Marvel movies are a cultural institution at this point. Whether it’s the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or the X-Men, or whatever the deal is with Spider-Man, there’s no real way to get away from Marvel superhero movies. They are everywhere online, they take over your local movie theater and even if you don’t frequently visit either of those places, you still might get involved in some guerrilla marketing stunt. Given this ever-present ubiquity, Marvel advertising has begun to receive intense scrutiny from both fans and critics. Whether it’s fans clamoring that the studio release a new trailer or critics complaining about how “extended universes” seem to be a part of every trailer now, marketing is a large part of the culture surrounding these films. And sometimes, these trailers give away more than you might expect.
For this list, we combed through trailers for the MCU and other Marvel film properties, looking for shots that revealed plot points in their respective films. Some of these may have had huge spoilers for their films, but got away with it because the shots were quick enough or because audiences didn’t know enough at the time about the specifics of the story. Others just gave the whole game away in front of everyone, spoiling important moments in ways that made it completely unavoidable for fans to know what would happen. Either way, these are the trailers that held important clues, whether they were subtle or obvious.
Here are 11 Spoilers Hidden In Marvel Movie Trailers (And 9 Way Too Obvious).
HIDDEN: Obadiah Stane is Iron Monger (Iron Man)
It wasn’t hard to tell that Jeff Bridges’ Obadiah Stane was going to be a villain in Iron Man, but while some of his sinister activities were on full display in the trailers (more on that later), this aspect was easy to miss. It was clear that Tony Stark would be fighting some kind of larger version of his own technologically-advanced exoskeleton, and if you looked closely at a specific shot in the trailer, you could actually see it was Stane inside.
Thankfully, at least this spoiler was hard to see. This preview probably gives away too much of the game, as most of the plot is contained within just two and a half minutes. Although Stane’s construction of a larger suit is one of the big reveals, it happens to be contained in the trailer.
OBVIOUS: The old lady is a Skrull (Captain Marvel)
When the first trailer for the upcoming Captain Marvel came out, some fans were confused by a shot of Brie Larson attacking what appeared to be an elderly lady. Instead of leaving fans to wonder, the second trailer expounded on that moment, basically telling the viewer that she was a Skrull.
The elderly lady gives a bestial growl, then leaps up and kicks Carol Danvers. The Skrulls are the enemy of the Kree, and have shape-shifting powers, so fans of the comics weren’t particularly surprised by this development, but those of us unacquainted with the comics were a little disappointed that this reveal was completely given away.
HIDDEN: M’Baku defeats W’Kabi (Black Panther)
When this trailer for Black Panther came out, viewers didn’t really know who the characters in this image were. It was dramatic, sure, but there was no way to know what was going on. Heck, even the two actors in the center of the frame, Winston Duke and Daniel Kaluuya, weren’t nearly as well known as they are now.
But as those who have seen the movie know, this image actually reveals a fairly important story beat: M’Baku (Duke) defeats W’Kabi (Kaluuya) in a pitched battle between their tribes. In the film, it occurs after M’Baku’s Jabari tribe reinforces T’Challa’s attack on the new king of Wakanda. The Jabari fight W’Kabi’s Border tribe, and the outcome may have seemed in doubt if you didn’t remember this shot from the trailer.
OBVIOUS: Rhodey is injured (Civil War)
Captain America: Civil War’s marketing teased the movie as an end of sorts for the Avengers, hinting that demises were inevitable and alliances would be broken. One of the ways they showed the audience the consequences was this shot in all the trailers, where Tony Stark cradles his unconscious friend, James Rhodes.
Obviously, the trailers didn’t explain the exact extent of Rhodes’ injury, but they definitely spoiled that he would be a casualty in some way. Some of the trailers even showed him falling from the sky, even spoiling the cause of the injury. Plus, audiences worried that he had passed in this shot, so when they saw the movie where he made it through, the general reaction was just: “Oh, that wasn’t so bad.”
HIDDEN: Professor X loses control of his powers (Logan)
There are a lot of memorable moments in James Mangold’s farewell to Wolverine, Logan, but some of the most surprising came from Charles Xavier. Patrick Stewart’s Professor X has always been the calm and collected type, never one to lose control of his powers; but he does just that in Logan, freezing the minds of everyone within a mile radius of him in immense pain.
Surprisingly, parts of this sequence find their way into this trailer (the screen vibrating from Professor X’s incredible power). It’s easy to miss, given that it’s just another dramatic shot in an action-packed trailer, but if viewers had sat down and gone frame by frame, they probably could have realized that this was a shot of Professor X freezing the minds of those around him, and not as peacefully as he did in the original trilogy.
OBVIOUS: Hulk is in the movie (Thor: Ragnarok)
We know that Marvel has to advertise their movies in whatever way will guarantee the most viewers, so we don’t really blame them for putting Hulk in every trailer for Thor: Ragnarok, since he’s a huge selling point; but imagine for a second if you went into the theater for a Thor film and didn’t know the big green guy would make an appearance. How incredible would that moment where Hulk appears in the arena have been?
