10 Worst Moments In The Marvel Cinematic Universe

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is fast approaching its tenth anniversary with fifteen films in the can, its sixteenth Spider-Man: Homecoming fast approaching and many more to come in the foreseeable future.

What lies ahead for the MCU beyond Phase Three is currently unknown, but its continued success has had a huge impact on blockbuster filmmaking at large. It is now the highest-grossing franchise in film history, the pioneer of the cinematic shared universe and, most importantly, all of the films have been generally received positively both critically and commercially.

But no film is perfect, and certainly no franchise is either. As solid as the series is overall, there are some noticeable dents in the armour, and whilst some films have been lauded as greats of the genre others have only scraped by as "good enough".

The problems may not be as obvious and critical as those that have plagued similar franchises, but they do highlight some of the the systemic flaws in trying to manage so many disparate films at once.

Whether they are examples of poor antagonists, preposterous plot developments, cloying set-ups for future instalments or just generally stupid scenes, the MCU has had its fair share of stumbles...

So Loki is widely regarded as the best villain in the MCU. He's a charming presence, his conniving schemes are often more than just simple world domination, and his relationships with Thor and Odin give him an air of sympathy; all of which is buoyed by Tom Hiddleston's enthusiastic performances. Marvel would be mad to get rid of him unless they really had to, but that hasn't stopped them from faking us out with multiple presumed deaths.

Loki's seeming demise at the end of the first Thor was left more ambiguous, and he was resurrected by the end of the post-credits scene anyway, leading to his return as the main villain of The Avengers.

So when The Dark World attempted to do this again by giving Loki a seemingly more definitive death, it was far from convincing. Marvel wouldn't kill off such a popular character after only three appearances, especially when they'd already supposedly killed him once. Sooner or later, we knew he was coming back.

The surprise was then how quickly he returned: before even the first round of credits rolled. When Loki turns up at the end having taken Odin's place, there's no surprise. Instead, the question on everybody's mind is how did he do it? What did he do with Odin? What are his plans for Asgard now that he has the throne? What has he done since The Dark World ended? Hopefully, Ragnarok will answer some of these questions, but even so this is still a poorly-handled and obvious twist.