Doomsday will soon be upon us. On December 18, Marvel Studios will release its biggest film since Avengers: Endgame, if not its biggest film ever, with Avengers: Doomsday. And while official plot details remain under wraps, it’s pretty clear that several different universes will be suffering through an incursion, where entire realities collide into each other resulting in the destruction of one or all of the universes involved. So far, it seems the main Marvel Cinematic Universe (Earth-616) will be colliding with the universe featured in The Fantastic Four: First Steps, as well as some simplified version of Fox’s X-Men universe (which will finally give us comic-accurate costumes for the characters).
Because of all the multiversal goings-on, the official watchlist on Disney Plus, which was released earlier this week, involves a wide array of Marvel movies, some of which even predate the MCU. The list includes: X-Men, X2, Captain America: The First Avenger, The Avengers, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, Loki, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Spider-Man: No Way Home, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Captain America: Brave New World, Deadpool & Wolverine, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Thunderbolts*, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps.
That is a lot of movies to watch, and at least one of the movies is a chore to get through (by that I obviously mean Captain America: Brave New World). Still, just from looking at this list, it’s clear a few titles must be missing. While I’m okay with omissions that don’t give away spoilers, I suspect these three movies are omitted for other reasons.
1
Captain America: Civil War
The official watchlist goes straight from 2012’s The Avengers, to 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War, which is one heck of a leap without Captain America: Civil War. Avengers: Age of Ultron is an understandable omission, even if it does include Tony Stark’s “suit of armor around the world” line, as it doesn’t really change the status quo for most of the Avengers. Captain America: Civil War, however, alters the Avengers in a cataclysmic way.
Civil War is one of the most pivotal films in the entire MCU. It features the breakup of the Avengers and explains where everyone is before going into Infinity War. At the end of Avengers, they’re a cohesive team, but by Avengers: Infinity War, they’re scattered across the globe and the two most pivotal members, Captain America and Iron Man, hate each other. Without Civil War to explain the change, new viewers will be lost, and even those who just need a refresh will find the change jarring.
As for why this was omitted, my guess is that whoever made this list at Disney didn’t want to overwhelm fans with too many titles. Regardless, Civil War is the throughpoint for way too many of the MCU’s biggest stories and it would be a huge mistake to skip it.
2
The Marvels
Brie Larson has yet to be confirmed for Avengers: Doomsday, so there’s no promise that the movie will include Captain Marvel. The same is true for Iman Vellani as Ms. Marvel and Teyonah Parris as Monica Rambeau. That said, if you stayed through the closing credits of The Marvels, there’s just no way this omission makes any sense. At the end of The Marvels, Monica Rambeau is zapped into another dimension where she meets Kelsey Grammer’s Beast. Presumably, this will be the same X-Men dimension in Doomsday because, if it isn’t, then what would be the point of the scene at all?
If Rambeau isn’t in that X-Men dimension featured in Doomsday, it’s going to raise some questions as to where she is. If she is in that X-Men dimension, people are going to wonder why she’s there if they don’t already know, or who she is if they haven’t seen The Marvels and/or WandaVision. The Marvels also serves as a fairly good introduction to all three of its lead heroes, which would eliminate the need to watch Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, and WandaVision to catch up on any of those characters (just in case any of those characters decide to show up).
My guess is that this one is omitted for one of two reasons, if not both. For one, Marvel Studios is trying not to spoil the appearance of one or all three of these heroes, as none of them have been announced yet. Second, the watchlist-makers at Disney Plus are trying to minimize the number of flops on the official watchlist. To date, The Marvels is still the MCU’s biggest-ever financial failure, as the movie cost $374 million to make but grossed only $207 million. I personally thought the movie was fine and didn’t deserve all the hate it got, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s a black mark in MCU history Disney is hoping fans will forget about.
3
X-Men: The Last Stand
Speaking of disappointing Marvel movies, 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand should also be on this list. Yes, it’s a much worse film than the first two films in the original X-Men trilogy, but it includes the introduction of a character that will likely have a key role in this film: Kelsey Grammer’s Beast. Beast has been included in the movie’s marketing efforts so far, and the fact that he was teased at the end of The Marvels means they must be setting him up for something.
Perhaps you’re thinking Beast is self explanatory — he’s blue, he’s smart, what more do we need? — but if Wolverine and Cyclops require a proper introduction, surely Beast does as well.
There are a few reasons for this omission. For one, this entry might be confusing, as it features the deaths of Cyclops and Professor X and the de-powering of Magneto, all three of whom are alive and powered up in Avengers: Doomsday. To that, I’d say let’s add X-Men: Days of Future Past to the list as it’s an excellent X-Men movie and it corrects these mistakes (if, also, creating a few new ones, but that’s the price you pay with any of the Fox X-Men films).
More likely, the Disney Plus list-makers didn’t want a movie people don’t like on the list. To that, I again would like to point out that the list does feature Captain America: Brave New World and X-Men: The Last Stand is a whole lot better than that cinematic dumpster fire.
Avengers: Doomsday will arrive in theaters on December 18.
