Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
With the highly anticipated Spider-Man: Homecoming swinging into theaters this weekend, even casual Marvel fans have probably thought to themselves, “Hey, I should rewatch all of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to prepare!” After all, movie marathons are rad, and figuring out how all the pieces of a cinematic universe puzzle fit together can be a fun challenge. Of course there’s one big hurdle standing in your way from diving into the deep end of the MCU: money.
As Decider’s Kayla Cobb found out, it’s crazy expensive to watch all of the MCU! If you don’t have a Netflix account and ain’t in the market for one, you’re looking at a hundreds-of-dollars commitment level. Even with a Netflix subscription (which is where almost all of MCU TV lives), you’re still going to drop over $100. That’s a high barrier to entry, and it makes me wonder why the MCU doesn’t have its own dedicated streaming service–because it totally should.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe encompasses every Marvel Studios movie, kicking off with 2008’s Iron Man and continuing through to this weekend’s Spider-Man: Homecoming. Note that Fox’s X-Men films (like Deadpool, Logan, and X-Men: Apocalypse among many others) and Fantastic Four films aren’t included in this universe, and neither is Sony’s abandoned Amazing Spider-Man franchise (the one with Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone). The MCU doesn’t stop with movies, either; ABC’s Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter are in the MCU, as are all the Netflix Marvel shows. FX’s mind-bending drama Legion, however, is not, since it’s a Fox/X-Men jam. And in addition to those MCU movies and TV shows, there are also MCU short films (called “One-Shots,” named after a comic book term for a one-off publication that’s not intended to have an issue #2) and even a web-series.
So just to give you an overview of what all is in the MCU, and all the content that could potentially be on a Marvel streaming service, here’s a list in release date order:
- FILM: Iron Man
- FILM: Incredible Hulk
- FILM: Iron Man 2
- FILM: Thor
- FILM: Captain America: The First Avenger
- ONE-SHOT: The Consultant
- ONE-SHOT: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor’s Hammer
- FILM: Marvel’s the Avengers
- ONE-SHOT: Item 47
- FILM: Iron Man 3
- ONE-SHOT: Agent Carter
- TV: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 1
- FILM: Thor: The Dark World
- ONE-SHOT: All Hail the King
- FILM: Captain America: The Winter Soldier
- FILM: Guardians of the Galaxy
- TV: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 2
- TV: Agent Carter season 1
- TV: Daredevil season 1
- FILM: Avengers: Age of Ultron
- FILM: Ant-Man
- TV: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 3
- TV: Jessica Jones season 1
- TV: Agent Carter season 2
- TV: Daredevil season 2
- FILM: Captain America: Civil War
- TV: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4
- TV: Luke Cage season 1
- FILM: Doctor Strange
- DIGITAL SERIES: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Slingshot
- TV: Iron Fist season 1
- FILM: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
- FILM: Spider-Man: Homecoming
That’s 171 TV episodes, 16 films, 5 short films, and 1 web series. The MCU has only been around for 9 years, but it’s every bit as complex and confusing as the original Marvel Comics universe. Stan Lee would be so proud! To get even deeper, that’s 10,180 minutes of content. It would take you a solid week of Clockwork Orange style viewing to power through the entire MCU. Remember when I said marathons are supposed to be fun?
That’s why a streaming service devoted solely to the MCU makes sense; right now, getting caught up is too daunting of a task. It costs too much money and there’s just too much of it to keep track of, especially since all the pieces of the MCU are more scattered than the Infinity Stones. A streaming service (called Mission: Marvel? Marvel Watcher? Marvflix?) is needed to unite these pieces of pop culture! Plus, a streaming service interface could actually organize all this content. Imagine lists organized by medium, release date, or chronology, or character. There are a number of ways to watch the MCU, thus making it all totally rewatchable. Who wouldn’t want to watch the chronological life story of Peggy Carter, from Captain America: The First Avenger all the way through to Captain America: Civil War?
The content is definitely there, and there are four more movies (Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Ant-Man and the Wasp) and four more TV shows (The Defenders, Cloak & Dagger, Runaways, New Warriors) on the way in the next year. Sure, smaller streaming services have a little more than that. A service like Shudder probably has around 12,000+ minutes of content. But, if this hypothetical MCU streaming service wants to boost its content, it could easily add in all the animated series that have been inspired by the MCU. Adding in the recent Ultimate Spider-Man, Guardians of the Galaxy, Avengers Assemble cartoons and a few others adds another 9,400 minutes of content and it makes the service appealing to parents with kids just as devoted to Iron Man’s adventures as they are.
The logistics of all this are, of course, a headache. Universal still has some stake in 2008’s Incredible Hulk (sidenote: That’s why we aren’t getting a solo Hulk movie anytime soon, y’all), and Sony has a similar chunk of Spider-Man: Homecoming. The upcoming Runaways show is a Hulu original, so that’s a problem. Disney and Netflix have a deal, which is bringing every MCU movie from Civil War on to that streaming service. And four (soon to be five) of the MCU TV shows are Netflix originals; it’d be hard to imagine Daredevil or Jessica Jones streaming on a service that’s not tangentially related to Netflix. Maybe an MCU streaming service would have to be part of Netflix, or an add-on, or a separate streaming service partially owned by Netflix–at the cost of including Runaways.
If Disney/Marvel/Netflix/etc. could tear up the red tape Hulk-style, this is the kind of thing you could easily sell to Marvel fans of all experience levels. When you subscribe to a streaming service, you’re paying for access to content you want. At $9.99/month price point means you would get access to all those MCU movies for basically a nickel a month! Any fan that’s turned off by the $19.99 price point of digital movies or the time limits on rentals would probably be up for paying a flat monthly price just to have the digital keys to the streaming equivalent of Stark Tower.
And if anything will light a fire under Marvel to get this done, it’s their rivalry with DC Comics–and they’re launching their own streaming service next year! And it’s gonna launch with a live-action series (Titans) and the return of a fan favorite animated series (Young Justice). If this service is a success, it’s probably only a matter of time before Marvel gets into the streaming service game. Start saving up your nickels, Marvel fans, just in case.
