Late Arrival Spoiler / Marvel Cinematic Universe

Due to its ever expanding outreach, both in-universe and out, all new entries in the MCU are produced and released with the feeling that you've seen the previous installments in the franchise, despite Kevin Feige claiming that each one tries to avoid as much Continuity Lockout as possible. As a result, each one may contain elements/characters or reference major plot points from past MCU offerings that were completely kept from their respective marketing campaigns in order to prevent spoilers. All spoilers listed below for films released prior to the release of the first installments of Phase 3 will be left unmarked. You have been warned.^note Some of the examples listed below may be examples more in line with the It Was His Sled trope rather than the Late-Arrival Spoiler one, so you may remove any of them if you feel like that's the case.

---

• Iron Man:
  • Its ending with Tony not bothering with hiding that he was Iron Man. That only remains a twist if you see this film before any other MCU film Tony appears in, including the sequels.
  • The now iconic post-credits scene involving Samuel L. Jackson as SHIELD Director Nicolas Joseph "Nick" Fury, meeting Tony after revealing his secret to the world, revealing he's actually become "a part of a bigger universe" that he just didn't realize yet. After introducing himself to Stark, he provides the kicker.
  Nick Fury: I'm here to talk to you about the Avengers Initiative.
• The Avengers:
  • The mid-credits scene where The Other speaks out to his boss, the real mastermind behind the Battle of New York. A purple, "mad titan" that went by the name of Thanos. The Reveal of his role in film was a huge plot twist and shock for comic fans as well as the implications of the Infinity Stones for future movies. And with that, the MCU had firmly established the very first Big Bad of the entire franchise, and the final obstacle its characters will have to overcome in order to get to the happy ending of the final major installment of what would eventually go on to be called "The Infinity Saga." An... endgame you might call it.
• Iron Man 3
  • The Mandarin is a fake, being an actor reading terrorist spiel as a cover-up for the villainous plot. The short All Hail the King shows that actor in prison, while revealing there was a real Mandarin, who was displeased at being impersonated and sent someone to bring him from jail. It's particularly prevalent in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which revealed that Mandarin (who doesn't go by this name) and recalled the events of when someone passed for him.
• Captain America: The Winter Soldier:
  • Evidently the marketers in charge of promoting the movie didn't even try to keep the titular Soldier's identity (Bucky Barnes) a secret, bringing up his real name in promotional material on DVDs and in a documentary about the MCU. Yes, for comics fans it was an eight year old spoiler already, but because of this mindset hardly anyone walking into theatres was shocked to find out who he was. Same goes for DVD viewers, which featured a screenshot of his uncovered face on the DVD case.
  • Although the movie's writers did seem to be aware of this, and exploited the fact that everyone could see this particular twist coming a mile off to distract from the real spoiler: SHIELD has been a puppet agency controlled by HYDRA from its very inception.
  • Although even this twist had a form of leak prior to the film's release, given that the synopsis for Avengers: Age of Ultron had already been released, which blatantly said that The Avengers start out the movie battling HYDRA. This didn't spoil HYDRA's ties to SHIELD, but it did spoil the fact that HYDRA has resurfaced in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
  • The Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode that aired a few days after the movie's premiere also served spoilers for those who hadn't seen the movie yet, as it unfurls the HYDRA reveal, and even has some dialogue regarding Captain America taking down a Helicarrier.
• Captain America: Civil War:
  • Its first trailer has Steve addressing a dude with a metal arm as "Bucky." So that pretty much does it, even if you've somehow managed to avoid the spoiler so far.
• Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2:
  • Baby Groot is a walking, talking (well...) late-arrival spoiler for the climax of the first movie. Just his presence, combined with the fact that adult Groot is nowhere to be seen, gives away the fact that something had clearly happened to him.
• Thor: Ragnarok:
  • Thor losing his right eye thanks to who turns out to be his long-banished sister, Hela.
    Hela: Ugh, now you remind me of dad.
• Captain Marvel (2019): The Skrulls are Good All Along, especially Talos as leader. It was meant as a surprise in the original movie, but since than, Talos, now obviously a good guy has not only appeared in The Stinger of Spider-Man: Far From Home but also was a main character in Secret Invasion (2023).
• Avengers: Endgame:
