Series Phase 5 — The Multiverse War (2025–2026)

What If...? (Season 3)

Name: What If...? (Season 3)
Released: 2024-12-22
Duration: 270 min
Cast: Zhong Chuxi, Liu Xueyi, Lin Shen, Yao Chi, Liu Mengmeng

Released December 22, 2024 4h 30m ★ Essential

A normal girl Xia Guo is faced with a difficult dilemma where the two choices will lead her toward two utterly different lives. Would she choose to live a home-sweet-home life with her boyfriend in her hometown or seize the opportunity to forge a successful career in a metropolitan? Which way would make her life "a little less normal"?

Watch note

Peggy Carter's story is finally concluded. Tony appears across realities. The Watcher's role in the multiverse war grows. The last anthology chapter — directly precedes Doomsday.

Why It Matters in the MCU

The final season of What If...? completes the multiverse trilogy structure and gives the Watcher his most substantive narrative role — no longer simply observing but positioned as the series' moral protagonist. The anthology format, having been established across two prior seasons, allows the third to take more formal risks with episode structure and visual ambition. It closes the stories begun in season one while introducing scenarios that feed directly into the live-action multiverse narrative.

Where It Fits in the MCU

What If...? (Season 3) sits at position 120 of 133 in the MCU's story-chronological order, placing it within the Phase 5 — The Multiverse War (2025–2026) era. It is rated Essential — must-watch for following the main MCU narrative. Watching in story-chronological order provides the most coherent character development experience — individual arcs build naturally toward the franchise's major crossover events, with each film's post-credits scenes carrying forward into what follows.