Marvel Cinematic Universe, Phase 4 & Beyond (and a chance to change your vote)

season 2 is better!

omg

Each time that The Falcon and The Winter Soldier stops to ask whether you see what it’s trying to do, it becomes harder to think of the show as doing much more than paying lip-service to a very surface-level understanding of how racism is bad. Racism is bad, and we shouldn’t gloss over opportunities to remind people of that fact, but The Falcon and The Winter Soldier is in a choice position to truly add something meaningful and more dynamic to the conversation. So far, it seems wholly uninterested in living up to its potential.

I don't actually think MCU does have the potential to do this kind of work. This is not a knock on MCU -- it is a great example of the kind of thing that it is, which is a thing that bangs major-key chords really hard, not a thing that embraces complexity.

A response would be the great line from episode 8 of Wandavision, but iirc that left you cold?

xp agreed, eephus. the fact that they're even going as far as they've gone is still a surprise. also, there's still four more episodes so let's see if they can do better. I liked the police arresting Bucky scene btw

The writer maybe should've waited to see whether we get the full Isaiah Bradley backstory before submitting that article.

I only just found out that Lodge 49 dude is Kurt and Goldie's kid!!!!

― Guayaquil (eephus!), Sunday, 28 March 2021 18:37 (four hours ago) link

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATTT

Season 2 of L49 is impossible to find in the UK, even to bootleg

xpost Hah, yeah, I knew him mostly from that better than it should have been nazi zombie movie. A bigger superhero scion reveal to me was learning that the lead from The Boys is the son of Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid, which, if you look at him, totally.

once you realize he's kurt russell's kid you can't unsee it

ahhhhh no fkn way

is it too late to recast star-lord

omg how did u people not know this lol

smack smack smack

i know i know

Season 2 of L49 is impossible to find in the UK, even to bootleg

Was hoping it would turn up on Prime like Season 1 but never has

I did eventually track down torrents though so it is out there

So, based on the first two episodes, if Wandavision was the Marvel equivalent of Twin Peaks and similar surrealist dramas, Falcon & The Winter Soldier seems to be their 80s buddy cop action comedy, a la Lethal Weapon or Tango & Cash? If this the way the MCU series are gonna continue, I'm cool with, because I like the idea of experimenting within different genres within the same universe just lie they've done the comics (and obviously some of the earlier series like Agent Carter and Luke Cage had already attempted it). I'm not sure how well the attempts of addressing racism fit with that tone, but I do appreciate the effort, and using the series featuring the MCU's most prominent African-American character feels like the best place to do that. (Black Panther obviously was deeply anti-racist, and presumably it's sequel will be too, but the fantastical setting doesn't work as well for scenes dealing with everyday racism like we've seen in this series.)

Also, I was surprised how much they've adapted from Mark Gruenwald's Captain America run into this: introducing a MCU version of John Walker to replace Cap feels like a no-brainer (especially since, unlike in the comics, Steve Rogers isn't around anymore), but I was surprised that Flag Smasher and Power Broker are a part of this too. Obviously Gruenwald's run was by far the longest anyone's written Captain America in the comics, but I was under the impression it isn't that well-regarded these days, especially with its cheesier elements like the Serpent Society and Capwolf? Tho I'd love to see a MCU version of the Serpent Society! :)

One thing I felt was kept deliberately ambiguous is the fate of old Steve Rogers: is he still alive, or did he die between Endgame and this series? Obviously the world thinks he's dead, but the way Falcon and Bucky talk about him makes it sound like we're supposed to think he really has died of old age? So I'm thinking, maybe the ambiguity is intentional, and by the end of the series we'll get a suprise cameo of Chris Evans in old guy makeup, giving John Walker a speech about the true meaning of the American Ideals or something?

Also, regarding Gruenwald, it's kinda disrespectful that Kirby, Simon, Lee, Colan, Brubaker and Epting are credited in the end credits for having created Cap, the Falcon, Bucky, and Winter Soldier, but Gruenwald and the artists he worked with get no such credit, with him being listed among several other names they give "special thanks" to:

https://mlpnk72yciwc.i.optimole.com/cqhiHLc.WqA8~2eefa/w:auto/h:auto/q:75/https://bleedingcool.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Screenshot-3825.jpg

I get it that the "created by" credits are normally reserved only for the main heroes, but give hown much of the stuff here was originally created by Gruenwald (the characters of John Walker and Lemar Hoskins, them becoming replacements for Cap and Bucky with a more right-wing agenda, Flag-Smasher(s) as anarchist villain(s) opposed to Cap's nationalism, etc), you'd think he would've given him a more prominent credit for it? It's not like they even have to worry about him complaining about not getting any royalties out of using his characters, like Brubaker did with the Winter Soldier, since he's been dead for 25 years.

i think the ‘he’s been dead for 25 years’ part might be key there, marvel aren’t exactly renowned for their generosity when it comes to credits

i read through gruenwald’s cap run a while back, it’s dated in a lot of ways but he was great at gently pulling on the threads of ‘america’ as a concept in interesting ways, and that spirit does seem to be captured in these first couple of episodes

The show is fine, the cast is great, and I’m enjoying it, but the banter stuff feels a bit like a Wandavision banter simulacrum. The therapist scene was forcing things way too much.

