Marvel Cinematic Universe Part II

[Frontier]

I think they can't do the comic transformation where she sizes up, but who knows maybe she will?

I wonder when she gets powered up her eyes will go white like Thor in the films

I'm assuming that's what'll happen.

[Albert1981]

Finally saw Spidey today. It was good, but I wish so much of it hadn't been spoiled so thoroughly. I'm usually really good at avoiding spoilers but this movie, man you just couldn't get away from them.

I enjoyed it though. It's definitely my least favorite of the Holland Spider-Man films, it's not as good a multiverse story as Into the Spider-Verse, and I think they were trying to squeeze two different movies into this thing. I would have much rather have watched Parker deal with the consequences of his identity being revealed for a whole film, including the legal battle, and then have a fourth film where Parker goes to Strange to make the world forget who Spider-Man is. But it was a fun film nonetheless and it was good to see the former Spiders again.

I hang out on Reddit quite a bit these days. But not so much on comic book related subs. It gives me a pretty decent perspective on how the "general public" perceives the MCU, and to a lesser extent, the DCEU. Here are some quotes I found that definitely came to mind after reading your post:

"All movies are too fucking long, now. I was seeing my mom for the first time in a long time and we wanted to go see the new James Bond because we used to watch those together when I was a kid. It's three (3) hours long and we ended up just going to an art show instead. Come on, people. You're not making Lawrence of Arabia and some of us have work in the morning."

"I hate the big boss fight thing towards the end that takes 30-45 mins and is really boring."

"Most of the movies are just the hero vs the evil version of themselves. It's boring."

"I feel like Endgame was more of a series of high-fives and taking a winning lap than it was a movie. Like, I get why they did it. Remind everyone about everything that happened. Get as many important characters to show up as you can."

"The phrase “leave them wanting more” has never been uttered at Disney. Enough already."

I think one complaint among many folks who generally enjoy these blockbuster franchise films, is the growing length of them. Marvel movies are ABSOLUTELY getting longer. They are cramming WAY too many characters and storylines into these films. After reading your comments, I think it would definitely have been better if the split NWH into TWO films. The focus of the writers is dispersed on too many different things and these movies can get messy because of that. And the sheer number of films (and now shows) is getting out of hand in my opinion. And I felt sometimes the movies and shows that Marvel Studios put out last year were REALLY self-indulgent and pretentious. Besides Endgame, I NEVER felt that way about MCU productions from Phases 1 to 3.

I still really enjoy and like the MCU, but I think Feige and Pascal made the right moves to delay their movies.

[Oberon]

I agree for the most part. I felt the ending of Shang Chi was tedious and could have been halved, the end battle that is.

[Albert1981]

I agree for the most part. I felt the ending of Shang Chi was tedious and could have been halved, the end battle that is.

I agree with you on that. These things tend to drag on for SO long. And the above quotes weren't made by people who hold the MCU in contempt. They're mostly fans as well.

[Ascended]

I think Marvel kind of painted themselves into a corner, with regards to ending scenes.

Endgame hit really hard. That was a giant battle with ridiculous stakes, and it worked in a ton of fanservice as a victory lap for a decade of unparalleled success. And I'm fine with all of that; there is a place for fanservice and that place is called Endgame. That film was exactly what it should have been, even when it didn't exactly make sense (like the "girl power" team up scene).

But now the question becomes "where do you go from there?" The expectation for spectacle is higher than ever, and quite frankly that just doesn't work for every story or character. I enjoyed the hell out of Shang Chi for example, but I agree with the folks who say the finale would have been stronger without the big cgi kaiju fight; the struggle between Shang and his father was far more interesting, emotionally, than a dragon and bat monster fighting it out. But a martial arts showdown, even with magic bracelets, just doesn't have the obvious "oomph" that Marvel probably assumed audiences demand post-Endgame.

Hawkeye, more or less, managed to avoid that by keeping things grounded and rooted in the emotional journey...but even then we ended up with a big fight against an endless legion of goons and I think it was one of the weakest parts of the show. But hopefully the show's success taught Marvel that not everything has to end in a giant battle with the fate of all things hanging in the balance. There are stories where that's fitting and proper, like Eternals, but it doesn't have to be *every* story.

