Marvel took over the whole convention and San Diego this year. A Hall H presentation closed out the weekend with Kevin Feige back in full command, and all of it is rather tantalising considering Marvel’s absence last year.
Worth remembering that Marvel skipping Hall H isn’t actually rare, they sat out 2025 outright to keep the “Avengers: Doomsday” cast in production. So the return this year carried some weight, but it also came without the pressure of a full Phase reveal. No sprawling slate of twelve new projects, no overwhelming multi-year timeline dump. Just two films, a handful of surprises, and a lot of room to actually let each reveal land.
Honestly, it’s a relief… And probably the smarter move anyway, given how announced projects can quietly fall apart before they ever reach a screen. We haven’t forgotten about you, “Blade.”
That’s not to say Marvel isn’t thinking big picture. Around the same time as the convention, Kevin Feige told press during a Shanghai tour that Marvel Studios has been mapping out potential movies “all the way up to 2042,” while immediately tempering it himself: “Whether we can make it to 2042? Who knows? Will it be those movies? Who knows? But this is how we approach and plan the vast amount of potential stories in the comics.” So the long-term vision is very much there, Marvel’s just choosing to dole it out in smaller, more digestible pieces these days rather than one giant Hall H info-dump.
Here’s the full rundown, from the booth floor to the Hall H stage.
A Witchy Mystery
Now, here’s one game they’ve been playing to keep our fan brains occupied.
Days before the Hall H panel, Marvel had some of the costumes from the movie up as exhibits. There were Captain America, Invisible Woman, Namor… But they’d also quietly planted a “Latverian Witch” costume at its booth, and then proceeded to change its colour every single day.
By the time a third witch costume showed up on Friday, this had become the actual main character of pre-Hall H SDCC discourse. It was green on Wednesday. Orange the next day. A vivid purple by Friday. Same silhouette every time. It was a hooded cloak, a silver face mask, and a belt with an unexplained silver diamond buckle.
Indeed, there’s no “Latverian witch” in the comics, so fans immediately started building theories. Simply put, we’re thinking of the existing magicians in the MCU. Scarlet Witch, perhaps? Maybe Agatha Harkness? Clea? Sylvie?
The costume’s design leans hard on Doctor Doom’s visual language, and the timeline lines up with a comics arc where Doom kidnaps and brainwashes Wanda Maximoff.
Combine that with gold symbols spotted on the later Doctor Doom booth costume (with details such as a hammer and a star embedded on it, very much Thor and Captain Marvel-coded), and the fan theory snowballed into: Doom isn’t working alone in “Doomsday”; he’s got a coven.
Marvel never confirmed anything outright, of course. But everyone walked into Hall H already primed to look for witches.
“Avengers: Endgame” Is Coming Back To Theatres
Before we even got to “Doomsday,” Feige opened with a nostalgia bomb. “Avengers: Endgame” is returning to theatres on September 25, and it won’t just be a straight re-release. There’s brand new footage attached, clearly designed to set the stage for what’s coming in “Avengers: Doomsday.”
“2019 was a very long time ago,” Feige told the crowd. “The world’s a different place. But reminding all of us what it was like to be in that theatre, cheering along and enjoying that crazy enthusiasm, is why we’re rereleasing ‘Avengers: Endgame.'”
Smart move, honestly. Get everyone back in their feelings before December.
Ryan Gosling Is Ghost Rider
After years of speculation, Marvel confirmed a brand new “Ghost Rider” film with Ryan Gosling in the lead, directed by Shawn Levy (who most recently did “Deadpool & Wolverine” with Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman). It’s set for 2028.
Levy explained the whole thing started as a side conversation. “We spent a lot of time last year making ‘Star Wars: Starfighter.’ And as Ryan started talking about his vision for this character, we started riffing, and I finally said, ‘Bro, let’s ride.'”
Zero details on which Ghost Rider we’re getting (Johnny Blaze? Robbie Reyes? A brand new rider entirely?), but we’re already thinking about how insane the visual language of a flaming skull could look with Levy behind the camera.
Also, it’s pretty funny how Shawn Levy is directing two films in the MCU with Ryans in the lead. Time to get a Ryanair sponsorship perhaps?
“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” Got A Sneak Peek
With the film swinging into theatres on July 31, Jon Bernthal popped up to tease exclusive footage focused on the dynamic between his Frank Castle (Punisher) and Tom Holland’s Peter Parker (Spider-Man), as the pair go up against Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk. We’re still spoiler-cautious about the wider plot, but the shape of the scene itself is too good not to break down.
The clip opens mid-fight, with Hulk absolutely wrecking Spider-Man the moment a couple of grenades get thrown into the mix. That’s when Frank shows up to help. Spidey isn’t thrilled about it. “Frank, what are you doing? This is above your pay grade. It’s the Hulk!” Frank empties a full clip into Hulk anyway. Predictably, nothing happens.
Then comes the standout shot of the whole clip. Spider-Man webs Frank and slides him across the floor in slow motion so he can take potshots at Hulk from ground level. It’s genuinely one of the coolest single images from the footage. Spidey webs Hulk down, Frank tosses a small disc at him, Hulk catches it (Hulk asking “are you kidding?” got one of the biggest laughs in the room), and Frank shoots the disc mid-air, sending Hulk flying back.
