Marvel Cinematic Universe / Tropes S to Z

Tropes for Marvel Cinematic Universe
Tropes A | Tropes B to F | Tropes G to R | Tropes S To Z

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• Scenery Gorn: The climactic battles of several films usually results in the city where the battles take place getting put through the wringer. Manhattan, in particular, took a massive beating in the first Avengers film, as does Sokovia in Age of Ultron and the Avengers compound in Endgame. Infinity War shows the wrecks remaining of Knowhere and Titan. Inverted in Doctor Strange, where Hong Kong starts out in ruins but it gets repaired during the battle via time magic.
• Schizo Tech: As expected for a superhero universe, the technology is all over the place. Geniuses with the right resources like Tony Stark can build highly-advanced Powered Armor, Applied Phlebotinum existed since the '60s that allowed people like Hank Pym and Janet van Dyne to shrink down to tiny sizes at will, and Super-Soldier serums existed back in the '40s which powered the legendary Captain America. Street-level criminal syndicates sell Imported Alien Phlebotinum to black markets, genetic engineering giving people superpowers is abound, Cool Airships are available courtesy of S.H.I.E.L.D., robots (both fully robotic and human-like) are common, advanced A.I.s are used to handle such technology, and there's a Hidden Elf Village in the form of Wakanda that is even more advanced than everything else while pairing it with that of an ancient African aesthetic. This isn't even close to everything. However, consumer products and government weaponry are often mundane and at parity with real life.
• Schrödinger's Canon: All the pre-Disney+ shows have fallen into this status for a variety of reasons (see the Trivia section for details that involve the studio politics). The closest thing that there has potentially been to any one pre-Plus series being removed from continuity has been WandaVision notably featuring the Darkhold, which has a significantly different design from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and absolutely no nods to it not previously being in Agatha Harkness' posession. Conversely, Endgame and some Phase Four works have had a few actors from Agent Carter and Daredevil come back to reprise their roles, tentatively confirming at least the Broad Strokes of their series; before Echo made direct references to Daredevil and definitively established it and its connected Netflix shows as canon.
• Second Super-Identity:
  • A post on the Russos' Instagram confirmed that post-Civil-War, Captain America ditched the shield and rebranded as the vigilante Nomad for Avengers: Infinity War. Black Widow, and Falcon, held onto their monikers, whilst Wanda Maximoff had yet to take on a moniker, but the entire group became known as the "Secret Avengers".
  • Black Panther and Falcon and the Winter Soldier had Bucky Barnes aka the Winter Soldier use the nickname "White Wolf", a reference to a comic-book ally of the Black Panther; though it's not clear if he uses it as a super-identity.
  • After his absence in Avengers: Infinity War, Hawkeye returned in Avengers: Endgame as "Ronin", with a new sword and haircut.
  • Spider-Man: Far From Home features an unintentional one — Spider-Man, while wearing Fury's stealth suit, is dubbed "Night Monkey" by Ned, who's trying to keep his girlfriend from realizing that it is in fact Spider-Man in order to preserve his friend Peter's Secret Identity. The press, hearing Ned and Betty call out to "Night Monkey" for help, refer to him by that name in their reports.
• Secret Identity: Generally averted with a few exceptions, as most heroes don't actively try to hide their powers. The trend began with Iron Man when Robert Downey Jr. ad-libbing Stark's public reveal of his superhero identity, which Kevin Feige liked and other superheroes were then adapted without their secret identities. Daredevil, Spider-Man, and Ghost Rider are three of the few that do (Matt so he doesn't jeopardize his law career, Peter so Aunt May doesn't find out what he's doing and ground him, and Robbie so his little brother doesn't learn what he's doing). Even then, Peter ends up repeatedly blowing his cover in front of his loved ones (including Aunt May); and then Mysterio and/or his allies publicly expose his identity out of spite. No Way Home's plot ultimately revolves around restoring Peter's secret via Cosmic Retcon.
• Seen It All: Both citizens and superheroes grow more and more unfazed with weird stuff across the phases. By Phase 4, people are so used to magical or alien occurrences that the muggle Dane asks if Sersi is a wizard without a blink of an eye and the presence of a green-furred minotaur learning magic at Kamar-Taj is treated with indifference.
  Natasha Romanoff: Scott, I get e-mails from a racoon. Nothing sounds crazy anymore.
• Serial Escalation:
  • Each phase gets progressively larger and more complex than the last one. Phase One focuses primarily on introducing the heroes via what are mostly localized conflicts, culminating in a battle that threatens to destroy all of New York City. Phase Two throws the heroes up against conflicts that can put entire countries and even the planet at risk, while the events of Phase Three span the galaxy and even the entire universe. Phase Four then takes things further with the concept of multiple timelines, effectively forming an MCU multiverse.
  • The size of each phase also increases. Phase One has six entries, all of them consisting of films. Phase Two has that same amount of entries, although with a slightly larger combined runtime. Phase Three then brought in eleven films, making it almost as large as the first two phases combined. And then Phase Four introduced TV series and specials on Disney+ to the mix—resulting in seventeen entries by the time the phase wrapped up.
• Series Continuity Error:
  • Starting with the episode "A Fractured House" from the second season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., every single MCU TV show has omitted Avengers Tower, instead keeping the MetLife Building in its original position.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 features Stan Lee telling a group of Watchers about his time as a FedEx deliveryman. This is a reference to his cameo in Civil War, which is chronologically later than this movie. James Gunn admitted that it was a mistake, and Handwaved that Stan was probably describing some other deliveryman experience.
