We have six live-action MCU productions coming our way in 2025: Captain America: Brave New World, Daredevil: Born Again, Thunderbolts*, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Iron Heart, and Wonder Man.
Behinds the scenes, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is hitting that place of Quality over Quantity that Disney CEO Bob Iger promised after returning near the end of 2022. In-Universe, we are getting a red Hulk, a continuation of the now former Netflix shows, an anti-hero team-up, a film set in an alternate Universe, and the release of a Disney+ series that started filming in the Summer of 2022.
Captain America: Brave New World (Spring of 2023), Wonder Man (Spring of 2023), Thunderbolts* (Summer of 2023), Daredevil: Born Again (Fall of 2023 – Creative Overhaul), and The Fantastic Four: First Steps (Summer of 2024) all started filming after Iger’s return to Disney, just like this past year’s Agatha All Along (Early-2023) and Deadpool and Wolverine which started filming in the Spring of 2023. Like Iron Heart, Echo (Spring of 2022) entered into physical production before Iger’s return.
All of this means that we are entering into a new era of Marvel film and television productions in 2025 and hopefully, this will make for a more cohesive and consistent Marvel Cinematic Universe before the arrival of Avengers: Doomsday in the Spring of 2026.
Captain America: Brave New World will follow the journey that Sam Wilson has been on since 2019’s Avengers: Endgame. Steve Rogers passed the mantle of Captain America over to Wilson following his Journey into Mystery return to the Infinity Stones to the points in time from which they were taken by The Avengers. 2021’s The Falcon and The Winter Soldier focused on Sam’s reluctance to become Captain America while highlighting the racial and political ramifications of such a thing. That show ended with Wilson fully accepting the mantle and donning a new suit that was created for him by Wakanda. Along with continuation of Sam’s story, Captain America: Brave New World will see Harrison Ford replace the late William Hurt as Thaddeus Ross, complete with a Hulk storyline that will see Ford’s Ross transform into a monster while bringing back two MCU characters that haven’t been heard of since 2008: Liv Tyler’s Betty Ross and Tim Blake Nelson’s Samuel Sterns / The Leader. Danny Ramirez will also return from The Falcon and The Winter Soldier to reprise his role as Joaquin Torres (The new Falcon) and Carl Lumbly will return as Super Soldier Isaiah Bradley. Last but not least, Captain America: Brave New World will at long last follow up on the remains of the giant Celestial (Tiamut) that has been sticking out of the ocean following the failed Emergence, seen in 2021’s Eternals.
Daredevil: Born Again will follow-up on last year’s Echo series and continue Matt Murdock’s journey which began in The Defenders Saga (formerly on Netflix) and then continued in 2021’s Spider-Man: No Way Home and 2022’s She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. Joining Charlie Cox’s Matt Murdock will be Vincent D’Onofrio’s (Mayor) Wilson Fisk and Jon Bernthal’s Frank Castle / The Punisher. Deborah Ann Woll (Karen Page), Elden Henson (Foggy Nelson), Wilson Bethel (Bullseye), and Ayelet Zurer (Vanessa Marianna-Fisk) will also appear in the 9-episode First Season, reprising their respective roles from the now former Netflix series’. The White Tiger and the villainous Muse will make their MCU debuts in this series.
Thunderbolts* will move several storylines from Phase Four and Phase Five forward. This team is to be comprised of Florence Pugh’s Yelena Belova, Sebastian Stan’s Bucky Barnes, David Harbour’s Red Guardian, Wyatt Russell’s John Walker, Olga Kurylenko’s Taskmaster, and Hannah John-Kamen’s Ghost. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is also returning to reprise her role as Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. Thunderbolts* will serve as a team-up sequel to 2021’s The Falcon and The Winter Soldier, 2021’s Black Widow, 2022’s Hawkeye, and 2018’s Ant-Man and The Wasp. Thunderbolts* is also introducing the powerful Marvel Comics character known as The Sentry, which I’m very excited about! Obviously, this is far from a team of traditional heroes, as every team member has a checkered past.
Yelena and Bucky are expected to lead the film, and many fans and insiders are speculating that the film will feature several character deaths over the course of the movie.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps will feature the long-awaited and highly anticipated debuts of Marvel’s First Family: The Fantastic Four! This comes 10-years after the last Fantastic Four film by Fox (Fant4stic) in 2015, and 20-years after the first Fantastic Four film by Fox in 2005. Of course, we did meet a Multiversal Variant of Reed Richards in 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (portrayed by John Krasinski) and this past year, we saw Chris Evans (who portrayed Johnny Storm / The Human Torch in Fox’s first two FF films) reprise his role in Deadpool and Wolverine; but he too was a Multiversal Variant without an Earth-616 counterpart. The Fantastic Four: First Steps will finally formally introduce Reed Richards / Mister Fantastic (Pedro Pascal), Susan Storm / The Invisible Woman (Vanessa Kirby), Johnny Storm / The Human Torch (Joseph Quinn), and Ben Grimm / The Thing (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). According to reports, all four of these characters will also be Multiversal Variants, with the film set to place in an Alternate Universe (not Earth-616). Along with the four main characters, the World-Eater Galactus (Ralph Ineson) is expected to be showcased in all his glory and a female version of The Silver Surfer (Julia Garner) will appear while most everyone expects Robert Downey Jr’s Doctor Doom to show up in some capacity as well.
Iron Heart will continue the journey of Riri Williams beyond 2022’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
The series will introduce The Hood (portrayed by Anthony Ramos). The plot of the series is rumored to feature a clash between magic and science with Mephisto expected to at long last appear, rumored to be portrayed by Sacha Baron Cohen.
Wonder Man will introduce Simon Williams (portrayed by Yahya Abdul-Mateen) and will feature Ben Kingsley reprising his role as Trevor Slattery from Iron Man 3, Marvel One-Shot: All Hail the King, and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Destin Daniel Cretton (who directed Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) has had creative input on this series, which has been described as being comedic in its tone. I hear that description and the first thing that pops into my head is She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, and that scares me a little bit.
I’ll give this show a watch and a review, but my expectations will be low. Like Echo before it, Wonder Man will be released under the Marvel Spotlight banner, which will make it standalone in nature.
My most anticipated project of 2025 is easily The Fantastic Four: First Steps! The introduction of Marvel’s First Family into the MCU is long overdue and I absolutely cannot wait to see what Kevin Feige and his Marvel Studios team do with these wonderful characters. The Fantastic Four are my favorite comic book team and having them be a part of the MCU was the stuff of fan fiction for so many years, but this Summer, it becomes a reality, and I am super stoked for it! Bring on H.E.R.B.I.E., and Galactus, and The Mole Man, and The Silver Surfer, and Reed and Susan’s love story, and Johnny and Ben’s brotherly dynamic, and bring on Doom! I’m here for all it!
My least-anticipated is obviously Wonder Man, but I’m not exactly pumped about Iron Heart either. When done right, Marvel’s Disney+ shows are a lot of fun, but there has been more than one disappointment and with Wonder Man being a stand-alone venture with a comedic tone, I can see it being the worst live-action MCU offering of 2025.
With all of thar being said, I hope all six of these projects are successful critically and financially and that the mythology of the MCU will be expanded upon in satisfying ways, laying the groundwork for next year’s Avengers: Doomsday where they can.
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