When it started way back in 2008, the Marvel Cinematic Universe focused on one hero at a time. Tony Stark got his own movie, then the Hulk got one, then Steve Rogers got one – but these movies were always building toward 2012’s ambitious team-up The Avengers.
Ever since the Avengers assembled, Marvel has put together a bunch more superhero teams. Some Avengers have broken off and formed their own subgroups, like Thor’s “Revengers” team, while other teams were recruited by non-Avengers, like the Ravagers or the Minutemen.
The Ravagers
Introduced in Guardians of the Galaxy, the Ravagers are the band of space pirates that abducted Peter Quill and intended to deliver him to Ego before Yondu decided to keep the kid and raise him as his own son (albeit with questionable parenting methods).
The What If...? episode with T’Challa as Star-Lord showed that all the Ravagers needed was the right leader to become a force of good in the galaxy. Under Star-Lord T’Challa, they became the renowned interstellar heroes of a parallel universe.
The Minutemen
In Loki, the trickster god began working with the TVA and uncovered that all of the organization’s agents are just pruned variants with their memories wiped. But most of them already suspect that they’re being duped by the TVA and gladly accept their small place in a wider universe.
The Minutemen are essentially the cops of the TVA, traveling through rectangular portals to clean up broken timelines. With nods to Doctor Who, Loki positioned itself as hard sci-fi, and the Minutemen were a large part of creating that aesthetic.
The Warriors Three
Consisting of Volstagg, Fandral, and Hogun, the Warriors Three are among the most fearsome and powerful fighters in Asgard (not counting their ruler, the God of Thunder, of course).
It was disappointing when this trio got sidelined in the later Thor movies, because their fantastical adventures through the Nine Realms could’ve been the basis for a whole trilogy of movies, let alone a subplot in one.
The Black Order
Not all the best teams in the MCU are made up of heroes. Thanos’ ruthless team of enforcers, the Black Order, is a well-oiled machine. If they put their minds to something a little nobler than universe-wide genocide, they could accomplish some wonderful things.
The most memorable side villains from the Mad Titan’s posse are Proxima Midnight, played by Carrie Coon, who fights Black Widow and Okoye simultaneously, and Ebony Maw, Thanos’ right-hand man with sinister telekinesis (and a face that Tony compares to Squidward Tentacles).
The Howling Commandos
When Steve Rogers is sick of having his superpowers used for propaganda alone, he breaks out to prove his mettle on the battlefield and ends up liberating dozens of P.O.W.s from a Hydra compound.
With some of these liberated prisoners, he forms the Howling Commandos. Like the titular heroes in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, the Howling Commandos go on a brutal warpath through enemy territory to send a message to the Axis powers.
The Defenders
It’s a shame that the launch of Disney+ meant that all the Marvel shows on Netflix had to be canceled, because those shows introduced their own street-level Avengers that MCU fans fell in love with. The Defenders are a group of hard-as-nails vigilantes watching over Hell’s Kitchen.
Every Defender brings something unique to the table: Luke Cage is bulletproof, Jessica Jones has superhuman strength, Iron Fist has magical martial arts abilities, and Daredevil is simply a badass.
The Revengers
When Thor plans to escape Sakaar through “The Devil’s Anus” and head back to Asgard to put an end to Hela’s reign, he enlists Loki, Valkyrie, and the Hulk to help and terms them “The Revengers.”
Not only does this team work surprisingly well together; the impromptu way with which Thor assembles and names the team feels like a meta-commentary on the MCU itself. After the success of The Avengers, solo movies like The Winter Soldier and Ant-Man started building up mini-Avengers teams to support the hero. Ragnarok’s Revengers team seems like a self-aware nod to this familiar trope.
Dora Milaje
T’Challa is a superhero and his sister Shuri has invented a ton of cutting-edge technology, but a huge part of Wakanda’s defense is its special forces unit, the Dora Milaje. Led by Okoye, the Dora Milaje have kept Wakanda’s secrets for generations.
Ryan Coogler is developing a series for Disney+ that will expand on the Wakandan worldbuilding, so Marvel fans can look forward to a lot more from the Dora Milaje.
Guardians Of The Galaxy
“Found family” is a common theme in the MCU, and the Guardians of the Galaxy are the epitome of that. On paper, the partnership of an ‘80s kid, a sociopathic raccoon, and a talking tree shouldn’t work. But the chemistry between the cast and James Gunn’s masterful tonal balance between heart and humor made it work.
The Guardians’ tangible familial dynamic turned the movie that some box office experts expected to be the MCU’s first bomb into one of the franchise’s biggest hits.
The Avengers
Of course, the greatest team in the MCU is the Avengers themselves. Throughout the Infinity Saga, starting with a group of six remarkable people handpicked by Nick Fury, Earth’s Mightiest Heroes grew into the unstoppable hundreds-strong tour-de-force that saved the universe from Thanos’ wrath.
The Avengers are the greatest team in the MCU purely because most of the other teams on this list fall under that banner. Following the explosive finale of Endgame, the Avengers Initiative encompasses just about every hero in the universe.