Two new Avengers films, The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars, were announced in July 2022 as the conclusion of the MCU's Phase Six and "The Multiverse Saga". Destin Daniel Cretton was hired to direct The Kang Dynasty and Jonathan Majors was set to reprise his MCU role as the villain Kang the Conqueror. Jeff Loveness joined the film as writer that September. In November 2023, Cretton departed, Waldron replaced Loveness as writer, and Marvel was considering moving away from the Kang storyline, in part due to Majors's legal issues; Majors was fired the following month. The return of the Russo brothers as directors and McFeely as co-writer, the casting of Downey as new villain Doctor Doom, and the new subtitle Doomsday were all announced in July 2024. Filming began in April 2025 at Pinewood Studios in England, with a large cast consisting mainly of actors from previous MCU media and 20th Century Fox's X-Men film series, and wrapped in September. Location filming took place in England and Bahrain.
Avengers: Doomsday is scheduled to be released in the United States on December 18, 2026, as part of Phase Six of the MCU. The sequel, Avengers: Secret Wars, is set to be released on December 17, 2027.
Paul Rudd as Scott Lang / Ant-Man: An Avenger and former petty criminal with a suit that allows him to shrink or grow in scale while increasing in strength[3]
Tenoch Huerta Mejía as Namor: The king of Talokan and a powerful mutant with pointed ears and wings on his ankles who is capable of breathing both on land and underwater[3]
Simu Liu as Xu Shang-Chi: A highly skilled martial artist and the wielder of the mystical Ten Rings who was trained to be an assassin by his criminal father Xu Wenwu.[3] Liu said Shang-Chi is older, more self-assured, and "a little more lived in with who he is and his responsibilities" compared to his introduction in the film Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021).[6]
Kelsey Grammer as Hank McCoy / Beast: A mutant and member of the X-Men with animalistic physical characteristics, including blue fur, pointed ears, fangs, and claws[3]
Lewis Pullman as Bob Reynolds / Sentry: A superpowered member of the New Avengers who is believed to be stronger than all of the Avengers combined[3]
Alan Cumming as Kurt Wagner / Nightcrawler: A blue-skinned, demonic-looking mutant who can teleport.[3] Cumming said the make-up process was reduced to an hour-and-a-half for Doomsday from the four-and-a-half to five hours it took on the 20th Century Fox film X2 (2003), in large part because the character's tattoos were no longer applied individually by hand.[8] He found working on Doomsday to be "healing" following his miserable experience working on X2.[9]
Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards / Mister Fantastic: Sue's husband, Grimm's best friend, and a highly intelligent scientist who is the leader of the Fantastic Four and can stretch any part of his body to great lengths[4]
Following Majors's arrest in March 2023 and subsequent assault allegations, reports and speculation emerged about his future in the MCU.[37][38] Loveness was no longer involved in the film by the start of the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike in May,[39] reportedly because he was closely associated with the Kang storyline and Marvel was "moving away" from that.[40][41] In June, the release dates for The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars were pushed back to May 1, 2026, and May 7, 2027, respectively,[42] in part due to the scripts not being ready before the strike.[43] Cretton stepped down as director of The Kang Dynasty in November 2023,[44] partially due to schedule delays,[45] and Waldron was set to rewrite the film.[46] The next month, Majors was fired by Disney and Marvel Studios after he was found guilty of harassment and reckless assault in the third degree. The studio had started referring to The Kang Dynasty internally as Avengers 5 by then.[47][48] By February 2024, both Avengers 5 and Secret Wars were being rewritten to minimize Kang's role or remove him entirely following Majors's firing.[49]
Shawn Levy became the studio's top choice to direct Avengers 5 by mid-March 2024, after he directed the MCU film Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), but there were potential scheduling issues with his other projects.[50][51] By that May, Marvel Studios had approached Robert Downey Jr.—who starred as Tony Stark / Iron Man in "The Infinity Saga", covering the MCU's Phases One, Two, and Three—about returning to the MCU to take on the new character of Victor von Doom / Doctor Doom. Downey said he would only return if the Russo brothers also returned as directors.[52][53][54] After McFeely approached the Russos with an idea for the films that excited them,[12] they entered early talks to direct both Avengers 5 and Secret Wars by mid-July.[55] At SDCC at the end of the month, the Russos were confirmed to be directing the two films.[11] They revealed that Avengers 5 was now titled Avengers: Doomsday, and both films would feature Downey as Doctor Doom.[56] The Russos were producing the films through their production company AGBO, and McFeely had joined as writer for both films,[11][57] working with Waldron.[58] In March 2025, Marvel announced 26 cast members for the film alongside Downey. Many of those actors returned from previous MCU media, while some were reprising their roles from 20th Century Fox's X-Men film series.[3][59] Downey, Marvel Studios, and Feige teased that there were more cast members to reveal.[60][1] Feige said Doomsday would focus on the Avengers, Wakandans, Fantastic Four, Thunderbolts—revealed in Thunderbolts* (2025) to be the government-sanctioned New Avengers—and the "original" X-Men teaming up to face Doom.[1][2]Chris Evans was confirmed to be returning as Steve Rogers in December, when the Russos called him "the character that changed our lives... it was always going to come back" to his story.[61][62] They added that they could not imagine telling this story without Rogers having a central role as he did in previous MCU films.[63]