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming also stated that the Battle of New York was 8 years before the events of the movie. This causes problems, since it's set shortly after Civil War (in 2016) in which it was stated that the first Iron Man was 8 years ago. Also in Civil War, Ross mentions that the Avengers have been active for four years, in agreement with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. where Talbot also specifically states that the battle took place in 2012 and not 2009.
• Setting Update: The universe takes origin stories that were written in the mid-20th century and places them firmly in the 21st century. As a result, many aspects of the characters and their settings are modernized.
  • Where the earliest Marvel comics were written in a political climate influenced by World War II or the Cold War, the MCU takes cues from The War on Terror; Iron Man has Tony get abducted in the Middle East rather than southeast Asia, a Mandarin initially similar to Osama who turns out to be a spoof and parody of Islamophobia, and S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who evoke Homeland Security as well as fears about NSA/PRISM.
  • Luke Cage was originally influenced by the jive movement and Blaxploitation flicks of the 70s. The MCU series tones the cheesier elements of that flavor way down, and throws a little bit of hip-hop/rap for flavor (although they include plenty of traditional jazz as well).
  • Peter Parker's high school is updated to a modern, ethnically-diverse school for the gifted; Flash is a snobby and arrogant dweeb rather than a jock in a letterman, and Michelle "MJ" Jones has something of a "sullen social activist" streak. The focus also tries to update as much as possible the notion of a Working-Class Hero in a very gentrified New York City with much of the action taking place in Queens and not Manhattan.
• The Shangri-La: The MCU has four hidden Asian villages where heroes have gone to train and study:
  • Lai Shi (a.k.a. "Afterlife"), a refuge for Inhumans in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Though characters make a point of saying that they don't know exactly where it is, so it might not be in Asia (but it does have an Asian design aesthetic and is led by a Chinese woman, so it still invokes the idea).
  • K'un L'un in Iron Fist, which exists in another dimension accessible through the Himalayas. It's never shown onscreen, but Danny speaks fondly of it.
  • Kamar-Taj in Doctor Strange. Unlike the other examples, Kamar-Taj isn't some vague place in the Himalayas, but rather a monastery in the very real city of Kathmandu, Nepal.
  • Ta Lo in Shang-Chi, another "in another dimension" example.
• Shared Universe: The Trope Codifier when it comes to film. While it's certainly not the first medium to do it (it's not even the first film studio to do it), it is, by far, the most successful and iconic. Its use of numerous properties set within the same universe, which connect and/or branch out into numerous storylines (all of which are smaller parts of one grand Myth Arc) has inspired numerous other franchises to attempt to create their own cinematic universe, to varying degrees of success. Some movies are far more independent than others and try not to rely on cameos and easter eggs, but all of them are in the same setting.
• Shirtless Scene: Male leads often take their shirts off at least once during the movie or TV season. Invoked in Shang-Chi, where he gets roped into Fight Clubbing and is told to take his shirt off for the crowd.
  Katy: What happened to your shirt?
  Shang-Chi: [shrugs]
• Simultaneous Arcs:
  • The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2 and Thor all take place very close together, which is indicated by Iron Man 2, where news footage depicts events from Incredible Hulk while Coulson leaves Stark to lead S.H.I.E.L.D.'s operation in Thor (shown in The Stinger). A tie-in comic Fury's Big Week shows how this trope plays out from Nick Fury's perspective.
  • Black Widow takes place between two scenes in Captain America: Civil War, after Natasha's final scene and before Steve breaks out his team from the Raft. It also establishes that the gap between the two Civil War scenes is at least two weeks, meaning that Black Panther (2018) (set one week after an assassination at the beginning of Civil War) also takes place during that span and may overlap with Black Widow.
  • The events of Spider-Man: No Way Home wrap up right around the time Hawkeye begins, as both installments take place during the 2024 Christmas holidays. In No Way Home's final scene, Peter can be seen swinging past the Rockefeller Tree, which is eventually knocked down by Clint and Kate during Hawkeye's finale.
• The Smurfette Principle: The official original rosters of the Avengers, the Guardians of the Galaxy, and the Defenders all play this straight, with the Avengers having one woman out of six (Black Widow), the Guardians having one out of five (Gamora), and the Defenders having one out of four (Jessica Jones).
• The Sociopath: Has its own page.
• Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Each of the major villains fought in each of the Avengers films increase in terms of threat level.
  • Loki wanted to conquer the world, and led an alien army to invade New York City.
  • Ultron planned to destroy humanity, and the scope of his plans went worldwide.
  • Thanos intended to use the six Infinity Stones to kill half of the universe so the other can thrive. He does just that. And then he's killed and replaced by his younger self from 2014, who desired to destroy the entire universe and reset it from scratch so people will forget about the old one.
• Spanner in the Works: This might as well be the Earth's hat. Whenever a nefarious plan is set in motion by cosmic players across the universe, a Terran can be counted upon to butt in and bring the whole thing crashing down, as the Supreme Intelligence, the Dark Elves, Ego, Dormammu, and Thanos himself find out to their sorrow. So much so that by the time of Endgame, the Mad Titan has developed a very personal antipathy towards the "stubborn, annoying little planet".
• Spared by the Adaptation:
  • Happy Hogan in Iron Man 3, who was mercy killed in the comics after going into a braindead coma but survives in this movie until the very end after experiencing the impact of an Extremis soldier exploding and awakening from his coma.
  • In Ultimate Marvel universe, Hawkeye had a wife named Laura and three kids, all of whom were killed by Black Widow during The Ultimates 2. Laura and the kids appear alive and well in Avengers: Age of Ultron, with Black Widow (who isn't a traitor in this continuity) serving as the children's Honorary Aunt. They later die in Avengers: Endgame, but are revived by the end of the movie.
