By now most of the true believers have had a chance to see Captain Marvel at least once in the theaters. So as a sign of my love for ALL things Marvel, I’m going to give you all the  1990’s Timeline for the MCU that you wish you’d had before going to see Captain Marvel. For those of you who are new to the MCU or casual Marvel fans, this should really help you as you prep for watching Avengers: Endgame.  For the other diehards out here, if you see something I’ve missed, drop it in the comments and I will happily add it and credit you.  What I don’t want is to see people going into Endgame under prepared for the sheer awesomeness that I know is going to blow all our minds and cause many of us to take several days to recover.

1990

Captain America is still a “capsicle” somewhere deep in the Atlantic Ocean. (Captain America the First Avenger)

The decade begins with two juggernaut companies leading the Future Tech Industry, Stark Industries headed by Howard Stark and Pym Technologies headed by Hank Pym. Both Stark and Pym have extensive backgrounds working with S.H.I.E.L.D. as senior scientists.

Captain Marvel Spoiler:   Dr. Wendy Lawson (Kree Scientist Mar-Vel) has been dead for a year after being killed in an explosion that imbued Carol Danvers with special powers.  Danvers has begun her training on Hala to become part of a special Kree battleforce and is known as “Vers”.

Captain Marvel Spoiler:  There is a huge Kree science vessel parked in orbit above the Earth with Skrull refugees on it who were being helped by Mar-Vell.

Armin Zola’s consciousness is hanging out in a computer system in a S.H.I.E.L.D. bunker at Camp Lehigh in New Jersey. (Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

Earth has been seeded by Ego for 12 years in his effort to grow himself.

Carl Lucas (age 10) and Willis Stryker (age 12) are growing up together in Savannah, Georgia, as best friends unaware that they are half brothers. (Luke Cage)

Hank Pym resigns from S.H.I.E.L.D. after discovering that Howard Stark and Mitchell Carson (undercover HYDRA agent) have tried to replicate his shrinking technology without him. (Ant-Man)

Hope Van Dyne is 10 and has been sent away to boarding school by her father (Hank Pym, The Original Ant-Man)  while still grieving the loss of her mother (Janet Van Dyne, The Wasp) who went sub-atomic to stop a bomb three years ago and got trapped in the Quantum Realm. (Ant-Man)

Agent Carter is recently retired from S.H.I.E.L.D. and inspiring her niece Sharon Carter to dedicated her professional career to the service of S.H.I.E.L.D. as Agent 13. (Agent Carter)

March 17 – Agent John Garrett steps on an IED bomb in Sarajevo, Bosnia.  Cybertek Corp (run by Hydra) was working on Project Deathlock (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) and sign Garrett up as their test subject.

Howard Stark is working on a new super soldier serum with S.H.I.E.L.D. that does not require Vita Rays. (Captain America: Civil War)

May – Magneto’s children Pietro (Quicksilver) and Wanda Maximoff (Scarlett Witch) are born to Magda on Mount Wundagore in Transia in the stronghold of the High Evolutionary. (X-Men, Avengers: Age of Ultron)

August 1 – Billy Johnson (brother of Tyrone Johnson, a.k.a. Cloak) is born to parents Otis and Adina Johnson in New Orleans. (Cloak & Dagger)

Hubble Telescope captures images of The Nine Realms (Thor)

October – Joy Meachum is born. She grows up to become an attorney working for RAND Enterprises (Iron Fist)

Ava Starr is born. (Ant-Man and The Wasp)

1991

S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Nick Fury turns 40.

Clint Barton (a.k.a. Hawkeye) turns 20.

Vasily Karpov defrosted James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes in the HYDRA Siberian Facility. Using the Winter Soldier Book, he activated Barnes and sent him to steal Howard Stark’s Super Soldier Serum and leave no survivors. Five additional Winter Soldiers were created who were erratic and difficult to control. They were all put into Cryostasis.