In April 2024, Alan Silvestri indicated that he could be composing the music for an upcoming MCU project after previously doing so for Infinity War, Endgame, and other MCU films.[77] That July, he was confirmed to be returning as the composer for both Doomsday and Secret Wars.[78]
Marketing
The Doomsday subtitle, the return of the Russo brothers, and the casting of Downey as Doctor Doom were all announced at Marvel Studios' SDCC panel in July 2024. The announcement involved multiple people dressed as Doom appearing on stage, including Downey, who unmasked himself to reveal his casting to the audience.[11] Kat Bailey at IGN described the casting announcement as "one of the most dramatic reveals in recent Marvel history" and reported on mixed responses from fans, with some praising Downey's return while others thought it was a desperate move from Marvel Studios following the creative reshuffling caused by Majors's firing.[79] Other commentators also discussed the casting and mixed responses to it,[80][81][82] including Collider's Collier Jennings who criticized the casting of a non-Romani actor considering the character's comic book heritage.[83]
Coinciding with the start of production in March 2025, Marvel aired a nearly five-and-a-half-hour-long livestream showing a line of director's chairs with cast member names on them. A new chair was revealed approximately every 12 minutes, accompanied by music from a relevant previous Marvel project. After revealing 26 cast members, the livestream ended with an appearance by Downey and a rendition of Silvestri's Avengers theme.[3][60] The livestream saw around 100,000 concurrent viewers on YouTube,[84] and an hour-over-hour audience growth, to become the most viewed cross-platform livestream stunt. It became the second-most trending video on YouTube with 275 million views in its first 24 hours, surpassing past livestreams for Marvel's red carpet premieres. The livestream also accumulated 3.1million mentions across social media, which is five times higher than the "social volume" of the first trailer for Deadpool & Wolverine. It garnered 55 distinct trending terms on X (formerly Twitter) and the hashtag "AvengersDoomsday" was the top trending topic on the site for over seven hours.[60] Numerous Internet memes were generated with each cast announcement.[84][60] Anthony D'Alessandro of Deadline Hollywood described the stunt as a "pop cultural event".[60]Variety's Jordan Moreau and Brent Lang called the livestream a "slow-burn" and likened it to the release date reveal for the seventh season of Game of Thrones in 2017, which saw a block of ice melt to reveal the date; both stunts were "mocked for their pace".[84] Austen Goslin of Polygon, who was concerned about the large size of the announced cast, described the livestream as "agonizingly slow [but] exceedingly fun". He enjoyed checking the stream for each new reveal and seeing responses on social media.[85] James Whitbrook of Gizmodo said the livestream's viewership spoke to Marvel's "ability to maintain much of that grip it's had on pop culture over the past almost 20 years".[86]
The Russo brothers and Scott Lang / Ant-Man star Paul Rudd introduced footage from the film at Destination D23 in August 2025.[87] Disney's Merchandise Expo in China the following month featured concept art of Doom from the film;[88] a light show centered on Doom, featuring logos for the Avengers, X-Men, and Fantastic Four; and a recreation of a panel from the 2015 Secret Wars comic series in which Doom rips the skeleton out of Thanos's body.[89] In December, Doomsday was featured at Disney's Giornate Di Cinema Sorrento presentation in Italy. The announced cast was grouped by their teams: the Fantastic Four; the X-Men; the New Avengers; Sam Wilson / Captain America's "Heroic Avengers" team, which included Thor, Xu Shang-Chi, Joaquin Torres / Falcon, Ant-Man, and Loki; and the "Wakandan Warriors", which included Shuri / Black Panther, M'Baku, and Namor.[90][91]
On December 18, 2025, the Russo brothers released a short teaser of a 12-month countdown clock to mark a year until the film's scheduled release.[92] Different short teasers were shown during each of the first four weeks of screenings for the Disney film Avatar: Fire and Ash, starting with its release on December 19:[93][94] the first revealed the return of Evans as Rogers and shows him holding a baby;[16][95] the second features Thor praying to his father Odin for the strength to return to his adopted daughter Love after the coming battle;[17][96] the third focuses on the X-Men characters Charles Xavier / Professor X, Erik Lehnsherr / Magneto, and Scott Summers / Cyclops, and shows a ruined Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters;[97] and the fourth is centered on the Wakandans and Talokanil, with Shuri and M'Baku meeting the Fantastic Four member Ben Grimm / The Thing.[7] The teasers were released online on December 23,[98] December 30,[99] January 6,[97] and January 13, respectively.[100] Each teaser ends with the countdown clock.