Marvel Cast: Every Major Actor, Director and Recast in the MCU

The Marvel Cinematic Universe cast is one long running ensemble, and each major hero is played by an actor who appears in the films where they are billed among the first 15 names in the credits. Think of it like a television drama that has run for eighteen years: the faces rotate, but a handful of leads keep coming back. The first film in the list is Iron Man (2008), directed by Jon Favreau, and the newest is The Fantastic 4: First Steps (2025), directed by Matt Shakman.

Among the women who lead Marvel films, Brie Larson, Scarlett Johansson, Elizabeth Olsen, Zoe Saldaña, Letitia Wright, Florence Pugh and Vanessa Kirby (Sue Storm in The Fantastic 4: First Steps) have all been billed in the top three of at least one film. Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts, Natalie Portman as Jane Foster, Evangeline Lilly as Hope Van Dyne and Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter add to that list. On the men's side, the longest running names are Downey, Evans, Hemsworth and Ruffalo. If you want the characters rather than the actors, the Marvel characters page covers them, starting with Tony Stark and Steve Rogers.

The top billing in the Avengers titles is steady, and it tells you who the studio treats as the core. The Avengers (2012), directed by Joss Whedon, bills Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner and Tom Hiddleston, in that order. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) bills Downey, Hemsworth, Ruffalo, Evans, Johansson and Renner, with James Spader voicing Ultron in seventh. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) runs Downey, Evans, Hemsworth, Josh Brolin as Thanos, Ruffalo and Johansson. Avengers: Endgame (2019) returns to Downey, Evans, Ruffalo, Hemsworth, Johansson and Renner, with Brolin seventh. Anthony and Joe Russo directed both of the last two films.

The Avengers films do not name a fixed roster of twelve, so the number depends on how you count membership. The Avengers (2012) assembles six: Iron Man (Downey), Captain America (Evans), Hulk (Ruffalo), Thor (Hemsworth), Black Widow (Johansson) and Hawkeye (Renner). Avengers: Age of Ultron adds five more among its top billed names: War Machine (Cheadle), Quicksilver (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), Scarlet Witch (Olsen), Vision (Bettany) and Falcon (Mackie). Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War then bring in Ant-Man (Rudd), Black Panther (Boseman), Doctor Strange (Cumberbatch) and Spider-Man (Holland), so the pool is already larger than twelve before Captain Marvel (Larson) arrives in Avengers: Endgame.

The four MCU Spider-Man films have their own franchise section, so their full casts live there: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) and Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026). Tom Holland leads all four, with Zendaya and Jacob Batalon billed alongside him in the later films.

Marvel Studios announced the Avengers: Doomsday cast on March 26, 2025, the day the studio said production had begun. Avengers: Doomsday is directed by Anthony and Joe Russo and opens on December 18, 2026, with Avengers: Secret Wars scheduled for December 17, 2027. Disney confirmed Robert Downey Jr. as Victor von Doom, and that is the only character name attached to any cast member so far. The other confirmed actors are Chris Hemsworth, Vanessa Kirby, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Letitia Wright, Paul Rudd, Wyatt Russell, Tenoch Huerta Mejia, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Simu Liu, Florence Pugh, Kelsey Grammer, Lewis Pullman, Danny Ramirez, Joseph Quinn, David Harbour, Winston Duke, Hannah John-Kamen, Tom Hiddleston, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Alan Cumming, Rebecca Romijn, James Marsden, Channing Tatum and Pedro Pascal. Chris Evans is listed on Disney's official film page too. For footage, see the Avengers: Doomsday trailer page.

More than twenty directors have made the 34 Marvel Studios films outside the Spider-Man series, and Anthony and Joe Russo have directed the most, with four so far and Avengers: Doomsday on the way. Marvel's pattern is to hire a filmmaker with a distinct voice for each hero, then bring the ensemble together under the Russos. Jon Watts directed the first three Spider-Man films, and Destin Daniel Cretton directed the newest, Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026), which the Spider-Man franchise section covers.

