Captain America and the Avengers standing in line looking ahead in Avengers Infinity War (2018)
Epic movies have been around for decades upon decades at this point, with the genre being one that’s had a certain degree of popularity for as long as cinema’s been around. You can go back to the silent era and see the likes of Napoleon, Intolerance, and maybe Metropolis counts, too.
Then later decades had Gone with the Wind, Lawrence of Arabia, Seven Samurai, and countless other large-scale movies that could be called epics. Something being a true epic and a superhero movie at the same time isn't incredibly common, but there have been just enough examples to make a ranking like the one below possible. If something juggled a lot of characters, had big stakes and/or a story that spanned a large area, and had a runtime that, at the very least, was close to 2.5 hours, then it’s able to be included here. Oh, it needs to be good, as well, so sorry, Eternals and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. 8 'The Dark Knight Rises' Actually, for all that talk about only good movies being featured here, The Dark Knight Rises puts a slight wrinkle in such a statement, or whatever the saying might be. It’s a messy movie, but you can’t really rank 7.5 good movies, since it’s better to do a whole number, and so even if The Dark Knight Rises fluctuates between being good and a tad overly messy, it’s still being included here. Also, The Dark Knight Rises is very much an epic in the true sense of the term, and the way it’s so long and sprawling might even be a detriment, leading to a lack of focus/consistency… but it is big and sprawling nonetheless, and most traditional epics are also those things. There’s another movie within this overall trilogy that’s a little less of an epic in the traditional sense, but also a much better film in pretty much every way, so more on that one in a bit. 7 'Zack Snyder's Justice League' For better or worse, Zack Snyder always swings big, and so when it comes to his superhero movies, you have some massively messy ones , but also some ambitious and impressive ones. If you're looking for that kind of thing specifically, then it’s hard to find too many superhero movies more ambitious than Zack Snyder’s Justice League, which is probably the longest superhero film ever? If there are others that are four hours long, then they're a good deal more obscure. It’s a movie that’s twice as long as 2017’s Justice League, and also more than twice as good. That’s not necessarily because it has twice the runtime, but it helps. Things are given room to breathe, the story’s not told in a confusing and overwhelming manner, and things also pop more on a visual front. It’s got its flaws for sure, like the way it doesn’t really know how to end, setting up one thing after another right before the DC cinematic universe got rebooted anyway, but for much of its very long runtime, Zack Snyder’s Justice League is impressive and grand stuff. 6 'Captain America: Civil War' Though it’s got “Captain America” in the title, Captain America: Civil War is more of an Avengers-level movie, certainly having enough characters in it to feel like an Avengers film. It follows on from the second one, Age of Ultron, and does indeed have allies engaged in a civil war of sorts, which is more of a skirmish, but there are nonetheless consequences here, because of the conflict, that impact the two Avengers movies to follow. Also, Captain America: Civil War finds room to introduce the MCU’s version of Peter Parker/Spider-Man, and it also establishes a fair bit by way of an origin story for T’Challa/Black Panther, meaning that Black Panther could hit the ground running, to some extent. There are many moving pieces here, and though they're moved around a little haphazardly, Captain America: Civil War still functions as a pretty good superhero movie, and it’s also big enough to just qualify as an epic, too. 5 'Watchmen' Zack Snyder is back at it again with the bombastic filmmaking and the very long runtimes, because here’s Watchmen. Actually, this one did precede his Justice League-related movies, though Watchmen is technically also tied to DC, just as its own separate thing. It’s very ambitious, as an adaptation of the comic book limited series of the same name, being much darker and more dystopian than your average comic book/superhero movie. It’s about ex-superheroes being targeted by some sort of killer, and all the while, the world seems to be on the brink of ending. That’s also a description that makes Watchmen sound a good deal more straightforward than it actually is, but it’s got more consistency and bite than Snyder’s subsequent superhero films. Watchmen is indeed heavy-going, but also quite beautiful as far as the visuals go, and it has a rather impressive soundtrack, too, for what that’s worth. 4 'The Batman' “Another Batman movie, really?” is what people might've said right before The Batman came out. The trilogy that concluded with The Dark Knight Rises was still in pretty recent memory, at that point, and the Batman who’d been part of the Snyder-Verse had also been featured in a handful of movies between The Dark Knight Rises and The Batman, so it felt soon to have another take on the character. But then after The Batman came out, any doubts about this film and it deserving to exist dissipated. The Batman is a genuinely new take on the titular character, as far as movies go, with the action de-emphasized and the crime/mystery elements heightened. All the while, it’s interesting to have such an inexperienced Batman operating in Gotham City in a movie that’s not strictly an origin story; not in the expected ways, at least. It’s one of the best DC movies ever made, and it’s paced very well for a movie that’s ultimately just a couple of minutes shy of three hours. 3 'Avengers: Infinity War' While Avengers: Infinity War might not be the longest superhero movie ever made, it could well be the most ambitious. The first Avengers movie was a big deal at the time, putting a bunch of well-known characters into one movie and balancing them all well, but the cast of that movie has nothing on the cast of Avengers: Infinity War, which brings together most of the main heroes from the first decade of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Avengers: Infinity War also ended in a bold way that necessitated another big team-up superhero movie to wrap things up. There are lots of different things going on at once, with a series of groups all trying desperately to prevent Thanos from carrying out his plan to wipe out half of all life in the universe. It also ended in a bold way that necessitated another big team-up superhero movie to wrap things up, and that conclusion, one year later, was… 2 'Avengers: Endgame' …The appropriately named Avengers: Endgame. Mostly appropriately named. It wasn’t quite the end, since there were more phases in the MCU after the third one, but it was, for a time, a send-off to quite a few prominent characters. It felt like their endgame. But also, not permanently. Two actors who seemed to part ways with the series after Avengers: Endgame are back, one as the same character as before, and another as a different one . Subscribe to the newsletter for epic superhero guides Dive deeper into epic superhero cinema—subscribe to the newsletter for focused rankings, context-rich analysis, and curated must-watch lists that turn sprawling films into clear takeaways, plus wider cinema features that put these movies in perspective. Subscribe By subscribing, you agree to receive newsletter and marketing emails, and accept Valnet’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You can unsubscribe anytime. And another exit here was kind of undone by that character getting a prequel movie later on. Look, it was a movie that felt special because it seemed like a finale of sorts, and then it wasn’t a finale, and then it eventually became not even really a finale for some characters. But for what it is, Avengers: Endgame is still a massive and impressive film, moving well for something that’s three hours in length, and it’ll be a challenge for any future MCU movie to outdo it, as far as size is concerned. 1 'The Dark Knight' Since it absolutely refuses to slow down, as far as pacing is concerned, The Dark Knight does not end up feeling like an epic, but the runtime is ultimately a substantial 152 minutes all up. It’s the best movie in The Dark Knight trilogy, being a massive improvement on Batman Begins, and also being all-around more satisfying than the aforementioned The Dark Knight Rises, even if the stakes are raised in that movie in a way that makes it feel like more of an epic. Suspense is constant throughout The Dark Knight, and you can enjoy it the way you'd enjoy a non-superhero-related crime/action/thriller movie. It’s that kind of thing, but it just so happens to have Batman in it. As a superhero film, it does everything right, and even if it doesn’t feel as tied to the whole epic genre in the traditional sense, it’s long, expansive, and ambitious enough to count as one regardless. Like Follow Followed The Dark Knight PG-13 Drama Action Crime Thriller Superhero Release Date July 16, 2008 Runtime 152 minutes Director Christopher Nolan Writers Christopher Nolan, Bob Kane, Jonathan Nolan, David S. Goyer Cast See All
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