Chris Evans’ First ‘Captain America’ Film Officially Replaced in the MCU
With Marvel Studios officially kicking off Phase Six last month via The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025), another major development has quietly restructured how fans experience the Marvel Cinematic Universe. A long-standing pillar of the franchise has been displaced in a move that subtly reorders the very foundation of Marvel’s on-screen chronology.
For over a decade, Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) was widely viewed as the chronological beginning of the MCU, despite being the fifth film released. It charts the origin of Steve Rogers, a Brooklyn native transformed into Captain America through a government experiment called Project Rebirth.
Set in World War II, the film follows Rogers (Chris Evans) as he confronts Hydra, a splinter Nazi organization run by Johann Schmidt, better known as Red Skull (Hugo Weaving). Schmidt possesses the Tesseract—an object powered by the Space Stone—that drives the film’s central conflict. Steve’s sacrifice to crash a Hydra plane into the Arctic ultimately leads to him being frozen in ice and awakened decades later, paving the way for The Avengers (2012).
The movie also introduced fan-favorite characters like Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell), Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), and Howard Stark (Dominic Cooper), while cementing critical lore including Hydra and the Tesseract.
Although it’s animated, Marvel Studios’ new series Eyes of Wakanda on Disney+ has now been confirmed as canonical to the MCU. Set across different eras, the show centers on the Hatut Zeraze, an elite Wakandan warrior faction tasked with retrieving Vibranium artifacts throughout history. Created by Todd Harris under the Marvel Studios Animation banner, Eyes of Wakanda continues to flesh out the world originally shaped by Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther (2018) and its sequel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022).
The voice cast includes Winnie Harlow as Noni and Cress Williams as the Lion, along with Jona Xiao, Anika Noni Rose, Patricia Belcher, Gary Anthony Williams, and Adam Gold.
Marvel made a quiet but major update to its Disney+ interface on August 1, 2025. Eyes of Wakanda now appears as the very first story in the MCU’s “Timeline Order,” bumping Captain America: The First Avenger from its long-held top spot.
Steve Rogers’ World War II-era origin has been reclassified as second in the timeline, as Eyes of Wakanda features events dating as far back as 1260 B.C., 1200 B.C., 1400 A.D., and 1896 A.D.—centuries before the 1940s.
According to Disney+, the MCU’s timeline now kicks off with Eyes of Wakanda, followed by Captain America: The First Avenger, Captain Marvel, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, and then the original crossover event, The Avengers. The continuity then continues with Thor: The Dark World, Iron Man 3, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
Shorts like I Am Groot follow next, ahead of Marvel Television’s heroes such as Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Avengers: Age of Ultron. From there, the timeline includes Ant-Man, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Defenders, and Captain America: Civil War, leading into Black Widow and Black Panther. The vigilante-focused The Punisher comes after, followed by Spider-Man: Homecoming, Doctor Strange, Thor: Ragnarok, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Avengers: Infinity War, and Avengers: Endgame.
Post-Endgame content includes Loki, What If…?, WandaVision, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Spider-Man: Far From Home, Eternals, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and Hawkeye. Series like Moon Knight, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Echo, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, Ms. Marvel, Thor: Love and Thunder, and Ironheart further enrich the timeline.
The chronological order wraps in recent entries like Werewolf by Night, The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, with Multiverse storylines escalating in Secret Invasion, The Marvels, and Deadpool & Wolverine. Newer installments include Agatha All Along, Daredevil: Born Again, Captain America: Brave New World, and Thunderbolts*.
Looking ahead, Spider-Man: Brand New Day arrives July 31, 2026, marking Tom Holland’s return as Peter Parker. Following that, Robert Downey Jr. returns to the MCU in the Russo Brothers’ Avengers: Doomsday (2026) after his debut as Victor Von Doom in The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ post-credits scene.
What’s your take on Captain America: The First Avenger being bumped from the top spot in Marvel’s timeline? Share your thoughts with us in the comments.
