Marvel Cinematic Universe by Slider_Quinn21 (Page 15 of 15)

It's fine to not like THE MARVELS, I was disappointed by the ongoing blankness of Carol's character and how the movie relied upon Brie Larson's charisma over an actual character arc, and there are numerous awkward dialogue patches such as the part where a planet losing all water is 'resolved' with a line about a science team working to resolve the matter. But a 105 minute movie is not a 150 minute movie. I don't take any issue with someone not enjoying a superhero girls' night, but THE MARVELS, whatever its faults, is a pretty short movie.

On the subject of a superhero girls' night, MADAME WEB is clearly at its strongest when it embraces that it's about a quartet of girlfriends (which is about 40 percent of the movie), and it's at its weakest when it fails to capitalize on the energy of its combined cast (which is about 60 percent). I thankfully did not pay to see MADAME WEB and putting the ticket on a gift card that my work supervisor gave me made me forgive most of its sins. If I'd paid a full $18.65 US dollars to watch this, I might have been angry.

MADAME WEB is, like VENOM and MOBIUS, Sony trying to mine its Spider-Man adjacent intellectual property, creating live-action Spider-Man spin-offs without having an actual live-action Spider-Man from which to spin-off. They keep hiring amazing talent for these films: Tom Hardy, Jared Leto are master thespians, and Dakota Johnson is an amazing performer. But the attempt to work around the absence of Spider-Man while tying into Spider-Man's mythology makes all of these Sony films very shaky and awkward.

Throughout MADAME WEB, there is an eerie forcefulness in director SJ Clarkson's flowing edits and camera movements that pull you into Cassie Webb's head as a psychic with a truly peculiar perspective of the present and the future, and a joyful camaraderie between the Spider-Girls, the teenaged Jessica Cornwall, Mattie Franklin and Anya Corazon, and the way they relate to Dakota Johnson's Cassie as their protector and overbearing sister. Johnson's performance as Cassie captures a hilarious frustated incredulity at her unlocked psychic abilities. There's a wonderful chemistry that the actresses achieve. It's a pleasure to enjoy their superhero girls' night with them.

But then there's the whole movie around them which is baffling. MADAME WEBB takes a quarter of the film to get Cassie and the kids together; the movie then has Cassie leave the kids somewhere else on two separate occasions, starving the film of the screentime needed to create meaningful relationships. The friendships are entirely dependent on the charisma of actresses Sydney Sweeney (Jessica), Isabela Merced (Anya) and Celeste O'Connor (Mattie); the script barely does anything to establish their bond.

There's the way in which the Spider-Man mythology is undermined. MADAME WEB is half-heartedly set in 2003, featuring payphones, Blockbuster, lack of easy access to the internet, limited use of satellite, barely any internet-connected cameras. The only reason for this seems to be to justify why the villain has so much trouble locating the protagonists, and MADAME WEB declares that it's set at least a decade before Spider-Man debuts.

However, the villain of MADAME WEB is Ezekiel Simms (Tahar Rahim), who murdered his way to stealing a mystical spider from Peru that grants him enhanced strength and agility, the ability to transfer toxic venom from his body into victims, and the ability to stick to walls and ceilings. Simms wears a Spider-Man-esque costume... so what we have here is the iconography of Spider-Man being pre-dated by a villain. Peter Parker is no longer the creator of Spider-Man's costume, but a mimic and an imitator. I don't understand why Sony would undermine Peter Parker this way.

The Ezekiel Simms character is extremely murky. We never get a good look at his evil-Spider-Man costume. His powers are apparently stolen (by stealing the spider) from a remote tribe in Peru that lives in the wild and has Spider-Man's powers (although we only really meet one member of this tribe and he exists only for exposition). The movie never explains Ezekiel's wealth and influence or how stealing a spider led to his superpowers. The movie has Ezekiel having prophetic dreams of being killed in the heat of combat by older versions of Jessica, Anya and Mattie who have spider-powers; we never find out how the spider-girls get their powers (the movie ends before it happens) or why they will be fighting Ezekiel in the future.

I'm not sure about some of the changes to the source material. Ezekiel in the comics was a sometimes-friend/sometimes-enemy of Peter Parker; he's been made totally malevolent here. Jessica Carpenter (the second Spider-Woman in the comics) has become Jessica Cornwall. I do think it's good that Mattie Franklin, white in the comics, was cast by the Black and spectacularly fun Celeste O'Connor. Cassandra Web in the comics is much older than Dakota Johnson.

At the halfway mark, the movie loses its grip on its story of an adult woman and three girls bonding in a crazy situation, but regains it for the finale setpieces. However, the film really does not capitalize well enough on Cassie Webb's precognitive powers. The TV show THE DEAD ZONE excelled in its first two seasons at having psychic Johnny Smith see deadly futures and then attempt to rearrange items, people, positions, and situations to avert horrific outcomes.

MADAME WEB has two instances where Cassie uses her powers in with some DEAD ZONE-esque cleverness, but aside from that, Cassie just uses her powers to know where to run away with the girls. The final action sequence gives up entirely on Cassie's precognitive powers and just has Cassie suddenly manifest remote projection and telekinesis rather than attempting something more creative.