And on the flip side, while I do agree with the "too much spectacle/stakes too high" complaint in a general way, I also think it's blown out of proportion to a degree. Black Widow's finale wasn't as crazy as people claim; what was the big set piece there? A fight during freefall. Well within the wheelhouse of a super spy and not really that crazy. Wandavision's threat never extended beyond one small town. Falcon had global repercussions but only of a political nature. Hawkeye only dealt with personal stakes. Meanwhile, stuff like Eternals and Loki demand a large scope; we'd have been disappointed if the challenges didn't match the protagonists' godly stature.

Really, it's only Shang Chi and Spider-Man that raised the stakes beyond what they needed to be.

[Frontier]

I think Marvel kind of painted themselves into a corner, with regards to ending scenes.

Endgame hit really hard. That was a giant battle with ridiculous stakes, and it worked in a ton of fanservice as a victory lap for a decade of unparalleled success. And I'm fine with all of that; there is a place for fanservice and that place is called Endgame. That film was exactly what it should have been, even when it didn't exactly make sense (like the "girl power" team up scene).

But now the question becomes "where do you go from there?" The expectation for spectacle is higher than ever, and quite frankly that just doesn't work for every story or character. I enjoyed the hell out of Shang Chi for example, but I agree with the folks who say the finale would have been stronger without the big cgi kaiju fight; the struggle between Shang and his father was far more interesting, emotionally, than a dragon and bat monster fighting it out. But a martial arts showdown, even with magic bracelets, just doesn't have the obvious "oomph" that Marvel probably assumed audiences demand post-Endgame.

Hawkeye, more or less, managed to avoid that by keeping things grounded and rooted in the emotional journey...but even then we ended up with a big fight against an endless legion of goons and I think it was one of the weakest parts of the show. But hopefully the show's success taught Marvel that not everything has to end in a giant battle with the fate of all things hanging in the balance. There are stories where that's fitting and proper, like Eternals, but it doesn't have to be *every* story.

And on the flip side, while I do agree with the "too much spectacle/stakes too high" complaint in a general way, I also think it's blown out of proportion to a degree. Black Widow's finale wasn't as crazy as people claim; what was the big set piece there? A fight during freefall. Well within the wheelhouse of a super spy and not really that crazy. Wandavision's threat never extended beyond one small town. Falcon had global repercussions but only of a political nature. Hawkeye only dealt with personal stakes. Meanwhile, stuff like Eternals and Loki demand a large scope; we'd have been disappointed if the challenges didn't match the protagonists' godly stature.

Really, it's only Shang Chi and Spider-Man that raised the stakes beyond what they needed to be.

I think there can be plenty of "oomph" to a final fight in a martial arts movie depending on how you execute it. It's like with a sword fight. I mean, obviously with Superheroes you expect some spectacle but I think it needs to be scaled appropriately and fit the character/story.

Black Widow's climax was basically a Bond movie climax. My main issue was how much it squandered Taskmaster and didn't really have that much of a memorable final fight for obvious reasons.

I wish Loki had remembered how capable/powerful Loki is supposed to be aside from when required by the plot.

I think the stakes in NWH actually made a lot of sense for what they are trying to do. I think we can debate whether Mysterio needed to engage in a full-scale terrorist attack with drones in FFH, which was a bit over the top, but it wasn't as bad as some examples.

[CosmicDeathMatch]

That's Mysterio's whole plan though, save people from catastrophes and get seen as hero on the level of the Avenges, it doesn't work as a small scale attack.

[Frontier]

That's Mysterio's whole plan though, save people from catastrophes and get seen as hero on the level of the Avenges, it doesn't work as a small scale attack.

I get that. It was still kind of a bigger scale attack than you'd expect from him.

[Ascended]

I think there can be plenty of "oomph" to a final fight in a martial arts movie depending on how you execute it. It's like with a sword fight. I mean, obviously with Superheroes you expect some spectacle but I think it needs to be scaled appropriately and fit the character/story.

