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- The Sunday Post
Welcome, friends, to the brand-new Sunday Post! Yes, the rumors are true. We are finally moving platforms- from Substack to Beehiiv for 2025. It is all a part of a huge overhaul of the Friends From Work website, which will soon be your one-stop hub for all of the content produced by Kyle, Robby, and the whole FFW team.
To celebrate this new incarnation of the newsletter, we are breaking with the traditional format. And also because there simply wasn’t very much news to cover last week. Instead, today, I’ll preview everything you can expect in 2025 from Friends From Work, from the MCU, and beyond.
2025 PREVIEW
FRIENDS FROM WORK
As we have been teasing for weeks, the podcast is poised to have its biggest year ever in 2025. Content will be coming at you from all sides- via the free main podcast feed, on the FFW YouTube channel, and for subscribers exclusively at FFW+. Here is a preview of what to expect over the next 4-6 weeks.
Friends From Work
| FFW+
| FFW YouTube
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February and March will be devoted almost entirely to Captain America: Brave New World and Daredevil: Born Again coverage on the podcast.
Meanwhile, the plan is to continue increasing written content from Kyle, Robby, and myself. New platform. New features.
FFW’s partnership with Organic Priced Books will continue, and Robby will regularly provide recurring recommendations for this newsletter. Returning features like Backordered and Reply All will continue.
Last but definitely not least, FFW is planning at least two live events this year. Stay tuned for more details!
MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE
January 29th: Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man
Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man is a ten-episode series starring Hudson Thames as Peter Parker, Colman Domingo as Norman Osborn, and Hugh Dancy as Otto Octavius. Created by Jeff Trammell, the story is set in an alternate universe where Norman Osborn, and not Tony Stark, becomes mentor to Peter Parker.
If you are a member of the FFW Discord, we’ve been rewatching the original Spider-Man: The Animated Series leading up to this release. Next Saturday, we begin the fifth and final season if you want to jump in and join us.
February 14th: Captain America: Brave New World
Captain America: Brave New World is only 40 days away. The first MCU film since Deadpool & Wolverine last July has been in production for a long time. Principal photography finished just prior to the 2023 SAG strike, and over the last 18+ months, the movie has gone through multiple reshoots, new castings, and rumors of poor test screenings.
Despite all that noise, I find myself more and more excited to see it finally. The trailers have done a good job of teasing a political conspiracy thriller, and if the movie maintains those vibes, it should make fans happy. It stars Anthony Mackie, Harrison Ford, Danny Ramirez, Tim Blake Nelson, Xosha Roquemore, Shira Haas, Carl Lumbly, and Giancarlo Esposito. Julius Onah (Luce) is the director and MCU veteran (and friend of the podcast) Laura Karpman returns to compose the score.
March 4th: Daredevil: Born Again
Daredevil: Born Again is the highly anticipated follow-up to the Netflix series which aired from 2015 to 2018. Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio return to play Daredevil and Wilson Fisk, respectively. Jon Bernthal will also reprise his role as the Punisher. The only official footage of the show so far is from the 2025 “Look Ahead” trailer that Marvel put out in front of the Agatha All Along finale. However, with the show less than two months away, a full trailer could come at any time. If it doesn’t happen before, keep an eye on January 13th (ABC/ESPN airs a Monday Night Football playoff game) or January 20th (ABC/ESPN airs the College Football Playoff Championship) as potential options for a surprise trailer.
This was another Marvel project that went through significant retooling during the 2023 strikes, and by all accounts, it appears to have come out the other side with everyone extremely excited. Dario Scardapane (The Punisher) was brought aboard as the showrunner, and popular Loki and Moon Knight directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead joined the series. The score is being composed by The Newton Brothers (X-Men ‘97).
May 2nd: Thunderbolts*
No 2025 MCU project did more to raise my expectations last year than Thunderbolts*, which released two outstanding first-look trailers. Starring Florence Pugh, Sebastian Stan, David Harbour, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Wyatt Russell, Louis Pullman, Olga Kurylenko, and Hannah John-Kamen, the film is directed by Jake Schreier, best known for his work on the 2023 Netflix miniseries Beef.
The behind-the-scenes buzz surrounding Thunderbolts* has been overwhelmingly positive. When Marvel Studios returned to filming post-strike in 2023, there was a notable shift away from using green screen and “The Volume” for most of their filming back towards practical, on-location filming. Nowhere is that more obvious than in the extended desert sequence in the special look at Thunderbolts* from D23 Brazil. The cast and crew went to Utah to film those sequences, and it shows.
