Superheroes (and villains) aren’t really known for great style. When you have to spend every waking moment beating up gods, being a god, wishing you were a god and getting bitten by spiders, there’s not much time to browse Vestiaire for old Rick and archival Margiela.
That said, there are some well turned out names in the - to use its official and proper name - Marvel Cinematic Universe. From the best-dressed Spiderman to the blockbuster debut of Hong Kong style and indie cinema royalty, here are the totally, definitely best dressed characters from the MCU in order of stylishness.
He’s old! He’s tired! He’s in the desert! It’s Wolverine, but gritty. On the run and not having that much fun really, Logan sees our taciturn and sharp-knuckled mutant fave in his hirsute salt and pepper fox era. There he goes in a high collar and a black suit and doesn’t it suit him! Graduating from the mutton chops and string vests of early X movies, this is Logan in a sort of Western frontier tragedy. His knees hurt, but his tailoring is spot on.
Objectively the best Spider-Man film (sorry Spiderman 2 featuring Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina as a freaky little Green Goblin and a big wild Dr Octopus in some very sick little tiny sunglasses, respectively), Miles Morales plays a Spidey in Spider-Man: into the Spiderverse whose head you don’t want to flush down the toilet. Yes it’s animated, but the olive green nylon flight bomber with rare Jordans is a winning combo all the same.
The original Himbo pin-up. Don’t tell me you haven’t ever, not even once, thought about getting as jacked as conceivably and physically possible, losing your total fucking mind and rolling through the city completely furious in a tiny pair of purple cut-offs and the atavistic urge to throw around some cars. Also, I’d like to make the distinction that we’re discussing 2003 Eric Bana era Hulk here, not that mope Ruffalo. Also an underrated feathered fringe. What’s his secret? Sea salt spray?
Just as suave in white-on-white-on-white Mandarin collared tailoring as he is in a drapey charcoal DB with the sleeves rolled up (for very essential fighting purposes), Tony Leung brought all of his Wong Kar-wai-certified 90s smoulder and style to his recent role as ring hungry mythical supervillain Xu Wenwu in Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings. A supervillain with genuine style, poise and the right amount of menace.
To be fair, it’s sort of cheating as Samuel L. looks like the coolest guy in the room whether he’s wearing a Kangol to the supermarket or getting really riled up by some snakes on a commercial airline, but as the head of global narc agency S.H.I.E.L.D, Nick Fury, he gets to wear a really quite Haider Ackermann-era of Berluti leather coat and matching eye patch. Not that losing your eye to a horrible alien cat is a style flex, but... we're not not saying that.
The suit itself is one of the best in the superhero business, but what really sets Chadwick Boseman’s imperial T’Challa apart is his regal dress during the beautiful and bucolic Wakanda scenes. Those waterfalls look nice, don’t they? Created by costume designer Ruth E. Carter, the film’s Afrofuturist outfits, hats and cloaks are inspired by the Masaai, Zulu, Tuareg and other African tribes and traditional ways of dressing, resulting in a costume that feels rich, abstract and markedly different from other MCU films.
Did you know that 1998’s Blade was the first Marvel movie ever released? As the fearless and flexible (just look at those high kicks!) half-vampire vampire hunter in the black leather trench, tight widow's peak and tiny shades, Wesley Snipes has had fashion school kids and Tbilisi industrial techno aficionados in a headlock for more than two decades. An antihero with a signature look!
There’s also a story from Blade: Trinity which alleges that Snipes was so irritated with director David S. Goyer that he refused to open his eyes for a shot requiring him to have his eyes open, which meant the production crew had to go through the laborious process of creating CGI eyes for just one scene. Very cool. We love a diva.
What I like about Tom Hardy’s take on doomed journalist and Spidey’s greatest nemesis Eddie Brock/Venom is that he mostly wears the kind of clothes Hardy favours in real life: jeans, boots, leather jackets, work shirts and moth-bitten hoodies, it’s the fact that it’s Hardy that makes it stylish, which is a harsh truth. If you’re Tom Hardy you look good even when you’re wearing jeans and a t-shirt. I don’t make the rules. Also, Venom has the best superhero look in the MCU. That black and white just sings.
As proven by Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, just because you have more money than the GDP of entire nations, doesn’t mean that you know how to get yourself dressed. As swaggering industrialist Tony Stark, RDJ’s take on super wealth style sees him in expensive pinstripe suits, some bodacious cheek filler (drop the surgeon Rob) and the occasional tasteful cashmere crewneck, which is how really rich people should dress when they’re not jetting around in rocket-powered nerd armour.
OKAY LET’S JUST NOT TALK ABOUT THE ENGLISH ACCENT OR EVEN THINK ABOUT THE ENGLISH ACCENT ALRIGHT GUVNA? Hoodie over trucker jacket notwithstanding (why do stylists always go for that combo in superhero films? Stop doing that) Oscar Isaac’s Moon Knight is quite a stylish new addition to the MCU. There’s a nice French blue work jacket that looks like it’s had the requisite amount of wear; an all-white suit which, when worn by Oscar Isaac, looks very cool and the costume itself, an Abloh LV-esque muted grey with a fetching little cowl. Fun!… Oh no, I just thought about the accent again.
Only joking. Nice cape though lol.
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