X-Men Stealing The Spotlight From Avengers In MCU's Future

The Avengers: Doomsday trailers have been getting fans excited, but it's the X-Men trailer that has garnered the most attention, and that might be a signal of who should be taking over the MCU. So far, we've had three teaser trailers for December 2026's Avengers: Doomsday, a new MCU film hoping for Endgame levels of buy-in from fans.

That's a tall task, particularly considering how little we know about the film and how janky the past three phases of the MCU project have been. The reappearance of Chris Hemsworth as Thor and Chris Evans as Steve Rogers is certainly exciting, but in truth, it reveals how shallow Marvel's roster is in terms of who audiences have connected with.

The latest trailer gives us our first look at the X-Men, including Sir Patrick Stewart as Professor X, Sir Ian McKellen as Magneto, and James Marsden as Cyclops. There seems to be a lot more online interest in this trailer than the previous two, indicating maybe it's time for the Avengers to step aside for a new MCU team.

The X-Men Are Bringing More Hype To The MCU Than The Avengers Lately

Out of the three Avengers: Doomsday trailers that have dropped so far, which are about as teaser as teasers can get, the X-Men one seems to have received the warmest reception. The Captain America trailer was exciting, seeing Evans back, but Rogers had a great send-off in Endgame, so it feels like a step backward.

It's always great to see Thor, but Thor: Love and Thunder was a part of MCU's Phase Four, and so it's not a surprise that he's appearing in this film. We all knew that the X-Men would be a part of Avengers: Doomsday, but it's still exciting to see McKellen, Stewart, and Marsden back in the universe.

The X-Men have been getting a lot of love lately, more so than even the Avengers, who have gone through so many iterations lately; it's unclear exactly who makes up the "official" Avengers. If Deadpool & Wolverine proved anything, it's that audiences want more X-Men, Wolverine masks and all.

The MCU's Multiverse Saga Would Not Have Worked Without The Fox Characters

Phases 4 through 6 of the MCU are collectively titled "The Multiverse Saga", which began in Avengers: Endgame with the heroes' time travel trickery. The multiverse of the new MCU has sought to bring in superheroes from all over the many universes of Marvel, a nifty way to ignore overlapping films, shows, and character deaths.

Steve Rogers might be old in Avengers: Endgame, you see, but in Avengers: Doomsday, he's been plucked out of another universe (or timeline? Somewhere else) so now he's young again. It's a wobbly kind of storytelling, but it's one the X-Men have actually pulled off in the past.

Time and universe-jumping shenanigans in the recent spate of Marvel films actually started with the 20th Century Fox X-Men movies. 2014's X-Men: Days of Future Past revealed that a multiverse story could be told successfully in a tentpole blockbuster. MCU's multiverse schemes would have been a lot harder to swallow without X-Men's foray into the space.

How The X-Men Can Become The MCU's New Flagship Franchise

Despite the "Avengers" in Avengers: Doomsday, MCU's flagship superhero team has lost a lot of its sparkle since they snapped Thanos into nothingness in 2019. Nearly all their attempts to add members have fallen flat. Where are Shang-Chi, the Eternals, and Ms. Marvel? Are the Thunderbolts the New Avengers or not?

I thought Sam Wilson, the Falcon, was supposed to be the new Captain America? So why is Steve Rogers appearing in the marketing materials? It's gotten unwieldy, and it's possible that Disney should just be satisfied with a decade of lucrative Avengers-based Marvel films, and maybe they can stop insisting on the team.

The X-Men are ready and waiting to take up the mantle of flagship franchise. There are so many characters in the franchise, with notable storylines and villains, that it's basically its own movie universe unto itself. I don't think it would be a bad idea to start a third saga, "The X-Men Saga", and forget about everything that's come before.

When Will The MCU Introduce The New X-Men?

A reminder, the MCU has not produced an X-Men-centric movie yet. Those films have all been under the auspices of 20th Century Fox. Disney and the MCU did produce Deadpool & Wolverine, but that film is more focused on Deadpool, with some X-Men making appearances.

Avengers: Doomsday will introduce the X-Men to the MCU in a more substantial way, presumably, but with the amount of superheroes expected to appear, they may not have as much screentime as fans are hoping for. Worry not, though, because an untitled X-Men film is set for some time after Avengers: Secret Wars.

This untitled X-Men film will take place after the expected "reset" of Secret Wars and will feature a new group of younger actors portraying the characters from the comics. Jake Schreier, from Thunderbolts*, is expected to direct. This group of New X-Men might be what we need to get past the Avengers after Avengers: Doomsday and Secret Wars.