  • Rhomann Dey in the comics is known for dying in his first appearance and bestowing his powers upon Richard Rider. His MCU counterpart has (so far) been spared this fate and is alive and well by the end of Guardians of the Galaxy.
  • Black Panther's father T'Chaka is still alive in Captain America: Civil War, until the end of Act 1. This is in contrast to the comics and most other adaptations, where T'Chaka was murdered long before T'Challa ever became the Black Panther. Also true of T'Challa's mom, as Ramonda was his stepmother in the comics; presumably, having T'Challa's biological mother succumb to Death by Childbirth as per his original backstory would be inconsistent with Wakanda's far-better-than-2018 medical technology.
  • Related, but in the original The Infinity Gauntlet comic book, Hawkeye was one of the many heroes who was killed when Thanos used the Infinity Gauntlet to wipe out half of all the life in the universe. In Avengers: Endgame, he's one of the few heroes to have survived Thanos' use of the Infinity Gauntlet.
  • In All-New Ghost Rider, Robbie's uncle Eli died years ago, and his vengeful spirit is what transforms Robbie into the new Ghost Rider in the first place. However, in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, Eli is still alive, albeit in prison because of a manslaughter conviction. He eventually becomes an aversion of this when Robbie kills him.
  • Daredevil season 3 hints that Karen Page will get the same fate she gets in the Guardian Devil comic, killed by Bullseye inside the Clinton Church. Instead, in an inversion of the original comic, Father Lantom stands in Karen's way to prevent her from being impaled by a thrown projectile and is killed instead.
  • In The Punisher, Micro survives the entire first season and gets a happy ending, whereas both prominent comics versions (the mainstream version and MAX version) were killed by Frank Castle himself.
• Speculative Fiction LGBT: Thus far, all of the named characters who are explicitly confirmed to be LGBTQ (Loki, Valkyrie, Phastos) are some form of Human Alien.
• State Sec: S.H.I.E.L.D is a branch of the US government filled with secret agents, myriad military forces, and various research labs.
• The Stinger: Most of the movies have had one or more, and in fact it's become one of the signature traits of MCU movies. While a full list can be found on its own page, notable examples and exceptions are listed below.
  • The Incredible Hulk had its intended post-credits scene placed just before the credits to capitalize on the success of Iron Man, although it still fits this purpose.
  • Captain America: The First Avenger had a different approach to the trope by having a teaser trailer for The Avengers movie. Spider-Man: No Way Home similarly featured a trailer for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness in place of a traditional scene.
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron has one mid-credits scene, but no post-credits scene.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2 has five extra scenes after the final shot of the movie.
  • Averted by Avengers: Endgame, which has absolutely no mid-credits or post-credits scenes.
• Strong as They Need to Be: Like most superhero franchises, the MCU is guilty of this more often than not, largely due to the number of characters and intricate Power Levels they have to manage from movie to movie:
  • Avengers: Infinity War:
    • The movie opens with Thanos making his debut by dragging out a post-Ragnarok Thor by the head and beating an enraged Hulk to a pulp. Fast forward an hour and a half, and Thanos is having trouble with Iron Man and Dr. Strange, despite having twice the number of Infinity Stones he had when he fought Thor and Hulk. Exaggerated a few minutes later when Captain America is able to pull a Punch Catch on Thanos during the Battle of Wakanda.
    • When the Black Order attacks Scarlet Witch and Vision in Edinburg, they almost get the best of them, and succeed early on in critically wounding Vision. However, later on, Okoye and Black Widow will be enough to match Proxima Midnight during the Battle of Wakanda, and Cap will be able to handle Corvus Glaive with minimal assistance from Vision.
    • During the fight in New York, Dr. Strange is defeated by Ebony Maw in a direct confrontation, and Iron Man needs the assistance of both Spider-Man and Wong to defeat Cull Obsidian. However, both will go on to match and even get the best of Thanos during the Battle of Titan without any outside help.
    • In Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2, Mantis's powers are potent enough to put an entire planet to sleep. In Infinity War, she struggles to put Thanos under for even a few minutes.
  • Captain America: Civil War:
    • During the airport battle in Leipzig, Captain America is able to match Spider-Man in a direct contest of strength, despite the fact that only a few minutes prior, Spider-Man pulled a Punch Catch on the Winter Soldier's metal arm—the same metal arm that Cap could barely stand up to in The Winter Soldier with both hands and his shield.
    • In the final showdown between Tony, Steve, and Bucky, both Bucky and Steve are able to damage Tony's armor, despite the fact that the lesser versions of that armor were capable of stonewalling tanks and blows from Thor without breaking. Similarly, Tony is able to hold his own against both Bucky and Steve in hand-to-hand combat, despite only taking up martial arts a few years ago.
    • In Age of Ultron, Wanda has enough control over her powers to hypnotize an entire city and stop a runaway train. However, in Civil War, she struggles to contain a suicide bomb and needs Hawkeye to provide distractions to her opponents in order to use her powers effectively.
• Sufficiently Advanced Alien: Aside from the Asgardians and other races from the Nine Realms, the Kree were regarded by early Earth peoples as "blue angels". The Celestials and Dormammu are so powerful that it seems even cosmic and magic characters aren't certain whether they're gods or simply powerful beings.
• Superhero: From the Badass Normal assassins to the guys in powered armor, to the heroic aliens, they fight against evil For Great Justice.
• Superhero Movie Villains Die: Generally played straight for the first two phases, with most of the major villains of each film dying at the end, with only a few exceptions. This starts to get averted in Phases 3 and 4 however, where the villains sometimes suffer a Fate Worse than Death, are only captured, get away, or some other fate. See the trope page for all the individual examples.
