Avengers: Doomsday Trailer 2 Breakdown: Every Doctor Doom Easter Egg I Found in HD

The new Avengers: Doomsday trailer is packed with detail, and going through the HD frames one by one turned up a lot that easily gets missed on a single viewing. I want to walk through every new piece I spotted, in the order it appears, because there is a lot here that ties back to things Marvel Studios has already shown us across the Multiverse Saga.

Sue Storm's Opening Narration Sets Up Doctor Doom's Tragic Backstory

The trailer opens with Sue Storm talking about her knowledge of Victor Von Doom before his tragedy, which sets up a good deal of their shared backstory. The very first detail worth pausing on is Doom sitting on his throne. If you freeze the frame and look down at the floor in the middle of the circle that is on fire, you can clearly see the same rune Marvel Studios has already shown us before, both at the laser show in Shanghai last year and on Doctor Doom's glove when he freeze-frames Thor and casts him aside like he is nothing.

That moment stands out because Stormbreaker was able to cut through every Infinity Stone in the Infinity Gauntlet when Thor attacked Thanos, yet it seems like no issue at all for Doctor Doom to stop it cold. Whatever this rune is, it is extremely powerful, and I think it ultimately calls back to WandaVision, where we learned that putting other sorcerers inside a circle of runes strips them of their power.

I think that is going to be the key to boosting Doctor Doom to what I'd call God Emperor status, because he would also be suppressing every other magic wielder around him. Sue continues by explaining that she thought Doom was lost but didn't know he was broken, which lines up with everything else the trailer shows about his state of mind.

The Tapestry Reveals Doctor Doom's Wife and Son

As Sue talks, we see Doctor Doom looking up at the tapestry first revealed in one of the initial posters. That image is Doctor Doom's wife and son, and it is heavily believed that whatever happened when Steve Rogers returned the Infinity Stones and Mjolnir but then chose to live out his life with Peggy ended up causing the tragedy of Doom losing his wife and son. Whether that was from his own experiments trying to stop an incursion, or from the incursion Steve caused in general, we still don't know.

What we do know is that this is his wife and son, and he seeks to reunite with them. Because of a photo taken at the Russos' Agbo headquarters over the last holidays, we know Doom stands side by side with Sue and their son Franklin, which is exactly what plays out in the 2015 Jonathan Hickman Secret Wars comic. Valeria was included there too, since it was all of Reed's family, though she hasn't been established in the MCU yet.

Once we get to Battleworld, Sue and Franklin appear to be part of Doctor Doom's family, and it seems no one will remember how life was before Battleworld existed.

The Location Is the Baxter Building, Not the X-Mansion

Sue keeps narrating how broken Doctor Doom is while we see a shot of where everyone is gathered. I saw people guessing this was the X-Mansion, but this is everyone inside the Baxter Building, which means the group later travels to Doom's world, Earth-828, where a backstory has been established of Sue and Reed knowing Doom for some time. Thor is with them alongside the X-Men, which suggests this takes place after their battle at the X-Mansion.

Then we get a shot of Doctor Doom brooding, because Doctor Doom broods, but there is a new detail worth flagging: a white bandana over his chainmail that we haven't seen before. This is probably going to be revealed as part of his original wife's dress, or possibly connected to his son, but it is almost certainly meant to remind him of them.

New Emblems on Doom's Armor Hint at Captain Marvel and Thor

Now that we can clearly see both emblems on his armor, I'm more convinced than ever this has something to do with Captain Marvel and or Thor. Some have pointed out that the star could be the Lot variant star, but the hammer on the other side is still curious for his emblems. I'm wondering if these will eventually be revealed as trophies of his conquest, since other industry insiders have said he's going to have a trophy room full of exactly that, things he's collected along the way.

Is That New York Burning, or New Jersey

This next shot is genuinely puzzling. From the original description of this trailer, people called it a post-apocalyptic hellscape, basically a city on fire. To me, though, that looks like Central Park in the middle, which makes this look like New York, whether the 828 New York, the 616 New York, or a different version entirely.

Ian McKellen has reportedly spoiled that he destroys New Jersey, and industry insiders have pointed to a major leak suggesting we'll see Deadpool and Wolverine, maybe even Magneto, fighting Tobey Maguire and his Rogues Gallery, which is supposedly when Ian McKellen's character destroys New Jersey. I'm wondering if that's exactly what we're seeing in this shot.