April 1 – Danny Rand is born.  Grows up to become the Immortal Iron Fist and is the heir to RAND Enterprises. (Iron Fist)

April 28 – Peter Quill turns 10 and is given his first M-Ship that he names The Milano (Guardians of the Galaxy)

May 31 – Pop is freed from prison (Luke Cage)

September – Crystalia Amaquelin (Inhuman Princess of Attilan) is born to Quelin and Ambur who go on to later lead a failed revolt against the royal family of Attilan. (Inhumans)

October 16 – Misty Knight at age 9 meets Pop who is opening up his Barbershop business (Luke Cage)

December 16 – Howard and Maria Stark are murdered by HYDRA Agent Winter Soldier aka Bucky Barnes in Long Island, New York on the way to the Pentagon with a new Super Soldier Serum. (Captain America: Civil War)

December 17 – Obadiah Stane is appointed as interim CEO of Stark Industries. (Iron Man)

1992

William Rawlins becomes a C.I.A. field agent (The Punisher)

January – Klaue attacks Wakanda to steal vibranium killing many Wakandan citizens. (Black Panther)

January 15 – King T’Chaka travels to Oakland to confront his brother Prince N’Jobu for his treason and kills him. Erik Stevens is left in Oakland an orphan. (Black Panther)

Prince T’Challa (age 11) and Nakia (age 10) [a member of the River Tribal of royal blood] roam and play in the chambers where the heart shape herbs are grown and tended by the Wakandan priests.  King T’Chaka calls his son to him and talks about the challenges of being King. (Black Panther)

Tony Stark takes over the leadership of Stark Industries at age 21. Obadiah Stane stays on with the company in a leadership role.  Stark hires Pepper Potts as his assistant.

Edwin Jarvis, Tony Stark’s longtime butler (and Agent Peggy Carter’s crime fighting partner) dies.  Stark names his home A.I. system in honor of Jarvis.

August – Darren Cross, a.k.a. Yellowjacket, is attending high school in New York City and gaining a reputation for being a scientific genius. (Ant-Man)

September 18 – Alexander Pierce, an undercover Agent of HYDRA, attends a Joint Chiefs of Staff meeting (Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

October 25 – Victor and Janet Stein meet at Culver University while watching a live video feed of a sunset in Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and are inspired by how the lecture demonstrated a theory of time travel. (Runaways)

The events of X-Men: Dark Phoenix transpire. Jean Gray is exposed to cosmic forces during a space mission with the X-men and begins to lose control of her powers. (X-Men)

1993

May 5- Whiplash (Ivan Vanko) is imprisoned for fifteen years for selling Soviet-era weapons grade plutonium to Pakistan. (Iron Man 2)

1994

Natasha Romanoff turns 10-years old.

July 19 – Matt Murdock is blinded in an accident.  Wakes up in a hospital after the accident discovering that his other instincts are heightened. (Daredevil)

 

1995

January 21 – Jack Murdock fights Carl Creel (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) and wins. Murdock is later assassinated. (Daredevil) Do you think Creel had his Inhuman powers at this point? Does anyone remember what those powers are? 😏

February 16 – Yondu Udonta is banished from the Ravengers for child trafficking (Guardians of the Galaxy 2)

May 5 – Bruce Banner meets Betty Ross at Harvard

Events of Captain Marvel (No Spoilers Here)

July 24 – Natasha Romanoff joins the Russian espionage service.

August 27 – Thanos spares Gamora (Avengers: Infinity War)

1996

May – Darren Cross graduates from high school and enrolls in MIT.

June – Elektra is adopted by a family from Greece.

1997

Jemma Simmons turns 10 years old. (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.)

July – Failed Inhuman Revolt against King Agon and Queen Rynda of Attilan.

Kaecillius joins the Masters of the Mystic Arts (Dr. Strange)

Elihas Starr continues to experiment with constructing a quantum tunnel in Argentina resulting in an explosion that kills him and his wife and throws Eva out of quantum phase. She is taken in by S.H.I.E.L.D. and adopted by Dr. Bill Foster.  S.H.I.E.L.D. trains her as an operative from a young age with the promise of curing her one day. (Ant-Man and The Wasp)