Exactly, and I think Marvel believed that audiences would demand something "bigger" after Endgame. I think they're wrong but I wouldn't be surprised if they thought they needed that big monster battle to satisfy fans after Endgame's over the top finale.

Black Widow's climax was basically a Bond movie climax. My main issue was how much it squandered Taskmaster and didn't really have that much of a memorable final fight for obvious reasons.

I wish Loki had remembered how capable/powerful Loki is supposed to be aside from when required by the plot.

Agreed on both counts. I think Black Widow completely failed all its antagonists; Dreykov's motivations and goals are vague, and despite that he still manages to be contradictory to his own statements and actions. Taskmaster isn't even that much of a character, reduced to a overt "victim of the patriarchy" pastiche that never came close to hitting the emotional note it could have achieved (to say nothing of squandering a fun and compelling bad guy in Masters). And while the other Widows are meant to be robots without agency or personality, there still could have been something there to help us feel for their plight and make it personal. And I really enjoyed Widow, one of the better MCU films in my opinion and I love the badass feminist message it sends. I just think they were too concerned with the thematics and not concerned enough about characterization (in regards to the villains, Nat and her family were fantastic).

I'm *slightly* more forgiving of Loki. He ends up looking rather ordinary, outside of the few obvious exceptions, but we were also dealing with powers beyond space-time...or at least alien civilizations with unknown technological limits and Loki is off balance throughout the whole thing, trying to figure out the rules of the game he's playing rather than pulling the strings. It's still not a great look but I can make allowances for a lot of it.

But in both cases, the scope and size of the threat was appropriate for the character and the problems concern execution alone.

I think the stakes in NWH actually made a lot of sense for what they are trying to do. I think we can debate whether Mysterio needed to engage in a full-scale terrorist attack with drones in FFH, which was a bit over the top, but it wasn't as bad as some examples.

NWH is absolutely within Parker's wheelhouse, it makes sense from that perspective. But we can get the multiverse and big cosmic stuff in nearly any MCU film, but damn few are capable of exploring the fallout of the hero's identity being revealed. That's why I said the film went bigger than it "needed" to, and not that it went bigger than it should've been "able" to. This is more a issue of "they didn't make the movie I wanted them to" than it is an issue of "the plot went beyond the hero's capability." I just wish they had turned NWH into two films; one dealing with the fallout of the secret ID, giving Murdock more screen time, dealing with villains who know where Parker lives, etc., and then a fourth film that has Peter ask Strange for help and goes multiversal.

As for Mysterio...it gets a pass from me; it was thematically resonant to Parker's arc and the state of the wider MCU (with everyone wondering who'd replace Tony and Steve as the #1 hero). It *is* a bigger con than we're used to from Mysterio, but he's not exactly an A-list villain so I'm okay with the adjustments. Better to make a C-list bad guy a legit threat than just recycle the Goblins and Ock over and over again.

I do question the wisdom of Tony leaving a weapon like EDITH in the hands of a kid...but Tony's judgement has always been questionable so I suppose that tracks.

[Albert1981]

I think Marvel kind of painted themselves into a corner, with regards to ending scenes.

Endgame hit really hard. That was a giant battle with ridiculous stakes, and it worked in a ton of fanservice as a victory lap for a decade of unparalleled success. And I'm fine with all of that; there is a place for fanservice and that place is called Endgame. That film was exactly what it should have been, even when it didn't exactly make sense (like the "girl power" team up scene).

But now the question becomes "where do you go from there?" The expectation for spectacle is higher than ever, and quite frankly that just doesn't work for every story or character. I enjoyed the hell out of Shang Chi for example, but I agree with the folks who say the finale would have been stronger without the big cgi kaiju fight; the struggle between Shang and his father was far more interesting, emotionally, than a dragon and bat monster fighting it out. But a martial arts showdown, even with magic bracelets, just doesn't have the obvious "oomph" that Marvel probably assumed audiences demand post-Endgame.

