In the wake of the unbelievable success of The Dark Knight trilogy, DC hoped to copy that success with another superhero, Superman. Sadly, Man of Steel went against popular expectations of the icon and the reception was cold, to say the least.

Coming off the smashing success of Marvel’s debut hit Iron Man, Iron Man 2 almost made it to the same level of success as its predecessor but certainly couldn’t be considered a sophomore slump. With gripping action and the charm of Robert Downey Jr., it convinced a large swath of moviegoers to give this flawed, but somewhat enjoyable sequel a chance.

While historically the third movie in any trilogy fails to impress critically or at the box office, Thor: Ragnarok beat expectations, becoming both the best in the trilogy and a smashing box office success. It’s humor, wit, well-written story, and impressive visuals took it much farther than its predecessors.

The movie that started it all for Marvel’s budding film studio. Iron Man was a major risk for the comic book company, but it paid off in spades, helping kick off a range of other superhero properties and kicking off the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Suicide Squad may have gotten panned by critics, but people apparently liked it enough to keep coming back and bring it above Iron Man. Fun fact, it also won an Oscar.

Hoping to kickstart their own cinematic universe, DC put together Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and while the box office numbers weren’t too bad, they definitely didn’t reach Avengers levels.

People were pretty adamant Guardians of the Galaxy wasn’t going to work, especially since it had a talking raccoon as one of the heroes. Little did they know it would become a huge success both critically and at the box office, raking in a cool $333,176,600.

Hot off the success of his cameo in Captain America: Civil War, Spider-Man quickly got his own solo movie, again. While it wasn’t able to top the original Spider-Man trilogy, Spider-Man: Homecoming still beat out the other Spider-Man movies.

From Blade 3 to X-Men Origins: Wolverine to Green Lantern, Ryan Reynolds has had more than his fair share of awful superhero movies. Thankfully, he pulled a rabbit out of his spandex and produced Deadpool, one of the most successful R-rated superhero movies to date. Because, let’s face it, four bad superhero movies would be depressing.

Beloved by many, Spider-Man 2 mirrored many of the same beats as the first but expanded on them, creating a fun, albeit familiar ride. Plus, it never hurts to throw in Doc Ock as the villain.

With the surprise success of its predecessor, many fans waited with bated breath to see Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2. Luckily, few left disappointed. It improved some of its earlier flaws, improving on the villain and providing a surreal and unique story worthy of the series.

Released in 2002, with superhero movies having mostly a bad reputation, Spider-Man proved you can pull it off and have adoring fans swarm to the theater. It set up one of the most popular franchises in superhero movie history.

Considered by critics to be better than Iron Man 2 but not as good as the first, Iron Man 3 focused heavily on Tony Stark’s insecurity after the first Avengers movie and helped him become stronger and change for the better. Still, critics don’t determine box office numbers, and it proved the strongest of the Iron Man movies.

With flop after flop tearing down DC’s cinematic universe, they really needed a solid win for the team. Thankfully, they made Wonder Woman. Told wonderfully and fixing many of the past DC movie errors, Wonder Woman provided optimism, hope, and a fun ride for the whole family.

Hot off the huge success of The Dark Knight, The Dark Knight Rises told a unique superhero story that acted more like a larger-than-life stage play at times. It also was a Batman movie with very little Batman. Regardless, the action and storytelling were enough to make it a major success.

Avengers: Age of Ultron tried to mimic the success of the original but just couldn’t quite do it. That’s not to say it wasn’t a huge success. Critics and fans liked it overall, and the box office numbers speak for themselves. Also, The Hulkbuster vs. The Hulk scene alone was a fantastic action sequence.

It may have taken fourteen years for Pixar to finally release a sequel to the smash hit The Incredibles, but it was well worth the wait for both the fans and Pixar. The Incredibles 2 skyrocketed up the box office charts, making it the fourth highest domestic grossing superhero movie of all time.

Marvel conceptualized and perfectly acted on something few had done before, creating a cinematic universe with the same actors and characters all coming together into one film. But it wasn’t just a gimmick. The movie is practically a superhero classic at this point and has inspired the creation of many other cinematic universes in Hollywood. We’ll let you decide if that’s a good thing or not.

Since the first Avengers film, Marvel has been building all of their superhero movies to this one point, assembling the mightiest heroes to fight against Thanos. It’s hard to imagine a movie on such an epic scale working, but they pulled it off, creating a mind-blowing experience, and beating out the original at the domestic box office in the process.

As it stands, this is now the superhero movie to beat at the domestic box office. This breakout film has overwhelmed and dwarfed expectations, becoming both a huge financial and critical success and also a major cultural moment. For a long time, Hollywood didn’t believe a superhero movie with an all-black cast could do well. Black Panther destroyed that presumption.