SJ Clarkson strikes me as a terrific director; Dakota Johnson strikes me as brilliant actress and both have wrung something superficially enjoyable out of what seems to me like a very poorly developed screenplay. MADAME WEB seems like a weird car crash of six different screenplays written by its six different screenwriters.

There's the story of Dakota Johnson's Cassie Webb discovering she can see the future, there is the story of three teenaged girls being hunted by a spider-themed supervillain, there is the story of a prequel lead-in to Peter Parker, there is the story of a Peruvian tribe of spider-powered humans, there is the story of three superheroines developing spider-powers; there is the story of three teen superheroines led by an adult psychic. Then there's whatever revisions SJ Clarkson made as this was filmed.

All seem to collide into a movie that is deeply confused about what story it is telling, except when it features Dakota Johnson, Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Mercad, and Celeste O'Connor in the same scene on their superhero girls' night. Those are the only scenes where MADAME WEB feels like a movie instead of test footage for a peculiar brand development exercise from Sony as they try to make something profitable out of ancillary, Spider-Man adjacent properties (Madame Web, Spider-Woman, Spider-Girl, Arana, Ezekiel, etc.).

I do not think there is anything to stop Sony from making another Tobey Maguire or Andrew Garfield movie, but it might make Marvel disinclined to contribute their services for the Marvel Cinematic Universe SPIDER-MAN films and it might split Sony's resources in opposing directions.

My understanding is that the contract between Marvel and Sony puts Marvel in the lead position for handling the Tom Holland Spider-Man creatively; Sony gets 75 percent of the gross from the movies in exchange for Marvel having 90 to 100 percent control of the Tom Holland version of the character... and Marvel doesn't want the Tom Holland version of Spider-Man in a non-Marvel Cinematic Universe film because they have no say or control over those.

Sony had Holland film one day on the first VENOM movie and Marvel asked Sony to take out the scene and not do that again, and I have to think the legal arrangement meant Sony had to comply.

However, Sony was free to make INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE and ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE without Marvel and feature Donald Glover in a cameo. I don't think there's any contractual restriction on Sony making non-Marvel Studios Spider-Man films, which would mean that Sony could absolutely rehire Maguire or Garfield for SPIDER-MAN IV or THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN III. But they probably don't see the point of competing with a Marvel Studios-directed Spider-Man film for which Sony gets 75 percent of the money.

From what I can tell, Sony doesn't want to lose the film rights to Spider-Man, and to keep it, they are required to periodically make a movie that uses the Spider-Man rights. Every three years and nine months, they have to start production on a Spider-related film; every five years and nine months, they have to release a Spider-related film to theatres. This Spider-related film does not have to be titled Spider-Man or feature Spider-Man in order to meet this legal requirement. The film just has to use some portion of the Spider-Man intellectual property.

If they do not do this, the Spider-Man film rights revert back to Marvel. FOX failed to get a Daredevil movie off the ground and the rights reverted back to Marvel.

Sony won't allow that. And the Tom Holland film series with Marvel was viewed as a temporary arrangement that could end or see its films delayed as Marvel has other superheroes besides Spider-Man. Sony has made VENOM, MORBIUS, VENOM II, MADAME WEB and KRAVEN and PETER PARKER'S NEXT DOOR NEIGHBOR'S DENTIST in order to ensure they can hang onto the Spider-Man film rights even if Marvel ends the arrangement or fails to get the next Tom Holland film off the ground by the three years and nine months deadline.

The animated SPIDER-VERSE films, while critically acclaimed and successful without Marvel, take many years to make and could have missed the 69 month release deadline. In contrast, MADAME WEB was shot in five months. The live action Sony films are not creative endeavours as much as contractual requirements to extend the corporation's grip on an intellectual property.

Yes Amanda is a gas.  The actors confusing Sony with the Disney MCU is quite funny.  Madame Web I think falls victim to exactly what  Marvel is suffering, which is that these obscure characters and off shoots, created by comic scribes because they were writing dozens of books a year and needed content, is not ideal.  Especially when you are missing what they had back then, the principle characters!

Her editing skills are impressive, and coming up with jokes is not easy.

She also pointed out how several actors who worked Sony "Marvel" movies had no idea they weren't working for Disney/Marvel, including Matt Smith.  Not unique to Dakota, who has been whining during the entire press tour.  Dakota Johnson is a lousy actress, and is not capable of carrying a film.  The rising star was Sydney Sweeney, who was not the lead and probably should have been.

It's like Sony has two alternate personalities. The first personality wants to make high quality, culture-redefining work like INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE and ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE, two epic animated films. The second personality wants to make glorified direct to streaming filler for release schedules and doesn't really care about the content as long as it maintains some hold on the film rights.

I think Sony has made two Spider-Verse films featuring Miles Morales and has no reason to undermine or dilute his brand with a live action film when the animated features are so successful.

I think Ben Reilly is too convoluted for a general audience, but VENOM, VENOM II, MORBIUS and MADAME WEB have pretty baffling plots. My sense is that while Sony had some care and concern for the Venom films, MORBIUS and MADAME WEB were just hacked out for Sony to maintain the film rights to Spider-Man in case the next Marvel film runs late (which it is) and the next Spider-Verse movie is delayed (which it is).