[101] They were all noted for their similar "serious and somber" tone,[7] and for a focus on children, continuing from the post-credits scene of the film The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) which focuses on Franklin Richards.[17][102][103][104] Jesse Schedeen at IGN appreciated the return to a more serious tone for Thor following the more comedic approach taken under director Taika Waititi with the films Thor: Ragnarok (2017) and Thor: Love and Thunder (2022).[96]Gizmodo's James Whitbrook enjoyed the first look at a Fantastic Four member interacting with other MCU characters in the fourth teaser,[100] which includes characters that debuted in, or are closely associated with, the Fantastic Four comic books.[105][106] Doom's absence from the teasers was noted by commentators,[100][107] with Marco Vito Oddo at ComicBook.com calling it a smart move to build anticipation for the character. He believed Doom would be revealed in a full trailer targeted at a global audience.[103]
All four teasers were leaked ahead of their online releases.[108] Germain Lussier at Gizmodo expressed frustration with the rollout, feeling it was fumbled by Marvel due to the leaks.[109] He was underwhelmed by the initial countdown teaser that was released after news of the Evans teaser already leaked,[110] said the leaks undermined the studio's plans to get a "big, exciting, in-theater [fan] reaction" to Evans's return,[111] and added that Marvel fans were "not used to major news being confirmed via bootlegged clips, wrapped in uncertainty of where and how to see things".[110]The Hollywood Reporter's Borys Kit and Aaron Couch described the teaser approach as a "unique rollout" that was attempting to get "diehard" Marvel fans to see Fire and Ash multiple times in theaters.[94] Jeremy Mathai at /Film also described the rollout as unique and said it had driven online discussion, but some of this was about how "un-hyped" some were feeling about the sombre teasers.[102] After the X-Men teaser was released, ComicBook.com's Chris Agar said it was the best so far and there was an escalation from showing Rogers at peace, to Thor preparing for battle, to Cyclops "firing an optic blast into the sky in rage".[107] Kyle Anderson of Nerdist also believed there was an increase in quality and excitement with each of the four teasers,[106] and /Film's Sandy Schaefer said the Wakanda teaser was Marvel saving the best for last.[112] Whitbrook felt the fourth teaser was "muted" compared to the previous three and their focus on "familiar heavy hitters".[100] Schedeen believed the focus on past lead actors over new characters who were introduced since Endgame indicated that Marvel was pivoting to reinvigorate casual fans who "checked out of the MCU once Evans and Downey did".[113]
The four teasers had collectively accumulated 1.02 billion online views within three days of the fourth being released. Couch said this was a "massive sum" considering they were not tied to a promotional broadcast. Together the teasers had more views than any single Marvel trailer on Instagram (505 million) and TikTok (103 million), each teaser had on average a 188 percent higher "social volume" than most Marvel trailers, and the rollout generated 16 distinct trending terms on X. Couch said Marvel was aware the teasers would leak once they were in theaters, and the studio saw the rollout approach—which required collaboration with theaters around the world—as a continuation of the cast reveal livestream. Based on the viewership, Couch believed the leaks had not impacted fan enthusiasm and said "the experiment paid off in a big way". The Russo brothers said the teasers each gave narrative information,[108] and described them as "stories" and "clues" rather than teasers or trailers.[109] Despite responding negatively to the teaser rollout and the Russos' "cryptic" comments, Lussier conceded that the approach was working since people were talking about the film 11 months before its release.[109] There was speculation about whether Marvel continued practices from previous films of using footage shot specifically for marketing,[114][115] or altering footage to hide certain characters or details.[116] Anderson believed the Wakanda teaser was the only one of the four to feature actual scenes from Doomsday.[106] That teaser debuted online through a livestream on Marvel's YouTube account that transitioned to be a livestream of the countdown clock,[101] continuing the "tradition" established with the cast reveal livestream.[108] Commentators questioned whether the countdown livestream would be used to reveal additional information about the film leading up to its release.[117][118] Lussier felt the livestream was unnecessary since the countdown was included at the end of each teaser.[109]
Release
Avengers: Doomsday is scheduled to be released in the United States on December 18, 2026.[70] The film is expected to be released in IMAX.[119][needs update] It was originally scheduled for release on May 2, 2025,[29] but was delayed to May 1, 2026, in part due to the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike,[43][56] followed by another delay to the December 2026 release to allow more time for production to be completed.[70] It will be part of Phase Six of the MCU.[29]
A sequel, titled Avengers: Secret Wars, is scheduled to be released on December 17, 2027.[70] It is also being written by Waldron and McFeely,[58] and directed by the Russo brothers.[56] The film will conclude Phase Six of the MCU.[29]
12Couch, Aaron; Kit, Borys (December 12, 2025). "Heat Vision". Heat Vision (newsletter). Archived from the original on December 13, 2025. Retrieved December 12, 2025.
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