There are many scenes in the history of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that have come to have very little meaning and make no sense at all. The magic of developing a huge shared cinematic universe such as the MCU is that plot threads and scenes can be paid off years later, but there have been several scenes in the MCU that haven’t been given this treatment. Some scenes have amounted to nothing, and made no sense for the story of the overall narrative even at their original times of release.
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While it’s still possible that some of these loose ends may be addressed in the MCU’s upcoming projects, some of these scenes will more likely be forgotten about completely and moved on from. This means that moments from projects such as Thor, Captain America: Civil War, The Avengers and Doctor Strange, among others, that seemed important at the time will never be explained in the MCU. While Marvel Studios has done a good job of tying up many other MCU loose ends, it seems not everything introduced to the franchise will get an answer.
10 Loki Shows Interest In The Tesseract Via Erik Selvig
Thor (2011)
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At the end of 2011’s Thor, Erik Selvig meets Nick Fury, the then-Director of SHIELD, in the Joint Dark Energy Mission Facility, setting up his involvement in 2012’s The Avengers. Fury showed Selvig the Tesseract, but the thought-dead Loki appeared in a mirror reflection of Selvig noting that the Tesseract was “worth a look,” a sentiment that Selvig himself then repeated. This seemed to suggest that Selvig was somehow under the control of Loki already, when this turn of events wouldn’t actually begin until the opening of The Avengers.
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This moment right at the end of Thor was never mentioned again in the MCU, and was quickly undone only a year after Thor’s release. Loki was seen taking control of Selvig’s mind using his scepter in The Avengers, and since these two characters didn’t cross paths in Thor prior to Loki falling through a portal and seemingly dying, there was no opportunity for Loki to take control of Selvig prior to The Avengers. This was likely just a mistake by Marvel Studios, but it’s still a meaningless scene in the MCU’s history.
9 Lady Sif & Volstagg Give The Collector An Infinity Stone
Thor: The Dark World (2013)
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Thor: The Dark World’s mid-credits scene provided a connection for Marvel Studios to introduce the Guardians of the Galaxy in the following year, as this scene introduced Benicio Del Toro as Taneleer Tivan, a.k.a. the Collector. Lady Sif and Volstagg of the Warriors Three gave the Collector the Aether, the liquid version of the Reality Stone, for safe keeping in his collection. However, this scene made little sense. Most notably, there’s no way that Asgardians would entrust the Collector with an Infinity Stone, particularly in a lawless location such as Knowhere.
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The Collector hinted that he also wanted to collect the Infinity Stones, stating,
“one down, five to go,”
after Lady Sif and Volstagg departed Knowhere after giving him the Reality Stone. This could have explained his desire to claim the Power Stone in
Guardians of the Galaxy
, but this wasn’t mentioned at all.
This scene did mean that the Guardians of the Galaxy had a reason to go to Knowhere in Avengers: Infinity War, as Thanos went there hunting for the Reality Stone. However, this scene also seemed to imply that the Collector himself would set out to collect all the Infinity Stones, which was completely forgotten about by the time of Guardians of the Galaxy’s release in 2014. It would have made more sense for Lady Sif and Volstagg to entrust the Reality Stone to someone else, or keep it on Asgard alongside the Tesseract.
8 Spider-Man’s Wrist-Worn Tech Never Appeared Again
Captain America: Civil War (2016)
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The post-credits scene of 2016’s Captain America: Civil War caught up with Tom Holland’s Peter Parker, setting the stage for his solo MCU debut in Spider-Man: Homecoming. This scene continued to expand on Tony Stark’s technological upgrades to Spider-Man’s superhero costume, introducing an array of gadgets connected to the wall-crawler’s wrist-worn web-shooters. This was an exciting addition to Spider-Man’s arsenal, but Homecoming didn’t mention this moment at all, rendering Civil War’s post-credits scene completely meaningless.
|
Notable Peter Parker Actor |
Debut Movie |
Year |
|---|---|---|
|
Tobey Maguire |
Spider-Man |
2002 |
|
Andrew Garfield |
The Amazing Spider-Man |
2012 |
|
Tom Holland |
Captain America: Civil War |
2016 |
|
Hudson Thames (Voice) |
Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man |
2025 |
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These new gadgets perhaps referred to the 576 web-shooter combinations that Karen mentions in Spider-Man: Homecoming. However, the introduction of the “Training Wheels” program means Peter Parker didn’t have access to these combinations prior to Homecoming, so he wouldn’t have been able to see these gadgets in Captain America: Civil War’s post-credits scene. This scene might have been rendered pointless, but it has been great to see Tom Holland’s Peter Parker grow and develop his skills in the years since his 2016 debut.
