10 Post-Credits Movie Scenes That Change Everything

8. Thanos Revealed - The Avengers

It'd be incredibly easy to just fill any list dealing with post-credit scenes with Marvel movies. The king of the post-credits scene, since the Marvel Cinematic Universe's inception the comic-book powerhouse-cum-movie studio has used the empty time after the film proper has finished to tease their next project (and when they don't - see Iron Man 3's Bruce Banner cameo - the fans come down heavy on them).

Most other big franchises have tried to emulate this approach, but none have come close to matching the swagger with which Kevin Feige and co. unveil massive plot points when half the audience has left. And few plot points come bigger than Thanos - seen part-way through The Avengers credits, the Mad Titan's debut scene revealed that he was behind the whole Chitauri invasion. Heavily hinting at what the franchise's long-term game-plan encompasses (as has now been confirmed, the Infinity War is coming), it also set the precedent for Marvel to throw out increasingly obscure comic characters with nary a care for the uninitiated (see the entirety of Guardians Of The Galaxy).

The film gets extra props for changing up how post-credits scenes were structured. For the first time featuring not one, but two, stings (as well as Thanos mid-way through, there's the hilarious schwarma joke pay-off at the end), The Avengers meant that even if audiences had already got one post-credit scene they weren't certain they'd got all the secrets, much to the ire of cinema workers the world over.