Avengers: Doomsday Was Reportedly Lined Up for Oscar Voter Screenings

A new report claimed that Avengers: Doomsday would get early screenings for Oscar voters in October and November of 2026, ahead of the 2027 Oscars in March. If that's true, it means Marvel Studios and Disney were putting the film in front of the Academy. I was surprised and glad, but I also had real worries about who might be among the first to see it.

I haven't always been a fan of everything Marvel does, especially its marketing. The rollout for the Avengers: Doomsday trailer is a case in point. In my view, it should have gone online, or at least gone online a couple of days after it was live in theaters. Another thing I haven't liked is Marvel holding pre-screeners for its movies, internal, external or otherwise. They lead to leaks, and to opinions from certain people that aren't always valid.

A newer scooper claimed Avengers: Doomsday would screen for Oscar voters

The report came from the Twitter scooper Majestic. He's fairly new to scooping and cropped up around Avengers: Doomsday, so there isn't much of a track record to judge him by yet. Take that as you will. According to Majestic, Avengers: Doomsday was set for early screeners in October and November of 2026, ahead of the 2027 Oscars in March. He added that films like The Odyssey would be among them.

That second part isn't unusual. It's the norm with the Oscars and the voters. Many studios offer pre-screeners of all kinds so voters have seen the films themselves before they vote. That matters especially for a film like this one, which was coming out right at the end of the year. The test screenings weren't due until later in the year, but at the time the context around them put me at ease that Marvel wouldn't be doing external pre-screeners for the film. There's an important distinction here.

Marvel courting the Academy would be a change from the Robert Downey Jr. approach

If the scoop is true, the real news is that Marvel Studios and Disney were extending these screenings to Oscar voters. As I remember it, Robert Downey Jr. famously told them not to push him for an Oscar for Avengers: Endgame. His point was that they knew better. The superhero genre as a whole, with Marvel Studios as its flagship, usually gets snubbed at the Oscars, so his message was essentially that they shouldn't bother.

Now Marvel Studios seems to be taking the opposite approach: give Avengers: Doomsday, and probably Avengers: Secret Wars too, to the Academy and let them vote. If it ends up with a special effects nod or something along those lines, that would be progress. But if Marvel Studios or Robert Downey Jr. was going to win an Oscar, it probably should have been for Iron Man, and it probably should have happened already.

I'm admittedly a little surprised that Marvel and Disney were extending pre-screeners to Oscar voters. Still, good for them. I'm glad they're doing it. Who knows? Best actor or best picture might come home for Marvel Studios in the next couple of years, as crazy as that is to say out loud. What are the odds Marvel Studios bags an Oscar this late in the game for Avengers: Doomsday or Avengers: Secret Wars? That's hard for me to fathom, but who knows?

Brave New World and Multiverse of Madness show how pre-screeners go wrong

I say it all the time: form your own opinion. Don't let anybody tell you how to feel about art. I like things other people don't, and some of my musical taste would be considered very fringe. We all have our own taste. But with Captain America: Brave New World, Marvel did external pre-screeners. Someone who didn't like the film got an unfair amount of attention, for an unfair amount of time, before the film had a chance to come out and defend itself.

Internal pre-screeners, which Marvel has always had, carry their own risk. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is a prime example. Leaks got out of its internal screening, and that's how we found out that Scarlet Witch would kill Professor X. NDAs don't stop this either. Around the time this report came out, there was a fresh example of NDAs being signed and material still leaking everywhere.

Oscar voters may not come to Avengers: Doomsday neutral

That's why an external screening for Oscar voters gives me pause. We already know those voters don't like the superhero genre as a whole, or at least that culturally, within that circle, it's regarded as a lesser genre. I don't know. It doesn't feel like a great idea to let those people maybe be some of the first to see Avengers: Doomsday, then pray that they won't say anything and that they'll stay neutral.

We never know the predisposition of the people who see pre-screeners, or what they think about Marvel and Disney. Marvel's IP has been around for so many decades that I think it would be near impossible for anyone to have a fresh impression of Captain America, Doctor Doom, Wolverine or Spider-Man. Those characters already have a place in people's opinions, whether they like it or not. If the wrong person comes out and says they saw an Avengers: Doomsday pre-screener and it was terrible, the way the news works means the conversation suddenly steers in that direction, fairly or not.

There's also a very small percentage of people, and I'd hesitate to call them part of the fandom because they're not, who want to hate on everything Marvel and Disney make. That's their prerogative. But if that's the person giving their impression after a pre-screener, how could they judge whether this film is good for the diehards who are anticipating it and whom it's meant to serve? I'm not claiming the fans should be the ones seeing pre-screeners and deciding whether the movie is good. That's not how it works.

I think it opens things up to the wrong kind of reaction. At best, the person sharing it might be someone who watched Avengers: Endgame once on TNT with commercials. At worst, it's someone who can't wait to hate on Marvel and Disney and gets the chance. Or they simply lie about having seen it, and it still gets traction, because that's the nature of the internet.

Avengers: Doomsday carries enormous pressure after the Multiverse Saga

These won't be the only screenings, that's for sure. Internal or not, this film was going to have more test screenings over the following year. It will be interesting to see whether we hear about them, and what the reactions are.

I think this movie probably already has some of the heaviest weight on its shoulders following Avengers: Endgame and Avengers: Infinity War. Even if Marvel Studios had aced the Multiverse Saga, the pressure would still be enormous. We all know it didn't, and I think the pressure is even higher to try to not only rekindle that fandom, but do it immediately, to get that fire going into these two films and hit fans the way Endgame and Infinity War did. That's their goal. They want to break a billion, then two billion dollars, and make these two of the top five or top 10 films of all time. They've got their work cut out for them.