10 Marvel Comics That Influenced the MCU

These are the comics that helped make some of the most popular movies of the last 20 years.

September 28, 2023, 2:55pm

Marvel Studios have created some of the most popular movies of the last 15 years, beginning with Iron Man and leading all the way up through Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 3. The franchise has become the highest-grossing movie series in Hollywood history, but of course, it’s all based on comic books. Some of the comics that influenced them are as simple as a single issue of a character’s origin fifty years ago, but others are entire runs in which writers and artists redefined the characters and came up with storylines that could drive one or more films.

As a comic book website, we’ve talked a lot about these connections over the years, and usually have a “here’s all the Easter eggs you missed” type post after each new blockbuster hits theaters. Still, it’s fun to look back and figure out what batch of books fans could buy to see the DNA of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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Here’s a rundown of some of the notable ones (although you could certainly have some pretty good arguments to include things like Planet Hulk or the Reginald Hudlin run on Black Panther, too…):

Iron Man: Extremis

This short storyline in 2005 and 2006, written by Warren Ellis and illustrated by Adi Granov, served as a huge inspiration for Iron Man 3. Significantly less Christmas in the comics, though.

Abnett & Lanning’s Guardians of the Galaxy

The 2000s reboot of Guardians of the Galaxy, from writers Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning with various artists, served as the template that James Gunn built his very personal version of the team on top of. Rocket, Groot, the “I am Groot” variant of the latter’s language, and most of the lineup comes from this run, and it was so obviously inspired by them, that the creators were invited to visit the set of the first movie.

Avengers #1

Yeah, this single issue of Avengers was likely key to informing Marvel’s decision to make Loki the first threat faced by the combined team (even though Captain America wasn’t part of the book yet at this point).

The Winter Soldier

Ed Brubaker’s Captain America run (which he produced with a number of artists, notably Steve Epting, Michael Lark, Mike Perkins, Butch Guice, and Luke Ross) was really influential across a few projects, but none more obvious than in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Falcon and the Winter Soldier.

Jason Aaron’s Thor

While Jason Aaron’s run on Thor had a much more serious and mythological take on the character than in Thor: Love and Thunder, but the introduction of Gorr the God Butcher happened in there, and not only did they use him and his backstory, but there were also a handful of examples of visuals pulled right from the comics.

The Irredeemable Ant-Man

The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman’s take on Ant-Man may not have ever been directly adapted, but elements of it were certainly incorporated into the tale of Scott Lang, including its irreverence. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to argue that the MCU’s Scott Lang feels more like Eric O’Grady than he does Scott Lang from the pre-MCU comics, in much the same way Greg Berlanti built a The Flash TV series around a version of Barry Allen who feels a lot more like ’90s Wally West.