears, a banging soundtrack, thrills, stunning visuals, and actual stakes; in a time when MCU movies are feeling increasingly hollow, there’s nothing empty here. But don’t look to it to restore your faith: this is a glorious, soulful ember burning above the cinders of a cinematic universe – we’re still hooked on the feeling, and this is as good as it gets.

1. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Spider-Man and Tony Stark in Avengers: Infinity War

The blood-draining, ‘no-no-NO!’ feeling of watching Spider-Man tremble frightfully into an ashy goodnight… some may have moved on from that gut-punch of an ending, but not us. Infinity War remains a gargantuan experience and the peak of the MCU: an exhilarating, lightspeed culmination of a decade’s worth of superhero stories and an unforgettable introduction to Thanos, the baddie to beat all baddies. It’s a film that allows your heart to soar with soul-powering action, your belly to feel the pangs of laughter, and your heart to be sucked dry. “Did we just lose?” It may not have felt like it, but the answer was a definite no.

Every movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (excluding Spider-Man: No Way Home) can be streamed on Disney Plus. In the meantime, you can check out new movies coming to streaming this month and find out more about the next film in the franchise: Deadpool & Wolverine.

This article is part of a week of a week of content celebrating all things superheroic. If you want to know more, check out our HeroFest schedule here.

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