Marvel Cinematic Universe Part II

[Force de Phenix]

I know it's still maybe 10 years in the future but will the MCU be able to create enough new characters to draw in the audience for Secret Wars? By then everyone from Endgame will most likely be gone and who will be left of the MCU for a Secret Wars event? The Eternals(movie bombed)? The FF? The X-Men? Thunderbolts? Young Avengers? The New Avengers? Blade? Shang-Chi? Lots of new characters down the future but I don't think they will be as popular especially the ones created from the TV shows.

I mean, it's not like Pixar or Star Wars is going to stop making productions. People were upset that "nobodies" like the Guardians of the Galaxy, the inhumans, Jessica Jones, and anyone who didn't have a movie in the past were getting any screen time. I remember when one of my coworkers thought Black Panther was a new Batman movie, and now he's a cultural icon. To answer your question, I don't see why not. They brought in the ClanDestine recently and Echo is getting a whole show.

I don't think Disney sees their property as less worthy because all of it was unknown until they made it known. And even movies that people thought were going to fail like Doctor Strange, that made almost a billion dollars ($900 million) without the Chinese and Russian market, did well. No one knew who the X-Men or the Avengers were until they flooded the market with them, and Disney now has 80% of their movies playing at theaters, so people are almost forced to watch anything Disney if they choose to not watch a series on a streaming service and go to the movies.

The X-Men and Spider-Man made movies for over 20 years and people still went to see them and it was the same story rehashed. And Batman has been making movies for 32 years.

[Force de Phenix]

I wonder if they have a cap limit for characters to introduce because between the Disney+ shows, the FF, and all the Young Avengers build up they keep throwing in there...will there be any room for the X-Men?

The X-Men were releasing one movie every other year at the same time the MCU was releasing movies and they never stopped releasing X-Men stuff until Fox was bought. People forget that we were also getting a lot of X-Men stuff because they wanted them to team up with the Avengers in their crazy universe. I assume it'll just be like those days, but under the Disney banner. People probably thought it was the same thing because they always opened with Marvel in big letters. I don't know if people paid attention to the "In association with" part.

[Colossus1980]

You don't need to if you use who you already have roaming around.

Define popular? Are talking popular by entitled comic book fans who threw fits about 90% of the folks Marvel has invested in.

Are we talking popular in terms of the normal public who could careless that entitled comic book fans hate the fact folks like Panther and Carol held their own in box office as Thor and others.

Who says Iron man or Cap America can't show up if we are doing the multi-verse? How many versions of those guys do we already have that we don't need to make a new one? Ultimate Marvel takes care of most of them and Miles Morales (despite the Peter fans praying he NEVER shows up live action).

But who will still be standing when Secret Wars comes onscreen? Tom Holland? Cumberbatch? Mackie? Hemsworth? Olsen? Cheadle? GOTG?

Most of them will be gone when SW comes around.

By popular I mean those who will bring in the box office. Not popular right now is the Eternals unless the sequel hits big.

How popular is Moon Knight? Ms. Marvel? America Chavez? She-Hulk? Echo? I think Shang-Chi has done enough at the box office to gain some fans.

I just think SW will be interesting seeing who is around at that time. Even Secret Invasion makes me wonder how many MCU characters will be used in the TV show.

[Albert1981]

They had a lot of violence and sex on the Netflix shows, and it was done pretty decent. Jessica Jones was one of my favorite shows. I just hated that they didn't have enough money for her to fly, so she would "hop" really high off screen. They are very character oriented, so we really got close to them and we didn't expect them to appear in the MCU because they couldn't because Marvel TV wasn't mixing with Disney's MCU in appearances. They just had Nick Fury, Sif, Coulson, and Peggy Carter on Agents of Shield.

I don't think it's so much of capitalizing on DD popularity as much as it is people wanting to know where Daredevil is now in the world and what happened to him. The same goes for everyone else. After watching the She-Hulk trailer, I got Daredevil and Jessica Jones vibes, but I doubt they're going to touch on rape and sex. The only thing I'd watch, and not because it's very good, is The Defenders because it's when they all meet up. It was a downer because the villains didn't raise the stakes high enough.

As probably one of the few fans of Star Wars Episode III, I loved Natalie Portman in sci-fi, so I hope she appears again. I don't get mixing two important stories for a movie, especially since there's probably going to be another Thor movie. They should've waited for Gorr. They explained Wakanda in an intro that was like 2 minutes or something, so I'm sure it's going to be easy to explain Atlantis, especially since people have watched Aquaman and the Little Mermaid.