• Superhero Packing Heat:
  • Captain America. But while Steve knows how to fire a gun and won't hesitate to use one if there's any need to, he still prefers not to as much as possible, preferring to use his shield over his M1911A1.
  • The more militarized heroes such as Black Widow and Falcon play this straight. Hawkeye does as well, even if he prefers a more old-school weapon, and War Machine takes it to an extreme with a bunch of guns built into his armor.
  • Star-Lord and especially Rocket Raccoon frequently use firearms. Gamora will also use them occasionally, depending on the situation (with Star-Lord lampshading that guns are usually his "thing", not hers).
• Superhero Paradox: This theme is a key element of the franchise, often stated clearly in ensemble pieces.
  • The idea that the presence of superheroes encourages or creates super-threats is invoked in The Avengers. Thor warns Nick Fury that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s experiments with the Tesseract to create a new generation of superweapons is "a signal to all the realms that the Earth is ready for a higher form of war" — something gods, aliens and godlike aliens alike will respond to the same way first-world nations would to undeveloped powers engaging in nuclear testing — but Fury points out they felt they had to do it, because Earth is on the precipice of discovering at large they are not alone in the cosmos, and aside from anomalies such as the titular heroes, the rest of the human race is fairly freaked out at learning that, "Not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."
  • Civil War tackles the issue head-on, as it deals with the fallout of Stark and Banner directly creating a supervillain in Age of Ultron. Vision specifically mentions it as a reason that he is pro-Accords.
  • The Netflix shows get hit hard with this trope in general, due to their dark and morally-ambiguous subject matter. The Battle of New York gave way to the rise of corruption and criminal activity in Hell's Kitchen, and the main characters' attempts to fight crime actively make things worse in many ways. For instance, Fisk's and Cottonmouth's criminal syndicates get thrown into chaos, and both specifically begin harming and involving innocent people in their attempts to bring down their enemies. In Daredevil Season 2, Fisk's fall left an Evil Power Vacuum; and characters wonder if Daredevil's heroics opened the door for more hardcore vigilantes like the Punisher. In Jessica Jones, the fact that trying to catch Kilgrave will potentially kill lots of innocents is discussed, but rationalized by the fact that if left to his own devices, Kilgrave will ruin a lot more. In Luke Cage, Mariah Dillard tries to stir up anti-superhuman sentiment and equip the police with more powerful weapons to fight them, but some on the force are concerned since police gear will inevitably find its way into the hands of criminals.
• Superhero Prevalence Stages: Phase One is an early stage, with each hero treated as though they are the only ones of their kind, the villains never win, and the heroes are uncompromising in their morals and convictions. Phase Two is a middle stage, with groups of heroes now forming, along with groups of villains to counter them. Phase Three and onwards marks the later stage, with heroes now policing one another, villains becoming competent enough to score real and permanent victories, and heroes begin dying or suffering other permanent harm while others compromise their convictions when faced with possible disaster.
• Superheroes in Space:
  • Although many of Thor's adventures have taken place on Earth, he has also done some superheroics on other planets both with his friends and on his lonesome.
  • The Guardians of the Galaxy are a Ragtag Bunch of Misfits from different parts of the universe who have been active since 2014. Their hijinks in that year alone included stopping a genocidal warlord from destroying an entire planet using an Infinity Stone, and stopping Ego the Living Planet from terraforming all the planets in the universe and remaking them in his image. Unlike with Thor, however, the Guardians very rarely get involved with Earth matters, not only because the universe is a huge place, but because de facto leader Peter Quill / Star-Lord has a traumatic history with his home planet, and avoids going there at all costs.
  • Carol Danvers, aka Captain Marvel is another example. Although she's also a native of Earth like Star-Lord, she also spends most of her time helping out other places in the galaxy, since most of them don't have the likes of the Avengers to rely on. The Marvels also explains that she doesn't come back to Earth too much because she had caused a major disaster on an alien planet, leaving her too ashamed to come home.
  • Eternals reveals the existence of Eros/Starfox, who, according to Pip the Troll, has had quite the superhero career in the cosmos.
• Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Ever since The Avengers brought the team together, most films have had to deal with the question of "Why aren't all the other heroes out there getting involved?" As each film generally has its own possible justifications (or doesn't, in some cases), the MCU has a dedicated page with the details.
• Super Registration Act: Captain America: Civil War shows the Sokovia Accords, which were intended to bring the Avengers under UN control. Afterward, the Avengers under Tony Stark were government employees, while superheroics by anyone else (including Captain America's side of the Avengers) were illegal. The Avengers reunited in Infinity War to defend the Earth from Thanos, but break up as an organization after the Snap. After Endgame, the Accords are effectively defunct.
• Super-Soldier:
  • About half of the superhuman origins in this 'verse have their roots in trying to make better soldiers, peacekeepers, and enforcers; whether it's by bioengineering (Captain America, Red Skull, Winter Soldier, Hulk, Abomination, Extremis soldiers, Deathlok, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Jessica Jones, Will Simpson), special equipment (Iron Man, Iron Monger, War Machine, Falcon), robotics (the Hammer drones, Deathlok again, the Iron Legion, Ultron, Vision), divine blessing (Moon Knight), or just good old-fashioned training (the Black Widow program, most high-level S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, Doctor Strange and the other Masters of the Mystic Arts, Iron Fist, the Hand and the Chaste including Daredevil and Elektra). Many alien species are innately superhuman, but even among those we have people like Ronan, Thor, and the Children of Thanos.
  • The Kursed are these for the Dark Elves. Being super soldiers among a race of super beings, this makes them ridiculously powerful. The Inhumans likewise originated as an alien supersoldier project.