I don't think Sony really cares if their live action Spider-Man-adjacent films are successful. They're just making them to keep the Spider-Man film rights.

I've only ever seen Sydney Sweeney in the cancelled-on-a-soft-cliffhanger EVERYTHING SUCKS where she was very much playing the blonde bombshell: flirty, ostentatious, glamourous, hypersexual, but with a lot of hidden depths. Basically a female Jerry O'Connell. I was fascinated to see Sweeney cast as a very restrained, geeky, nerdy, internally-oriented character in MADAME WEB. It's interesting to compare Sweeney and Jerry's approaches to playing a geeky character when they themselves are not geeky.

Jerry's approach was to play Quinn as highly excitable regarding engineering and science, and highly aloof and uncertain when dealing with human vulnerability. Jerry gives Quinn a hyperanalytical presence in the face of danger and problem solving and a certain world weariness in his body language.

Sydney Sweeney has an interesting and equally valid approach: she lets the costuming do all the acting for her. Sweeney in MADAME WEB is wearing a reddish-brown wig that is so heavy on her head that it's clearly weighing her down and adding an unbalanced awkwardness to her body language. Sweeney is wearing non-prescription glasses in the role and they dim Sweeney's eyes and she seems to peer through them uncertainly. Sweeney is wearing a buttoned up to the neck shirt, a hoodie and knee-high stockings and they seem to restrict her arms and legs and force her into very enclosed and guarded postures.

I guess that's one way.

My thinking: Ben's superhero identity is as the Scarlet Spider, and the Scarlet Spider costume is a torn and ripped up hoodie on a makeshift bodysuit. It looks like Ben stole clothes to throw the outfit together. If Sony made a SCARLET SPIDER movie, maybe Ben Reilly wouldn't be a clone of Peter Parker or have any connection to Peter at all. Instead, he's a homeless man who encounters a Spider-Verse style 'glitch' and a box of damaged Spider-equipment falls into his hands along with a damaged Spider-costume.

The equipment and costume let Ben use spider-powers through the technology of the suit. The homeless Ben uses the equipment and costume (with stolen clothes to make up some of what's missing) to try to steal food from a closed bakery only to accidentally uncover and expose a money laundering operation from a criminal gang called the Sindicate, with his spider-agility and stingers and spider-strength. Ben finds a list of Sindicate safehouses and tries to steal enough money to get a motel room while he figures out his next move, but ends up destroying them and becoming infamous to the underworld as the Scarlet Spider scourge of the Sindicate and its operations, while also being hunted by police for vigilantism.

The entire city thinks Ben is some sort otherworldly force of violence and superhuman power... but the Scarlet Spider is a fragile, troubled, traumatized homeless man who does not have a family home for sanctuary or an Aunt May to take care of him or an Uncle Ben to model morality for him or a science background to guide him. He isn't Peter Parker. He is not Spider-Man. He may not even have what it takes to be the Scarlet Spider. Can he rise to the occasion?

My thinking is to look at the aesthetic of the Scarlet Spider costume and make Ben Reilly the homeless superhero.

I watched Madame Web.  It wasn't great, but I do think something good was hidden.  Spoilers if anyone cares:

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Okay so Madame Web is convoluted and stupid and no one in the movie (the actors or the characters) seems to want to be there.  But I think some of the ideas in the movie really work. 

Ezekiel Sims is a dumb character, but the *idea* of Ezekiel Sims works.  He's an evil Spider-Man.  We are used to a Spider-Man who is good and willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, but he's also a guy who pulls his punches can hide in the shadows and drop on you from hundreds of feet in the air. 

What if that guy was a bad guy, and there was no Spider-Man so save you?  And what if vague future powers were the only thing that could save you?  In fact, no one gets super powers to save the day.  I think there's something there.  I think the movie just doesn't lean into this concept enough.  If it had focused on being a horror movie, I think it could've been good.  I also think maybe you just focus on one Spider-Woman.  Maybe kick up the gore in the scenes where Cassie doesn't save someone.

And since all the actors have talked about the bait and switch they all seemed to have experienced, I wonder if that was originally the plan.  You can see the bones of something different when you watch it.

Nando v Movies did a video about all the ADR in the movie that I haven't watched yet.  I'm hoping he has some answers on what it could've been.

I'll take my coke when I move to Canada.

Didn't you originally write a long post about Deadpool and Wolverine?  Maybe you just started with "I saw Deadpool and Wolverine" and I jumped out.  Let me talk briefly about the X-Men and then get into Deadpool and Wolverine, which I saw last night.

Timeline Stuff

I think Days of Future Past is a really cool movie.  I think I love the concept of the movie more than the movie itself, but I think it's cool that they had these prequel characters that everyone loved and they tied it together with these later versions people already loved.  And they tied it together with this mostly-immortal character that everyone universally loved.  I know it isn't fully comic accurate, but I think it makes a lot of sense.  Wolverine was alive in both periods and could be the bridge.

And because it's a cool idea, I'm willing to suspend my belief that McAvoy and Stewart are the same guy.  I think the problem with Days of Future Past is that they didn't stop there.  Like Logan is a great ending for Wolverine, I think Days of Future Past could've been a great ending to X-Men.  I understand striking while the iron is hot with the First Class cast and grabbing characters like McKellen and Stewart while they're still young-ish, but I wonder if they should've done a trilogy of "young X-Men" films set in the 60s and 70s and finished with Days of Future Past.

