A lot has changed since Robby and I published our first FFW Watch Order article in April. Thunderbolts* was released in theaters, and new trailers for Ironheart and The Fantastic Four: First Steps were released. Additionally, Marvel pushed back the release dates for the upcoming two Avengers movies from May to December 2026 and 2027. However, one thing has not changed: a lot of fans are gearing up to embark on a rewatch journey soon, in many cases for the first time since Endgame.

So Robby and I will continue trying to untangle this largely disparate collection of projects that have been released over the last few years to create a watch order that is as narratively cohesive as possible. So, without further ado, here is the next installment of our ongoing conversation.

PART V DISCUSSION (CONTINUED)

GREG: Since we last spoke, we've both had the chance to see Thunderbolts* (multiple times), and two trailers for Ironheart have been released. Based on some dates seen in the Ironheart trailer, I think it may align more closely with our Part IV projects in the continuity timeline, so I think we should set that project aside (right next to Agatha and the Special Presentations) until we've had a chance to see it. As for Thunderbolts*, I will circle back around to that movie in a few minutes. But I am already getting ahead of myself.

First, I want to take a step back and talk big picture with you. Let’s just come out and say it- crafting a watch order during the Infinity Saga was infinitely easier, not just because there were fewer projects, but because there were Avengers movies to anchor each section of the rewatch. Not to mention the fact that when you first conceived of a new way to watch the Infinity Saga, you had the benefit of having seen all 23 movies before making decisions. The Multiverse Saga does not have any of those luxuries. It is incomplete, it does not have similar team-up stories to tie together each chapter of the watch, and because of the sheer number of projects (28 by my count so far), it is not as easy to find a throughline for each part.

This is where I want to give you a lot of credit Robby- I think despite that you landed on the perfect throughline for Part IV- Wanda Maximoff's journey bookends this chapter of the order, and the other core multiverse properties (Loki and Spider-Man: No Way Home) land squarely at the midway point. With those projects settled, everything else falls into place around those titles based on a few key themes that you established. 

For Part V, I think the challenge becomes even greater. There are only a handful of characters that even appear more than once, and they are not characters you would typically build a watch order around. Complicating matters further, the real-life trials and tribulations of Jonathan Majors forced Marvel Studios to pivot away from his Kang the Conqueror as the primary antagonist of the Saga. In a different universe where he was still in that role, Part V may have centered on Kang/Victor Timely/He Who Remains and his many variants but that no longer feels like the right choice.

So, with that long preamble out of the way, what direction should the watch order go? Staying big picture, I want to walk you through a few of my general watch order pairings for Part V.  In my last missive, I suggested that the 9 titles in discussion could be broken into three distinct groups (multiversal, aliens/space, and ground-level). Drilling down deeper, I think there are a couple of sets of specific projects that pair well together. The first two are the second season of Loki and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. These are likely to be the final appearances of Kang in the MCU. Conventional wisdom would probably dictate that you start with Quantumania, and use Loki as the final chapter for the character. But we are not always conventional here. I am fascinated by the idea of placing Loki first and using the ending ("one of [Kang's variants] caused a little bit of a ruckus on a 616 adjacent realm," says Mobius in one of the show’s final scenes) as a teaser for seeing that full story play out in Quantumania. Admittedly, this would require both post-credits scenes from Quantumania to be ignored (not necessarily a deal-breaker), but I am curious where you land on that question. Regardless of which title comes first, do you agree that these titles should be back-to-back in the watch order, closing the book (for now?) on Kang?

The other pair of projects that are inherently linked are Secret Invasion and The Marvels. Nick Fury is the crossover character here, though Samuel L. Jackson’s portrayal varies substantially between the two projects. Both of these are among the most maligned projects in the canon (largely unfairly in the case of The Marvels) and I think their placement in the watch order is crucial to elevating their effectiveness in the story. Unlike Loki and Quantumania, separating these projects may prove beneficial because of the different Fury characterizations.