• Super-Strength: Has its own page.
• Super Team: Initiated by Nick Fury, the Avengers at first assembled a genius billionaire in powered armor, a super-soldier from the 1940s, two secret agents, a scientist that turns into a wrathful giant because of gamma radiation and a Norse god, whose explicit goal is to protect Earth. The team inflated through reinforcements from diverse horizons, broke, and then reassembled. At the end of the Infinity Saga, the Avengers have become Household Names and popular celebrities who've managed to tackle Earth-threatening to Universe-threatening villains such as Loki, Ultron or HYDRA. In Endgame, they even manage to bring back all life that Thanos had erased from existence through the Decimation.
• Team Title: Within Marvel Studios, we have The Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Eternals. Marvel Television has Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., The Defenders, New Warriors, and Inhumans.
• Theme Music Abandonment:
  • Ramin Djawadi's themes for Iron Man were never used in Iron Man 2 or Iron Man 3, nor were John Debney's themes for Iron Man 2 used in 3 (which was scored by Brian Tyler). Some of Tyler's themes do briefly appear in Avengers: Age of Ultron, however, as that film was co-composed by Tyler.
  • Craig Armstrong's music for The Incredible Hulk is never utilized in any of the character's future appearances.
  • Patrick Doyle's theme for Thor is replaced by a new theme for Brian Tyler's Thor: The Dark World score. However, both scores are briefly utilized in Thor: Ragnarok (In-Universe in the latter case), though composer Mark Mothersbaugh primarily uses his own theme for the character instead. None of these themes are used in the Avengers films.
  • Alan Silvestri's theme from Captain America: The First Avenger does briefly appear in Captain America: The Winter Soldier but is never integrated into Henry Jackman's score for it or Captain America: Civil War. However, the theme is reprised in The Avengers, as well as its sequels Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, which were composed by Silvestri.
  • Averted by Avengers: Age of Ultron; despite being composed by Brian Tyler and Danny Elfman, rather than Alan Silvestri, the film heavily utilizes the first film's theme alongside its own compositions. The sequels, composed by Silvestri, naturally retain the theme as well; however, they do not utilize any of the Tyler/Elfman compositions.
  • Avengers: Infinity War includes a brief snippet of Ludwig Göransson's theme from Black Panther, but said theme is not incorporated into Alan Silvestri's score for the film.
  • Later franchises, such as Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man and Spider-Man: Homecoming, have generally averted this trope by establishing composer continuity with Tyler Bates, Christophe Beck and Michael Giacchino respectively scoring those franchises. However, this trope can still occur when the characters appear in other MCU franchises, such as Ant-Man's appearance in Captain America: Civil War and the Guardians' appearance in Avengers: Infinity War. With Avengers: Endgame, however, composer Alan Silvestri made a more concerted effort to avert the trope by incorporating Beck's Ant-Man and Pinar Toprak's Captain Marvel themes (among others) in the film.
  • Even occurs with the Marvel Studios logo. Thor: The Dark World, the first film released fully under Marvel's own banner, retired the "pages flipping" sound and introduced a new company theme composed by Brian Tyler, but it only lasted for two more films before disappearing. Michael Giacchino's fanfare first appeared with the revamped logo in Doctor Strange, which has lasted a bit longer (at least through WandaVision).
• Theme Music Power-Up: The movies will frequently a character's theme at the point that they dramatically come in to save the day.
• There Are No Global Consequences: Generally averted, as aftereffects of any one film can usually be seen in others.
  • S.H.I.E.L.D. already knew some things, such as the events in New Mexico during Thor, and Iron Man was already a celebrity, but the great unmasking took place in the first The Avengers. There is an alien invasion for all the world to see, Norse gods such as Thor and Loki are real, Captain America is back, there's a superhero group in New York, etc. Yet, the only serious government attempt to manage any of that was with three helicarriers to keep all potential menaces under track (which ended up becoming a menace itself).
  • The third season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. shows a number of global consequences, such as Terrigen spreading to cover all the world's oceans (at least) in seventeen months and Inhumans sprouting up all over the place. America created a new agency to deal with them.
  • Phase 4, in particular The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, goes out of its way to show that despite the Avengers succeeding in resurrecting half the universe, the effects of Thanos' initial triumph which took hold in the five year period between Infinity War and Endgame are going to stick for a long time.
• Three-Point Landing: This is a fairly common action pose seen. Iron Man is best known for it, but other heroes (or the occasional villain) do it sometimes as well. Yelena even mocks Natasha for doing it in Black Widow, and claims she only strikes this pose to show off. Parodied in Moon Knight when Steven, unused to superheroics, manages to pull one off but collapses in pain right afterward.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Generally zig-zagged; as some heroes have no-kill rules but others don't particularly have any issues killing enemy combatants. The details can be found on their own page.
• Timey-Wimey Ball:
  • Time travel in Avengers: Endgame operates on an Alternate Timeline basis where changing the past does not affect the present. By the end of the film the various timelines include one in which Loki escaped with the Tesseract after the Battle of New York (setting up his Disney+ series); and one in which Thanos left the year 2014 to travel to the future.
  • Loki (2021) expands on Endgame, revealing that Time Police cut off alternate timelines before they can fully form, though it doesn't explain the details of how this interacts with what's shown in Endgame.
  • Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. operates on a Stable Time Loop; the season 5 finale has the team break the loop, which did not affect the existence or memories of Fitzsimmons's stowaway time traveler grandson. During season 7, the team follows the Chronicoms through time resulting in a new timeline where Sousa and Kora don't die, Jiaying is killed before Daisy is born, and S.H.I.E.L.D. was decimated by the Chronicoms. Kora, Sousa, and the Chronicoms are removed from this timeline and taken back to the original timeline.