We’ll never know, because everyone and their grandma already knew Hulk was in this movie beforehand thanks to the aggressive marketing. These trailers definitely drew in more viewers than the movie would have gotten otherwise, but we can’t help but dream of an alternate world where that wasn’t spoiled.
HIDDEN: T’Challa gives a UN press conference (Black Panther)
Black Panther’s trailer actually had quite a few important plot points sneakily on display, like this trailer that showed the establishing shots of the film’s mid-credits scene. This scene has T’Challa in front of the podium at the United Nations, spilling the beans about Wakanda and promising to share the country’s technology.
It’s an odd choice to put your mid- or post-credits scene into your trailer, but Black Panther is hardly alone there. Several MCU movies did the same thing in their marketing, and it always takes a little air out of the scene when it finally arrives. Thankfully, most viewers probably missed this one, as nobody was watching Black Panther waiting anxiously for the scene where a politician makes a speech.
HIDDEN: The post-credits sequence (Ant-Man and the Wasp)
The filmmakers behind Ant-Man and the Wasp did not film any scene to specifically be their post-credits scene, but it is part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which mandates a little something extra after the credits. And so, filmmakers stuck an extended shot of a giant ant playing Scott Lang’s drum set at the very end. However, that shot not only had a brief appearance in the main film, it also appeared in the trailer.
Thus, by the time the end credits rolled around, audiences had already seen it. This is disappointing, and you might think it counts as one of the “Obvious” entries, but we’re saying it’s “Hidden” because there’s no way the trailer’s viewers could have known its significance at the time; they would have thought it was just a throwaway gag, not the surprise at the very end.
OBVIOUS: The final scene (The Amazing Spider-Man 2)
There are a few entries on this list relating to respective films’ final scenes or post-credits sequences, but none of them give away the game so completely as The Amazing Spider-Man 2. This trailer ends with shots of Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man taking on Paul Giamatti’s Rhino, which is exactly how the film itself ends.
It is almost always a mistake for trailers to use a film’s closing shot, as nobody wants to have a movie’s final word spoiled in advance. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 somehow managed to spoil the entire scene; viewers were generally disappointed by the film, but it was a special kind of underwhelming to see a film’s final scene play out exactly like its trailer.
HIDDEN: Aldrich Killian is a bad guy (Iron Man 3)
Did you think the Iron Man franchise was done revealing who the villains were in their trailers? Much like they did with Iron Monger in the first film, the trailer for Iron Man 3 snuck in a hint to Aldrich Killian’s true malevolent nature under our noses. Take a look at this clip from the trailer, and note what Robert Downey, Jr.’s voiceover says over an image of Killian’s face.
Those who have seen the film know that Guy Pearce’s tech startup leader is indeed a villain. Dangling Ben Kingsley’s fake Mandarin in front of Tony Stark while manipulating things from the shadows, Aldrich Killian is the main antagonist. There were clues to this twist in the trailers, if we had only noticed that Mandarin wasn’t shown with any superpowers and Pearce’s appearances were all menacing.
OBVIOUS: The final fight (Civil War)
In the comics, the Civil War crossover event was largely driven by a conflict between Captain America and Iron Man. The MCU’s inciting conflict is slightly changed from the source material, but it kept the opponents. Therefore, it had to play up that conflict in the trailers, but some fans would have preferred if they didn’t show so much of the dramatic final three-way fight between Cap, Bucky Barnes, and Tony Stark.
This trailer, which also drew criticism for spoiling Rhodey’s injury, contains a lot of footage from that fight. It doesn’t spoil the outcome, but fans knew it would all come down to a fight in the snow between the three characters. That meant that the plot line of more Winter Soldiers was obviously a red herring, and it squashed any tension there.
HIDDEN: Killmonger burns the heart-shaped herb garden (Black Panther)
Erik Killmonger is the best villain the MCU has ever produced, largely because his motivations are understandable and sympathetic. But his downfall comes from his violent nature, and his willingness to end and sacrifice anything and everything. This is exemplified by his burning of the garden of the heart-shaped herb, which gives the Black Panther his power.
This is pretty important to the plot of Black Panther, as the heart-shaped herb is central to the superhero’s role in Wakandan society. And what may look like just an average dramatic shot in this trailer, it actually shows Killmonger burning the garden. We couldn’t have known that the area burning around the villain was so important at the time, so Marvel got away with it.
OBVIOUS: The train set piece (Ant-Man)
It’s not uncommon for films to use footage from their climactic final fight scene in their trailers, but most viewers wish they didn’t. Ant-Man showcased a lot of miniature action in its marketing, including a fight scene on Scott Lang’s daughter’s model train set. Trouble is, that fight scene is quite literally the last one in the movie.
This trailer ends with quite a bit of footage from that fight, and other ads for the movie did the same. Needless to say, this robbed the film’s climax of some of its impact for viewers that had watched the trailers. Nowadays, superhero movies endeavor to show footage mostly from the first half of the film, while some try to build hype by showing parts of the climax, but it’s not always a good choice.