Interestingly, did you realize that Secret Invasion is the only project in Part V outside of our "ground-level" trilogy to be set primarily on Earth-616 (or Earth-19999 if you prefer)? Secret Invasion ends with President Ritson declaring war on the Skrulls and inspiring vigilante violence in the streets against aliens, something I think many fans would have preferred as a driver for the entire series, rather than being relegated to the last five minutes. My gut feeling is that this show should land relatively early in the watch order, allowing us to sit with this chaos much longer than the series itself allows. By doing this, you could enhance the impact later in the watch order when Thaddeus Ross runs for President on a message of "Together" (directly contradicting Ritson's message) in Captain America: Brave New World and Wilson Fisk (with his anti-vigilante message) is elected Mayor of New York City in Daredevil: Born Again.     

One project I have yet to mention is Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, a movie you suggested last time could be a good candidate to kick off the watch order. It remains one of the standout projects of phase 5 but has no major connections to other projects, beyond being set in space like most of The Marvels. I could see some logic in tying those projects together in the order. The Guardians’ original introduction in the Infinity Saga is part of a space-themed run of projects and watching it in conjunction with The Marvels could serve as a nod to that. There is some other minor connective tissue as well, both end with a major character choosing to settle back on Earth for the first time in decades. But GOTG3 might be the most malleable project of the Saga so you could sell me on many different placements. 

The other project yet to be discussed is Deadpool & Wolverine, another movie with a loose connection to The Marvels. It is unique because it is the first project with (almost) no connections to Earth-616. But the post-credits scene of The Marvels establishes a potential X-Men connection. And with Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars fast approaching (despite the recently announced delays) DP&W helps keep the multiverse top-of-mind and I think would function well somewhere toward the back half of Part V. 

Finally, as promised, I wanted to come back around to Thunderbolts*. While this may feel obvious, I think this is the perfect project to end Part V with. It essentially is the Avengers movie that has been missing from the Multiverse Saga and its post-credits scene propels the story into Phase 6/Part VI perfectly. 

Now that I’ve laid all my cards on the table, but without diving too deeply into a specific order, what do you think? Where do you agree or disagree? Talking through this has definitely helped to clarify some of my own thoughts. I hope it does the same for you.

ROBBY: Greg, thank you for (re)setting the table here and for laying this out so clearly. Unsurprisingly, I think we're pretty much in lockstep -- particularly when it comes to these project groupings. I'm also with you on likely ending Part V with Thunderbolts*. One of the reasons we ended Part IV with Multiverse of Madness is that it was sort of the closest thing we had to an Avengers movie at that time. Yes, Marvel Studios has placed MoM earlier in the chronological timeline (immediately following the multiversal events of No Way Home), but as the only film that directly connected to other Part IV projects, it felt like the only satisfying finale. It also gave us our first mention of incursions and moved the multiversal ball forward in a way that set us up well for the next stage of the story. I think Thunderbolts* can serve a similar purpose. It brings together threads from Part III, IV, and V in a way no other project has since Avengers: Endgame. And the post-credits scene here was the unexpected cherry on top, setting us up for the opening projects of Part VI. (I'll avoid getting too much into the specifics there in case we have folks reading that haven't yet had that one spoiled.) So yes, Thunderbolts* seems like a natural ending to Part V.

Unfortunately, that's just about the only placement I'm certain of at this point.

As you know, I've been thinking a lot about watch order lately (when I'm not thinking about reading order for our upcoming Marvel Comics 101 series for FFW+). And let me tell you: I have been all over the place. There are a few reasons why I think this is proving difficult for me.

1. Part V is technically not yet over. Do I think Ironheart is going to massively shake up the ongoing narrative? No, it probably won't. But could it alter the flow of certain projects depending on how ground-level or magic-adjacent it is? Yes, I think it very much could. And while we do have some obvious groupings (as you've already pointed out), the placement of Ironheart could change those groups just enough to change the way I'd want to order them. Luckily, we don't have much longer to wait on that front. So this is one issue that will be resolved before The Fantastic Four: First Steps hits theaters next month.

2. A bigger problem is that we still just don't know much about the final films in Part VI. Yes, we know Doctor Doom is going to play a pivotal role. And we know that there will be multiversal shenanigans and some fireworks moments decades in the making. But we know practically nothing about who RDJ's Doom will be. We don't know whether he'll connect more to the universe introduced in Fantastic Four or Earth-616, whether he'll serve as a villain or misunderstood antihero, or how he'll interact with the multiversal elements already introduced in the saga -- incursions, the TVA, America Chavez, to name a few. We don't even know whether Kang/He Who Remains will be completely removed from the equation or if the Russos will find a way to tie that character into the story they are telling. And because (again, as you point out) the Multiverse Saga has been significantly less linear than the Infinity Saga, it's almost impossible to know how to build this thing until we know what exactly we're building to. Now- that's not me throwing my hands up in surrender. I know that folks will be eager to rewatch the saga heading into Doomsday and Secret Wars and I think it's worth making the best estimate we can at this stage with the understanding that we may have to make some changes down the line.

