The Marvel Cinematic Universe Wiki is, first and foremost, an online encyclopedia that aims to collect any and all official information regarding the franchise that gives name to it, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The Marvel Cinematic Universe Wiki's canon policy takes an unbiased and factual stance: every movie, one-shot, TV special, TV series and comics officially stated to be part of the MCU franchise is canon, whether they were made by Marvel Studios or Marvel Television. These projects are the ones that form and comprise MCU canon: the events officially confirmed to occur in the primary continuity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Purpose[]
The Marvel Cinematic Universe Wiki aims to cover every material released by Marvel Studios, Marvel Television and Marvel Comics officially confirmed to be set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, also known as Earth-616 within the MCU Multiverse, or Earth-199999 within Marvel's multiverse system.
With the inclusion of the Multiverse in the second chapter of the Marvel Cinematic Universe overarching story, Marvel Studios has created content that is not set within the main universe of the MCU, such as What If...? and Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, yet they are confirmed to be part of the MCU franchise and are acknowledged by the studio to be part of the MCU slate, and are part of the story of this fictional universe.
On the other hand, a lot of tie-in material (comic books, books, video games) inspired by the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise often contradicts or is contradicted by new content produced by Marvel Studios. Or they are stated by their creators to be merely inspired by the MCU continuity and is not necessarily part of the official canon.
Therefore, to ensure the most comprehensive and impartial way of collecting all information, the canonicity of material is evaluated only regarding what is explained in the following policy.
Canon and Non-Canon[]
There is one factual truth about the story of a fictional universe: you are either canon or you are not. However, there are some tie-in material like books or comic books that cannot be clearly factually labelled definitively one way or another because Marvel have been unclear for unknown reasons. As such, the MCU Wiki implements categories for types of confirmation for project that are not officially non-canon (which are those that do not belong to the MCU continuity). This must not be confused with the MCU wiki trying to label projects based on a "level of confirmation" as not such thing exists within the MCU franchise.
For example, Eternals: 500-Year War Infinity Comic and Helstrom are not in different levels of canon, they are around the same level just in parallel groups with different statuses of confirmation.
Statuses of Confirmation[]
Inspired[]
As a collective effort to tie-in and promote the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Marvel Comics released a number of comics that are inspired by the events of the MCU without saying if they are part of the canon or not, simply labelling them as "inspired media". There are also other material like books released under Marvel's approval that are an exact retelling of the story of an installment of the MCU. Therefore, and as long as those comics and books do not contradict substantially the canon of the MCU, this inspired media can be described as: "part of an MCU franchise story inspired by the canon of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it is not considered official canon."
Unconfirmed[]
On a similar manner, there are novels (that are not a retelling) that expand the Marvel Cinematic Universe by telling an original story within the universe, and they do not contradict the canon of the MCU. However, opposed to inspired media, their canon status have either been confirmed nor denied by the people behind them, nor classifiedas "inspired canon". For example, novels like Avengers: Infinity War: The Heroes' Journey, Black Panther: The Junior Novel or Captain Marvel: Starforce on the Rise tell original or standalone stories within the MCU continuity but they are not contradicted. Therefore, this status can be described as: "part of an MCU franchise story whose canon status has been neither confirmed nor denied."
Dubious[]
However, there are projects like Helstrom which have had contradicting statements by the people behind them on how they fit the Marvel Cinematic Universe and whether they are canon or not. This status can be described as: "an installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that has conflicting statements regarding its canon status."
Implementation[]
In-Universe Articles[]
In order to keep an unbiased and impartial take on the products that are part of the MCU franchise, content that is categorized into the three statuses of confirmation will be added in all of our in-universe articles: Characters, items, weapons, vehicles, locations, races, creatures, etc.
This means they will also be listed in the infobox for those pages. However, books and novels that are a explicit retelling of events seen in a MCU film or TV series will NOT be listed in the "Appearances" section nor in the infobox of said pages in order to keep them clean and readable.
Alternate Counterparts Articles[]
As mentioned above, with the introduction of the Multiverse, Marvel Studios started to tell stories set in the MCU that are not part of the main universe. In order to label them as such, the AltUniverse template will be added to them.
For locations, items and other types of in-universe articles that do not get an alternate counterpart, the stories depicted in non-canon projects will be added under a ==Non-Canon History== subheader, while the stories depicted in alternate universes that are officially part of the MCU story will be added under an ==Alternate Universe History== subheader. Each of these subheaders can be further organized with additional subheaders as necessary, ensuring a structured presentation of information throughout the article.
Out of Universe Articles[]
The Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise is comprised of several types of media: movies, TV series, web series, comics, video games, etc. However, only some are officially stated to be canon to the MCU, and those that are not will have each of their respective templates for statuses of confirmation ([[:Template:InspiredCanon|inspired]], [[:Template:UnconfirmedCanon|unconfirmed]] and [[:Template:DubiousCanon|dubious]]) added to them.
When it comes to projects that are officially non-canon to the MCU continuity, i.e., all of the video games and some comics and most novels, the [[:Template:NonCanon|NonCanon]] template will be added to them. This will also transpire to the articles of characters and events that are depicted in them.
Hubs and Alternate Continuities[]
Given projects like What If...? and Spider-Man: Homecoming: School of Shock are not set in the main universe of the MCU, but the former is actually part of the story of the MCU and the latter is non-canon, this will be reflected in Hubs for the characters. I.e., Spider-Man's Hub will be split into "Alternate Versions" and "Non-Canon Versions".
In our article List of Alternate Universes, the universes depicted in Non-Canon media will be listed under a "Non-Canon" section which will contain "Comics", "Books" and "Video Games".
Continuity Documentation[]
In order to properly categorize the products that are part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise in their respective statuses of confirmation as well as in order to properly classify them as "non-canon", the "Continuity" section will be used to properly detail and source said product in regards to how it relates to the MCU franchise and its canon.
Implementation[]
This section will be written in paragraphs and will be used only for out of universe articles (i.e., comics, books, videogames, TV series, etc) that belong into "Inspired", "Unconfirmed", "Dubious" and "Non-Canon" statuses of confirmation. This section will discuss how said project is part of the MCU franchise, but due to its content, or statements given by author, director, writer, among others, they do not or are not intended to fit the current MCU continuity. If details that will serve to categorize said title into one of our different statuses of confirmation come from out of universe sources, they will be sourced as dictated per our sourcing policy.
How to Write the Continuity Section[]
''Guardians of the Galaxy: The Junior Novel'' is an adaptation of the film expanding upon dialogue, setting and characters' traits that are not elaborated in the movie. As the novel does not contain elements that substantially alter or contradict the canon of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it is categorized within "Inspired Canon" per our canon policy.
''Iron Man 2 (book)'' establishes that the [[Tony Stark's New Element|element]] created by [[Tony Stark]] is [[Vibranium]]. However, the subsequent release of ''[[Captain America: The First Avenger]]'', retconned that information. Therefore, per our canon policy, the novel does not fit the current continuity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and it is categorized as "Non-Canon".
Main Canon[]
As the Marvel Cinematic Universe goes through a phase of exponential growing, a lot of projects not only introduce new elements, they also go back to change the story of the MCU that was established by old productions, creating retcons in continuity. At the same time, there are sometimes continuity errors that occur due to several factors, like lack of oversight or lack of communication between the different parties involved. These retcons can be noted through the different titles that are part of the main canon of the MCU, unlike the other statuses of confirmation, these retcons will not be noted in a "Continuity" section, they will simply go into their respective Trivia articles, or "Trivia" and "Behind the Scenes" sections.