HIDDEN: The toys (Deadpool 2)
The Deadpool franchise takes an aggressive stance on marketing, flooding the internet with conventional and guerrilla advertising. You might not expect for a movie about a violent mercenary to have a red band trailer where he plays with dolls, but sometimes, even that has great significance.
Ryan Reynolds’ Wade Wilson appears to just be stalling for time when he takes two action figures and has them fight, but if you’ve seen the movie, you’ll notice some similarities to scenes in the actual film. First, take a look at the nesting doll in the background, and tell us it isn’t a stand-in for Julian Dennison’s Firefist, the boy Deadpool tries to protect in the film. Second, Deadpool’s, uh, unconventional attack on Cable does happen in the film. Turns out, it pays to take notes when Wade breaks out the action figures.
OBVIOUS: Stane is working with the enemies (Iron Man)
Obadiah Stane, a.k.a Iron Monger, is the main villain of Iron Man, but even though it wasn’t completely obvious that Jeff Bridges’ Stane was the man in the giant metal suit fighting Iron Man in the trailers, it was still painfully clear that Stane was a bad guy working with the group who captured Tony Stark.
This trailer quite literally shows Stane meeting with the group that the trailer had previously shown forcing Stark to build weapons. It’s a decent twist in the movie that Stane planned the capture in the first place, but anyone who paid attention to this trailer saw it coming from a mile away. Ah, well, the MCU was young, and hadn’t learned to guard its spoilers yet.
HIDDEN: The rap sheets (Guardians of the Galaxy)
The trailer for Guardians of the Galaxy is one of the best pieces of marketing ever from the MCU. Immediately engaging and charming, it also manages to acquaint audiences with an unruly cast of space misfits that very few outside the core comic fandom had ever heard of. And if you look closely, there is a little extra information to be found in the convicts’ rap sheets.
Aside from trivial information like the subjects’ weights, we learn a little about each character’s history: Drax and Gamora’s bodily enhancements are mentioned, hinting at their super strength, Rocket Raccoon’s history of breaking out of prisons shows up in his screen, foreshadowing the big jailbreak scene in the film, plus, Yondu Udonta is listed as Peter Quill’s associate, before most people knew who that was.
OBVIOUS: The whole plot (Spider-Man 3)
Nowadays, most superheroes guard against spoilers with everything they have, and their trailers don’t tend to give away too much in terms of big plot beats. But in the olden days of 2007, the marketing department behind Spider-Man 3 took a different approach: they decided to put basically the whole movie inside the trailer.
This trailer has almost every important story moment from Spider-Man 3. Sandman’s backstory and rise to villainy, Spider-Man’s struggles with the Venom symbiote, Harry Osborn following his father’s villainous footsteps, and more are all present in the trailer. Plus, the trailer omits the infamous dance sequence, so it might actually be a better way to watch Spider-Man 3 than see the whole movie itself.
HIDDEN: Tony fights Rhodey (Iron Man 2)
Iron Man 2 was a mess of a movie, with a lot of plot threads that never really added up to a cohesive whole. Thus, the trailers were kind of all over the place, and we could pick any of a handful of small spoilers to be found there, from Tony’s creation of a new element, to the final fight in the garden. But, we think the big one is the shot of Tony and his best friend James Rhodes’ battle in Tony’s house.
These moments are easy to miss in a long, loud action montage, but eagle-eyed fans could have spotted it and noticed that Tony was fighting against his own suit in his own boxing ring. Given that the previous film had already teased Rhodey as War Machine, it wasn’t impossible to guess.
OBVIOUS: Hulk catches Iron Man (The Avengers)
The first Avengers film was a watershed moment for superhero movies, as the idea of multiple tentpole heroes coming together to form a super-team had never really been done. Thus, the act of the Avengers assembling itself was something of a miracle, and few things exemplify that better than Hulk catching Iron Man as he falls unconscious from the sky.
This is one of the movie’s last big moments, a demonstration of how far the team has come. But, people who saw this trailer saw it coming because it was featured prominently near the end. It certainly worked to help build the hype for the movie, but it was still so obvious that it ended up robbing that moment of any surprise.
HIDDEN: Thor eliminates the Rainbow Bridge (Thor)
The climactic battle of the first Thor film takes place on the Rainbow Bridge, Asgard’s connection to the rest of the Nine Realms. Thor fights his adopted brother Loki there and ends up using Mjölnir to eliminate the bridge and sever the connection to prevent Loki from carrying out his sinister plan.
This moment is actually in the second trailer for Thor, though viewers had no way of knowing at the time where the huge magical explosion was taking place. Trailers love to show the movie’s biggest explosions, so it’s a bit of a coup that they managed to show this important plot point without spoiling the climax for anybody.
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What are some other hidden/obvious spoilers in previous Marvel trailers? Let us know in the comments below!
