We’re really looking forward to Cyclops flexing those optic beams in the new Avengers movie. — Photo: Handout
These past few years have not been good to fans of superhero movies and TV shows. Sure, last year was alright, with the likes of Superman, Fantastic Four, and Thunderbolts* doing well, but their box office numbers were relatively disappointing, especially when compared to when the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) was at its peak with 2019’s Avengers: Endgame.
Well, Marvel is banking big on the Avengers again this year, with the release of Avengers: Doomsday in December, while DC will be taking a chance on another member of the Super-Family, Supergirl. Maybe she’ll soar just as high as Kal-El did last year.
In terms of television shows, there are a few notable new ones to look out for from both DC and Marvel; the latter is also set to release the second seasons for Daredevil: Born Again, acclaimed animated series X-Men ‘97, and Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.
Invincible will also get its fourth season this year, and The Boys will wrap up with its fifth and final season as well, so maybe don’t cancel those extra streaming services just yet.
Here’s a roundup of the superhero shows and films to catch this year.
Wonder who? No, he is not the male version of DC’s Wonder Woman, but a Marvel character named Simon Williams who made his comics debut in 1964 as a villain given superpowers by Baron Zemo through chemical and radiation treatments with “ionic” energy.
Named “Wonder Man” by Zemo (a name the hero himself considers “corny” at first), Williams seemingly sacrifices himself to save the Avengers, but is resurrected 15 years later and becomes a full-time Avenger in 1976’s The Avengers Annual #6.
Wonder Man was not sure his name was all that wonderful.
The upcoming TV show, however, will tread a different path altogether. From the trailers we’ve seen, Williams (played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) is now a struggling actor who teams up with fellow failed actor Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley, reprising his role from Iron Man 3 and Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings) to try and get into a remake of the film Wonder Man.
Yes, Wonder Man is trying to play Wonder Man in the film Wonder Man. How wonderfully meta. With Destin Daniel Cretton and Andrew Guest behind the show, this promises to be a mind-bending show that may (or may not) have bigger implications for the MCU.
We already got a glimpse of Milly Alcock’s Kara Zor-El aka Supergirl in last year’s Superman, and we really liked it.
The upcoming movie is based on the acclaimed, Eisner-winning Supergirl: Woman Of Tomorrow limited series by writer Tom King and artist Bilquis Evely.
Will we get to see Supergirl take a space bus in the upcoming movie? — DC Comics
The story starts off with Supergirl celebrating her 21st birthday getting drunk on a planet with a red sun. There, a young alien named Ruthye (Eve Ridley) tries to convince her to help avenge her father, who was killed by a ruthless alien named Krem of the Yellow Hills (Matthia Schoenaerts).
Although she initially refuses Ruthye’s request, an attack by Krem results in Krypto being poisoned, leading to Kara and Ruthye chasing Krem across the galaxy to get the antidote.
Directed by Craig Gillespie (Fright Night, Cruella), the movie will also feature one of the best bits of re-casting the DC Cinematic Universe (DCU) has seen so far – Jason Momoa as the vicious Czarnian bounty hunter Lobo.
Long-time Spidey fans will recognise the title as the name of a story arc that followed the much-maligned 2008 One More Day, in which Peter Parker and Mary Jane asked Mephisto to change reality and make everyone forget that Peter is Spider-Man.
This is, of course, similar to what happened in 2021’s Spider-Man: No Way Home, in which Doctor Strange’s memory wiping spell has made sure that no one remembers that Tom Holland’s Peter is Spider-Man.
Like the comic story arc of the same name, 'Brand New Day' looks to be a hard reset for Tom Holland's Spider-Man. — Photo: Marvel Comics
Beyond that, however, we’re not sure how the story of this new movie will go. What we do know is that Zendaya and Jacob Batalon are back as his (former) girlfriend MJ and (former) best friend Ned Leeds respectively.
We’ll also see appearances by The Punisher (Jon Bernthal), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), plus villains Scorpion (Michael Mando), and Tombstone (Marvin Jones III). It’s got the potential for a real blockbuster of a return for the Web-Crawler, as long as director Destin Daniel Cretton (yes, him again) doesn’t suddenly introduce Mephisto out of nowhere...
There have been successful movies and TV shows based on Batman rogues before (Penguin, Joker), but we did NOT expect to see a Clayface solo DCU movie.
Well, as it turns out, neither did DCU head James Gunn, initially. As the story goes, Mike Flanagan – the brains behind horror series and films like The Haunting Of Hill House, The Fall Of The House Of Usher, Doctor Sleep, and The Life Of Chuck – wrote a screenplay for a horror movie about Clayface, and Gunn loved it so much that he decided to greenlight the project.
The Matt Hegan version of Clayface made his debut back in 1961. — DC Comics
Unfortunately, Flanagan was unable to direct it himself due to scheduling issues, so the job went to James Watkins (Eden Lake, Speak No Evil) instead. The movie will star Tom Rhys Harries as Matt Hagen, who in the comics is the second character to be called Clayface.
Hagen made his debut in 1961’s Detective Comics #298, and was a treasure hunter who was exposed to a pool of radioactive protoplasm and gained shapeshifting powers.
In the upcoming movie, however, Hagen will be a struggling actor whose face is disfigured by a gangster, and in desperation, turns to a scientist whose experimental serum turns him into a being made entirely of a clay-like substance.
This is the big one for the MCU, and one that could either make it or break it. With almost every actor from past MCU movies involved in the film, including Robert Downey Jr as not Tony Stark, but Viktor Von Doom, this is arguably the biggest MCU event since Endgame.
The three teaser trailers have already confirmed that Chris Evans will return as Steve Rogers (but will he be Captain America?) and Chris Hemsworth has gone serious again as Thor.
What we are really looking forward to is the return of the X-Men from the original X-Men movies in the early 2000s, with James Marsden finally flexing his powers as Cyclops.
Will Doomsday be jsut a prelude to Secret Wars? — Photo: Marvel Comics
However, we know better than to trust Marvel’s trailers – remember when they “teased” us with the Illuminati in Doctor Strange: The Multiverse Of Madness, and then killed them off within 10 minutes? – so we’ll be reserving judgment for when the actual movie comes out.
The story so far has been kept under wraps, but Doctor Doom has been responsible for multiple major multiversal events in the comics, including the 2015 version of Secret Wars, where the entire multiverse was destroyed and reborn into a single “Battleworld” ruled by Doom. And considering the next Avengers movie is called Avengers: Secret Wars, we won’t be surprised if this is the direction the MCU is heading with Doomsday as well...
Besides the one I’ve mentioned above, there are a few other shows that have been announced for 2026, but did not have official release dates at the time of writing:
Lanterns – Follows Green Lanterns John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) as they investigate a murder on Earth. The show will also feature Nathan Fillion reprising his role as Guy Gardner (from Superman), and Ulrich Thomsen as the villain Sinestro.
'Lanterns' will follow Green Lanterns John Stewart (Aaron Pierre, left) and Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) as they investigate a murder on Earth. — Handout
Spider-Noir – Nicolas Cage as a 1930s noir-version of Spider-Man? If that sounds familiar, that’s because he also voices the same character in the Spider-Verse animated movies. This TV series, however, is a live-action one set in an alternate version of 1930s New York, and Cage plays Ben Reilly (not Peter Parker), a hard-boiled detective who also has spider-powers.
Vision Quest – Remember how a clone of Vision that was completely white showed up at the end of WandaVision and flew off after the show ended? No? Well, if you are the few fans who still wonder what happened to “White Vision” (played by Paul Bettany), this show should tie up that particular loose end.