You know me, loving glut in movies, but it actually might've been cool to have parallel movies setting up Days of Future Past.  A trilogy of "First Class" movies setting up Sentinels in the background, and a post-apocalyptic movie with Sentinels taking out mutants.  Give the older cast one more solo movie to set this movie up, now that interest was re-ignited in the X-Men and give fans an Empire Strikes Back moment where the heroes lose.  Show the young cast setting up a world where mutants can thrive and show the older cast showing a world where it all falls apart.  Then, Days of Future Past can hit the ground running without any exposition.  But that might've been too much.

Because I think you can suspend your belief that the characters will age to look like their "original trilogy" selves, and maybe there are some suspensions of belief that can happen.  Maybe there are two characters named Emma that have diamond powers.  Maybe there were Cyclops-looking mutants in the 60s that weren't Scott Summers.  Maybe there are two guys named Bolivar Trask that look completely different.

I'm willing to throw all the hate on Apocalypse and Dark Phoenix for taking it to the extreme and bringing the timelines too close together.  It's fun to do period pieces in the 80s and 90s but if they wanted to move to a younger version of the cast, they should've just stayed in the 60s.

The X-Men Films

In anticipation of Deadpool and Wolverine, I watched three movies: Deadpool 2 (I've seen the first Deadpool multiple times but I'd only seen 2 once), Logan, and First Class.  For the rest of the movies, I watched summaries on YouTube.  And while I've seen every entry in the series, I don't know how many times I've sat down and watched most of these films a second time.  There were swaths of the movies that I didn't remember.  The original trilogy has been on cable TV for most of my life, and I've seen bits and pieces here and there.  But that's about it.

The original trilogy feels of its time, dated in a way.  The Wolverine Origins movie is fun in places but pretty bad.  The Wolverine is really good but also very forgettable.  The last two McAvoy movies are bad and forgettable.  New Mutants was just nothing.  So to me, this is a series with some real high points but a lot of low points.  I think the three movies I watched were all really good.  The ones I skipped could probably be skipped for a reason.

At the same time, you can't really skip stuff.  The podcast The Weekly Planet noted how funny it would be if you'd watched the Wolverine solo trilogy (Origins, The Wolverine, and Logan) and that's it.  It's one character who literally progresses from youth to death in three movies, but it would be nonsense.  It's a solo trilogy that depends on you knowing characters that don't appear in any of the movies of the trilogy.  You have to have seen The Last Stand for The Wolverine to make sense.  And Professor X makes cameos in the first two movies without any real clarity on who he is, and then he's one of the most important characters in Logan.  There's an end-credits scene in The Wolverine that gets followed up in a different movie.  If you don't see that movie, two characters you don't know show up and warn Logan about an apocalypse that happens off screen, I guess.

Even just tonally, it would be bizarre.  One is a full-on action movie.  The Wolverine is about a man trying to understand his place in the world.  Logan is an R-rated movie about a man who has lost everything.

So even the forgetful entries are important if you want the whole picture.  And while not as successful, there are more X-Men films than Star Wars films.  It's a huge series of films that technically all tie together.  It's impressive.

Deadpool lives in his own space

Deadpool is hard to categorize.  I think it wants to fit in, but I think Deadpool has to live in his own space.  Not only because Wade breaks the fourth wall but because its a comedy.  The scene from Deadpool 2 breaks continuity but it's a sight gag solely for the audience.  I think it's a little bizarre that they went with Colossus in the first place, but I guess you could still argue that those are two characters with similar powers and the exact same name?

Then there's the weird stuff.  I'm not sure how Deadpool's powers work.  He knows he's in a movie (or a comic book) and can talk to the audience.  He's aware that other characters are played by actors, and he's even aware that he's played by an actor named Ryan Reynolds.  Knowing that is one thing.  But has he "seen" X-Men First Class or is he just supernaturally aware that it exists?  Did he see Logan, or does he just somehow know what happened?  Does he gets some sort of pop culture data dump of movies that the audience has seen?  Or can he pop into the Fourth Wall Cinema and actually see these movies?  And when he has the music box of dead Logan from Logan, is that real?  Or just inside Wade's head.

I'll get into a little more in Deadpool and Wolverine spoilers

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Continuing on with Wade's powers...I think (but I don't know if this is consistent) that no one can hear Wade's fourth wall comments.  Either Wade doesn't say them out loud, or whatever he does say out loud makes sense in context.  Because no characters ever react to them.  When Wade is asking which version of the Professor he's going to see or asks Cable about the DC universe, no one ever stops to question what the heck Wade is talking about.  So I have to assume he's either saying nothing or saying something the characters wouldn't think anything less of.  Maybe he's whining something else to Colossus or accusing Cable of having bad breath or something.

But Cassandra Nova gets inside Wade's head.  Couldn't she see whatever is going on?  I think an interesting subplot for Deadpool and Wolverine could've been Cassandra trying to harness whatever fourth wall power that Deadpool has.  I'm assuming, in universe, that she might've just assumed they were the rumblings of a maniac.  But it's hard to say.