  • The series finale of Runaways has the team go back in time and change events on a Set Right What Once Went Wrong basis, causing the time-displaced future selves to be erased from existence, though the erasure did not affect the results of their actions or the memories of anyone who encountered them.
• Token Wizard:
  • Among the original line-up of the Avengers, Thor Odinson is the most different among them as being the only one among them associated with magic. In his case, he is a Sufficiently Advanced Alien from a culture that harnesses magical energies. With the help of his hammer Mjölnir, he has the power of flight and command over the weather, and was even able to temporarily connect with the Odinforce. Combined with his Asgardian physiology, he is an incredibly powerful Magic Knight (with emphasis on "knight")
  • In Avengers: Infinity War, Doctor Strange fills this role when he, Tony Stark/Iron Man and Peter Parker/Spider-Man are abducted by Ebony Maw. This continues when they are joined by Star-Lord, Drax and Mantis, being the only one among them proficient in magic.
  • Word of God claims that Ebony Maw is also a wizard, making him the only known magic-user to the Children of Thanos and Evil Counterpart to Doctor Strange.
  • Among the Defenders, whereas Matt Murdock is a Badass Normal with a Disability Superpower and Ninja training and both Jessica and Luke are Unskilled, but Strong Differently Powered Individuals with Super-Strength, Danny Rand is the only member who is associated with the supernatural. While much of his power comes from his focus and his Training from Hell Warrior Monk kung fu, what gives him is title of Iron Fist is his ability to use chi to turn his fist into an indestructible weapon, having gotten it after slaying a dragon.
• Trauma Conga Line: Poor Wanda. Her life seems to get worse in every film she appears. WandaVision puts the spotlight on how much she's gone through, and on the consequences that have come with it (she's showing signs of clinical depression, and is actively retreating into delusions instead of reality):
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron: Wanda and Pietro's parents were killed when they were kids by a Stark Industries missile while watching The Dick Van Dyke Show. Another one landed in her house, and she and her brother Pietro were trapped there for two days waiting for it to go off. Orphaned, in a failed state, she and Pietro struggled to survive until they fell in with HYDRA. In terms of the actual events of the movie, the twins join up with Ultron, who seems to genuinely care about them. However, Ultron's also insane, and when they try to stop him from ending the world, Pietro gets killed while Wanda only survives thanks to Vision saving her.
  • Captain America: Civil War: Wanda tries to stop a suicide bomber in Lagos and accidentally blows up an office block, leaving her distraught and guilty. The UN use her mishap as an excuse to enact the Sokovia Accords, causing infighting that leads to the dissolution of the Avengers, so she gets that on her conscience too. Tony Stark confines her to the Avengers compound. While Hawkeye breaks her out of the house arrest to help Cap out in Germany, she and the rest of Team Cap save for Cap and Bucky get arrested at the end of the airport battle and sent to the Raft. She gets put in a tiny cell with a straight-jacket and power-dampener, and spends the rest of the movie staring listlessly at the wall until Cap breaks his teammates out at the end.
  • Avengers: Infinity War: Wanda and Vision fall in love. Since she's still a fugitive, they can only meet a few days at a time, but they make it work. However, Thanos and his minions want to kill Vision for the Mind Stone in his head. When there's no other way of keeping it away from Thanos, Wanda is forced to kill Vision herself (at his request). This takes about a minute, so Vision dies slowly, and after it's done...Thanos uses the Time Stone to put the Mind Stone back together. He rips the Stone out of Vision's skull, and Wanda is Forced to Watch. Wanda is then dusted when the Snap occurs, still crying over Vision's body.
  • WandaVision: After Wanda is un-dusted, she goes to SWORD headquarters to claim Vision's body, and discovers him being picked apart by SWORD. She scans Vision's mind, realizes that unlike almost everyone else he is permanently dead, and asks SWORD director Tyler Hayward for his body so she can bury him, and gets refused. The final straw is discovering Vision had bought them a house so they could grow old together in the suburbs, and with both of them dead, they hadn't even finished building it. Wanda snaps, and creates a sitcom reality encompassing the whole of Westview.
• Trilogy Creep: Regarding the Phases:
  • Inverted with Phase 1, which was originally meant to go on a while longer before culminating in The Avengers. However, due to the Disney acquisition, plans changed and certain movies (such as Ant-Man) were pushed back, leaving Phase 1 comprised of six films instead of one that encompassed at least seven or eight films.
  • Phase 2 was originally five films long. However, Ant-Man was shifted over from Phase 3 to Phase 2, meaning that Phase 2 comprised six movies.
  • Phase 3 is an interesting case. The original plan was for there to be nine films, but the total was bumped up to ten when Marvel Studios worked out an agreement with Sony Pictures to share the Spider-Man property and add a new movie to the schedule. Then Ant-Man and the Wasp was added to the schedule after Ant-Man did well enough to warrant a sequel, bumping the total up to eleven. Later on, Inhumans was taken off the Phase 3 schedule and eventually cancelled altogether, meaning that the slate would consist of ten films.
  • With regards to the series within the franchise, Thor will be the first character to have a fourth solo film in Thor: Love and Thunder while everyone before him had only trilogies (Endgame is the fourth Avengers movie but was always intended to be part two of the Movie Multipack with Infinity War). A fourth Captain America movie is also currently in the works, albeit with Sam Wilson taking up the mantle; and Sony has announced that they intend to make a second set of Spider-Man movies.
• Understatement: In works that take place after The Avengers (2012), the people of New York City refer to the full-scale alien invasion their city suffered simply as "the incident". The disappearance and return of half the population after Endgame becomes "the Blip".
