Iron Man (Image: Paramount Pictures), Spider-Man: Far From Home (Image: Sony Pictures); all other photos courtesy of Marvel StudiosGraphic: Rebecca Fassola
Conventional critical wisdom holds that the floor and the ceiling of the 15-year-strong Marvel Cinematic Universe, a.k.a the MCU, are not so far apart—that in devising a recipe for success, the company has managed to avoid any outright disasters, even as its principle of quality without risk more or less negates the possibility of a true pop masterpiece of the genre. Still, as anyone who’s sat through both Eternals or Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania and the Oscar-winning zeitgeist phenomenon Black Panther can surely attest, there remains a range of quality within this franchise of franchises. Which is to say, while most MCU movies have been hits, they are not all created equal.
How does Marvel’s latest cinematic installment, The Marvels, measure up to the 32 movies that have come before it? Here The A.V. Club offers our comprehensive ranking, from worst to best, for every Marvel movie to date, going all the way back to Iron Man in 2008. Like the studio, we wouldn’t dream of spoiling our endgame, but here’s a hint: Ed Norton fans, this won’t be your day of vindication.
This list was updated on November 10, 2023.
30. Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania
Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania | New Trailer
In the grand scheme of the MCU’s culture-dominating “phases,” will be remembered as the film that shifted our focus to the next Thanos, a multiversal murderer who goes by (or at least, one variant of him does). But in terms of audiences’ relationship with what is now over 30 installments, Quantumania doesn’t inspire confidence about Marvel’s onscreen future. Forget superhero fatigue; this may be the blockbuster that confirms we all have green screen fatigue. Set mostly in the microscopic Quantum Realm, this third Ant-Man story immerses Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang and co. in fantastical sci-fi vistas so thoroughly computer-generated, it’s essentially an animated film. The feeling that these actors are rarely even in the same room may explain why their collective charisma doesn’t shine as much as it has previously. Or maybe director Peyton Reed and writer Jeff Loveness can’t juggle quite this many world-building elements, tones, and characters (Evangeline Lilly’s Hope van Dyne, despite inclusion in this film’s very title, is given little to say or do). Jonathan Majors brings his inherent magnetism to Kang, lending menace to a film that’s otherwise wall-to-wall (green-screen-to-green-screen?) predictable silliness. Maybe it’s a natural development in any mega-franchise, but Quantumania includes details that feel recycled—quirky alien-like creatures feeling reminiscent of Thor: Ragnarok, or even Disney’s animated Strange World, or a baffling enough to call to mind Jar Jar Binks—resulting in an unoriginal sequel that serves mostly to set up future, and hopefully better, storylines. [Jack Smart]