Deadpool MCU Chaos

One interesting scene at the beginning of the movie happens when Wade interviews with Happy Hogan to join the Avengers.  It's a funny scene that's played for both laughs and seriousness.  Wade is silly but Happy takes the process seriously.  But how did Wade get there?  Deadpool 2 implies that Wade can somehow travel in time back to our world so did he use the Cable time travel device to travel to the MCU?

The movie doesn't explain and doesn't seem to care.  It also doesn't quite explain why Wade has a change of heart later in the movie.  If he had been accepted into the MCU, would he have taken his friends with him?  Or would he have left them all behind?  Or does he truly only care about Vanessa, who he would've brought with him?  Would he have been okay leaving his other friends in their universe if it meant that they got to live?  The movie doesn't really say.

General movie thoughts

- Overall I really liked it.  Very fun.  Very funny.  Good payoffs.  I think Chris Evans is an underrated actor because he has a completely different posture as Johnny and Steve.  Even when it was implied that Evans was Cap, it didn't feel like Cap.  I thought that was a little underrated.  I also appreciated that I got some payoff from watching 50+ movies in these combined series, whether it be from cameos or easter eggs or whatever.

- I've never seen Elektra.  I think that was the only film that I hadn't seen.  I obviously haven't seen the Channing Tatum Gambit film, but duh.  I was surprised that Deadpool didn't comment on the fact that Tatum's movie never came out.  I also assume that Tatum's accent was awkward on purpose, but it got me thinking what Tatum's Remy accent would've actually been.

- I'm actually a little surprised that there weren't more cameos.  Like with Multiverse of Madness, I was led to believe there would be more cameos so I left a little disappointed.  Unless I missed something, Azazel was the only character from the First Class series to show up.  I think Pyro and Sabretooth were the only original trilogy characters to show up.  Neither version of Scott or Storm or Jean or Mystique or Charles or Magneto or Beast.  Only Johnny from either version of the Fantastic Four.  Neither version of Daredevil.  Some of these characters were referenced but didn't show up.  I get that the movie budget was $200 million, but I'm still surprised.  Some of these actors were certainly available and could've done a quick appearance.  I wasn't upset - just a little surprised.

- I did like the love letter to all the movies in the credits, including some of the smaller or forgotten movies.

- I was a little surprised they allowed the "there will only be one Blade" joke.  Not because Feige would censor Reynolds but because that one had to sting.

- I was a little surprised that Lady Deadpool didn't take off her mask, and I'm a little surprised that Deadpool didn't reference that it was Blake Lively.

- One of the few references I didn't get was all the alternate Deadpools since I'm not super familiar with the comic version of the character.

- I'm very surprised that Deadpool stayed in his own space.  I thought, for sure, that they'd end up in the MCU universe, and I'm a bit shocked that they left him where he was.  It does sort of feel like the end of the character (although you gotta think he shows up in Secret Wars).  At the same time, I guess it makes sense.  I think Reynolds wants to come back and could play this movie a bunch more, but even in Secret Wars, I don't know how the character works.  Would we really want him to break the Fourth Wall in an Avengers movie?  And would a PG-13 version of the character even make sense in an Avengers movie except as a sight gag?  So does it make sense for the next movie (if there is one) to just be a Wade solo movie?  Or maybe it's another buddy film where someone else stumbles into Wade's universe and goes on an adventure?  Spider-Man would be fun, but I assume that would be a rights nightmare.  Wade and another version of Johnny would be fun.  Maybe Wade and another fourth wall breaker in She-Hulk?  Or just bring back Cable and do the X-Force movie.  I just think this would be hard to top.

- After all the Hawkeye jokes, I wish he would've been giving the interview.  Although more Favreau is good.

- So is X-23 the one from Logan?  It was implied, but I really don't know.

- I guess it's also official that Logan is in the Deadpool universe?  Is it possible that Logan and Deadpool is in the same universe but that the rest of the X-Men series is in a separate one?  Deadpool obviously references mutants and the X-Men.  Russell could've been born before the last mutant had been born and there are no mutant kids in the rest of the Deadpool movies (I don't think?).  No one talks about it so maybe it happened that way?  I prefer for Logan to be its own thing, but I don't think it breaks too much if it was just Logan and Deadpool and everything else was separate?

- I was pretty proud of myself.  I went into this movie fairly blind.  I saw parts of the first trailer (the Super Bowl one) but I didn't see any of the subsequent trailers.  I didn't watch any of the TV spots (except when they popped on before I could change it).  I accidentally saw some of the more widely-spread set pictures (Logan and Deadpool fighting in front of the Fox marquee, obviously Logan in his yellow costume, etc).  But I avoided hearing about a bunch of the cameos, even though I could've guessed.  And that might've played into my expectations to see more.

- All in all, I really liked it.  I thought it was fun, had some good action, some good jokes, and was worth the wait.  I don't know if it means that the MCU is back because it feels like such a one-off thing.  I'm also a little surprised they didn't set anything up with the movie (new actor playing Wolverine, any mutant thing in the MCU, new Fantastic Four, etc) but I could see how it might be weird to have this movie fairly separated from the MCU and then tease anything legitimately connected.

