Ahead of the release of Avengers: Doomsday, Marvel has released a watchlist of 15 movies and TV shows fans should rewatch to catch up on the narratives of their favourite superhero teams before they clash with Robert Downey Jr’s Doctor Doom on 18 December 2026.
As seen on Disney+, the streamer now hosts an official Countdown to Avengers: Doomsday preparation playlist, and thankfully, fans don’t have to watch all 38 feature films or the over 25 TV shows linked to the MCU. Instead, they just need to rewatch 15, which includes just one TV show, with the full pre-Avengers: Doomsday watchlist listed below, in order of release date:
- X-Men (2000)
- X2 (2003)
- Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
- The Avengers (2012)
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
- Avengers: Endgame (2019)
- Loki (2021)
- Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)
- Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
- Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
- Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
- Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
- Captain America: Brave New World (2025)
- Thunderbolts* (2025)
- The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025)
While most of these inclusions are pretty obvious, as it makes sense for fans to catch up on Fox’s X-Men film franchise, the past Avengers movies and the more recent MCU hero additions, considering how Avengers: Doomsday is set to see a team-up between multiple hero groups like the Avengers, the New Avengers, the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four. The interesting films to note here are Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Deadpool & Wolverine, since Doctor Strange, Deadpool, and Wolverine are not included in Doomsday’s cast as of yet, this might hopefully be a sign of their eventual appearance.
While the list is pretty substantial, there is one notable omission – 2023’s The Marvels. The movie might have been a box office bomb, but what it did provide was a direct setup of its universe-combining narrative. The film ended with Monica Rambeau stranded in another universe after using her powers to help stabilise a collapsing wormhole, whereby she wakes up in a medical facility and encounters none other than Kelsey Grammer’s Beast, confirming that she had landed herself in the X-Men universe. As Grammer’s Beast is among the returning X-Men characters, it makes sense for Monica Rambeau or Captain Marvel to show up, but it seems the movie and its characters have been sidelined due to its box office failure.
Besides this, the list pretty much covers what all fans or even newcomers need to catch up on before the launch of Avengers: Doomsday, which will see an epic team-up against perhaps the greatest threat the MCU has seen to date on 18 December 2026.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
Si Jia