  • Its trailers didn’t hesitate to hide the fact that half the life in the universe got dusted by Thanos at the end of Avengers: Infinity War. They only hid the means by which they got everyone back. There's even a Logo Joke of the Marvel logo being dusted away in one of the trailers. True to form, the second act which is when they actually do the saving (they go back in time to get the stones before Thanos and make their own gaunlet) was almost entirely absent from the trailers. There are a few shots from it but the bulk of the scenes in the promotional materials came from the set up first act and Final Battle third act.
• Spider-Man: Far From Home:
  • Inverted with its first trailer, which came out before the release of Avengers: Endgame, and the mere existence of the film spoils the fact that Peter Parker somehow crawls back out of the grave he ended up in at the end of Avengers: Infinity War.
  • The second trailer for Far From Home, released May 6, 2019, however, spoils Endgame while revealing more details about the plot of Far From Home, which takes place after Endgame. Given how avoiding spoilers have become Serious Business for some, the trailer is even prefaced with a spoiler warning from Tom Holland.
  • As for major revelations in the film itself, yes, Mysterio is indeed just a holographic illusion created by Quentin Beck and is the main antagonist of the movie, just like his comic counterpart.
  • The MCU incarnation of the Daily Bugle appearing in the film's mid-credits scene as an in-universe counterpart to outlets like Fox News and Info-Wars, complete with J. K. Simmons reprising his role as J. Jonah Jameson, becoming the first MCU actor to reprise a role from previous Marvel offerings. (this one appeared even in a non-MCU Marvel movie, Venom: Let There Be Carnage)
• WandaVision:
  • Yes, the whole 1950s-2010s sitcom worlds that most episodes took place in were indeed direct creations of Wanda Maximoff cooping with the events of both Infinity War and Endgame which resulted in her boyfriend, Vision dying in the former, whom she inadvertently resurrects while first creating her sitcom "hex."
  • Evan Peters becoming a recurring character in the series as a "recasted" version of Wanda's brother, Pietro, whom turned out to be just a guy named Ralph Bohner, and not the actual Quicksilver from the X-Men Film Series.
  • Yes, the "noisy neighbor" Agnes, played by Kathryn Hahn, is indeed a deaged version of the character Agatha Harkness from the comics.
  • Wanda not only finally getting called "The Scarlet Witch" after 4 MCU appearances up to that point, but also finally getting her own version of her wardrobe from the comics. This one in particular is "spoiled" on the front of the Blu-ray Steelbook.
• The Falcon and the Winter Soldier:
  • Julia Louis-Dreyfus appearing as Contessa Valentina Allegra De La Fontaine^note Or "Val" for short, but don't call her that., in an appearance that was originally intended to come after her role in Black Widow, before the COVID-19 Pandemic switched up the release schedule for Phase 4.
  • The reveal of Sam's comic-accurate Captain America suit in the series finale, which he got from the Wakandans just the episode prior.
• Loki (2021):
  • Season 1:
    • A female variant of Loki named Sylvie ends up as both the show's co-lead, and the titular character's Love Interest respectively.
    • A variant of Kang the Conqueror, He Who Remains, is the true creator of the TVA, and gets stabbed to death by Sylvie just after the timelines start branching out and formally begin both the countdown to the arrival of the real Kang, and the central arc of what may or may not end up being called The Multiverse Saga in the long run.
  He Who Remains: See you soon...
• Eternals:
  • One Direction member Harry Styles, as Thanos' brother Eros, and Patton Oswalt as Pip the Troll show up in the film's mid-credits scene, claiming that they know where to find the Eternals that were taken hostage during its climax.
• Hawkeye (2021):
  • Yes, Vincent D'Onofrio does indeed reprise his role as Wilson Fisk AKA "The Kingpin" from the 2015 Daredevil series on Netflix, becoming the very first character from one of the shows on the service to ever appear in a Marvel Studios offering.
• Spider-Man: No Way Home:
  • The film completely centers around the fact that the mid-credits scene in Far From Home had its main villain, Mysterio, not only frame Peter for what went down in the attack on London in its climax in a posthumous video message, but also expose his identity as Spider-Man to world in the process, and that Parker now has to undo the damage Quentin Beck's done to his life and restore his good name as well.
  • Yes, Charlie Cox does indeed reprise his role as Matthew "Matt" Murdock from the 2015 Daredevil series on Netflix, becoming one of the very first major characters from one of the shows on the platform to appear in a Marvel Studios offering.
  • Yes, Both Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield do indeed reprise their roles as their Spider-Man variants from the original Spider Man Trilogy, and The Amazing Spider-Man series respectively.
  • The Green Goblin killing the MCU's Aunt May, firmly cementing Peter as an official orphan.
  • Peter undoing the damage he caused in the end by having Doctor Strange completely wipe people's memory of him.^note Supposedly, this also included wiping every single trace of his existence that ever existed, but it was unclear if that was also the case when the spell was cast.
  • Peter constructing himself what may be the most comic-accurate Spider-Man costume every realized before the credits start rolling.