Imagine facing bankruptcy, and risking everything to even just have a chance to earn some money.

Marvel, without a doubt, is arguably the most successful studio on this planet, with Avengers: Endgame being the number one highest grossing film, taking over Avatar with a gross of US$2.79 billion.

There is no denying Marvel’s fame and success, but as cliché as it sounds, the rainbow always comes after the storm. Marvel hasn’t always been this successful and popular, believe it or not. Marvel was in debt 20 years ago and it eventually led to their bankruptcy. But how did Marvel go from being in debt to becoming a huge success, and being bought by Disney just after two movies?

Marvel’s Backstory

Marvel has been constantly losing money since the 1990s due to the movie industry taking over the customer base of the comic industry. Not only this, but they were in debt, with their largest debt owed to Disney at US$1.7 million. On December 27, 1996, Marvel officially filed for bankruptcy in court.

With their last bit of money, in 2008, they released Iron Man and from there, the Marvel empire was born. Iron Man completely blew up, earning over US$585.3 million worldwide. With new “spices” added on top of the superhero genre, which I will talk more about, Marvel made the Iron Man franchise fresh for the community. After that, Marvel released another movie, The Incredible Hulk, which grossed US$264.8 million. Marvel thus stole the throne for the best superhero movies.

After the two movies, Disney decided to buy Marvel at a price of US$4 billion in 2009, making Marvel even more popular and leading to what they are now.

But how did Marvel blow up on their very first movie? Different components add up to their success, and here’s why.

Innovational

Marvel is good at a lot of things, but especially at innovation.

Past superhero movies like Spider-Man by Sony, Batman, X-Men, all feel the same to the audience. The movie starts with a villain destroying the world, the superhero comes out, goes through some conflicts, and then defeats the villain and everybody loves him.

Well, Marvel did it differently. While keeping the superhero genre in the movie, Marvel added a few components to make audiences like the movie more. A character like Iron Man is especially a good one.

Tony Stark, also known as Iron Man, is a rich CEO for Stark Industries and creates powerful weapons. On a business trip he is attacked and locked inside of a cave. He escapes by creating weaponized armor only using the things he had. The audience was touched because of his dedication.

With this technique, audiences might find some characters relatable and start liking these characters. And when the audience likes the characters, they’ll watch more, which makes the movies sell.

Casting

Marvel is full of surprises. Unexpected cast member choices is one of them. They took gamble after gamble, but it all turned out to be inspiring and impressive from the audience’s point of view.

Let’s take Robert Downey Jr. as an example. During the time when Marvel announced the production of Iron Man, many fans guessed that Tom Cruise would be cast as Iron Man in the movie. Tom Cruise, a popular, clean, and safe choice, could just be Iron Man. Instead, Marvel chose RDJ, who has a history of being arrested for dealing with a variety of drugs, so RDJ was a risky choice for Iron Man.

But Marvel still decided to take the risk and chose RDJ for the part, and it turned out great. RDJ is almost the perfect resemblance of Iron Man, and he soon became one of the most fan-loved characters in the Marvel cinematic universe.

Patience

Marvel tends to build up their projects, with small projects adding up to the big project. At the early age of Marvel, they only filmed solo heroes movies instead of big movies like The Avengers.

With this technique, audiences get to learn and have a clear understanding about the heroes before they all come together, which might get confusing otherwise. With small films explaining each hero’s past history and how they became who they are now, big films like The Avengers won’t be confusing, instead, it will be the best movie out of all of them.

For example, in Avengers: Endgame, Captain Marvel joined the Avengers to help stop Thanos. But before Endgame, Captain Marvel was filmed explaining her past before bringing her into the Avengers movie. With this technique, the bigger films won’t be confusing, instead, it will be the best and the most popular out of all the films.

Marvel cultivates curiosity

It is clear that Marvel has a long term plan for their films. This is clearly shown in the post credits scene after almost every movie. Marvel already knows what they’re going to do next, and with the post credits scene, they also build customers’ curiosity and get them thinking about what’s going to happen next.

With the post credits scene, audiences get curious, and watch movie after movie to find out what the post credits scene really means.

Marvel has post credits scenes that serve both short term and long term purposes. For example, in Avengers: Infinity War, the post credits scene shows Nick Fury calling for help from Captain Marvel. A year after Infinity War, in Endgame, Captain Marvel made her appearance.

But in Avengers: Age of Ultron, the post credits scene shows Thanos ready to conquer the universe by putting on the Infinity Gauntlet. It builds up for Avengers: Infinity War, which was released three years after Age of Ultron.

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Marvel’s courage in taking risks and trying out different things saved them from bankruptcy to being one of the most popular studios in the world right now. With their creativity and adding a new kind of spice in their movies, Marvel blew up instantly, separating them from their competitors.