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

Yeah the design sense throughout all the GOTG movies has been wonderful.

We took our 13 and 8 year old girls to see it. 13 was totally fine, but this is the first Marvel movie that troubled the 8 year old, which isn’t surprising. There was also a camera shot through a wound in a creature’s chest. There were a few gnarly parts, it definitively felt like Gunn was pushing things and maybe getting back to his Troma days.

What are they going to do, fire him from Marvel, etc etc I make joke

So we're watching everything in order with the kids, most of us seeing these things for the first time. We're halfway through Wandavision and loving it. It's hitting my Lynch pleasure center when the dialog becomes stilted and awkward and the laugh track stops. Are there any MCU television series that are not worth watching? So far we've liked everything we've seen except the big duds (Thor 2, Hulk, Iron Man 2).

The Disney ones are all solid, but Winter Soldier and Moon Knight might be the most skippable. The Netflix ones have their moments, but are often shockingly dark/violent. The best of the Disneys are Wanda, Loki, Ms. Marvel and She Hulk (those last three are also the most fun), but Hawkeye is kind of slept on as an almost self-contained adventure that nonetheless (re)introduces a few key characters.

I'm very positive about a lot of Marvel, don't dislike any of the movies, even liked Netflix' Iron Fist a lot (which most people consider the biggest dud), but Ms. Marvel is the one where even I would say that it's skippable. The main actress is good and it starts out fun but the story clumsily develops into nothing of interest. I also don't expect it to be necessary viewing for the Marvels either. But yes, be warned that the Netflix series are very dark and violent - also unnecessary for the MCU (and I can't recommend Jessica Jones S2 and S3 either, her character is permanently stuck in a place where it's harder and harder to sympathize with).

Falcon & Winter Soldier doesn't seem skippable to me. It follows up on movie themes and introduces characters like USAgent. It feels weaker than it should/could have been, but I found it an enjoyable series comfortably fitting inbetween movies.

Moon Knight might be skippable as it's self-contained, but I've heard more people naming it as the strongest MCU series.

We'll probably watch all the MCU shows then. The kids are def gonna want to watch Ms. Marvel. No interest in the Netflix stuff.

Ms Marvel is tonally different from a lot of them, not that dissimilar to the recent Spiderman movies. And with the Marvels movie imminent, probably a good character to get acquainted with.

Ms Marvel is great; Moon Knight also great… honestly i thought they were both refreshingly enjoyable against the somewhat familiar formula of other properties

“unique” does not equal “skippable” imo but ymmv

I was thinking of "skippable" as in, "if we skip this show, will we be lost watching future movies?". "WandaVision"? For sure. "Loki"? Possibly. "Ms. Marvel"? Looks like it. "Moon Knight"? Not so much, so far. Exception might be "She Hulk," which is also unique and seemingly stay alone (for far), but tons of fun.

But the shows are all solid at minimum.

My fave was Loki, wandavision was excellent, Winter Soldier and Hawkeye almost as good. This run of TV shows, out of what I've seen, has been better than the concurrently released films.

Moon Knight might be skippable because it's not really hooked into the "MCU" in general but it was really really good, so I don't recommend skipping it.

I feel like the last Dr Strange and Antman movies were skippable because they fucked up cool stuff from Wandavision and Loki

Yeah, I was wondering more if there were any total dogs in the pack.

I'm def watching She-Hulk because she is my comic book girlfriend. I'm reading all of the She-Hulk stuff; I'm almost done with the Byrne Fantastic Four when she was a member, then I start on the Byrne solo run. I have mixed feelings about Byrne but he sure does draw her well.

Meanwhile given everything:

https://gizmodo.com/marvel-thunderbolts-wonder-man-productions-pause-strike-1850478277

Of the ones I’ve seen: Loki and Wanda Vision both had some exceptionally strong episodes but whiffed their endings; F&WS was solidly enjoyable but the scripts didn’t give Stan & Mackie enough opportunities to be fun together; and Moon Knight didn’t reach the highs of Loki or Wanda, but tells a fun complete story, and Oscar Isaac has bags of charisma in the lead role(s). Haven’t seen the rest! I thought the She-Hulk opener was dire but I’ll give it another go

She-Hulk was fun but it was very light - an enjoyable lark.

I'm 10 years away from having seen either, so my memory's not great on why I feel that way. Iron Man 2 had Tony peeing in his suit and the dance-off with DJ AM (RIP), but Whiplash was fun. Iron Man 3 opened with Eiffel 65 in one of the most baffling soundtrack moves I've ever experienced, pointless Ben Kingsley fake-out, Pepper Pots gets a giant bunny, and there was something about plants? Maybe I'll watch them again sometime. Who knows.

― peace, man, Friday, May 5, 2023 12:42 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

Squeezed Iron Man 3 in today and yeah, it is so much worse.

