The snap gets reversed (mcu)

[Nik Hasta]

Gonna preface this, because I feel like we're arguing at cross-purposes here.

My argument is less about whether Shuri particularly is Sue-ish. It is about how the term is not a good or useful term when discussing characters because it is usually employed to dismiss a character (mostly female) for being some arbitrary level of "too good at stuff," which isn't useful. That's my whole deal here.

My view is that the term shouldn't be used because it's not clearly defined or often used in a clearly defined way. Shuri and her proximity to Stark in terms of characterisation is more the vehicle for the case rather than the thing I'm interested in arguing. Just want that clear because I'm not super into litigating the particulars of Tony Starks character at length.

That said;

Well then you should be able to easily give me examples.

Okay. Herein follows a brief breakdown of Tony Stark and the themes of his egotism and arrogance in the movies from the MCU that I remember.

- Iron Man 1: Literally the arc of the character in this story is Tony learning to accept that he can't just do things on his own and the way he's conducted himself has made things worse for people he isn't aware of. He is introduced as wildly arrogant, dismissive to most people and learns that he needs to change. He also flies to another country and murders people because he feels he's allowed to do that.
- Iron Man 2: Tony has a festival dedicated to primarily glorifying himself complete with sexy Iron Man dancers, Tony smacks talks the government and the UN arrogantly proclaiming that he has privatized world peace and also commits the rather amusing crime of hacking into international surveillance networks in front of a courtroom. Later Tony falls into a spiral of alcoholism and believing his own hype due to his out of control ego, culminating in a robot suit fight with his best friend. Heck, it's partly his condescension and arrogance towards Hammer that drives him to recruit Whiplash and make the conflict worse.
- Avengers 1: When the staff is influencing people to draw out their negative traits, it draws out Tony's ego because it's still a massive part of his character.
- Iron Man 3: Thematically Tony is confronted by a reflection of himself - another egotistical billionaire playboy who thinks he should be able to rule the world due to him being better than everyone else - and actually has to consider the ramifications of that. The film ends with Tony actually giving up everything even though he's already won; it is a really good moment of him actually stepping away from his self-aggrandisement and arrogance because he sacrifices everything to make the point that he has changed. This meaningful scene is then mostly undone by...
- Age of Ultron: Tony is back to building more stuff than ever. Ultron is literally built using scans of Tony's mind and he is present as an arrogant egomaniac who thinks that he has the right to decide the fate of the entire human race. Tony then demonstrates a tremendous lack of self-awareness because he immediately builds another AI superbeing to fight Ultron, the only difference being he didn't use his own brain this time and this one is not an out of control sociopath. HMMMM.
- Civil War: Tony, a person who has previously flown into other countries and murdered people just because he wanted to, attempts to take the moral highground over Scarlet Witch who accidentally killed people on a government sanctioned mission. His response to being told that maybe he's incorrect in his response is to gather up a group of superhumans, including a literal child, and have a big punch fight that gets his closest friend paralysed because he refuses to actually consider that he might be wrong or have a dialogue.

I'll be honest, I largely checked out in Infinity War, Spiderman Homecoming and Endgame because I was doooone by this point, and I never saw Far From Home. However, all of these either feature Tony or the legacy of his actions. I hear he made personal information hacking glasses that call in drone strikes? Seems cool and normal.

I recall the bit from Endgame where Tony goes on a rant at Steve and the others about how he was right to try and stomp over civil rights and build super dangerous AI that almost killed humanity because Thanos existed. Still not great at the self-reflection thing, Iron Man 3 notwithstanding.

My point is that Tony's struggle with his ego and arrogance as symbolised by his desire to control everything is a consistent character and thematic arc for him and doesn't get the same pushback as Shuri being condescending to Bruce Banner literally once.

Which is why, as I said repeatedly, I don't consider her a Mary Sue. She says some arrogant things of the sort that sometimes foreshadow's a Mary Sue, but the narrative doesn't back her up, and implicitly portrays her arrogance as a flaw that needs to be overcome. Hence, not a Mary Sue.

This is the thing though, arrogance isn't a Mary Sue specific thing.

Like, look at someone like Escanor from Seven Deadly Sins. That dude is literally personified by his ego and has a ridiculous OP ability that he did not have to train for that allows him to win most confrontations with ease. Does he get labelled a Sue or Stu? No, because none of those things are intrinsic to the concept of Sueism. The term doesn't have a clear or well applied meaning.