Hawkeye, more or less, managed to avoid that by keeping things grounded and rooted in the emotional journey...but even then we ended up with a big fight against an endless legion of goons and I think it was one of the weakest parts of the show. But hopefully the show's success taught Marvel that not everything has to end in a giant battle with the fate of all things hanging in the balance. There are stories where that's fitting and proper, like Eternals, but it doesn't have to be *every* story.

And on the flip side, while I do agree with the "too much spectacle/stakes too high" complaint in a general way, I also think it's blown out of proportion to a degree. Black Widow's finale wasn't as crazy as people claim; what was the big set piece there? A fight during freefall. Well within the wheelhouse of a super spy and not really that crazy. Wandavision's threat never extended beyond one small town. Falcon had global repercussions but only of a political nature. Hawkeye only dealt with personal stakes. Meanwhile, stuff like Eternals and Loki demand a large scope; we'd have been disappointed if the challenges didn't match the protagonists' godly stature.

Really, it's only Shang Chi and Spider-Man that raised the stakes beyond what they needed to be.

Endgame's fan service was fairly well done in my opinion. They ended the journeys of several characters and I liked the movie because of that a lot. Surprisingly, it made me into a pretty big fan of Natasha (I hadn't really felt that way before this movie). I agree with most of your comments and insights. When it comes to 2021's Marvel movies I was a bit disappointed in Black Widow and the Eternals myself, but that's just my personal opinion. I do think a decent chunk of casual fans might have lost patience with Loki and What If because they were steeped so deeply in MCU lore. I enjoyed Hawkeye a LOT more than I thought I originally would, but I soured on it a bit because I think the series tried to do too much. I enjoyed the trick arrows, but I don't like how the show handled some of the characters. The introduction of the whole Kingpin/Maya storyline I think was something that was NOT part of the original plan for Hawkeye:

https://variety.com/2021/tv/features...in-1235143246/

I think Kazi, Eleanor Bishop and the Swordsman were REALLY underserved because of this.

I also thought the introduction of Taskmaster in Black Widow was something the writers/director might not have wanted but Marvel executives demanded:

https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/bla...-more-to-life/

It's like I said before, I think Marvel is adding too MANY characters in their movies and shows. And it's making their movies and shows LONGER because they have to get them involved somehow.

[Frontier]

Exactly, and I think Marvel believed that audiences would demand something "bigger" after Endgame. I think they're wrong but I wouldn't be surprised if they thought they needed that big monster battle to satisfy fans after Endgame's over the top finale.

This reminds me of some of the past few DC Animated movies.

Agreed on both counts. I think Black Widow completely failed all its antagonists; Dreykov's motivations and goals are vague, and despite that he still manages to be contradictory to his own statements and actions. Taskmaster isn't even that much of a character, reduced to a overt "victim of the patriarchy" pastiche that never came close to hitting the emotional note it could have achieved (to say nothing of squandering a fun and compelling bad guy in Masters). And while the other Widows are meant to be robots without agency or personality, there still could have been something there to help us feel for their plight and make it personal. And I really enjoyed Widow, one of the better MCU films in my opinion and I love the badass feminist message it sends. I just think they were too concerned with the thematics and not concerned enough about characterization (in regards to the villains, Nat and her family were fantastic).

Dreykov felt inconsistent. It's like on one hand they're trying to make a commentary about Russian politics and Dreykov being part of the "old guard" and what the Widow program's MO had to say about Russia...but then he's just used as a stand-in for old white men who victimize and abuse women, which while topical and definitely very relevant, just didn't feel like the kind of character he was initially set up as.

I really don't think the character needed to be Taskmaster. They barely used Taskmaster's gimmick as is, because they basically showed off all the moments where they copied Avengers' powers in the marketing. Antonia could've just been a souped-up Black Widow or clone of Natasha and it would've had the exact same effect, minus the moment where they reveal her face and her small head looks comically out of place in the suit.

