Endgame's rerelease just answered what Brand New Day left hanging

Marvel buried the real Hulk answer in a seven-year-old movie

If your family sat through Spider-Man: Brand New Day’s Hulk fight wondering why Bruce Banner was suddenly rampaging with no explanation, Marvel just answered it — not in a new film, but bolted onto one from 2019. Avengers: Endgame Encore, a rerelease with a revised ending and three new post-credit scenes, hit theaters September 25, 2026, and those three minutes matter more than a nostalgia lap usually does.

The new ending: a knock at Steve and Peggy’s door

The first change comes before the credits. Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter get their dance and their kiss, as in 2019, but this time a knock at the door interrupts them. Loki stands outside in a TVA uniform and tells them he can help. It’s a short beat, and it turns the most final goodbye in the MCU into an open question.

The scene that actually matters: What happened to Hulk

The first and most important scene picks up directly after Brand New Day. Banner, in military “self-containment,” explains over a grainy video call that he’d been keeping the Hulk suppressed with a gamma dampener — until Jean Grey’s powers broke it during Brand New Day’s climax, freeing the Hulk in the first place. He’s mid-sentence about a new suppression serum when the feed glitches, Robert Downey Jr.’s Doctor Doom breaches the bunker with “I’m here to collect you,” and the transmission cuts to a glowing Doom sigil on the floor. No Hulk in sight. It’s continuity-stitching that rewards keeping up with the MCU homework and leaves the rest baffled — our complete Easter egg guide covers what that fight set up.

The other two scenes are shorter but just as loaded: Mobius, Casey and O.B. at the TVA watching the old Fox X-Men universe collide with another Earth as “3,000 universes” edge toward collapse, and Doctor Doom forging his own mask — echoing Tony Stark building the Mark I in Iron Man, which lands differently now Robert Downey Jr. plays both men. Joe Russo called it “a narrative connection” to December’s film; that reads like an understatement. See our full Avengers: Doomsday breakdown.

What’s next

Avengers: Doomsday lands December 18, 2026, and after this it plays less like a standalone event than the next chapter of a story Endgame just restarted. Whether Banner survives whatever Doom is “collecting” him for is now a real open question.

When did Avengers: Endgame Encore release, and what's actually new in it?

September 25, 2026 — a revised ending (Loki interrupts Steve and Peggy) plus about three minutes of new footage, split across three post-credit scenes not in the 2019 cut.

What happens in the Endgame Encore post-credit scenes?

Bruce Banner explains he’s been suppressing the Hulk since Brand New Day, until Doctor Doom breaches his bunker and takes him. The TVA watches the old Fox X-Men universe collide with another Earth. Doctor Doom forges his own mask, echoing Tony Stark building the Mark I in Iron Man.

How does this connect Spider-Man: Brand New Day to Avengers: Doomsday?

It explains why Hulk was loose during Brand New Day’s fight — Jean Grey’s powers broke Banner’s dampener — and shows Doom taking him into custody right before Doomsday’s December 18 release.

Do I need to have seen Spider-Man: Brand New Day before watching Endgame: Encore?

Yes, or the first post-credit scene won’t land. It’s a direct follow-up to that film’s Hulk fight, not a self-contained scene.

If it’s been a while, Endgame is worth the rewatch on 4K, and a Prime Video trial covers the Holland trilogy in the meantime. Kids want a Spider-Man fix at home? Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 on PS5 is still the best way to swing through it.