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Captain Marvel (2019)
289 Plays2 years ago
Nicholas Pepin of Pop Culture Roulette joins Perry for a discussion of 2019's Captain Marvel! We discuss the history of the character, the project's road to production, and the ridiculous backlash against it from certain sewers of the internet.
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Transcript
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Introducing Nicholas Pepin and Pop Culture Discussion
00:02:00
Speaker
With your hands bound, I just want to talk. Last time we talked, I ended up hanging from my ankles. That was before I knew who you were. Before I knew what made you different from the others. I have an audio recording from Pegasus of your voice from a plane crash six years ago on a device I believe you call a black box. They told me it was destroyed in the crash.
00:02:26
Speaker
How'd you get it? She don't understand. Young lady, I have a special skill that kind of allows me to get into places I'm not supposed to be. Call me young lady again. I'm going to put my foot in a place it's not supposed to be. Am I supposed to guess where that is? Your ass.
00:02:48
Speaker
Welcome to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. I'm your host, Perry Constantine, and joining me is a new guest and a fellow podcaster, and that is Nicholas Pepin. Nick, how you doing today? I'm good. How about you? I'm doing pretty good. I just finished wrapping up another episode right before, so I'm doing a double feature this morning. Before we jump too much into today's movie, we're going to be talking about Captain Marvel. Why don't you tell people a little bit about yourself and about your podcast?
00:03:13
Speaker
I am I live in Wisconsin right outside of Milwaukee. I have a podcast called pop culture roulette I do with two of my friends where we basically anything we want to talk about we just call it pop culture and talk about it. It's real convenient to
00:03:32
Speaker
Basically like, hey, we feel like talking about sports today. Well, sports is pop culture. If we feel like talking about the newest movie or whatever, you know, obviously that's pop culture, but, uh, currently we're in the middle of a, um, a series on who played it best. We just released the episode for the others. So like everybody who's not Marvel or DC. So like everybody who played Greenhorn at flash Gordon, uh, the Archie comics, you know, whatever.
Batman and Superhero Film Nostalgia
00:03:59
Speaker
And we were debating who did what.
00:04:01
Speaker
Who what was the better live-action actor? We've got Marvel on deck and then then we're gonna attempt it to Crack DC, but that's a oh That's a large area. Yeah, yeah, especially when you get into Batman and Superman you got so there's like there's a that's why I had to limit it to live-action because like we were gonna have to do an episode just on Batman if we did animated as well and
00:04:27
Speaker
Yeah, well, I mean even just live-action you could just do an episode on batman because there's been so many of them I mean, there's a I think eight live-action batman something like that. Yeah. Yeah It's funny that you mentioned this because I had just before I started recording stuff today I watched the trailer the new trailer for the flash and Michael Keaton gets a lot more chance to shine in that trailer and god he looks he looks so good in this movie and as much as I hate Ezra Miller just
00:04:54
Speaker
I can't turn down the chance to watch Michael Keaton on the big screen one last time.
00:04:59
Speaker
No, I was there in 89. I distinctly remember going to see that movie in the theaters. I received that as a... I can't remember if it was a birthday gift or a Christmas gift, but I had that, the black and yellow cassette tape that just had the Batman logo on it. Yeah, I had that too. VHS. I mean, as much as I love a lot of the other Batman stuff, Michael Keaton is my Batman.
00:05:26
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, no, I feel a lot of yeah, I mean, like, there's, there's stuff I quibble with in terms of, you know, the whole killing aspect of it, but, but still, like, just his performance, the more I think about it, the more I'm just like,
00:05:40
Speaker
That is my Batman, you're right. DC has been disappointing, to put it mildly, the last handful of films that they released. The first trailer, I was like, oh man, it's got Michael Keaton, so I'm going to see it. I watched it while I was getting ready for this as well, and I was like, oh.
00:06:03
Speaker
He is like, this is why they're actually releasing the movie because they spent way too much time and effort getting Michael Keaton in this thing. I'm still holding out hope that they that we might be able to see him in a Batman Beyond movie because he just he looks so much like the part now for an old Bruce Wayne. Absolutely. And and I don't believe for a second that someday they won't figure out a way to accidentally release Batgirl. Yeah. Yeah.