7 Hank Pym Has A Tank On His Keys
Ant-Man (2015)
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The science of the Pym Particle and the Ant-Man suit has always been a hot topic of discussion in the MCU, and has never actually been explained properly. While a lot of this has been left purely up to artistic and creative license, there’s no escaping from some of the obvious moments that make no sense in relation to the Pym Particle. Most notably, 2015’s Ant-Man saw Hank Pym reveal that he keeps a miniaturized military tank on his keychain, but this shouldn’t be possible, as it was previously revealed that miniaturized objects retain their mass.
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Hank Pym doesn’t have superhuman strength, as far as the MCU has revealed, so there’s absolutely no way he would be able to carry an object as heavy as a tank in his pocket. This is simply incomprehensible, so this is perhaps the most overt breaking of the Ant-Man’s own loose scientific explanation. It seems unlikely that Marvel will actually make an attempt to accurately explain how Pym Particles are used, particularly since these rules have already been broken many times since Ant-Man’s 2015 debut.
6 Iron Man Speaks To Thaddeus Ross About The Avengers
The Incredible Hulk (2008)
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2008’s The Incredible Hulk has been something of an outlier in the MCU, since it stars Edward Norton as Bruce Banner’s Hulk, rather than Mark Ruffalo, and characters such as General Ross and Emil Blonsky’s Abomination have been completely reimagined in the years since. This may have also discounted The Incredible Hulk’s post-credits scene, which tried hard to establish the shared universe of the MCU right at the beginning. Tony Stark approached the late William Hurt’s General Ross in a bar to deliver the next Avengers team-up tease.
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|
Marvel One-Shots |
Year |
Set After |
|---|---|---|
|
The Consultant |
2011 |
Iron Man 2 (2010) |
|
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor’s Hammer |
2011 |
Iron Man 2 (2010) |
|
Item 47 |
2012 |
The Avengers (2012) |
|
Agent Carter |
2013 |
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) |
|
All Hail the King |
2014 |
Iron Man 3 (2013) |
At the end of The Incredible Hulk, Bruce Banner was on the run again, while General Ross was drowning his sorrows, ready to be met by Tony Stark. Ross had no clue where the Hulk was, however, so it seemed as though Stark may have been hoping to recruit the Abomination to the Avengers, which would have been catastrophic. This confusing scene was later explained in Marvel’s The Consultant One-Shot, with Jasper Sitwell and Phil Coulson sending Stark to meet Ross so that he’d refuse to help, but this scene was still misplaced and confusing in 2008.
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5 Thanos Wants To Court Death
The Avengers (2012)
While he would become the most significant and powerful villain of the MCU’s Infinity Saga, Thanos made his first MCU appearance in the post-credits scene of 2012’s The Avengers. This saw him warned by his follower, the Other, who noted that to threaten the Avengers is to “court Death.”This hinted at Thanos’ Marvel Comics story, in which he forms a romantic obsession for Lady Death, the personification of life ending, but this story wasn’t followed up on in the live-action MCU, with Thanos collecting the Infinity Stones to solve overpopulation rather than to woo Death.
Thanos was portrayed by Damion Poitier in
The Avengers
, but was recast for Josh Brolin from
Guardians of the Galaxy
onwards, and made a total of five appearances in live-action, and has shown up in several animated
What If…?
episodes.
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Marvel Television’s Agatha All Along series finally introduced Aubrey Plaza to the MCU as Death, so it’s possible that Thanos’ Infinity Saga story could be retconned, but this seems unlikely. If this doesn’t happen, Thanos courting Death in The Avengers will make no sense at all. It would be great to see Josh Brolin return as Thanos, especially now that Death is in existence in the MCU, and now has no ties to Kathryn Hahn’s Agatha Harkness, who became a ghost after sacrificing herself to Death in Agatha All Along’s final episodes.
4 Steve Rogers & Sharon Carter Kiss
Captain America: Civil War (2016)
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Most of these MCU scenes make no sense, but can easily be forgotten and brushed aside. However, Captain America: Civil War delivered one of the most controversial and cringe-worthy Steve Rogers scenes in the MCU’s history, one which can’t easily be ignored. Steve Rogers kissing Sharon Carter came out of nowhere, made no sense for the story and was completely pointless and unnecessary, boiling down to nothing more than Rogers getting a love interest. It would have been better had Marvel not given this honor to the niece of Rogers’ actual long-lost love, Peggy Carter.
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Sharon Carter’s storyline in the MCU has gone to a strange place, as she was revealed to be the Power Broker in 2021’s The Falcon and the Winter Soldier series. It would be great to see her either killed off or given a more substantive hero role in the MCU’s future, perhaps redeeming herself from this weird moment in Captain America: Civil War, developing her as a character away from Steve Rogers’ Captain America. It was always weird that Sharon Carter formed a romance with her aunt’s true love, so it’s best that the MCU ignores this and moves on.