Oh, when you put it that way (Aquaman and the Little Mermaid), I think general audiences will understand what Atlantis is all about. Most folks know about Atlantis outside of the comic book community so I suppose no elaborate introduction is necessary. I don't want too much sex, violence and profanity in the MCU. Kids of different ages should be able to enjoy the Marvel movies and shows. I didn't know MCU movie characters were in the Marvel ABC television stuff. I don't think any of the Marvel ABC television characters made it into the MCU movies as far as I know.

I don't watch the Marvel Netflix stuff because I don't enjoy watching r-rated material. And that doesn't just go for comic book properties either. I liked Platoon though. For me as a strictly Feige MCU guy, I don't anything about the Daredevil on Netflix, so I'm not really wondering what happened to him because I never knew him in the first place! I did like DD in the comics, so I'm excited to see his debut in the MCU. But I'm worried that Marvel Studios will insert him awkwardly into She-Hulk (if that happens at all). I wasn't thrilled with how Kingpin was introduced in Hawkeye.

Yeah, I like Natalie Portman in sci-fi too. I liked her in Star Wars as well. She's a fine actress and the MCU is very lucky to have her. Don't know what her future holds. I'm not too sure if Natalie is interested in a long-term commitment to the MCU though. Hopefully when Hemsworth leaves the MCU, Thor and Jane can meet up again one final time.

[John Venus]

I don't think a phase have an overarching end point really means much for the movies. They've always been mostly disconnected with just minor things tying them together or pointing to the next movie.

But from a pure money making standpoint... I still don't know why the MCU is letting phase 4 feel so random and disjointed. I mean, does it actually feel like Eternals was even part of the MCU? Is that Celestial still chillin lol?

MCU was known for the "shared universe" and "forward planning" type stuff and this phase just feels random. There is no Avengers team up seemingly coming... they are maybe teasing Thunderbolts but... that is a DEEP CUT lol. I didn't even know who the seinfield actor was playing and I read comics. Compare that ti SAMUAL JACKSON name droppng Avengers. It just doesn't hit the same.

And the post credit scenes just feel... pointless. aka they lost their magic. Teasing something for a sequel that is 4 years away ain't it lol.

Like I said, I don't think it matters for hte actual movies... the movies just need tightened up. Cleaner scripts, better CGI, focus on he main character of the story.

I think part of that has to do with all the reshuffling that happened due to COVID. We went an entire year without MCU content then got a fire horse of content in 2021-present.

After EG, it was the right choice to go small and do more stand alone projects and even experiment with new stuff like the D+ show and Eternals. But I think now, that with things stabilizing people are itching for more cross over content.

Also, they are planting seeds for cross overs. They're obviously setting up the Thunderbolts with John Walker, the Young Avengers are seeded throughout Phase 4 and they're setting up Midnight Sons via Blade, Moon Knight and Black Knight. The pay offs would obviously happen with the formation of Thunderbolts, Young Avengers and the Midnight Sons. Then afterwards they can do cross overs with those teams and finally pay off with Secret Wars.

[MindofShadow]

Unpopular opinion but I don't think Secret Wars works unless it is like a 2-4 year thing.

One movie sets if up, live in Battle World for 2ish years with movies and shows, and then a movie to end it.

If they "IW/EG" it, I dont' think it works.

[John Venus]

I wouldn't mind a villain phase. They already have Kang, Kingpin and obviously Dr Doom is coming. Doom and Kang actually succeeded in taking over the world separately, Kingpin became the Mayor of NY. A whole phase where the heroes are discredited and driven underground whilst the villains run the government could be cool. They could do their own version of Dark Reign.

[MindofShadow]

The "building up to something" never affected the individual movies much. Hell, my two favorite MCU movies don't even connect to the overarching plot at the time (BP and WS).

But... for pure hype reason and fan engagement...

The MCU built its back on "its all connected!" and building up to the next big thing. And then they reached the BIGGEST thing and afterwards... nothing.

They got people used to "what is coming next" and then went radio silence afterwards. So you have fans who have been "trained" for 10 years to expect the next big thing and anticipate the next big thing and there is nothing to look forward to.

And that sort of thing can color how you feel about a product. Expectations play a HUGE role in how you enjoy things. If you go in expecting one thing and get something else, even if that something else is GREAT in isolation, it can feel like a let down.

(whcih is why I want to see thor one more time before reviewing because I want to see if I can enjoy the movie for what what it is vs what I wanted)


And because there is no "goal"... fans are making up their own goals, which leads to stuff like "IT WAS MEPHISTO!!!" and then being disappointed lol

[Force de Phenix]

Unpopular opinion but I don't think Secret Wars works unless it is like a 2-4 year thing.

One movie sets if up, live in Battle World for 2ish years with movies and shows, and then a movie to end it.