• Uniqueness Decay: The Asgardians were the premier Superior Species of the MCU for the first three phases, and was largely treated as very unique in the setting because of it. Outside of them, the movies were oriented largely on humans, and no other race held such a status. However, Phases 4 and 5 see the introduction of the Eternals, Vampires and Mutants, all of whom are species with superpowers and could fill the role of being a Superior Species. Thus, the Asgardians are no longer the super race, just one of them.
• The Unmasqued World:
  • Phase Two seems to have this as a theme, as The Avengers was the big unmasking. Killian mentions that "subtle" is a thing of the past, students eagerly take photos and videos of Thor's fight with Malekith, and Coulson's team regularly deals with supernatural or super-science items that have fallen into the wrong hands. To take it even further, The Winter Soldier ends with Natasha having released every single S.H.I.E.L.D. secret onto the internet. Whatever S.H.I.E.L.D. knew, the whole world knows now.
  • Thanks to Doctor Strange's involvement in Infinity War and Endgame, whatever masquerade that covered magic is now also gone in Phase Four. People in the MCU now discuss magic and wizards in complete seriousness.
• Unobtainium: Vibranium is a very rare material that can absorb vibrations in shields or catsuits, power vehicles, propel technological progress centuries ahead of the rest of the world, and influence plant life so that consuming it would heighten strength, speed, and reflexes.
• The 'Verse: The franchise's official name is the "Marvel Cinematic Universe".
• Viewers Are Geniuses: The crux of the films' arc-heavy success is trust that viewers can handle a lot of plot threads and cross-pollinating. Before the MCU, a superhero series focused on one hero and a rotating pick of their traditional rogues gallery. With criss-crossing arcs, continuity nods, and eventually crossovers, the MCU proved the audience can not only handle juggling a vast superhero mythology spanning a large roster but embrace it.
• Villain Decay: HYDRA. They're a serious threat in The Winter Soldier, but they were dealt severe blows in that same film, Age of Ultron, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., due to the failure of Project Insight, the dissolution of S.H.I.E.L.D., and the outing of HYDRA, with things going only downhill for them until, thanks to Malick's intel, the ATCU is able to, simultaneously and off-screen, destroy all of their remaining facilities in a matter of seconds. US Air Force General Hale later tries to rebuild them as a way to defend Earth from aliens, but her plans are stopped and she is killed, seemingly ending HYDRA again.
• Virtual Sidekick: Tony Stark loves this trope.
  • His first assistant was JARVIS; he aided Tony in most of his inventions, and later with piloting the Iron Man armor.
  • When JARVIS became Vision, he switched over to FRIDAY, who has the same role.
  • When he gave Peter Parker a new suit, he added a nameless AI in it to control the suit's various functions, so Peter didn't need an interface. Peter eventually names her Karen. Notably, when Tony takes away the suit and thus Peter can't access Karen anymore, his friend Ned takes over as Mission Control.
  • After his death, Tony gives Peter a pair of glasses with an AI named EDITH. Other than the previous functions, she also has access to a drone army. Notably, she acts far less human than the rest of Tony's creations, but she also has far less hardware.
• Walking Spoiler: Has its own page.
• Weak Boss, Strong Underlings:
  • By virtue of his advanced age and lack of combat prowess, Non-Action Big Bad General Dreykov can barely throw a punch. Luckily for him, he has an army of Widows as well as the Taskmaster at his disposal.
  • Pietro and Wanda Maximoff both serve as the Strong Underlings to Baron Strucker's Weak Boss, as they are both enhanced individuals capable of taking on the Avengers, while Strucker is an older scientist with no combat skills who doesn't even try to defend himself when Captain America comes to capture him.
  • Due to his old age, General Ross isn't much of a physical threat to any of the heroes. Which is why he has to rely on his soldiers, especially Emil Blonsky, who was a skilled fighter even before he took the Super-Soldier serum.
• Wham Episode:
  • "T.A.H.I.T.I.", the episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. that revealed how Phil Coulson was resurrected: with Kree blood.
  • Captain America: The Winter Soldier, with the dissolution of S.H.I.E.L.D. due to HYDRA's corruption of the organisation being made public knowledge, Nick Fury faking his death and going underground in Europe, and the reveal that HYDRA recovered Loki's staff and have begun studying its power.
    • The subsequent Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode that tied into the movie, "Turn, Turn, Turn", applied the movie's big plot twist onto Phil Coulson and his team. Phil's old friend is the enemy that his team has been tracking all season, and Grant Ward is The Mole that works for him.
  • A meta example would be the announcement of Spider-Man officially joining the MCU, which is something that nobody thought would happen while Sony had the character rights. That two major film companies decided to share is quite frankly remarkable.
  • Civil War ends with only two healthy Avengers still on duty Iron Man and the Vision, while one is crippled War Machine, and the rest Captain America, Falcon, Hawkeye, Ant-Man, Scarlet Witch, and Black Widow are all fugitives on the run.
  • Thor: Ragnarok ends with Asgard being completely destroyed by Surtur, with the surviving Asgardians reduced to refugees.
  • Avengers: Infinity War ends with Thanos succeeding in completing the Infinity Gauntlet, wiping out half of the universe. The only heroes still alive at the end of the movie are Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow, War Machine, Rocket, Nebula, Okoye and M'Baku.
  • Avengers: Endgame marks the conclusion of the "Infinity Saga" and the transition to what comes after, and it definitely qualifies: Thanos — who has been the driving force behind the majority of the villains so far — is finally defeated and those killed in Infinity War are brought back, but Tony Stark and Black Widow are both Killed Off for Real (apparently irreversibly), non-Snap fatalities like Gamora and Vision are still dead, Steve Rogers permanently retires, and the five-year Time Skip is not undone or erased, meaning the consequences from the Snap will presumably still be felt throughout all future movies.
