Despite the excitement, I cannot believe that the cast reveal for Avengers: Doomsday lasted five and a half hours. When word first got around that Marvel Studios would unveil a mᴀssive announcement to rival Robert Downey Jr.’s casting as Doctor Doom on March 26, 2025, I was just as excited as everyone else. Eventually, Marvel Studios’ surprise announcement was revealed in the form of a live stream. Many thought the set chair bearing Chris Hemsworth’s name would lead to a bigger reveal, but the majority did not expect a full cast list for Avengers: Doomsday.

After all, Avengers: Doomsday‘s story is still over a year away. Two other mᴀssive Marvel movies of 2025 are expected before then, as are several more Marvel Television projects. Nonetheless, Marvel utilized the live stream to reveal every actor – at least, so far – that has been cast in Avengers: Doomsday, raising anticipation for the first half of a major two-part story that will culminate in 2027’s Avengers: Secret Wars​​​​​​. As I have said, this was all very exciting, but I could not believe it when Marvel’s announcement stretched past the five-hour mark.

The MCU Just Gave Us 27 Cast Members Who Will Be In Avengers: Doomsday

A Mᴀssive Marvel Movie Is Imminent

By the time the live stream by Marvel had ended, 27 cast members had been confirmed for Avengers: Doomsday. The first was Chris Hemsworth and the last was the already-announced Robert Downey Jr., with 25 other names synonymous with Marvel characters from across the decades nestled in between. Be it current MCU heroes like Anthony Mackie’s Captain America, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, or Simu Liu’s Shang-Chi – to name a tiny handful – or heroes from upcoming Marvel movies like The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Thunderbolts*, Avengers: Doomsday‘s cast is absolutely huge.

Also included in Avengers: Doomsday‘s cast are several members of the classic Fox X-Men movie timeline. Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen were confirmed as Professor X and Magneto, alongside the likes of James Marsden as Cyclops, Alan Cumming as Nightcrawler, Rebecca Romijn as Mystique, and Channing Tatum as ᴅᴇᴀᴅpool & Wolverine‘s Gambit. Combining these with other MCU heroes played by Leтιтia Wright, Winston Duke, and Paul Rudd, Avengers: Doomsday is shaping up to be the biggest MCU movie yet. To make things even more daunting, multiple big Marvel actors were missing from Avengers: Doomsday‘s cast list.

I Can’t Believe The Avengers: Doomsday Only Revealed 1 Name Every Roughly 15 Minutes

The Announcement Stretched On Beyond Belief

Now that I have adequately summarized the sheer size of Avengers: Doomsday‘s cast, I can mention how unbelievable it was that Marvel only revealed one name every 15 minutes or so during the live stream. After a certain amount of time, the white noise over the live stream would change to a specific character theme and reveal another name in the line-up. Initially, the anticipation was mᴀssive for this event. However, as people realized just how long Marvel waited to reveal a new chair and cast member, excitement turned to disbelief.

Frustration even crept in, with fans waiting hours to see yet another chair with an actor’s name plastered to it. I must admit, the marketing strategy – however nonsensical it initially seemed – kept people invested, with Marvel’s live streams across various platforms reaching millions of viewers. Regardless, the frustration of one name every 15 minutes was felt. Eventually, though, the frustration circled back around to enjoyment, with the hours that pᴀssed allowing meme creators to get creative.

The endless memes of who could be on the back of the next chair forced the anticipation of each reveal to return. By the end of the five-and-a-half hours, audiences were still checking in to see who would be announced for Avengers: Doomsday. While I am still in disbelief that the event took as long as it did, I do not think anyone would label it a flop from Marvel, given how much it got people talking in all kinds of ways.

The Avengers: Doomsday Cast Reveal Deserved To Be An Event, But It Didn’t Need To Take Up 5 And A Half Hours

All of this is to say that Marvel Studios perhaps pushed things slightly too far with Avengers: Doomsday‘s cast reveal. While I admit that the event was exciting, then frustrating, and then, a lot of fun, it still did not need to take up the time that it did. As it was, the cast announcement for Avengers: Doomsday was certainly a huge event, as the movie deserved to have. The film is clearly going to be an immense undertaking for Marvel to conclude the Multiverse Saga in style, meaning a big event to announce the cast was logical.

All that said, there is no denying it could have been much shorter than it was. Even an hour-long live stream would have been an improvement, with a name revealed every two minutes. That way, the anticipation of who is coming next would still be intact, yet the frustration and seemingly endless waiting-around would be removed. All I can say is that I hope whenever Marvel plans to announce the remaining rumored cast members of Avengers: Doomsday, the studio will opt for a less time-consuming strategy!