Marvel’s Disney+ Shows Dominate 2021’s List of Most Pirated Content

2021 featured plenty of first for the crew at Marvel Studios. Spider-Man: No Way Home, a movie the Burbank-based outfit co-produced with Sony, became the first movie of the pandemic era to make $1 billion at the box office. It was also the first year Kevin Feige and his team produced content in the form of a television show. As it turns out, it’s those very television shows that would end up as the most pirated items of the year.

As part of its year-end lists, TorrentFreak says WandaVision was, by far, the most-pirated show of the year—and it’s only the tip of the iceberg for Marvel Studios. Out of the pirate shows the website tracked, Marvel properties make up four of the top five slots on the list. WandaVision and Loki are first and second on the list, while The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Hawkeye are fourth and fifth.

“With the current streaming landscape being so fragmented, it appears that many people prefer to pirate instead of paying for ‘another’ subscription. That definitely applies to Marvel fans,” the site says.

It’s that same list Lucasfilm’s The Mandalorian dominated last year. Marvel’s What If…? also happened to crack the list, finishing at sixth place on the list. The top ten most pirated shows of 2021 list then rounds out with Foundation, Rick and Morty, Arcane, and Wheel of Time.

“You can come up with a cool concept — lots of people can come up with cool concepts. Sticking the landing is the thing that everything is judged on — how it ends up,” WandaVision head writer Jac Schaeffer previously said of the show. “I stand by where the show goes, and I’m very proud of my team and so impressed and in awe of all of the collaborators on this enormous show. And it’s my hope that the fanbase feels the same excitement and emotional response that we all had in making it.”

Cover photo by Miguel Candela/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images