If they "IW/EG" it, I dont' think it works.

If they did a two part movie like Infinity War and Endgame, I could see them doing one Secret Wars event, and now that Disney Plus exists, have series and shows in Battle World, and have it conclude in the second movie. They should make some of the animation be canon in the MCU. What If? was in the realm of the MCU, but it didn't add to the story. It did help people understand what the multiverse was and what Doctor Strange was doing. The second season is probably just the continuation and it's in its own world.

They could go all out with their animation and have it be cheaper.

It depends on how far out they want to go with the story.

[MindofShadow]

Msybe they can do it like Kang tropolis in lego marvel 2 game lololol

[Frontier]

I feel like it depends on what kind of Secret Wars storyline they want to do. The original was more of a direct hero vs. villain conflict (then again 99% of villains are already dead so...) while the latter explored Battleworld and the setting more, even if ultimately it always came down to stopping Dr. Doom one way or another.

I don't really see the MCU doing a villain phase or something like Dark Reign because that just doesn't seem to fight the tonal sensibilities of the MCU or something I could see them properly carrying across. It's not like we got multiple stuff set during the Blip era.

[Username taken]

So Thor is getting a huge opening (over $300 m WW in just one weekend). No surprises there, at this point anything with the Marvel logo will make money.

But as a Thor fan, I feel a little disappointed that we haven't gotten a big, epic Thor movie.

Say what you want about Jason Aaron but his Thor work (both with Jane Foster and Odinson) were large-scale epic runs and a movie adapting both storylines should have been more "serious".

[Username taken]

As much as I've criticized recent MCU, there's a criticism of the new movies that doesn't sit well with me.

A lot of people are saying that the MCU feels directionless, I have an issue with this because a LOT of people complained about how MCU movies were simply advertisements for the big events. Marvel to their credit has made a conscious decision to move away from that and now they get criticized for it

This is definitely a damned if you will, damned if you don't scenario.

[Frontier]

So Thor is getting a huge opening (over $300 m WW in just one weekend). No surprises there, at this point anything with the Marvel logo will make money.

But as a Thor fan, I feel a little disappointed that we haven't gotten a big, epic Thor movie.

Say what you want about Jason Aaron but his Thor work (both with Jane Foster and Odinson) were large-scale epic runs and a movie adapting both storylines should have been more "serious".

Yeah, I didn't expect the divisive critical reaction to really effect the box office that much. Even with how critiqued the Disney+ shows get they're enough crowd pleasers to do well streaming-wise that it doesn't matter.

The fact that they turned Surtur into a joke and a plot device was such a big waste to me. One of the most epic things in Simonson' run and it just wasn't done the justice it deserved. Neither does it seem they captured the feel of Aaron's run either.

As much as I've criticized recent MCU, there's a criticism of the new movies that doesn't sit well with me.

A lot of people are saying that the MCU feels directionless, I have an issue with this because a LOT of people complained about how MCU movies were simply advertisements for the big events. Marvel to their credit has made a conscious decision to move away from that and now they get criticized for it

This is definitely a damned if you will, damned if you don't scenario.

I don't really have an issue with the lack of a clear direction so much as it feels like they're trying to do too much.

Spider-Man suddenly jumps into the Multiverse with, like, no build up and gets some makeshift multiversal Sinister Six to make up for his lack of a built up Rogues Gallery.

Everything has to be a world-ending scenario. Even Ms. Marvel! Shang-Chi didn't need to be fighting kaiju's and monsters in his solo movie like he's MCU Iron Fist. Black Widow had a weird sense of scale.

Dr. Strange has a solo movie that has to set up Young Avengers, suddenly dovetail into a twist Scarlet Witch from a show that they didn't even properly integrate into the movie itself, and barely uses anything from Strange's own mythos that you would expect from a Dr. Strange sequel (I mean, MORDO).

Eternals maybe had too many characters and too grand a scope for it's own good. I think Jack Kirby's initial introduction to the concept was more straightforward by comparison.

People keep complaining about the CG quality between the shows and the movies.

They keep churning out Disney+ shows that are generally fun and draw people in with something but tend to fall apart the more people think about them, especially in the final acts. They have that streaming show problem of not knowing how to properly pace the story.

[skyvolt2000]

So Thor is getting a huge opening (over $300 m WW in just one weekend). No surprises there, at this point anything with the Marvel logo will make money.

But as a Thor fan, I feel a little disappointed that we haven't gotten a big, epic Thor movie.

Say what you want about Jason Aaron but his Thor work (both with Jane Foster and Odinson) were large-scale epic runs and a movie adapting both storylines should have been more "serious".

Black Panther WF says hold my beer on that.