So MCU is steaming forward with what I still say is a completely unsellable franchise, The Fantastic Four.  Their powers are so outdated and dumb, including the villain, and THIS is the mini-franchise you're pinning the next two years on?  RDJ's turn as Dr. Doom will be lame, as it will be very difficult for the audience NOT to view him as Tony Stark.  Not to mention the insane money he's being paid.  Can the Russo brothers truly save this mess?  Thunderbolts looks buffoonish.

That's an opinion. The actual reality: any concept is sellable.

It's all a matter of how a creator uses the concept, how the creator infuses it with relevance, topicality, imagination, emotion, characterization, and meaning. There is no such thing as a bad idea or an outdated idea or a dumb idea, just an idea that is misused, misapplied or unfulfilled.

For a practical example: the average person may think the steam engine is "outdated" and "dumb" in the twenty-first century. While that use case is dated, the ideas within steam energy remain essential: steam transfers heat to spin turbine blades in any modern power plant; it's essential for food processing; it creates vacuum conditions to test orbital components for satellites. Steam maintains uniform temperature in pipelines, dries concrete and stores thermal energy.

If we enjoyed any canned food recently, it was batch-sanitized in a pressure cooker using steam. If we are using electricity, we are depending on a modern power plant which, whether nuclear or oil or coal, turns water into steam for turbine rotation and electrical generation.

I concede: this discussion isn't about steam. It's about the Fantastic Four and responding to the remark: "... a completely unsellable franchise, The Fantastic Four. Their powers are so outdated and dumb."

Well, the Fantastic Four's concept is that they are a family of superheroes. This concept of the superhero family has in fact proven to be current, clever and extremely profitable: THE INCREDIBLES (2004) is a movie about a superhero family: it is one of the greatest movies ever made both in terms of writing, performance and visual realization. THE INCREDIBLES (2018) grossed $1.2 billion worldwide. The family of superheroes concept is extremely sellable.

The Fantastic Four's powers are only outdated if they are used in an outdated way, and they don't have to be. Reed Richards' power of stretching any part of his physiology means that he can stretch his brain, rework his organs and adapt to any physical threat or intellectual challenge.

Sue Storm's power is to bend energy: she casts energy fields that can manipulate seemingly any form of energy whether to deflect or refract or convert: that energy includes light, gravity, force, and potentially more. The invisibility is merely the most immediate application of her ability.

Johnny Storm's power is to manipulate combustion: the capacity to control thermodynamics means control of any chemical reaction. It means the ability to control cell biology, equilibrium and momentum, and any aspect of internal or external chemistry.

Ben Grimm's superstrength is less scientifically complex, but his appearance has made him an icon of body dysmorphia, an extremely present and relevant concern as society becomes more aware of transgender identity and rights.

The Fantastic Four's powers are not outdated or dumb. However, a person's creative application of their powers might be narrow, unimaginative, limited, myopic, small and closed-minded.

An unimaginative person might reduce Reed to stretching instead of contemplating his tensile biology and intellect and the applications of tractable physiology (like adjusting his lungs to breathe oxygen in water or to convert himself to a fluid form). They might see Sue only as an invisible girl instead of exploring her ability to bend and refract light and other forms of energy (such as turning light into force and blades or sound into momentum and gravitational lift).

They might see Johnny as a fire-defined superhero instead of considering the power of remote control of chemical reactions (where someone with this power could make someone suffocate by reversing cellular respiration or electrocute them by converting the body's chemical energy into electrical power).

They might see Ben as an aggressive rock monster instead of a symbol of feeling at odds with your own body.

Tim Story's FANTASTIC FOUR movies were adequate but lacking in imagination. Josh Trank's FANTASTIC FOUR movie failed critically and financially, but it was not an example of the concept being "outdated", "dumb" or "unsellable"; it was an example of how it was foolish for a studio to film a movie with a script that was not only unfinished but written for a budget that the studio reduced mere days before production began.

That's an opinion based on speculation; until there is an actual movie to watch, it is a presumptive assumption.

Here's an objective truth: Robert Downey Jr. is widely regarded as the greatest living actor of his generation. He is beloved. Now he wants to take on the challenge of being hated in the role of Dr. Doom. A doubtful person may feel the audience won't see him as anyone Stark. I say that the master thespian is eager for the challenge.

Could he fail? Of course. But Robert Downey Jr. has failed at many things and most things in his life, and his success in recent decades has been an interesting fourth act after many disasters. If he fails... I'd still be interested to see him do that.

Here's another objective truth: the Marvel FANTASTIC FOUR could certainly turn out "outdated" or "dumb" or "unsellable". Projects can fall short. But if the film turns out to be "outdated", "dumb" or "unsellable", it won't be due to the underlying concept of a superhero family.

No character or concept is 'unsellable'; it's merely that creators may sometimes fail to sell it because their approach did not fully explore the inherent possibilities in a compelling way, or because their approach was out of step with the viewing climate of the era, or because their storytelling craft was impaired, or because the marketing department sold it to an unreceptive audience.

I encourage people to never think of ideas as too old or stupid or useless, especially your own. What's "outdated", "dumb" or "unsellable" is more likely the attitude of the person rather than the idea itself.

Ideas are not good or bad in themselves; it is how they are applied and executed that should be evaluated. Even the idea of fascism is valuable; if we read MEIN KAMPF with the right mindset, we can learn to identify and battle authoritarianism and hatred.

