The Marvel Universe is an exemplary case of both transmedia and cross-media storytelling, demonstrating how a fictional universe can expand across various platforms while maintaining narrative coherence and engaging audiences in multiple ways. Understanding the distinction between transmedia and cross-media is crucial: transmedia storytelling involves telling a single story or story experience across multiple platforms and formats, with each piece contributing uniquely to the overall narrative, while cross-media involves the same content being distributed across different media platforms without necessarily adding new layers to the story.

Transmedia storytelling is at the heart of Marvel's success. The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) does not just tell stories within the confines of individual movies but expands these narratives through interconnected films, TV series, comic books, video games and web series. Each medium provides a unique piece of the larger puzzle, creating a rich, multi-layered experience that encourages audience engagement on multiple fronts.

One of the most prominent and current examples of transmedia storytelling in Marvel is the interplay between the MCU films and TV series. For instance, the TV series "WandaVision" (2021) directly builds on the events of "Avengers: Endgame" (2019) and sets the stage for the film "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" (2022). While the series explores the emotional aftermath of Wanda Maximoff’s journey, it also introduces key narrative elements, such as the concept of the multiverse, which are critical to understanding the subsequent film. However, even without having seen the other projects, the audience could still enjoy each movie or show as a standalone project.

Marvel also exemplifies cross-media storytelling by distributing similar content across different formats, allowing audiences to access familiar stories through various channels. Unlike transmedia, where each medium adds a unique narrative element, cross-media focuses on adapting the same content for different platforms. A classic example of cross-media is how the "Avengers" storyline appears in films, graphic novels, animated series, and even in audiobooks. The essence of the story remains largely the same, but the audience can choose their preferred medium. For instance, "Avengers: Infinity War" (2018) was adapted into novelizations, motion comics, and even animated forms that retain the core storyline but are packaged differently.