1998

January 27 – Nick Fury sends Clint Barton, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., to eliminate the Black Widow (Natasha Romanoff, age 14).  She is instead given a chance to join S.H.I.E.L.D. and does. Remember Natasha told Bruce in Avengers 1 that she started as a spy young. If you want a peek into the program that trained her (beyond the weird flashback moment in Avengers – Age of Ultron) go check out Agent Carter (the series) and keep a close eye on Dottie Underwood. 😉

Whiplash a.k.a. Ivan Vanko turns 40. (Iron Man 2)

Carol Danvers turns 30. (Captain Marvel)

Sam Wilson (a.k.a. Falcon) turns 20. (Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

Hammer Technologies is operated by Justin Hammer. (Iron Man 2, Luke Cage)

 

February- Leo Fitz is abandoned by his father at 10-years old.

March 17 – Lorna Dane (Polaris) turns 10 years old. She is the daughter of Magneto and was born in Georgia (U.S.). (The Gifted)

May – Darren Cross graduates from MIT as valedictorian at the age of twenty and is hired immediately by Hank Pym as an assistant at Pym Technologies. Pym is still studying the Pym Particle without letting Cross in on the full workings of the science as he tries to find his wife Janet who is trapped in the Quantum Zone. Cross becomes obsessed with the rumors of the Ant-Man and the Pym Particle. (Ant-Man)

Carl Lucas and Willis Stryker get arrested for car theft in Savannah, Georgia. Lucas is given a chance to go to the marines while Stryker is forced to do time. (Luke Cage)

Around this time in the Marcel Universe is when T’Challa (a.k.a. The Black Panther) and Ororo Munroe (a.k.a. Storm) meet for the first time as teenagers. Fun Fact: Y’all know that Storm was at one time an Avenger right…?

1999

July – Jessica Jones loses her family in a car crash and ends up in a coma after which she is experimented on. She later develops super strength and is adopted by Dorothy Walker and raised alongside Trish Walker. (Jessica Jones)

Captain Richard and Agent Mary Parker work for the C.I.A. The fell in love, eloped and worked together as field agents.  While on assignment to recover an agent of a “friendly power” they end up rescuing Agent Ten (a.k.a. Wolverine) from Baroness and Baron Wolfgang von Strucker.  At the end of the mission they find out that they are pregnant and Wolverine is the first to congratulate them. (Spiderman)

Ben and May Parker (Uncle Ben and Aunt Mae) are married and living in Queens, New York. (Spiderman)

December 31, 1999 – New Years Eve party Where Tony Stark first encountered the Extremis experiment, the brainchild of Maya Hansen.  Happy Hogan works for Stark at this point.  That evening Stark met both Ho Yinsen (Iron Man), Dr. Wu (Iron Man 3) and Aldrich Killian (Iron Man 3).

Nathan Bowen is a scientist working for Roxxon Corporation and the husband of Melissa Bowen. They are expecting their first child Tandy to be born going into Y2K. (Cloak & Dagger)

Captain Marvel Spoiler:  Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S. has been retasked from using the Space Stone (tesseract) to create a lightspeed engine to looking for alternative energy and advanced weaponry.  That’s right, the Space Stone has been on Earth this entire decade under the control of S.H.I.E.L.D.  Oh yeah, and the Time Stone is on Earth also with the Masters of the Mystic Arts.

It’s a really good thing that that at the end of Avengers Thor took the Space Stone back to Asgard because HYDRA got ahold of the Mind Stone and were using it to super charge the Maximoff twins in all of the confusion so both the Mind Stone and the Time Stone are on Earth at that point.

Oh yeah, and there’s a backdoor portal on Earth to Svartalfheim where Bor hid the Reality Stone that Jane just accidentally slips through and becomes infected with the aether resulting in THREE, count ’em, THREE infinity stones being on Earth at the same time for a brief bit.  No wonder Earth keeps getting attacked!

Also, what is the whole thing with MIT?!?  Seriously, A LOT of folks in the MCU go there apparently.

 

Marta C. Youngblood is a writer, education and social entrepreneur based in Hot Springs, Arkansas. For more information on her current projects visit https://about.me/MCyoungblood.

 

References:

http://collider.com/mcu-timeline-explained/

https://marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline

https://screenrant.com/marvel-mcu-complete-timeline/