Ready for your Avengers: Doomsday homework? Marvel has released a watchlist of 15 movies and TV shows you should watch before December 18 rolls around.
Despite saying that Avengers: Doomsday would reset the MCU to ‘Phase Zero’, it turns out that the optimal way to watch Marvel’s next blockbuster will be to have viewed some of the many films and TV series that have come before it. Who would have thought!
Thankfully, though, Marvel does not suggest you need to see all 38 films released to date, nor every Agents of Shield episode. Instead, Disney+ now hosts an official Doomsday preparation watchlist, with 15 projects highlighted by Marvel as your most important things to catch up on.
Included in that rundown are some obvious choices. Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame are in there, of course, as are movies that directly highlight some of the characters and teams who will come together to try and stop Doctor Doom: last year’s excellent Thunderbolts/The New Avengers, as well as the so-so The Fantastic Four: First Steps, as well as Shang-Chi, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Deadpool & Wolverine. Deep cuts such as Fox’s X-Men and X2 are also apparently recommended viewing.
(Technically, Disney has not released an updated cast list with Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds added, but the fact that the pair have now been used to promote Doomsday at both San Diego Comic-Con and D23, as well as their presence being widely accepted by fans due to plot leaks, makes their movie’s inclusion here to be expected.)
Next up in the list are a handful of projects that have dealt squarely with multiversal shenanigans (if you already know what Incursions are, top marks for you). Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Loki are obvious picks here, as is, somewhat intriguingly, Spider-Man: No Way Home. (Hey! I wonder if that Brand New Day post-credits scene is pointing to another Peter Parker!)
And then there are a couple of unexpected additions to Marvel’s list of homework. The original Avengers? I mean, it’s a great movie. But if you’ve already seen it a dozen times, Infinity War and Endgame have you covered. Captain America: The First Avenger? Uh, I guess it sets up Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter’s relationship, though again, Endgame also ticks off that one.
Notebooks at the ready for Marvel’s full pre-Avengers: Doomsday watchlist:
- 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
- The Fantastic Four: First Steps
If you really are coming to the MCU cold ahead of Doomsday, there’s certainly a couple more movies and shows I’d personally recommend. The Marvels deals heavily with the multiverse and Incursions, so its absence here certainly raised my eyebrows. X-Men: Days of Future Past is another surprising omission and yet more James McAvoy Professor X erasure, especially if Doomsday argues that the X-Men have been faffing around with timelines as well (which they definitely have).
That said, if this was just a list of projects I’d enjoyed, we’d really be here all day — and certain omissions seem understandable, such as no Guardians of the Galaxy films (the team is now disbanded/reformed/sitting this one out entirely), Wandavision (RIP) or Wonder Man (no, I’m still not over its cancellation).
All of the projects on the list are enjoyable, to be honest, perhaps with the sole exception of Captain America: Brave New World. Just watch Endgame — good advice all around, really — then you’re sorted.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