I'm *slightly* more forgiving of Loki. He ends up looking rather ordinary, outside of the few obvious exceptions, but we were also dealing with powers beyond space-time...or at least alien civilizations with unknown technological limits and Loki is off balance throughout the whole thing, trying to figure out the rules of the game he's playing rather than pulling the strings. It's still not a great look but I can make allowances for a lot of it.

I keep going back to how he seemed more competent as a villain and less so in his own show as a protagonist.

NWH is absolutely within Parker's wheelhouse, it makes sense from that perspective. But we can get the multiverse and big cosmic stuff in nearly any MCU film, but damn few are capable of exploring the fallout of the hero's identity being revealed. That's why I said the film went bigger than it "needed" to, and not that it went bigger than it should've been "able" to. This is more a issue of "they didn't make the movie I wanted them to" than it is an issue of "the plot went beyond the hero's capability." I just wish they had turned NWH into two films; one dealing with the fallout of the secret ID, giving Murdock more screen time, dealing with villains who know where Parker lives, etc., and then a fourth film that has Peter ask Strange for help and goes multiversal.

I'm not sure if that could've ended satisfactorily before we get to the multiversal stuff and why, in terms of Hollands' story, it needed to happen. At least in my opinion.

As for Mysterio...it gets a pass from me; it was thematically resonant to Parker's arc and the state of the wider MCU (with everyone wondering who'd replace Tony and Steve as the #1 hero). It *is* a bigger con than we're used to from Mysterio, but he's not exactly an A-list villain so I'm okay with the adjustments. Better to make a C-list bad guy a legit threat than just recycle the Goblins and Ock over and over again.

I feel like I'm the only person who sees the OG!Sinister Six as all A-listers in Spidey's Rogues Gallery, at least in terms of prominence and relevance, when I think people only use that for the Big Three (Gobby, Ock, Venom).

I do question the wisdom of Tony leaving a weapon like EDITH in the hands of a kid...but Tony's judgement has always been questionable so I suppose that tracks.

Thank goodness we can finally leave that relationship behind .

[Ascended]

[Dreykov is] used as a stand-in for old white men who victimize and abuse women, which while topical and definitely very relevant, just didn't feel like the kind of character he was initially set up as.

I think the concept fits perfectly and works on several basic levels...but there wasn't any real character in front of it.

I really don't think the character needed to be Taskmaster.

Agreed, and that's a real shame. I suppose there's always the potential for future development (if Abomination can come back...), and I got no serious issue with the "daughter of Dreykov" thing, but to say I was underwhelmed with what we got is an understatement.

I keep going back to how he seemed more competent as a villain and less so in his own show as a protagonist.

No argument there. Ironic and fitting in a way I suppose, but not satisfying.

I'm not sure if that could've ended satisfactorily before we get to the multiversal stuff and why, in terms of Hollands' story, it needed to happen. At least in my opinion.

Well I'm not knocking the film or it's choices, I enjoyed it a lot and thought they did a surprisingly good job juggling it all. I'm happy with what we got. It's just not the story I was hoping to see. So this is just me griping. Exploring the fallout of Parker's identity being revealed was a chance to do a kind of genre story we haven't really seen before, and one that Parker is very well suited to tell. In the current MCU he's practically the *only* one who can tell it. We saw a bit of this in the first Act, with the media and Murdock's cameo, etc, and I thought it was some of the best stuff phase 4 has given us. Instead we got the live-action, nostalgia-driven redux of Into the Spider-Verse. (just busting stones, the movie is good) And while there's plenty of good reason to use Parker to introduce the multiverse, I think there were other equally viable ways to do it and still get all the franchises where they need to be.

I feel like I'm the only person who sees the OG!Sinister Six as all A-listers in Spidey's Rogues Gallery

I'm sure you're not the only one, but I'm not among you. But I'm not a huge Parker fan anyway so my opinion is ill-informed and worthless.

Oh, random question but did anyone else watch Eternals and feel like it was the kind of movie DC wants to make but can't?

[CosmicDeathMatch]

Exactly, and I think Marvel believed that audiences would demand something "bigger" after Endgame. I think they're wrong but I wouldn't be surprised if they thought they needed that big monster battle to satisfy fans after Endgame's over the top finale.