• Completely forgot that it was a Christmas movie. Double-checked the release date and it came out in May - they couldn't even get "Christmas in July" right, for Christ's sake.
• Egregious version of Jingle Bells as Tony Stark dances his new Iron Man suit on.
• Stark tells an adorable child "Loved you in Christmas story, by the way." Har dee har har har.
• Stark encounters a second adorable moppet, who becomes his annoying sidekick for about ten minutes. At one point, Tony calls him a pussy!
• TV news camera guy totally fanboying out over Stark. Shows off Stark tattoo.
• Bad guy plans to publicly justify presidential assassination by saying it was in retaliation for an oil spill. Although that is not his actual motivation, it still plays into the bad-guy-as-ecoterrorist trope.
• Too Many Iron Mans at the end reminded me of my gripes about the last season of Mandalorian.
• Couldn't find a way to wrap up all the storylines, so they gave us several minutes of Stark voiceover at the end explaining to us what happened.
• Spy music over closing credits - why?

On rewatching Iron Man 2 a few weeks ago, the only other thing I had forgotten about that dragged it down for me was an Elon Musk cameo. He acquitted himself like a bumbling moron. I really liked everything else about it.

Completely forgot that it was a Christmas movie

did you see who is credited as writing and directing it

^^^

THANK youuu

is that a favreau trademark? christmas?

…you do know what one of his most famous movies is, I trust.

Chef?

No, Chelf

Just checked imdb and the only other Shane Black-related movie I've ever seen was Monster Squad.

Have yourself a merry little Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and The Nice Guys.

listen to sic, he speaks the truth

The family and I watched Wandavision and Loki. Wandavision started off terrific but once the Marvel machinery kicked in it became just okay. Agatha’s look was straight out of a Spirit Halloween store or something, very generic and not BAD enough. Color coordinated energy blasts, bleh.

Lokii didn’t start off as strong but kept getting better. I wish the ending was more of a self-contained thing instead of stage setting for the next Big Bad, but Kang was played so charismatically that it worked. Curious if the actor is going to rehabilitate his image fast enough to continue on with Marvel or if they’ll recast him. Given the multiverse aspect to his character, that seems like it would be the easiest option?

As a straight guy, I often don’t pay a lot of attention to guy’s looks, but Loki is extremely handsome in this, especially when he’s just in a suit.

It made me very happy anytime it cut to alligator Loki for a reaction shot. And Richard Grant as classic Loki!!!

Next up is Falcon and Winter Soldier.

Curious if the actor is going to rehabilitate his image fast enough to continue on with Marvel or if they’ll recast him.

i saw someone on twitter say he'd already been let go but I could find nothing to substantiate that. He was obv in Ant Man but that was shot ages ago (and maybe released before this situation occurred); he's slated to be in Loki season 2 which I don't know that they filmed yet; and the next Avengers movie revolves around him, apparently. No idea what they're going to do there. hard to see him coming back since, parallel with the arrest, an awful lot of former co-workers of his publicly stated he has always been a nightmare.

seems like it would be pretty easy to lampshade or whatever. this man is the imposter, blah blah blah. kind of like what they did with the Mandarin. you thought that was Kang but it was just some shape shifter God being, the real Kang is so much worse and he's coming for you.

Or they could just easily recast him, like they did with Iron Man's friend.

Given that within the multiverse there’s an alligator Loki, they could literally recast him with anyone, right? I haven’t seen Quantum-Mania, so I don’t know where that leaves off. But they could have a golden retriever play Kang.

Started Falcon & Winter Soldier tonight. Digging it so far.

I just became aware of the Mcu yesterday

Looking for something new to watch on Sundays now Succession is over?

Finally saw GOTG V3

Loved the Rocket storyline … overall pretty enjoyable. Soundtrack has really kinda gone off the rails at this point… like it’s still fun songs but pretty unfocused, it’s just an Everything Salad lol
but I did love the Rainbow & Alice Cooper was a fun drop

Sounds like less MCU coming: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/13/disney-cuts-back-on-marvel-star-wars-content.html

for sure, lots of delays/holds. Saw Shang Chi 2 might not be til 2026 or something.

With the actors going on strike too, it's probably going to be really thin calendars for a few years soon. But, good. Fuck the greedy asshole.

yeah, all these companies are going to use the strikes as a way to scale down their original programming

“Marvel is a great example of that. It had not been in the television business at any significant level, and not only did they increase their movie output, but they ended up making a number of TV series,” said Iger. “Frankly, it diluted focus and attention.”

Such a weird thing to say about a wing of your company that absolutely destroyed most box office records.

well, the movies did get significantly worse in the past few years

don't think the business wing cares as much about that.

Also I think it’s very much up for debate that the movies have gotten worse

The de-aged Samuel L Jackson in the TV series looks somehow better than in Capt Marvel.

the technology gets a little better every year

An interesting MCU side-effect is that when I dip into a recent Marvel TPB collection (as I do from time to time), the "stasis" of E-616 is startling... Tony's still alive, Natasha's still alive, everyone looks young... obviously the mainstream timeline was always like this (notwithstanding significant side-trips and fluctuations that almost always ended up reverting back to the mean), but it's thrown into contrast by the onscreen universe where actors age, characters die, etc.

Anyone watching Secret Invasion?

Is this the first time the shows have had some fairly significant plot points for the MCU?

I mean Maria Hill dying is maybe not that big a deal but Talos has had a pretty major role in recent films, so him being killed seems like a big thing to happen "off screen" for those that just watch the movies. (Although I'm still not convinced he's dead seeing as we've already had one fakeout this season with his daughter and that this is Marvel where numerous characters return after being killed).