Reed Richards Realizes Too Late, and Doom Calls Out "Stolen Lives"

We get the realization, a little too late, from who's supposed to be the smartest guy in the room, Reed Richards, that Doctor Doom is behind all of this. That's followed by shots of the Avengers' kids and loved ones embracing as Doctor Doom says, "All of you have lived stolen lives."

Right after the kid montage, we see Loki. Tying this back to what we know about Steve Rogers from earlier leaks, it sounds like Loki may be the one who relocates Steve to Earth-828 and gives him his card, which was shown in the previous trailer, allowing Steve and Thor to find Loki later and make it to the TVA.

Doom accuses all of them of living stolen lives, as if none of what they have belongs to them, that they took it from someone else. I think the full depth of that line hasn't been revealed yet, because while Doom lost his wife and kid, none of the Avengers stole them from him. This movie is supposed to pick up at the end of Avengers: Endgame, when the Avengers went back in time, got the Infinity Stones, and set things right. Even with the Loki season one line that what happened with the Avengers was supposed to happen, I don't think it was, or at least what happened with Steve Rogers afterward was not supposed to happen, and that may be exactly why Doom says they're all living lives they aren't supposed to have.

Doctor Doom Raises the Sentinels in the Trailer's Money Shot

Then we get what I'd call the money shot of the trailer, where Doctor Doom raises all of the Sentinels. These are the exact frames that were part of the leaked Industrial Light and Magic footage that spread across social media weeks earlier, which suggests the rest of that leaked scene is probably true too, with the X-Men, the Avengers, and the Fantastic Four all teaming up. One thing I noticed missing from the scene right after it, though, is any of the super soldiers from Thunderbolts, because let's be honest, what is John Walker going to do against the Sentinels in that situation?

The Trailer's Tone, Craft, and What It Means for Marvel's Redemption

I want to take a moment to point out how good this trailer looks and how beautifully this movie is shot. The cinematography, the coloring, the way they've stylized Doom, Castle Doomstadt, and his magic and action all looks stunning. We joke about how no one ever truly dies in Marvel movies anymore because of the infinite multiverse, but in this film it feels like Marvel Studios is going for it, fully embracing real stakes, and I think we're going to see a lot more deaths in this movie than we're used to in an Avengers film, deaths that won't simply get undone in Avengers: Secret Wars.

It's worth noting that Marvel Studios has gone for a tone here that lacks basically any comedic relief. We haven't seen a single joke in any of the preview trailers so far, and I don't think there's a place for one in a movie that feels this serious. If you buy into that and get in the spirit of it, this looks absolutely incredible.

Given the state of Marvel's standing in the general conversation lately, with the D23 presentation, the new X-Men cast reveals, the Spider-Man box office, and the early tracking for Avengers: Doomsday after just one day of global ticket sales, it really feels like Marvel Studios has redeemed itself as of late. But they have to capitalize on it, and Doomsday has to be the movie everyone hopes it is. Kevin Feige has teased that the ending of Avengers: Doomsday is extremely satisfying, with a cliffhanger so strong we won't be able to wait for Avengers: Secret Wars. Marvel's top brass have talked that way about projects during the Multiverse Saga that haven't always lived up to the hype, but this one has to.

Why the Payoff Depends on Callbacks Built Throughout the Multiverse Saga

During the Infinity Saga, Marvel Studios laid the groundwork for how things work: when they introduce something, it's meant to be set up for later, whether the lingo is a Nexus event or an anchor being. At the end of the Infinity Saga, especially in Avengers: Endgame, they made callbacks to things already introduced, which created the feeling that Marvel Studios was planning it all along, even though they weren't. They didn't know how far they'd get or what they'd ultimately do with Thanos. They just had a plan and worked toward it, and when Markus and McFeely wrote Endgame and Infinity War, they went back and used those earlier details in ways that made sense.

I don't think McFeely forgot that, I don't think the Russos forgot that, and I definitely don't think Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios forgot that either. Even though some Multiverse Saga projects, like Thor: Love and Thunder, weren't beloved, I still think they're going to go back to details planted in those films. That's why I think we're onto something with the WandaVision runes theory: we already know you can manipulate runes to suppress others' powers, and if you pour back through the Multiverse Saga movies, there are probably other reveals waiting to come into play in Avengers: Doomsday, the same formula that worked for Infinity War and Endgame, now filtered through nostalgia for Steve Rogers and the Fox X-Men.

Do you agree the trailer looks as good as I think it does, and what else did I miss in here?