Thunderbolts*’ post-credits scenes are the first real win for Marvel teasers in years

Thunderbolts* is the final film of Marvel’s Phase 5, which was more or less marked by insecurity. Starting with 2023’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, and snaking around some of the roughest news cycles for the Cinematic Universe, Phase 5 is now giving way to a (seemingly) more confidently laid-out Phase 6. 

Which means Thunderbolts*’ final moments have a lot of setting up to do, and a fair bit of propping up as well, as they set the tone for the MCU moving forward. Much like the rest of the movie, they do it with a sort of return to form for the MCU. And in the end, the post-credits scenes do what seemed impossible, actually drumming up excitement for the next MCU movie specifically, instead of just boosting the nebulous stakes of the franchise.

[Ed. note: This post discusses Thunderbolts*’ post-credits scenes, which involves talking a bit about the end of the movie. Spoilers abound.]

Does Thunderbolts* have a mid-credits scene?

Yup, and it’s a bit of classic Marvel charm: Red Guardian (David Harbour) is in the cereal aisle in a grocery store, trying to impress a random stranger by encouraging her to buy a box of Wheaties branded with him and the other recently established “New Avengers.”

He strikes out, but it doesn’t matter — he’s living the dream! His face is on a Wheaties box! When she leaves it behind, he hardly cares; can’t nobody tell this man nothing after he’s been featured by the breakfast of champions. 

That all feels very quaint for an MCU mid-credits scene after years and years of endless promises with no payoff. Harbour absolutely has Red Guardian’s humor dialed in, and smooshing his face against the cereal box to make sure the connection is clear as day (even though he’s masked and bearded on the box, but unmasked and freshly shaved in real life) is more comedy gold. This mid-credits moment doesn’t need to build to anything bigger in Marvel’s universe, because the gravitational pull of Red Guardian’s charisma is that strong.

Plus, that’s what the other Thunderbolts* credits scene is for.

Does Thunderbolts* have a post-credits scene?

Yes! And it’s a big one. 

We jump forward 14 months, where the Team Formerly Known As Thunderbolts have officially been rebranded as The New Avengers, and are living in Avengers Tower. Unfortunately, they are running up against a problem: Sam Wilson, after his exploits in Captain America: Brave New World, is filing a copyright claim for “the Avengers.” And as the real Captain America, he’s already winning in the court of public opinion. 

The New Avengers are discussing this, along with how they’re being cut out of assisting with whatever “space problem” is currently going on, which no one will fill them in on. Red Guardian comes up with the genius rebrand “New Avengerz” (it’s foolproof; with the Z in place, there’s no justification for a copyright complaint). Meanwhile, Bob is chilling in the corner with snacks and a book. (He’s afraid The Void will return if he tries to use his powers again, so he can’t help much with the space problem.)

Then their computers alert them to some sort of multidimensional spacecraft entering Earth’s orbit. As they stare at the screen and go, “Multidimensional spacecraft? What does that even mean?” the answer appears on the screen… It’s the Fantastic Four’s rocket.

This is exactly the kind of Marvel teaser we really haven’t gotten in a minute: An actual tease for a movie that isn’t out yet, but is legitimately on its way. (Coming up next in Marvel’s cinematic release roster, even!) And though this scene is a brief window into what might happen at the end of July’s Fantastic Four: First Steps, it’s an exciting one. Will Fantastic Four end with the Four getting bounced to another dimension and having to find their way to the MCU Earth, possibly decades later (and maybe… with some X-Men in tow)? 

Worth noting here: That “14 months later” timeline seems pretty specific, and it certainly seems to align with the next round of MCU movies in an interesting way. Fourteen months after the release of Thunderbolts* would mean this post-credits scene is happening just in time for Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which comes out at the end of July 2026. (With Avengers: Doomsday due out in May 2026, and Avengers: Secret Wars not following along until May 2027.) 

All of this points to something bigger brewing — if you didn’t already know a major team-up event was on the horizon, you certainly do now. It’s enticing, especially because it will get paid off soon. This has always been the way of Marvel’s post-credit scenes. But lately, they’ve felt different — more lurchy, if you will — as they try to build a multiverse through the scheduling madness. While Tony Stark getting his invitation to the Avengers initiative at the end of 2008’s Iron Man wasn’t really paid off until a few movies later, it’s hard to deny that lately, MCU post-credits scenes have felt like too much delayed gratification. That’s because they skewed either too small or too nebulous, or ultimately, because something never really paid off — either because the movie it was setting up just dodged the issue, or because the MCU still hasn’t caught up to it.  

Thunderbolts*’ post-credit scene feels like a real return to form for the MCU: something with imminent, tangible promise. And for the first time in a while, it feels exciting to both want to see what’s going to come next, and to feel like we’re actually going to get to.