Marvel's Ironheart: Release Date, Story, Secret Baddies, and Everything Else to Know

After a relatively light 2024, which brought us only two new seasons of live-action Marvel television — Echo and Agatha All Along — the MCU is back in force in 2025 starting with Captain America: Brave New World in theaters and Daredevil: Born Again on the small screen. But perhaps the most intriguing upcoming piece of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is a new series that we know all too little about: Ironheart. But what we do know indicates that Ironheart, which officially features only one single existing major MCU character, will probably be a lot more important than you'd think.

Ironheart is a relatively new Marvel hero whose real name is Riri Williams. Williams has made only one MCU appearance, in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, where she was introduced as a genius MIT student who built an Iron Man-esque prototype suit. This series will properly add Williams to the MCU's roster of superheroes — and possibly pit her against a Marvel baddie that has not yet shown up in the MCU despite years of clues.

So what's in store for Marvel fans when Ironheart lands on Disney+ this summer? Let's take a look at what we know so far.

Ironheart premiere date

Ironheart will premiere on Disney+ on June 24, and release new episodes weekly from there. If Disney+ follows normal procedure, the first two episodes will form a two-part premiere, with the other episodes dropping individually — which would bring Ironheart to a close right as The Fantastic Four: The First Steps hits theaters on July 25.

What is Ironheart about?

Here's the official synopsis from Marvel: "Set after the events of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Marvel Television's Ironheart pits technology against magic when Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) — a young, genius inventor determined to make her mark on the world — returns to her hometown of Chicago. Her unique take on building iron suits is brilliant, but in pursuit of her ambitions, she finds herself wrapped up with the mysterious yet charming Parker Robbins aka 'The Hood' (Anthony Ramos)."

As previously mentioned, Williams' power comes from her smarts and her suit, but unlike Tony Stark, she's just a regular person who doesn't have billions of dollars with which to do anything she wants. Though after her outing with the Wakandans in the last Black Panther movie, she probably has access to a lot of tech that would otherwise be unavailable to her. Vibranium can be pretty helpful for that kind of project, after all.

The most interesting part of the synopsis, though, is the reference to magic and the inclusion of The Hood. In the comics, The Hood gets his powers, and namesake, by shooting and stealing a demon's cloak and boots — items that gave him magic powers. 

That bit, combined with an offhand mention on Deadline that Sacha Baron Cohen is "probably" secretly playing Mephisto, has fans hoping that Marvel Satan will finally make his MCU debut. Mephisto, a red guy with horns who rules a pocket dimension called Hell, was first teased all the way back in the first Avengers movie in 2012, but he hasn't yet popped up at all, despite more hints about him more recently in WandaVision and Agatha All Along. In Marvel lore, Mephisto is best known for being the one who gave Ghost Rider his powers, and he may serve as the same sort of "benefactor" for The Hood on this series.

Ironheart trailer

We haven't gotten a proper trailer for Ironheart yet, but Marvel devoted 15 seconds of its 2025 hype reel to the upcoming series — and, yes, we get some very clean looks at Riri's full Ironheart suit in action. Check it out.

Ironheart cast and crew

Chinaka Hodge serves as showrunner and head writer on Ironheart after previously serving as a writer on Mike Flanagan's The Midnight Club on Netflix and TNT's adaptation of Snowpiercer. The cast is led by Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams, with Anthony Ramos popping up as bad guy The Hood. And, of course, there's also Sacha Baron Cohen in an unspecified role, which may or may not be Mephisto.

Full cast

• Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams/Ironheart
• Anthony Ramos as Parker Robbins/The Hood
• Alden Ehrenreich as Joe McGillicuddy
• Lyric Ross as Riri's friend Natalie Washington
• Sacha Baron Cohen
• Manny Montana
• Reagan Aliyah
• Matthew Elam
• Anji White
• Cree Summer
• Paul Calderón
• Shea Couleé

Will Ironheart tie directly in with any other MCU projects this year?

In the comics, The Hood is one of the many baddies in New York City who runs afoul of Spider-Man and Daredevil and all those folks. But Ironheart will take place instead in Chicago, a city that has had little presence in the MCU, and the main cast contains only one existing MCU character, Williams, and she only appeared in one previous project. So while these characters may have direct comic book connections to other MCU folks, Ironheart is unlikely to be required viewing for any other MCU projects coming out this year, and there's little reason to expect that the events of Captain America 4, Daredevil, or Thunderbolts will affect Ironheart, either. 

That said, Ironheart's incredibly close proximity to the new Fantastic Four movie does raise our eyebrows a little bit. But Marvel has demonstrated repeatedly that it wants viewers to be able to jump into the MCU at any point without feeling lost, and so projects that are released close together rarely interact with each other in any major way.

What to watch before Ironheart

Ironheart appears to be an MCU series that lacks much in the way of franchise baggage. Since its title character was introduced in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, that excellent film contains some necessary backstory. But you're pretty much off the hook beyond that — it'll also help if you know who Iron Man is, since Riri is clearly a big fan who was inspired by the suit. But if you're watching an MCU TV show in 2025, that's probably not an issue. You can watch Black Panther: Wakanda Forever on Disney+.