3. And that leads me to the final issue I'm struggling with: the phases themselves. For the Infinity Saga, the phases were (with a few exceptions) pretty intuitive. Not so with the Multiverse Saga. You would never put Iron Man in Part II or Captain America: The Winter Soldier in Part I. But who's to say you couldn't put Quantumania in Part IV or Ms. Marvel in Part V? To be clear, I'm very happy with how our Part IV order is structured, and I'm not suggesting that we go back to the drawing board. But I am keenly aware of how lopsided Part IV is when contrasted to...well, virtually every other section of the MCU. But that's even more stark when you consider the relatively few projects we'll have in Part VI. On the one hand, maybe it doesn't matter. These are just arbitrary dividing lines anyway. It's the order that matters. On the other hand, I think the way we define a part can impact the projects we include it in -- which means it would potentially alter the order itself. (Most recently, we ran into this with Echo.) The project that's giving me trouble now is the second season of Loki. I recently rewatched portions of S2 as part of the ordering process, and I strongly believe it works best as a direct follow-up to S1. I actually think it's more confusing to watch in Part V because the events of Loki S2 would ostensibly set the stage for all the multiversal happenings in Part IV. To put a long gap between the two seasons gives the impression that the multiverse is somehow operating differently in Part V based on the events of the Loki S2 finale. But I don't think we're supposed to think of No Way Home as occurring between the two seasons. When Tobey and Andrew come into the 616, I think they're doing so from branches of the timeline Loki is already holding. Again, maybe I'm wrong, and maybe Doomsday and/or Secret Wars will change all this. But as of now, I'm starting to think it makes more sense to have both seasons of Loki before we get any other multiversal stories. That way we know exactly what the rules are from the outset, which allows us to build steadily towards the inevitable crisis instead of feeling like we're constantly taking detours. Of course, if we moved Loki S2 to Part IV, we'd be looking at an even more outsized Part IV -- and that's before we get to the Quantumania of it all.

So yes, I've been thinking a lot, but I still have a lot of thinking to do. Are these issues you've run into? Or am I overcomplicating things per usual?

GREG: Wow! As usual, you’ve given me a lot to chew on. You are not the first person to suggest that the Loki seasons should be viewed back-to-back, even though I hadn’t seriously considered it myself until now. I want to sit with that for a bit, but you laid out a very strong case. Does that create a Quantumania problem, as you alluded to? Does that project also make more sense in Part IV if all of Loki is in Part IV? It is worth considering.

You also expressed some concern about the size of Part IV (already at 15 projects) if you add another season of Loki, Quantumania, and potentially Ironheart as well. That is almost the size of the Infinity Saga on its own. I’m just not sure there is any way around that. By my estimation, the Multiverse Saga will eventually include between 38 and 40 projects, and trying to spread them more evenly may be an unnecessary exercise in futility. After all, it is not like the Infinity Saga splits were perfect. Nearly half the projects fall in Part III.

I think everyone reading this understands that this very much remains a work in progress. It will probably change multiple times as more projects are released and the path to Avengers: Secret Wars becomes more clear. But I do think we are starting to get somewhere.

I want to leave today’s discussion with one final thought- we have settled on Thunderbolts* as the final project in Part V! That may seem like a small step but maybe we can build this thing backwards. While I mull over the possibility of moving Loki S2 into Part IV, what do you think about the other two ground-level projects from 2025? Is it too simple to slide them in before Thunderbolts*, creating a Captain America: Brave New World-Daredevil: Born Again-Thunderbolts* trilogy with a heavy dose of political intrigue?

As always, hit Robby and me up on Discord with all your thoughts, questions, and things we missed or didn’t consider. Once Ironheart has aired in its entirety, we’ll be back with the third installment of this ongoing series.

TO BE CONTINUED