Agreed on both counts. I think Black Widow completely failed all its antagonists; Dreykov's motivations and goals are vague, and despite that he still manages to be contradictory to his own statements and actions. Taskmaster isn't even that much of a character, reduced to a overt "victim of the patriarchy" pastiche that never came close to hitting the emotional note it could have achieved (to say nothing of squandering a fun and compelling bad guy in Masters). And while the other Widows are meant to be robots without agency or personality, there still could have been something there to help us feel for their plight and make it personal. And I really enjoyed Widow, one of the better MCU films in my opinion and I love the badass feminist message it sends. I just think they were too concerned with the thematics and not concerned enough about characterization (in regards to the villains, Nat and her family were fantastic).

I'm *slightly* more forgiving of Loki. He ends up looking rather ordinary, outside of the few obvious exceptions, but we were also dealing with powers beyond space-time...or at least alien civilizations with unknown technological limits and Loki is off balance throughout the whole thing, trying to figure out the rules of the game he's playing rather than pulling the strings. It's still not a great look but I can make allowances for a lot of it.

But in both cases, the scope and size of the threat was appropriate for the character and the problems concern execution alone.



NWH is absolutely within Parker's wheelhouse, it makes sense from that perspective. But we can get the multiverse and big cosmic stuff in nearly any MCU film, but damn few are capable of exploring the fallout of the hero's identity being revealed. That's why I said the film went bigger than it "needed" to, and not that it went bigger than it should've been "able" to. This is more a issue of "they didn't make the movie I wanted them to" than it is an issue of "the plot went beyond the hero's capability." I just wish they had turned NWH into two films; one dealing with the fallout of the secret ID, giving Murdock more screen time, dealing with villains who know where Parker lives, etc., and then a fourth film that has Peter ask Strange for help and goes multiversal.

As for Mysterio...it gets a pass from me; it was thematically resonant to Parker's arc and the state of the wider MCU (with everyone wondering who'd replace Tony and Steve as the #1 hero). It *is* a bigger con than we're used to from Mysterio, but he's not exactly an A-list villain so I'm okay with the adjustments. Better to make a C-list bad guy a legit threat than just recycle the Goblins and Ock over and over again.

I do question the wisdom of Tony leaving a weapon like EDITH in the hands of a kid...but Tony's judgement has always been questionable so I suppose that tracks.

Turning NWH into two movies just makes of them redundant and unneeded.

[Frontier]

Agreed, and that's a real shame. I suppose there's always the potential for future development (if Abomination can come back...), and I got no serious issue with the "daughter of Dreykov" thing, but to say I was underwhelmed with what we got is an understatement.

I just have a hard time seeing that version of Taskmaster becoming anything resembling the comic version unless it's a different person in the suit. I don't think they cast for their charisma, at any rate.

Well I'm not knocking the film or it's choices, I enjoyed it a lot and thought they did a surprisingly good job juggling it all. I'm happy with what we got. It's just not the story I was hoping to see. So this is just me griping. Exploring the fallout of Parker's identity being revealed was a chance to do a kind of genre story we haven't really seen before, and one that Parker is very well suited to tell. In the current MCU he's practically the *only* one who can tell it. We saw a bit of this in the first Act, with the media and Murdock's cameo, etc, and I thought it was some of the best stuff phase 4 has given us. Instead we got the live-action, nostalgia-driven redux of Into the Spider-Verse. (just busting stones, the movie is good) And while there's plenty of good reason to use Parker to introduce the multiverse, I think there were other equally viable ways to do it and still get all the franchises where they need to be.

I didn't want the Multiverse either, but ultimately it was to service reconstructing Hollands' Peter into the Spider-Man he needed to be by celebrating and emphasizing what Spider-Man is.

Oh, random question but did anyone else watch Eternals and feel like it was the kind of movie DC wants to make but can't?

I haven't watched it yet, but considering the reception to it I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

It did seem more Wonder Woman than Captain Marvel to me.

[Frontier]

Moon Knight trailer coming Monday.