3 Baron Mordo Thinks There Are Too Many Sorcerers
Doctor Strange (2016)
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The ending of 2016’s Doctor Strange set up the perfect villain and storyline for a sequel, but 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness completely ignored this set-up. Chiwetel Ejiofor’s Baron Karl Mordo stole Jonathan Pangborn’s magic at the end of the Phase 3 movie, rendering him paralyzed once again, and starting his war on sorcerers in the MCU, suggesting that there are simply too many of them. It seemed as though Mordo would continue his eradication of sorcerers in subsequent MCU projects, but this version of the character hasn’t been seen since.
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Earth-838’s Baron Mordo appeared in
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
as a member of the Illuminati and that reality’s Sorcerer Supreme, having replaced Earth-838’s Doctor Strange after his execution.
This story was planned to be wrapped up abruptly in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, as Mordo would have been revealed to have been killed by the Scarlet Witch. This would have perhaps been explained by him tracking her down in an attempt to steal her power and rid the world of yet another sorcerer, but Wanda Maximoff was far too powerful. This scene was cut, however, leaving Earth-616’s Mordo’s fate uncertain, and raising more questions about his seemingly-non-existent war on the MCU’s magic-users.
2 Doctor Strange Grows A Third Eye
Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness (2022)
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While Doctor Strange contributed to one of the MCU’s biggest loose ends, the 2022 sequel followed this theme. At the end of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Doctor Strange fixes his broken watch and heads out to continue his simple life, but is distracted by a blinding headache that turns into Doctor Strange mysteriously acquiring a third eye, reminiscent of the one sported by his Sinister Strange variant. This came out of nowhere and was not explained at all, leaving audiences confused and curious about what the future could hold for Strange.
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This scene might have been forgiven had the aftermath of Strange acquiring a third eye been explored. Unfortunately, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ mid-credits scene saw Strange completely acclimatized to his new feature and having full control over when and if it appears, as he shows it to Clea when she approaches him for help in stopping an incursion. This made no sense, and made the prior scene even more confusing, but hopefully Marvel Studios’ upcoming Doctor Strange 3 will answer some of these questions.
1 Thanos Will Do It Himself
Avengers: Age Of Ultron (2015)
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While Thanos’ debut scene in The Avengers was somewhat misplaced, his return in the post-credits scene of 2015’s Avengers: Age of Ultron was also confusing and meaningless. After the Avengers defeated Ultron and recruited the likes of Vision, the Scarlet Witch, Rhodey and the Falcon into their ranks, the ending of Avengers: Age of Ultron saw Thanos don an Infinity Gauntlet and suggest that he’d track down the Infinity Stones himself. However, this made absolutely no sense, most notably because the Infinity Gauntlet hadn’t even been forged yet.
|
Thanos’ Live-Action MCU Movie |
Year |
|---|---|
|
The Avengers |
2012 |
|
Guardians of the Galaxy |
2014 |
|
Avengers: Age of Ultron |
2015 |
|
Avengers: Infinity War |
2018 |
|
Avengers: Endgame |
2019 |
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Avengers: Infinity War revealed that Thanos forced the Dwarves of Nidavellir to forge the Infinity Gauntlet shortly before his quest began. Thanos also subsequently did not “do it [himself],” instead sending the Black Order to acquire the Infinity Stones for him. Avengers: Age of Ultron might have wanted to mark the next huge development in Thanos’ story in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it might have actually ended up delaying the story’s progression, as it introduced a confusing element that didn’t make any sense and Marvel might have been better off avoiding.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a multimedia superhero franchise that began in 2008 with Paramount’s Iron Man starring Robert Downey Jr. The franchise quickly grew in popularity, with Disney eventually buying out Marvel Entertainment in 2009. The MCU consists of dozens of movies and TV shows, most notably Avengers: Endgame, WandaVision, and Loki.
Created by Kevin Feige Upcoming Films Deadpool & Wolverine , Captain America: Brave New World , Thunderbolts* , Blade (2025) , The Fantastic Four: First Steps , Avengers: Doomsday (2026) , Avengers: Secret Wars Upcoming TV Shows Agatha: Coven of Chaos , Ironheart , Daredevil: Born Again , Wakanda , Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man , Marvel Zombies , Wonder Man , Vision Quest
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Upcoming MCU Movies
-
Captain America: Brave New World
Release Date February 14, 2025
- Thunderbolts*
Release Date May 2, 2025
- The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Release Date July 25, 2025
- Avengers: Doomsday (2026)
Release Date May 1, 2026
- Spider-Man Homecoming 4
Release Date July 24, 2026
- Avengers: Secret Wars
Release Date May 7, 2027
Captain America: Brave New World
Thunderbolts*
The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Avengers: Doomsday (2026)
Spider-Man Homecoming 4
Avengers: Secret Wars