However I’m absolutely here for the cheesy guitar tone in the credits theme.

I love the therapist and how little time she has for bullshit

Falcon & The Winter Soldier seems to be their 80s buddy cop action comedy, a la Lethal Weapon or Tango & Cash? If this the way the MCU series are gonna continue, I'm cool with, because I like the idea of experimenting within different genres within the same universe

I want this to be true but F&WS is muuuuuuuuuch more standard-issue MCU than the front half of WandaVision was.

"buddy cop action movie" as a genre template is much closer to describing the MCU than virtually anything else you could think of, though

like the entire Steve/Tony character arc could be extracted, de-superheroed, and turned into the foundation of a Bad Boys reboot starring John Boyega and Brian Tyree Henry

I love the therapist and how little time she has for bullshit

Sony re-signed Rob Liefeld's Shrink! for a "mid-six against a seven figure deal" two years ago, I can't see Disney getting away with the same premise.

Can't see Sony ever making Shrink, actors have feet

http://robliefeldcreations.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/shrink5.jpg

Dude. I just showered, why u make me have to shower again

didn't know feet pics would get you so sweaty

The "legal notice" he includes along the right-hand edge is the worst part.

oh ffs

I like the shrink actress a lot, but miffed that they moved her from "sarcastic but realistic shrink" to "comic relief written by somebody who's never been to therapy" in a single episode

revelation with count Zemo?
Is that framed Bucky for the death of T'chala thing further explored in a media that I haven't encountered yet. Not sure what films I'm not catching up to other than Black Widow to have it take place in something

T'chaka (BP's father), not T'challa. The events of Civil War are extensively referenced in this show, so go watch that if you haven't already.

I know it's a fictional place but why bother mentioning Madripoor's in the Indonesian archipelago if they can't even get the climate right?

There's nowhere in Indonesia (or anywhere in Southeast Asia for that matter, apart from a handful of high-altitude regions) where anyone would be wearing heavy coats with fur-lined collars at any time of the year.

Also the whole place is a mishmash of dark Asian cities - kinda looks like Singapore, with Japanese motorbikes, Tagalog rap on the soundtrack - with no actual Asian people. Ugh.

TBF, that's a pretty straight lift from the comics, where its geographic location is less important than the fact that it's an island full of criminals from all over the world.

the whole place is a mishmash of dark Asian cities

I didn't think it was a mishmash of anything, I thought somebody just said "make it look like Blade Runner or something"

I thought they had possibly retrofit the death of a certain actor. But right maybe misheard central consonant.

chill dancing zemo

xposts lmao and they included all those other details i mentioned for ~aesthetic~ reasons I suppose? and do I really have to rehash 30yo arguments about the orientalism in Blade Runner c'mon

anyway, I don't read the comics so I don't know how it's portrayed there but if you can't see how messed up it is that a franchise that cares so much about ~representation~ introduced a city located in Asia, with an Asian name, with Asian characteristics, with no actual Asian characters in it, then I can't help you

yet if MCU madripoor is majority populated by gangsters who read east asian they’re just in a different representational bind

In terms of Asian representation in the MCU, the main cast of the forthcoming Eternals movie is about 1/3 Asian and the Shang-Chi movie looks like it will have an almost entirely Asian cast and both are helmed by Asian directors so I'm not getting too bent out of shape about Madripoor being presented the way Madripoor has pretty much always been presented (ie as an Asian island pretty much in name only).

sigh

afaict for all the talk about madripoor attracting criminals from all over the world, there weren't even any Asians IN THE BACKGROUND. fuck this, there were so many ways they could've done this even a tiny bit better... starting with the damn weather.

also Southeast Asia looks very very different from East Asia - for a start, we're significantly browner. but sure it's cool that they finally made some concessions towards asian representation 23 movies in with a mostly east asian cast.

It’s not really a good look itt at the moment

afaict for all the talk about madripoor attracting criminals from all over the world, there weren't even any Asians IN THE BACKGROUND. fuck this, there were so many ways they could've done this even a tiny bit better... starting with the damn weather.

I don’t remember all the movies but there are asian actors in the Dr Strange one, iirc.

& Tilda Swinton

Roz FWIW I didn't mean to invalidate your concerns. I apologize if that's how it came across. If the people making these shows/movies choose to foreground real-world details that weren't as prominent in the comics, they can and should do better about how they represent those details.

best thing about this show so far was marvel’s decision to swap wandavision premiering before this.