New MCU TV Show Becomes Instant Streaming Success Despite Disappointing Rotten Tomatoes Score

Marvel is back on top of Disney+, continuing its strong run of streaming success. 2025 has been a mixed year for the MCU. Of the three movies that were released, only one – The Fantastic Four: First Steps – made it past the $500 million mark, with Captain America: Brave New World grossing $415m, and Thunderbolts* earning $382m. None of those are what we’ve come to expect from Marvel’s peak, but are more consistent with its non-event movies across Phases 4, 5, and now 6.

Things have generally been better on the streaming side, where Marvel’s movies (once they land there) and TV shows have tended to go straight to number one on the platform after release. That’s happened again with its latest TV show, Marvel Zombies, which, per FlixPatrol, has taken the top spot globally among series, overtaking Hulu’s Alien: Earth. In terms of the United States specifically, it’s currently at #2 among movies and TV shows combined, behind Pixar’s Elio.

What This Means For Marvel Zombies & The MCU

The success in its first week of release is encouraging for Marvel Zombies, and much-needed after its reviews didn’t generate a lot of hype. The series has a rather mixed score of 66% on Rotten Tomatoes, with praise for its animation and gore, but a feeling that its story and lack of emotional depth hold it back. The show is performing a little better with audiences, carrying a 76% score on the platform, and that is translating to its streaming success.

Read Next

Ranking Marvel’s 2025 Films From Worst to Best

Of course, the reality is that almost any Marvel release on Disney+ is going to go to number one. It’s still the biggest pull for the service, outside of its more child-friendly offerings at least, and with little competition, it makes sense the new show would be a hit. What will be more important is how much it can sustain that, because several MCU TV shows in the past couple of years, such as Secret Invasion, Echo, and Ironheart, have come and gone without leaving much of a lasting impression. Marvel Zombies Season 2 should happen based on its ending, but that’ll only be the case if audiences stick with it. Nonetheless, the early signs are promising.

For Marvel, this should also further confirm that they are on the right path with animated Disney+ shows. There’s a bit of a slowdown planned on the live-action front, with Disney realizing they went too hard into streaming with both Marvel and Star Wars. The animated shows are separate from that, though: new seasons of X-Men ’97 and Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man are expected to be released yearly on the platform. Marvel Zombies might not sustain a few seasons, but at this point, it’d be surprising if Season 2 didn’t happen, since it doesn’t seem to be dead on arrival.

Marvel Zombies is now streaming on Disney+. The next MCU TV show will be Wonder Man, which is expected to release in December 2025.

What do you think? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!