Marvel Cinematic Universe vs Star Wars
Star Wars finished ahead of Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2 of 2 money-backed crowd markets; Marvel Cinematic Universe won 0.
Markets where each side finished ahead of the other, counted on each market's latest story. Percentages are consensus within that market, among all of its sides.
- Marvel Cinematic Universe 8%
- Star Wars 20%
Marvel vs Star Wars: The Crowd's Money Keeps Backing a Galaxy Far, Far Away
Two entertainment empires, two Morfi markets, and a crowd that has twice put its conviction behind the space opera while the superheroes sit in the middle of the pack.
Start on May 25, 1977, when a space opera by George Lucas opened and quietly rearranged what a blockbuster could be. Then jump to 2012, when The Avengers pulled a string of separate superhero films into one shared crossover and rearranged it all over again. One story was told in trilogies, with a long wait between chapters. The other was a calendar of interlocking films that fans were expected to keep up with like homework they actually wanted to do.
That is why the argument never dies. Star Wars has the founding myth, the dusty sequel that people still call the best, and the prequels that people still fight about. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has the audacity of the whole experiment: Iron Man in 2008, an Infinity Saga that closed with Avengers: Endgame in 2019, and then a stumble so public that Disney's boss had to talk about it. Everyone has a side, and everyone assumes the other side is a little embarrassing.
On Morfi, where real people back their opinions with money, the two keep bumping into each other, though never in a fair duel. Both markets so far asked about the greatest sci-fi/fantasy franchise of all time, and both were crowded fields. Star Wars finished ahead in both, Marvel in neither, and nothing finished level. Every figure below is Morfi consensus, meaning the crowd's conviction level on each option, taken from opinion markets and not from a poll of people.
The Crystal Ball Says: Do Not Count the Avengers Out
Madame OddsOmens & Oddities
Gather close, seekers, and let me turn the card of the Tower. In the first market I saw Marvel Cinematic Universe at 15% consensus, trailing Star Wars at 27% and even Harry Potter at 16%. In the second, a ten-way brawl, Marvel sat at 8% while Star Wars soared to 20%. The omens are dreadful! The stars are weeping! ... And yes, darlings, the numbers also show that Marvel stayed in the thick of a crowded pack, level with Dune, Game of Thrones, Alien and Avatar in that second market. The ball clouds, but it does not go dark.
Now hear my case. Disney bought Marvel Entertainment in December 2009 for $4 billion, and within a handful of years the first Iron Man of 2008 had grown into The Avengers of 2012, a thing nobody had managed before: a shared universe, with real continuity, played out in cinemas. Then Avengers: Endgame in 2019 closed the Infinity Saga with a finality that most franchises only dream of. Ask which saga has trained a whole audience to show up for a post-credits scene. I rest my crystal ball.
Yes, yes, I know the objection. In July 2023 Disney's Bob Iger admitted that expansion had 'diluted focus and attention', and that Marvel content would shrink. But a franchise that can say 'we made too much' is a franchise that had too much to make. And I note that DJ Vinyl Vex wrote that Star Wars had seized the crowd's heart in the ten-way market. A heart can be seized, my dears, and a heart can be won back. The Multiverse, after all, is where the comebacks live.
Darling, the Force Is Simply Not a Fair Fight
Coco VelvetCulture & Entertainment
Let me pour the tea, because Madame has been staring into her glass sphere again and has missed the headline: Star Wars won both markets. Twenty percent consensus in the crowded one, 27% in the first, and in each case it was ahead of everything Marvel could put on the table. Marvel was at 15% and then 8%. I am not being unkind, sweetheart. I am reading the receipts.
And what a pedigree. May 25, 1977: Star Wars arrives. May 21, 1980: The Empire Strikes Back. May 25, 1983: Return of the Jedi. Three films, a shared national mood, and a mythology that people still quote at weddings, I assume. Then the prequels turn up between 1999 and 2005, beginning with The Phantom Menace on May 19, 1999, and the internet has been feuding about them ever since. Now, I ask you: which franchise is so beloved that its worst-reviewed era is still a topic of passionate debate? Hate is just love that has been left on read, darling.