  • "For All Time. Always.", the Season One finale of Loki, kicks the next Myth Arc of the franchise into high gear: The death of He Who Remains not only causes the Sacred Timeline to break apart into The Multiverse, but unleashes his many Varaints, most notably Kang the Conqueror, unto it.
• Wham Line: Nearly every movie or show has at least one. We have a dedicated page full of examples, but the biggest ones, which reveal where the franchise as a whole is headed, are usually delivered in The Stinger:
  • The first one was all the way back in Iron Man. Whilst there had been talk of Marvel wanting to make an Avengers movie at some point, this was the moment that it became a reality.
    Nick Fury: I'm here to talk to you about the Avenger Initiative.
  • The Avengers has the second big Wham Line of the MCU; not so much for what's being said as who it's said to:
    The Other: To challenge [humanity] is to court death... [cue Thanos, the guy who in the comics "courts Death" literally]
  • And then Thor: The Dark World reveals the Myth Arc:
    Volstagg: The Tesseract is already on Asgard. It would be unwise to put two Infinity Stones so close together.
    The Collector: One down... five to go...
• Wham Shot: Has its own page.
• What Other Galaxies?: The MCU has a complicated relationship with the scale of its universe, but for the most part uses a downplayed and justified version of this trope. In general, no worlds or galaxies outside of the Andromeda Galaxy and the Nine Realms (including Earth) are ever mentioned.
  • The World Tree, Yggdrasil, connects nine disparate and far-removed worlds, each in a different galaxy, which happen to all be cosmologically linked and uniquely important. It's never explicitly stated how far apart the Nine Realms are. However, no races not part of the Nine Realms are ever seen visiting any of the Realms (with the exception of Earth), so presumably they're far enough from each other and from other planets as to preclude conventional travel between them.^note Asgardians are shown to be able to travel to the Andromeda Galaxy (see below), but they're Sufficiently Advanced Aliens even to the other aliens. This is reinforced in Thor: Ragnarok when Valkyrie points out that it would take 18 months of travel to reach Asgard from the vicinity of Xandar without the Bifrost, implying a truly outrageous distance.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy takes place in the Andromeda Galaxy, not the Milky Way. The sequel reveals that interstellar travel is accomplished through the use of fixed "jump points", explaining why all the action takes place within one galaxy. While travel to the Milky Way is shown to be possible, no inhabited planets except for Earth are ever shown or even mentioned; this may imply that Earth is the only inhabited planet in the Milky Way. "Galaxy" and "Universe" are also used interchangeably, with no mention of anything beyond the Local Group.
  • And of course, most of the films are set on Earth.
• Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Averted. Everyone with gadgets has a good explanation for where they got them. More often than not, these weapons are built by a member of the Stark family or designed by S.H.I.E.L.D. Later films add Hank Pym and Wakanda to the list of common suppliers.
• "Will Return" Caption: Common starting with Iron Man 3. Some particularly notable examples:
  • Iron Man 3 ended with a "Tony Stark will return" caption, to explain to the audience that the film's ending with Tony seemingly retiring permanently from superheroing wouldn't stick and that Tony-only fans should still go and see Avengers: Age of Ultron.
  • Avengers: Infinity War ends with a "Thanos will return" caption, lampshading the film's The Bad Guy Wins ending.
  • Played with again in Ant-Man and the Wasp, where the caption reads "Ant-Man and The Wasp will return." Then two seconds later, before the screen completely fades to black, the period changes to a question mark, lampshading the Cliffhanger fates of both characters going into Endgame.
  • Shang-Chi's post-credits scene shows Xialing in control of her father's organization, capped off with the promise (or threat?) "The Ten Rings will return" taking up the full screen.
• Withholding the Big Good: Zig-Zagged for Phase One. Captain America was the last hero to get a solo movie in Phase One and to emerge in the present day, but it established him as the first superhero in the MCU (discounting the Asgardians who visited Earth centuries prior). Still, the Big Good was withheld for sixty years due to "doing time as a Cap-sicle."
• Wolverine Publicity: The Avengers, or, more accurately, Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk, and Thor. They're essentially the faces of the MCU, and are sometimes used to promote movies or shows starring lesser known characters. This was particularly notable with Ant-Man and Doctor Strange, both of which used recycled footage of the Avengers in TV spots.
• The World Is Always Doomed: And how. From aliens and killer robots to giant dragons and Eldritch Abominations, many MCU installments have something threatening to cause The End of the World as We Know It.
• World of Action Girls: Most named female characters get to have at least one scene featuring them kicking serious ass.
• World of Snark: To say that snarky exchanges and witty one-liners are commonplace here would be a massive understatement. Joss Whedon described The Avengers as "a desert of wit".
• Wretched Hive: New York became one in the Netflix shows after "The Incident", particularly Hell's Kitchen and Harlem. The reason for this is that the alien invasion greatly damaged New York, leading to an increase in organized crime.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One:
  • Averted in the series as a whole in that the heroes in the various film have been able so far to thwart Thanos' schemes of collecting the Infinity Stones through minions, to the point where he has to ditch that approach and collect them himself.
  • Averted in Age of Ultron, where the heroes not only stop Ultron's initial plan to put himself in a new, synthetic body with the Mind Stone, but turn it around into a way to defeat him.
  • Also averted in Civil War, where an ex-HYDRA agent is uncooperative with Zemo and forces him to come up with a much more complicated plan to get what he wants.

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