As we said in our closing message at the end of this year’s auction, 2025 has been one ceaseless horror after another. But we've stood our ground and said no to fascism, no to cruelty, no to hate. Instead of resigning ourselves to the darkness, we've put up our fists and said, "Bring it on." Instead of allowing the evil and avaricious to dictate how things should be, we've pushed back forcefully. We've linked our arms to form a wall of resistance and a shield for our most vulnerable. We've taken to the streets and the seas, rejecting the idea that we should surrender, eke by on crumbs, and accept suffering as an inescapable part of life that we're helpless to do anything about.
We've loudly shouted that we want a better world—now, not later—and that we'll fight for it with all our might.
The past two days alone, we've seen the fruits of that labor. We're seeing what happens when we refuse the cynical notion of inevitability and futility and instead act with the knowledge that the power is with us, the people. Even when you have a 1% chance, when the odds are impossibly stacked against you, when you're a "nobody," you can pull off the unimaginable if you embrace empathy and optimism and have the people with you. (New York, how you feelin'?!) What happened Tuesday night in the U.S.—the thundering repudiation of not only authoritarianism and bigotry but also the idea of returning to the harmful status quo—demonstrates the necessity and power of the collective. It shows that what we're told is unachievable can be reached, that we can beat giants who seem unstoppable, whether they be Galactus or the despots and billionaires that want to destroy our world.
And of course, we have a shining example of collective action through MTH.
This year, 181 "Marvel"-ous creators came forward to offer 306 auctions. They offered 401 unique platonic and romantic relationships and character-centric options (if we include "all ships/gen"-inclusive relationships, this number is even higher) across 47 universes within the Marvel multiverse.
This spirit of inclusion goes beyond trying to encompass as much of the Marvel fandom as possible and can be seen in our auction and charity results too. Every one of 306 auctions was bid on, and every one of our 30 supported charities received donations. As ever, we’re in awe of your commitment to supporting all our creators and charities.
So many people donated above and beyond their pledged amount, creators took on multiple auctions and offered multiple winner slots, and bidders accepted their second-place wins with glee. An unprecedented number of people donated even if they didn't win an auction, emptied their wallets completely if they didn't use up all of their bidding budget, and chipped in even if they didn't participate as a creator or bidder this year. For the first time ever, we also had people donate "just because" in honor of their friends to show their appreciation and love—and we found out that one of those friendships started because of MTH (is it any surprise that we cried?!). From the opening of sign-ups till now, we've watched as you supported one another, and we're seeing that generosity extend past the event. A big shout-out to those of you who are choosing to volunteer for charities on our list and financially support your local organizations like food banks. It absolutely makes our day.
Of course, we can't forget our final donation tally, the greatest testament to the power of unity and generosity. Are you ready?
The grand total we raised this year is…
(We hope you comics lovers enjoy that number. 😉)
THIS IS THE MOST WE'VE EVER RAISED IN A SINGLE MTH AUCTION BY A MILE! We weren't sure we could ever reach our previous highest total ($52,025) again, but somehow we smashed that and got to $61.6k. WHAT?!?! This is all the more incredible because we managed to pull this off with the third-smallest number of creators and auctions. No, we don't know how this happened either. You folks also shattered our records for the highest amount donated to a charity ever and highest winning bid ever (in fact, you did that so many times this year alone, we lost count of the records broken).
You can see the effort of our teamwork and the breakdown of the donations here (to enlarge the image, click here and hover to see the donation amount per charity).
We’ve also listed the amount raised per charity on our 2025 auction results page.
Creators, we couldn't have started this auction without you. Your commitment to the event, whether you return every year, made a surprise welcome return after a break, or are new and took what we know can be a scary jump into the event, moves us. It’s hard putting yourself out there and we applaud you for it.
Bidders, your willingness to duke it out helps us raise as much money as we do. We’ve seen some wild things, but what we always love is how so many of those crazily high winning bids are the result of people pooling their few dollars together! This has consistently been the case since MTH began and is a testament to the ripple effect you can have if you’re part of something bigger than yourself.
We also owe our success to our amazing signal boosters. There can’t be an auction without any participants, so to everyone who shared our posts, made announcements in your fannish spaces, and encouraged your fandom friends to sign up and/or bid: thank you so much. Together, we reached hundreds of fantastic creators and bidders from all corners of the Marvel fandom, many of whom we didn't know and some who were hearing about us for the first time (and some who made the leap after sitting on the fence for years, which is awesome).
We can't express our gratitude enough to EVERYONE who showed up. From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for helping us turn our eighth Marvel Trumps Hate auction into such a fantastic experience. We cherish every single message of love and support that we received and continue to receive on our Discord server and through DMs, Tumblr messages, emails, tweets, etc. They as well as your generosity have lifted our spirits tremendously, made us fall in love with our fandom even more, and prompted us to dance with joy.
If you'd like to stay updated on all of the 2025 Marvel Trumps Hate fills, follow us and/or check out the "mth 2025" tag on our Tumblr. You’ll also be able to find works posted on AO3 in our Marvel Trumps Hate 2025 collection and links to fills in our Discord server, which you can join to brainstorm prompts, chat about fills, and find out about other fandom events.
We know that the work isn't over, but we feel that through MTH, we've demonstrated that it can be joyous and even fun. That, to take inspiration from Zohran's speech, hope is alive but cannot be abstract. It needs to be a decision, and all of you are making that decision every day.
And with that, MTH 2025 has officially come to a close. We're so beyond grateful to you all and can’t wait to see all of your fanworks over the coming year!
Lots of love and gratitude,
Your 2025 MTH mods