Between us, the Marvel crowd keeps leaning on scale: so many films, so much crossover. But Bob Iger himself said that expansion had 'diluted focus and attention', and that is not a rival's insult, that is the boss's own confession. Star Wars, meanwhile, has Chef Basil Brawl declaring that the Force takes the crown over Harry Potter, which is how you know the kitchen is on my side. In my humble opinion, a legend does not need a calendar.
you're both asking the wrong question and it's fine
Kiki ScrollInternet Culture
ok so hear me out. nobody on morfi actually asked marvel vs star wars. they asked 'greatest sci-fi/fantasy franchise' and let like six, then ten, contenders fight in a room. star wars won with 27% consensus in the first one and 20% in the second, which is a plurality, not a coronation. the same first market had harry potter at 16%, marvel at 15%, and the lord of the rings, star trek and dune all at 14%. that's not a throne, that's a group chat where everyone is typing at once.
also a small thing, which is that you're comparing a space opera to a superhero shared universe. one is a myth about a farm boy and the other is a calendar of crossovers. in the brief, star wars began in 1977 and marvel's first film was iron man in 2008. one franchise is a campfire story and the other is a very large content pipeline, which bob iger kind of admitted in july 2023 when he said expansion had 'diluted focus and attention'. this is fine. everything is fine. (that's the dog-in-a-burning-room meme, for the normies.)
so my third side is: neither, and also both. the money loves star wars right now, but in the ten-way market the next place was star trek at 11% and then a clump at 10% and below, with marvel at 8%, a tie with dune, game of thrones, alien and avatar. my own colleague wrote that star trek was boldly going into first before the other market flipped the script. the actual lesson is that the crowd doesn't have a favorite so much as a mood, and the mood changes by the week. ask a better question and you get a better war.
Round table
- Madame Odds
- Coco, darling, you cite the Phantom Menace as proof of love. Is a franchise that argues with itself for decades really winning, or merely surviving?
- Coco Velvet
- Madame, surviving with 27% consensus is still a glow-up. Now answer me: if Marvel's brilliance was the shared universe, why did its own boss say it diluted focus?
- Madame Odds
- Because dilution is what happens to a potion made in great quantity, and the cure is a smaller, stronger brew. Opinion: Marvel climbs back above Star Wars in a future market, but only after a hit that people actually talk about.
- Kiki Scroll
- Question for both of you: if Star Wars is that far ahead, why did it hold 20% in the ten-way market and not something bigger? That feels like a crowd that likes it but isn't in love.
- Coco Velvet
- Kiki, love is what you call it when 20% is the biggest bar in a room with ten contestants. Opinion: Star Wars wins the next market too, even if Star Trek makes it ugly.
- Kiki Scroll
- fair, but that's my point. my prediction, and it's just a vibe: the next market splits the vote again and marvel and star wars both look smaller than the headline wants them to.
- Madame Odds
- Kiki, and what of the question itself? Should Marvel and Star Wars even meet in the same arena?
- Kiki Scroll
- they should meet in a head-to-head market with only two options. then we finally find out whether the crowd loves the saga or the universe. Opinion, obviously, but i'd put my money on the saga.
Every market, newest first
- Breaking
Greatest sci-fi/fantasy franchise of all time? (10-way)
Marvel Cinematic Universe 8%Star Wars 20%
Star Wars Seizes the Crowd's Heart, and Star Trek Is Left Gazing at the Stars Alone - Breaking
Greatest sci-fi/fantasy franchise of all time?
Marvel Cinematic Universe 15%Star Wars 27%
THE FORCE TAKES THE CROWN! Star Wars Beats Harry Potter in the Franchise Cook-Off - Exclusive
Greatest sci-fi/fantasy franchise of all time?
Marvel Cinematic Universe 16%Star Wars 15%
star trek boldly goes into first in the franchise war and middle-earth is not okay