The two duck behind a table to regroup, and that’s when the banter kicks in. Frank was supposed to be guarding MJ (Zendaya), but MJ apparently told him to protect Spidey instead. Spider-Man is very obviously delighted by this. “Did she actually say that?” “Are you blushing, daffodil?” Frank fires back. They start arguing strategy, Spidey mentions he’s got a device that could actually stop Hulk, and Frank suddenly finds an excuse to go do something else. Spidey isn’t having it. “Are you just trying to get out of fighting the Hulk?”
And it’s here that the footage ends. Guess we’ll have to find out what comes next when the movie releases this week!
“Avengers: Doomsday” Brought Out Basically Everyone
This was always going to be the centrepiece, and it delivered. Directors Joe and Anthony Russo brought out the cast in full force, split across two stages at the back of the hall, one marked with an X and the other with the Avengers symbol. We’re talking Rebecca Romijn, Kelsey Grammer, James Marsden, Lewis Pullman, Tenoch Huerta, David Harbour, Hannah John-Kamen, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Simu Liu, Danny Ramirez, Anthony Mackie, Paul Rudd, Pedro Pascal, Hayley Atwell, Chris Evans, and Robert Downey Jr., all uniting for a massive crowd selfie.
Downey took the mic while the entire hall (now decked out in their Doom masks and capes) turned green under the lights. “It’s not easy being green,” he said. “I need a lot of help. I need this whole family around me to finally assist me in being an arch-enemy, which is daunting.”
He also looked back on his Doctor Doom reveal from the same stage back in 2024. “When y’all had faith in me two years ago, you lifted me up, and I think we made something real special. But decisions will have to be made. Perhaps you’re on the side of the good guys, or perhaps you’ll have to consider the alternative.”
And then, because Marvel panels always need one chaos moment, a grey denim-clad Deadpool appeared in the audience, revealed to be Ryan Reynolds in full costume, who proceeded to grill the cast with questions before very clearly angling for a spot in the movie. At one point, he turned to Paul Rudd, completely deadpan, and just asked him why Thor was crying. Rudd clapped back with a Wrexham FC joke…
But anyway, is anyone here thinking Marvel is making a sly reference to Jean Gray?
Then came the footage, and it was the kind of thing that had the whole hall dead silent. It opens on Victor von Doom (Robert Downey Jr.), in full costume, sitting on a golden throne, the ground beneath him pulsing with green energy. Sue Storm (Vanessa Kirby) narrates over it: “Victor was always the smartest guy in every room. He used to be different. Then everything he loved was taken from him.”
He’s framed in front of the same painting from the teaser poster. “I knew he was lost, but didn’t realise he was broken,” she continues, and we see she’s saying all this directly to a room full of the assembled heroes.
The footage then flies over a completely levelled city. Reed Richards (Pedro Pascal), sounding genuinely horrified, asks, “Victor. Did you do this?” We get quick cuts across the ensemble, including a crying Magneto (Ian McKellen), Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) holding a baby. “All of you have lived storied lives,” Victor says. “And now you must give them back.”
Victor leaps off a building and sticks a full superhero landing on the ground below. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is already there, swinging Stormbreaker at him. “I swear you’ll beg for Hell when I’m through with you,” Thor says. Victor stops the swing with a single finger. Thor keeps pushing, gets nowhere, and Victor casually flicks him back with a burst of green energy. “Hell answers to me,” Victor says, raising an army of Sentinels straight out of the ground around him.
That’s the whole clip, and it’s easily one of the most menacing Marvel villain reveals we’ve seen on screen. Doctor Doom isn’t being set up as a guy to root against reluctantly. He’s being set up as an actual, unambiguous threat, and going by the reaction in the room, it worked.
“Avengers: Doomsday” hits theatres on December 18.
A New “Black Panther” Film Is Officially Happening
Ryan Coogler returned to the Hall H stage himself to confirm he’s directing a third “Black Panther” film, joined by Letitia Wright and Winston Duke. The bigger reveal, though, was casting. David Jonsson (“The Long Walk,” “Alien: Romulus”) is stepping in as the new Black Panther, playing the son of T’Challa (the late Chadwick Boseman). The film will follow him “growing up” and “coming of age” into the mantle, and it’s set to hit theatres on December 15, 2028.
Coogler also confirmed the film will be partially shot on IMAX 70mm, making it the first Marvel Studios movie ever shot on actual film rather than digitally. Smart move, honestly, especially given the year Marvel’s had on the format. Both “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” and “Avengers: Doomsday” got squeezed out of IMAX screens in their respective release windows this year, first by Universal’s “The Odyssey” locking down an exclusive three-week IMAX run, then by “Dune: Part Three” securing IMAX exclusivity for their shared December 18 opening weekend. Getting “Black Panther 3” shot natively on 70mm, the same format Coogler used for “Sinners,” is a real way to build IMAX goodwill back into the pipeline well ahead of release, rather than scrambling for premium screens at the last minute again.
Jonsson got a standing ovation when he walked out. “I want to say thank you so much. Thank you, Ryan, thank you, Kevin, thank you to this amazing family that I have the honour and the privilege and the blessing to join. I actually don’t want to say too much because I want to let the screen do the talking. But believe me, the honour is entirely mine.”
What Didn’t Get A Mention
No “Avengers: Secret Wars” news.
No updates on the MCU’s X-Men reboot.
“VisionQuest” only got a passing mention with no real details attached.
If you were hoping for a full Phase 7 roadmap, you’ll have to wait.
Disney’s D23 Expo kicks off August 14, and more announcements are expected there.