I will end by noting that anyone on this board is quite keen on a certain quantum quartet, a makeshift family of science heroes, and the Fantastic Four are genre-defining science heroes. Quinn, Wade, Rembrandt and Arturo look on in respectful envy at Reed, Sue, Johnny and Ben.

I am super-behind and need to watch ECHO before I get to AGATHA. And I am currently knee-deep in a SMALLVILLE rewatch. But I'll get to it!

Interesting, you didn't feel like it was a completed first season?  There's certainly more to the story but I didn't feel like it cut off in the middle of a season.  I would expect this story to either get picked up in a second season of Agatha or maybe something like the Vision show or Young Avengers.

What If is both an interesting show and a hugely missed opportunity in my head.  I think the stories they told were interesting, and I'm glad the show exists.  But it's a little crazy what it decided to be when it could've been so many other things.

To me, What If should've been specific to things that happened in the MCU.  I would've liked to have seen different takes on stories that the MCU told, and I don't think we got nearly enough of that.  Maybe take one of the movies and change out the ending.  Something like "what if the other half had been snapped?" or "What if Captain Marvel never left Earth?" or "What if Ultron had worked?"

Instead, they did a lot of "what if this character was here?" or "What if this character was this other character instead?" Which is fine and I think worked most of the time.  And I think they told interesting Marvel stories but not necessarily MCU stories.  I know they wanted to create their own characters and craft their own stories, but I just think it was a missed opportunity to follow divergent paths that the movies didn't take.

The more I think about it, the more it would just end up being "What if the battle with Thanos was changed by X" but they didn't even do that once!

I would have loved seeing some of these ideas in the What If... series. I thought it was a little repetitive, but it was still enjoyable. The whole point of what if, though, is to explore how different outcomes could have happened with different choices, right?

I would love it if, after the new Sliders reboot if they do one, if they could do a Sliders What If that expands on this concept but actually executes the ideas you discussed. That would be pretty cool.

I would enjoy a what if spinoff of other shows, too. Like Star Trek: TNG. Or Star Trek: Lower Decks.

Something like this?

Possible episodes in 10-episode season format:

Marvel's What-If Season Something Or Other:

Episode 1: Thanos's Goal: What If Thanos Didn't Get the Infinity Stones?
Episode 2: Gamora's Destiny: What If Thanos Did Not Destroy Her Home Planet?
Episode 3: The Death of Tony Stark: What If Tony Stark Didn't Die in Avengers: Endgame?
Episode 4: Loki's Childhood: What If Loki Remained Part of Jotunnheim?
Episode 5: The Missingvengers: What If The Avengers Never Existed?
Episode 6: Dr. Strangeverse: What If Dr. Strange Didn't Have His Car Accident That Night?
Episode 7: Quinn Mallory meets Tony Stark: A Sliders and Marvel-verse Crossover (this episode would actually turn out to be linked to a malfunction of the time machine Tony Stark created in Avengers: Endgame)
Episode 8: Black Widow's Bite: What If Natasha Romanoff Did Not Become Friends with The Hulk?
Episode 9: Tony Stark's Loss: What If Pepper Died Instead of Becoming Infected with Extremis?
Episode 10: Thanos's Change of Heart: What If Thanos Decided Not to Attack The Statesman and The Asgardians Survived?

This is intriguing. FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN is a full-fledged WHAT IF series. What if Norman Osborn were Peter's mentor instead of Tony Stark? All it's missing is a Watcher voiceover about the prism of endless possibility.

Very interesting article on why FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN isn't in the MCU: the original plan was to set the series during the MCU Peter's first year of high school, which I think would have to be before the events of the CIVIL WAR movie. This proved impossible and untenable, and I think it's because the time frame didn't allow this version of the show to tell any significant stories with the character. And I guess it was impossible to set the series after NO WAY HOME without treading on the ground of the next MCU Spider-Man film... so they made it a WHAT IF series without the branding.

https://comicbookmovie.com/spider_man/s … #gs.jl8j1h

**

I am on the third episode of WHAT IF and... there was nothing to prevent a Red Guardian/Winter Soldier storyline in the main MCU continuity. I'm once again not sure what makes this third episode a WHAT IF, just like the first two episodes of the third season.

Sorry to hear about the spoilers. While I personally don't care about spoilers, a lot of people do and more importantly, Marvel has portrayed themselves as very concerned with spoilers: fake trailer shots, special effects as decoys, threatening Tom Holland... which makes their indifference for THUNDERBOLTS alarming. THUNDERBOLTS may be a lower budgeted project that doesn't have the money to do all the spoiler camouflaging, however, which may be why you're seeing things get spoiled that more expensive Marvel films would obscure.

**

I finished ECHO. My God, that show was boring. Even at five episodes, Echo wanders around her hometown doing nothing much, and when the Kingpin appears, she reiterates that she is done with him... which she already conveyed exhaustively in HAWKEYE when she shot him in the face. What was the point of this show?

**

I finished WHAT IF and I honestly found Season 3 to be weak and boring. With the exception of the two part finale, none of the episodes seemed to present vital or meaningful stories, and so many of them like a Shang Chi/Kate Bishop teamup or a Howard/Darcy relationship could have just been done in the main universe, despite some shifts in setting. I thought it was also very odd that Riri Williams, who only appeared in the BLACK PANTHER sequel, got a whole episode of focus; we barely know the prime Riri, so showing an alternate version isn't very meaningful.