June 24th: Ironheart
Ironheart was filmed primarily in 2022. So fans have been waiting for this series for a very long time, and it is finally coming in June. Ryan Coogler’s production company, Proximity Media, is co-producing alongside Marvel Studios. Dominique Thorne returns as Riri Williams for the first time (in live-action) since Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. She is joined by Anthony Ramos as Parker Robbins, Alden Ehrenreich, and Lyric Ross. Chinika Hodge is the head writer of the series, and Sam Bailey and Angela Barnes split directing duties.
July 25th: The Fantastic Four: First Steps
When I was in Los Angeles at the end of August for Marvel Studios’ Infinity Saga Concert Experience, I was lucky enough to hear Michael Giacchino’s theme for The Fantastic Four: First Steps performed live. And it was incredible. The overwhelming emotion the theme evokes is one of hope, and in my opinion, it is unlike anything we’ve heard in the MCU before. I dare you to listen to this theme and not get excited about the movie.
Much like Deadpool & Wolverine, Marvel has dated this to arrive the same weekend as San Diego Comic-Con and at the end of one of the biggest movie months in years (more on that in a bit). The movie stars Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Marvel’s First Family. Julia Garner, John Malkovich, Ralph Ineson, Paul Walter Houser, and Natasha Lyonne round out the cast.
While we are in a window right now where a trailer could be released at any time, the smart money is on the teaser trailer releasing on Super Bowl Sunday (February 9th). I would not be surprised if this trailer breaks viewing records when it does arrive.
August 6th: Eyes of Wakanda
Marvel Animation returns in August with the first series to be set within the larger 616-MCU. Consisting of four episodes that will all be dropped simultaneously, the series promises to highlight the history of the Wakandan War Dogs as they are “tasked to travel the world retrieving dangerous vibranium artifacts.”
Ryan Coogler is producing this series and Todd Harris will serve as the show’s director.
October 3rd: Marvel Zombies
Marvel Zombies is a direct spin-off of the fifth episode of What If…?’s first season titled “What If… Zombies?!” Another four-part series, Zombies will be the first animated project to be rated TV-MA at Marvel Animation.
December 2025: Wonder Man
Wonder Man is the project that seemingly everyone online had heard about, but nobody was 100% sure actually existed. At least, until footage showed up in that 2025 “Special Look.” Developed originally by Shang-chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings director Destin Daniel Cretton, the show stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in the titular role, alongside co-stars Ben Kingsley (returning once again as Trevor Slattery), Ed Harris, and Demetrius Grosse.
BEYOND THE MULTIVERSE
May 23rd: Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning
Tom Cruise returns as Ethan Hunt for the last (?) time in May in one of my most anticipated movies of the year. Cruise continues to find ways to top himself performing stunts at the age of 62, and writer/director Christopher McQuarrie has taken the series to a whole new level since taking over the franchise in 2015.
July 2nd: Jurassic World Rebirth
Outside of the MCU, there are few franchises that I hold as dearly as the Jurassic franchise. Have any of the sequels achieved the same quality level as 1993’s original? No, but there will always be something special about seeing dinosaurs on the big screen as John Williams’ iconic score plays.
Rebirth serves as a fresh start for the franchise, bringing in all-new lead characters played by Scarlett Johannson, Jonathan Bailey, and Mahershala Ali, as well as a new director in Gareth Edwards (The Creator). Original Jurassic Park scribe David Koepp returns to pen the script. The first teaser trailer is expected at Super Bowl LIX.
July 11th: Superman
For many people, no project is more highly anticipated in 2025 than Superman. James Gunn’s DCU needs this movie to be a huge success, and the teaser trailer was carefully crafted to appeal to most fans’ sensibilities. It set records online for fan views of a DC project.
These three projects are prime targets to be covered on Screensaver as part of the perks of being a member of FFW+.
While that seems like a lot, there is not enough time to mention all of the exciting 2025 projects on the way. Wicked, Ballerina, Karate Kid: Legends, and second seasons of Peacemaker, The Last of Us, and Andor are all coming out this year, too.
Friends From Work will cover as much of it as possible. Please let me know in the comments or on Discord what you think of the new platform, and feel free to offer ideas or suggestions of things you would like to see or things I can do better.
The Sunday Post will return next week in its traditional format.
Happy New Year!
-Greg
