It's been 7 years since Avengers: Endgame brought together an entire fandom and closed arguably the most impactful saga in cinema. That was the last Avengers film that hit theaters, and since then, the MCU has lacked a clear direction in the Multiverse Saga. We've had no shortage of movies and television shows, but very few have connected in a meaningful way to hint at what's coming.
Creed 3 actor Jonathon Majors was originally supposed to star as the MCU's next big bad, Kang the Conqueror, who was featured at the end of Loki season 1 and was the antagonist of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. However, he was involved in some serious controversy, and Disney distanced itself from him. Instead of recasting the role, they pivoted to a different major character –– Victor Von Doom, a.k.a., Dr. Doom. And who would be playing the role? No other than Robert Downey Jr.
Some fans were shocked, some were excited, while others were definitely skeptical. Instead of going with a lesser-known actor, they rehired Downey Jr. He had already played the legacy character Iron Man for well over a decade and had expressed that he wanted to stop while he was ahead, approaching his final movie as Iron Man. Avengers: Endgame gave him a proper sendoff.
Despite all of that, I've been optimistic about Avengers: Doomsday since its first official trailer was released. Trailers are one of my favorite parts of a movie's life cycle. It's more than marketing or advertising, but an art form in itself, the way it's edited with character dialogue, impressive cinematography, and epic music. It's a prime ingredient for a fandom's hype, to get them to feel something about the project before they've even watched the full thing.
Avengers: Doomsday's trailer, unfortunately, doesn't make me feel as excited as I want to be. I still rewatch old trailers from years ago that left an impression on me. I'm still rewatching Dune: Part Three and Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2's trailers because they're genuine mastercrafts in editing and subtle storytelling. There is a lot a trailer can tell us without spoiling the story, and it's meant to get us in the mood to see the movie.
Watch the official Avengers: Doomsday trailer
Considering Disney brought back one of their most valued actors, changed villains, and this is the first Avengers movie in 7 years, there are a lot of expectations for Avengers: Doomsday. Fans definitely wanted to be wowed and blown away, but the reactions seem mixed. While there's no shortage of YouTube videos picking it apart, it's not an awful trailer and deserves cautious optimism. However, it is hard to care about this movie as much as we did with Avengers: Infinity War.
Dr. Doom hasn't had much time to stew in the MCU. Kang had multiple appearances already, more time than we got with Thanos before he arrived in Infinity War. Now that Majors' Kang is scrapped, Downey's Dr. Doom has to build up hype with less time. To be fair, the trailer does make him look cool, intimidating, and not at all lame. With a single shot, we can tell the MCU's Dr. Doom is not a villain to take lightly. He stops Thor's Stormbreaker axe with two fingers. Mind you, that's the same weapon that split a beam shot from a fully assembled Infinity Gauntlet and struck Thanos in the chest, the same Thanos whom Iron Man struggled to make bleed with multiple attacks. I have no doubt the MCU's Dr. Doom could kill leagues of characters by himself.
But that's just powerscaling. Why else should we be afraid of Dr. Doom? He may seem like a tough fighter, but his purpose as the villain is vague and mysterious. In the trailer, Victor speaks like a sincere leader and says, "Something is coming. Something we may not be able to deter. Before this day is done, we shall be faced with an unthinkable decision." It sounds like, to me, he sees himself as the one to make that decision.
But without a tease of this threat, the trailer doesn't give us much reason to feel dread other than Thor's speech warning of it. The trailer is filled to the brim with main-universe characters meeting each other and shaking hands, but there are also a few shots of main-universe heroes like Shang-Chi and Yelena fighting the mutants Gambit and Mystique, who aren't usually Avengers-level adversaries. We also don't see any city-level destruction, a population in danger, or vast army-versus-army scenes, which is very atypical of an Avengers trailer.
Avengers: Doomsday compared to the Infinity War trailer
In contrast, the official trailer for Avengers: Infinity War gives me chills. At the time, we knew this movie would be the end of an era for Marvel, but the trailer does a great job of setting the mood. It starts with quotes from our legacy heroes about what being Avengers means to them. How far they've come. Then, their toughest enemy yet approaches Earth with interstellar ships that wreck New York (which never catches a break) and Wakanda, searching for the last infinity stones. We see a shot of Loki holding the Tesseract surrounded by dead bodies. Thanos monologues about taking joy in "balancing the universe" and implies that he is fate incarnate, unavoidable, all while our heroes seem powerless against him. Everything about this trailer is hope versus dread, and everything we need to know about the potential plot is in the trailer without spoiling crucial details and surprises. Doomsday, in comparison, is holding its cards close.
It might be better to think of Avengers: Doomsday as the start of another saga, like Marvel's The Avengers was. This could be the beginning rather than an end. Kevin Feige suggests that soon the MCU will be much easier to comprehend after Avengers: Doomsday and Secret Wars –– one simplified universe.
Victor Von Doom may want to conquer the multiverse or collapse every timeline thread into one reality, which is possibly what Feige suggested. In the official poster, we see Victor beneath an art piece of himself and his mother above the world. It seems sacred and self-worshipping, which suggests Dr. Doom sees himself as the world's savior –– one world. I suspect the "unthinkable decision" he mentions in the trailer is the choice of which universes to cull to create a new, perfect world. Thus, perhaps the universes belonging to the Fantastic Four and the X-Men were on the chopping block. Maybe the mutants are fighting the Avengers to protect their realities due to an unforeseen threat that requires multiversal restructuring, which Dr. Doom will take control of.
This echoes Dr. Doom's motivations in books and comics. After multiple multiversal incursions, Dr. Doom saved pieces of several realities to create a patchwork planet called BattleWorld, and he claimed himself as ruler — a god. But sometimes a comic book character's goals differ from their source material. If you didn't know, Thanos originally wanted to wipe out half of all life to impress Lady Death romantically. That's a change I don't mind.
Thanos's motivations were more fleshed out in the second trailer of Infinity War, with even more peril and danger shown, so maybe the second trailer of Doomsday reveals a bit more too while remaining ominous. I would like to see more despair, which our favorite heroes will have to muster up some hope to face. As it stands, I don't get a sense that anyone is in real danger in Doomsday from the trailer alone. A trailer doesn't need to spell out the plot for me, but I'd like a glimpse of what's to come rather than just being told: "something's coming." A trailer should show, not tell, while still being spoiler-free.
Thor's speech does resonate with me, though. In my opinion, superheroes are at their best when they inspire everyone, no matter their allegiance, nation, or creed, to come together to stop a greater threat. The fact that he said, "If you return, you will return as brothers and sisters," I believe is a subtle hint that all the heroes, even the mutants and antiheroes, will team up eventually.
The most shocking thing Infinity War did was fulfill the villain's promise. After all of that big talk about balancing the universe and wiping out half of humanity, Thanos did it, and our characters watched their friends and loved ones fade away. Of course, this was reversed in Endgame, but not without great sacrifice from the characters. Could Dr. Doom achieve what he's set himself up to do, and will the Avengers be able to prevent or reverse it this time? I suppose it's less a question of whether they'll win and more of how. The right way, as heroes should do, or through the "unthinkable decision."
Avengers: Doomsday arrives in theaters on December 18th, 2026.
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