A few of these credits carry production history. Peyton Reed took over Ant-Man (2015) after Edgar Wright left the project following years of development. Scott Derrickson directed Doctor Strange (2016) and stayed on as an executive producer of the sequel after stepping aside, which is how Sam Raimi came to direct Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Jon Favreau also acts in the universe, playing Happy Hogan from Iron Man (2008) through Deadpool & Wolverine. Michael Giacchino, who scored several of the films, directed the black and white special Werewolf by Night, and James Gunn directed The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special, but both are shorts and sit outside the film count.

The Avengers: Doomsday crew is led by the Russo brothers as directors, with Kevin Feige, Louis D'Esposito and Jonathan Schwartz as producers. Stephen McFeely and Michael Waldron are confirmed as writers. TheWrap has reported that Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers also wrote on the film, but that credit remains a report rather than a studio confirmation. Alan Silvestri, who scored The Avengers (2012), Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, is listed as the composer on Box Office Mojo. For how the music has evolved, see the Marvel soundtrack page.

Marvel Studios has not published a list of departures, and the changes on record are recasts and story endings rather than public exits. In my opinion, the studio handled most of these swaps with little disruption to the heroes themselves.

The clearest example is Bruce Banner. Edward Norton played him in The Incredible Hulk (2008), directed by Louis Leterrier, and Mark Ruffalo took over in The Avengers (2012). James Rhodes changed hands earlier: Terrence Howard played him in Iron Man (2008), and Don Cheadle has played him from Iron Man 2 onward. Fandral switched from Josh Dallas in Thor (2011) to Zachary Levi in Thor: The Dark World, and Howard Stark is played by John Slattery in Iron Man 2 and Ant-Man (2015) but by Dominic Cooper in Captain America: The First Avenger. That being said, none of these changes broke the continuity of the heroes themselves.

The better story, as an opinion, is the way the universe keeps older faces alive. Tim Blake Nelson's Samuel Sterns appears in The Incredible Hulk (2008) and again in Captain America: Brave New World (2025), and Liv Tyler's Betty Ross appears in both films too. William Hurt played General Thaddeus Ross in 2008 and returned as Secretary Ross in Black Widow (2021), while Harrison Ford plays President Thaddeus Ross in Brave New World. Ben Kingsley's Trevor Slattery moves from Iron Man 3 to Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, and Corey Stoll plays Yellowjacket in Ant-Man (2015) before returning as M.O.D.O.K. in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

Heroes have also changed hands inside the story. Anthony Mackie, billed as Falcon in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, is billed as Sam Wilson / Captain America in Captain America: Brave New World, and Danny Ramirez plays the new Falcon, Joaquin Torres. Chadwick Boseman led Black Panther (2018) as T'Challa, and after his death the sequel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, opens with the king's death and is led by Letitia Wright as Shuri, with the script rewritten after Boseman's passing according to an AP report. Paul Bettany's Jarvis is a voice in the early Iron Man films before the credits list him as Jarvis / Vision in Avengers: Age of Ultron.

Absence from an announcement is not the same as an exit, so I would not read too much into names missing from the Doomsday cast. Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo and Jeremy Renner are not on that list, but the studio has not said anything about their futures. The Doomsday lineup shows a deliberate mix of generations: Robert Downey Jr. is confirmed as Victor von Doom, Chris Evans is listed, and newer leads such as Vanessa Kirby, Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach come from The Fantastic 4: First Steps.

The Doomsday list also brings in actors from outside Marvel Studios' own films. Patrick Stewart already played Professor Charles Xavier in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and he is joined by Ian McKellen, Alan Cumming, Rebecca Romijn, James Marsden and Channing Tatum, who played Gambit in Deadpool & Wolverine (2024). That film also had Chris Evans as Johnny Storm, a different part from Steve Rogers, and Disney's Doomsday page lists Evans without naming a character. Marvel has not announced which roles most of these actors will play, so any claim about them is speculation. For release context, start with Marvel movies in order, and see the Marvel Cinematic Universe hub for the full film list.