I'm not sure what went wrong here, but I think it's best that the show take a break for now, even if it was good to see Peggy Carter back in action for two episodes.

**

I just got back from CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD... and there honestly isn't a lot that's new and very little that's brave. It's basically a higher budgeted episode of THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER and despite some flairs of excitement and some good jokes, it comes off as bland, empty product that, in its political leanings, is naively out of date and utterly out of touch.

Were Marvel movies always like this? Were they always nothing more than functional, passable spectacle if Robert Downey Jr. wasn't there to ad-lib? Were they always formulaic, vacant filler when fake feminist Joss Whedon wasn't there to punch up the scripts? It seems to me that Marvel movies are and always have been product, but sometimes, that product was elevated by vision, and when the director of a Marvel film is just executing the formula, it comes off as product.

I guess I have always thought of the Marvel movies as like instant ramen noodles. Instant ramen fine on its own, but instant ramen is vastly improved by visionaries adding in fresh vegetables, eggs, meat, and even possibly replacing the instant ramen itself with fresh noodles. Movies like the GUARDIANS trilogy, WINTER SOLDIER, RAGNAROK, ENDGAME and BLACK WIDOW replaced the ramen; movies like CIVIL WAR, CAPTAIN MARVEL, THE MARVELS, all the ANT MAN films added fresh ingredients. But CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD is just the ramen.

Also...

SPOILERS

I don't understand why they told this story of the Leader and Red Hulk and Thunderbolt Ross and Betty Ross in a CAPTAIN AMERICA film. These elements and this plot are all a Hulk story, except Mark Ruffalo doesn't appear in this film and Marvel doesn't have the distribution rights to do Hulk-titled films. What we have here is a Hulk storyline that for some reason features Sam Wilson instead of Bruce Banner at the center of it. It's very much a square peg in a round hole, much like TITANS trying to do an adaptation of UNDER THE RED HOOD but removing Bruce Wayne and using Dick Grayson because the rights for Dick were easier to acquire.

What is the point of making a Hulk storyline the center of a Captain America film? Captain America fans will be disappointed at not receiving a Cap story; Hulk fans will be disappointed that the Hulk isn't even in this film.

One would have hoped that Sam Wilson's feature film as Captain America would feature a story written for Sam instead of one that seems written for Bruce Banner but with Bruce removed and replaced with Sam for rights and legal reasons.

Of 35 Marvel movies, I think I have only disliked three -- IRON MAN II (meandering tedium setting up future movies), CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER (where it feels like Cap only spent a week fighting in WWII) and CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD (bland product that seems especially out of touch in 2025). Unlike a lot of people, I loved ANT MAN III, ETERNALS, THE MARVELS, THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER and my dislike for recent Marvel product has been the blandness of THE FALCON series, the pointlessness of SECRET INVASION and the tedium of ECHO. Creatively, I think the recent run of movies has been terrific...

And yet, I concede that there has been a lack of headliners. In the earlier phases, the films were clear: these movies are about Iron Man, Thor and Captain America. Ever since ENDGAME, it's been unclear who the A-list is: the last THOR film was likely the last for awhile; Tony Stark is dead; Steve Rogers is retired; Spider-Man is A-list in the real world but a minor hero in the actual Marvel Cinematic Universe. Shang Chi, Dr. Strange, Ant Man and the second Black Panther are all more peripheral characters than the main stars. It's no longer clear which characters are the leads, especially with Sam Wilson seeming more like a passenger than a protagonist in his own TV show and his movie.

Maybe the hope was to do a post-A-list run of films, but the Marvel franchise, despite my fondness for almost all of it recently and historically, does seem to be in decline.

**

I just realized I forgot to watch WEREWOLF BY NIGHT and AGATHA ALL ALONG which I will address post-haste.

CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD was okay. If I'd seen it in summer 2024, I would have considered it okay. But in February 2025, it's simply inadequate. I posted why here.
https://sliders.tv/bboard/viewtopic.php … 058#p17058

That said, I've enjoyed most Marvel movies including the recent run, so one inadequate movie is not a big deal to me. It's probably a big deal to Kevin Feige, though, that the entire franchise seems to be spiraling from the lack of A-listers, the fallout of Jonathan Majors, the critical failure of SECRET INVASION, the box office failure of THE MARVELS and ETERNALS, etc.. And I liked THE MARVELS and ETERNALS a lot.

AGATHA ALL ALONG is such an impressive show that I find myself watching even the end titles and credits, which I normally skip. I am only on episode 7.

Like Grizzlor, I too felt that AGATHA ALL ALONG seemed to cut off abruptly with the search for Tommy. That said, my expectation (although I don't know it for a fact) is that this plot will continue in VISIONQUEST.

A terrific, eerie and disturbing show, and I loved how AGATHA refuses to make Agatha in any way redeemable or sympathetic.

I am excited beyond excited to watch DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN this week! Even if it isn't the greatest, I've missed Deborah Ann Woll so much. It'll be good to see her. Also, I saw through ECHO and I want a payoff.