What To Watch Before Each MCU Disney+ Show

With all the new MCU shows coming to Disney+, people who haven’t been following the franchise may want to tune in. 

But what MCU details do they need to know before each series? What’s the quickest way to catch up without losing the vital details? The official accounts for WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier have tweeted out options, but these can definitely be modified based on how much patience the person trying to catch up actually has, so these aren’t the only options we have. Let’s break it down show by show.

WandaVision

Shortest

Marvel Studios Legends: Wanda Maximoff & Vision

These short episodes will summarize Wanda and Vision’s characters in about 17 minutes combined. This is absolutely the fastest way to do it if you’re potentially new MCU friend has almost no patience.  That said, they are clearly going to miss a lot of context and I don’t recommend this.

Medium

Avengers: Age of Ultron
Captain America: Civil War
Avengers: Infinity War
Avengers: Endgame

This rewatch is just a little under 10 hours long, hits the key points of the two main characters, and explains how they got into their current situation. 

Longest

This is the official Disney recommended MCU rewatch for WandaVision.

Avengers: Age of Ultron
Captain America: Civil War
Thor
Thor: The Dark World
Avengers: Infinity War
Avengers: Endgame
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Captain Marvel

The benefit of this rewatch order is that you get to learn more about Darcy, Jimmy Woo, and Monica. That said, each of these characters is a supporting character in these movies, so the majority of the films are about other things.  This is almost 8 hours of extra film for side characters.  That said, if you think your new MCU fan may really love one or all of these characters, feel free to add in the extra films as you see fit! 

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier

Shortest

Marvel Studios Legends: Falcon, The Winter Soldier, Zemo, Sharon Carter

These shorts total about 29 minutes and will give a new MCU fan a basic understanding of the four main characters. They lack a lot of context, however, but it’ll work if your new MCU fan doesn’t have much patience.

Longest

This is the official Disney recommended MCU rewatch for The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.  If you’ll notice, I’m not including a medium length recommendation for this one because every film is pretty vital. This is 17 hours of film, however, so if you’re looking to make a cut, you can maybe cut Black Panther and just verbally explain the Dora Milaje to them. That said, Black Panther is incredible and Chadwick Boseman should not be skipped, so don’t do that! 

Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: Winter Soldier
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Captain America: Civil War
Black Panther
Avengers Infinity War
Avengers Endgame

Loki

The Marvel Studios Legends episodes and the official Disney recommended rewatch orders for both WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier weren’t released until after the show was already going. If you want to catch up your new fan, consider my recommended order. Be advised that I don’t know if other elements will be included in the show besides Loki himself, so I’ll update this with a “Longest” option once we actually get going and know what else is involved! Loki will premiere on Disney+ on June 11th, 2021.

Shortest

TBA (Likely Marvel Studios Legends Episodes)

Medium

This is just a little shy of 14 hours of film, and starts with some of the weaker ones, but this is what we have to work with here. We should have more to go on later (hopefully).

Thor
The Avengers
Thor: The Dark World
Thor: Ragnarok
Avengers: Infinity War
Avengers: Endgame

Longest

TBA (Likely the above + other films)

Other MCU Disney+ Shows

At this time, there are plans for Hawkeye, Ms. Marvel, Moon Knight, She-Hulk, Ironheart, and a heck of a lot more. I genuinely don’t know what will be required for these yet, but I will likely make a separate page, which I’ll link here, to keep track of everything. Keep an eye out for updates to this article as the MCU moves forward!

Full MCU Film Rewatch #1: Release Order

So your new MCU fan has the patience of a saint and wants to watch a lot of movies. Awesome!  I highly recommend watching them in the official release order as the after-credit scenes flow into the next films very smoothly. This is the order most of us experienced it, so it’s great to give your new fan a similar experience. That said, this is over 50 hours of film, so buckle up!

The following list does NOT include any streaming or TV content.

Iron Man 
The Incredible Hulk*
Iron Man 2 
Thor  
Captain America: The First Avenger 
The Avengers  
Iron Man 3 
Thor: The Dark World  
Captain America: The Winter Soldier  
Guardians of the Galaxy 
Avengers: Age of Ultron  
Ant-Man 
Captain America: Civil War  
Doctor Strange  
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  
Spider-Man: Homecoming** 
Thor: Ragnarok  
Black Panther  
Avengers: Infinity War 
Ant-Man and the Wasp  
Captain Marvel  
Avengers: Endgame  
Spider-Man: Far From Home**

*The Incredible Hulk is not available on Disney+ at this time, and many MCU fans consider this optional due to the casting change and minimal connections to the rest of the MCU outside of Bruce Banner himself.
**The Spider-man films are not yet on Disney+, but they should be in 2022. For now, you’ll need to either skip them, purchase them separately, or switch over to their current home on STARZ.

Full MCU Film Rewatch #2: Chronological Order

Doing a chronological rewatch is pretty fun, but this does mess up the order of the post-credit scenes. You may want to hold off on the post-credit scenes with your MCU newbie to avoid spoilers. I will notate the post-credit scene issues below.

The following list does NOT include any streaming or TV content.

Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain Marvel – Note: The mid-credit scene should be watched after Infinity War. The post-credit scene is safe to watch. 
The Incredible Hulk*
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
Thor
The Avengers
Iron Man 3
Thor: The Dark World
Captain America: Winter Soldier
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Ant-Man
Captain America: Civil War 
Doctor Strange
Black Panther
Spider-Man: Homecoming**
Thor: Ragnarok
Ant-Man and the Wasp – Note: The mid-credit scene should be watched after Infinity War. The post-credit scene is safe to watch.
Avengers: Infinity War
Add: Ant-Man and the Wasp and then Captain Marvel mid-credit scenes.
Avengers: Endgame
Spider-Man: Far From Home**

*As noted above, The Incredible Hulk is skippable and also not available on Disney+.
*Also as noted above, the Spider-man films will be available on Disney+ in 2022.

Which MCU Rewatches Will You Choose?

As I’ve already seen all the MCU film content, I’ve chosen to try out different ways to view them and see what works best. I believe the full release-order rewatch (minus The Incredible Hulk) is the most ‘pure’ way to experience it, but I’m giving the chronological order a shot now.

But what do you do? One of the above? Something else? Let me know!

Author: Angel Wilson

Angel is the admin of The Geekiary and a geek culture commentator. They earned a BA in Film & Digital Media from UC Santa Cruz. They have contributed to various podcasts and webcasts including An Englishman in San Diego, Free to Be Radio, and Genre TV for All. They’ve also written for Friends of Comic Con and is a 2019 Hugo Award winner for contributing fanfic on AO3. They identify as queer.

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