00:06:31
Speaker
I'm hoping about that too. That's one of my hopes too. So obviously you talked about 89 Batman seeing that when you were young. So because we talk about superheroes here, what was kind of like your gateway into superhero stuff?
00:06:47
Speaker
I mean, Batman would be the easiest answer. I grew up in a town right outside of Memphis that the library actually had comic books. So my parents, particularly my mom, would take us to the library and we'd just free run of the library and I'd go read
00:07:09
Speaker
the batman they had batman comics but they had fantastic four and the avengers and stuff like that and then uh a good friend of mine had daredevil so and daredevil and punisher so like my you know my interest in comic books has been around for for as long as i can remember i i've proudly been a nerd my entire life like this whole this whole nerd renaissance where we we now run the world is great but i've been here forever you know like
00:07:37
Speaker
Yeah. Well, we're talking about Captain Marvel, so this will probably definitely factor in the conversation about all the misogynistic discussions going on. And me growing up as a lonely kid who was the only one in my school who liked comic books, or at least the only one who was willing to admit that they liked comic books, I would have killed for people to be interested in this stuff back when I was growing up.
Evolution of Nerd Culture and Current Interests
00:07:58
Speaker
Right. I would have.
00:08:00
Speaker
I would have killed for just having a podcast didn't exist back then. I would have killed just for the idea of being able to sit down and have a conversation with people or listen to two people have a conversation about the stuff that I was interested in. The internet obviously also didn't exist then, so it was harder to find people who
00:08:22
Speaker
who were willing to have those conversations. Right, right, yeah. I mean, you said you saw Batman in the theater, so I think you're a little bit, you got a few, a little bit older than me, but yeah, I remember we got the internet in my house when I was like in probably like eighth grade or something like that. So it was like right at the end of junior high. And that was when I was able to first find out, it's like, oh wow, other people like comic books too. Yeah, it was a huge revelation to me because like nobody in my town had ever talked about it.
00:08:49
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, when I was in high school, because I graduated high school in 96. So I think based on, because I did listen to a couple episodes, so I knew what I was getting into. I think I've got four or five years on you. Yeah, I graduated in 02.
00:09:03
Speaker
Yeah, so I remember like people like there was the the early days of the internet where like you had basically just chat rooms, chat rooms, like message boards was a big thing. I mean, that kind of and then when I graduated high school and went to college, like my college was just starting to get in on the internet. Like they didn't even have like official email like they just had
00:09:26
Speaker
like a computer room where you could go do research for your papers and stuff, but like you didn't know, almost nobody had a computer in their dorm room that was internet capable. It was basically just there to write term papers. Yeah. Okay. And another thing I want to ask people lately is what are you interested in right now? Like it can be anything, you know, comics, movies, TV shows, video games. What is kind of grabbing your interest at the moment?
00:09:56
Speaker
Um...
00:09:58
Speaker
I mean, I'm still very much interested in whatever Marvel is. I've just been so entrenched in doing the podcast thing. A friend of mine from college started an 80s podcast where he talks about 80s films. So I've been rewatching a bunch of 80s films, but I also have been rewatching The Monsters from the 60s. But just last weekend, I watched Cocaine Bear.
00:10:28
Speaker
Well, how is that? Oh, it is gloriously cheesy. It is. I mean, don't you know, you're not getting, you know, well, Citizen Kane is always the example that people use, but I've never actually watched that movie. You're not getting a masterpiece. You are getting something similar to snakes on a plane. So, you know, it is it is, you know, everybody in it knew what they were getting into and they just had fun with it. It is a sci fi, you know, like
00:10:55
Speaker
It's a movie that got elevated beyond just a sci-fi original. It is so much fun, and it is just cheesy. And Elizabeth Banks is in that, too, isn't she? She directed it. Oh, OK, OK. Yeah, she is in it, but she directed it. Oh, OK. Because I was thinking that, because we had just done an episode on the 2017 Power Rangers, where she gloriously choose all the scenery in that movie. And I was hoping she was in it, too. Maybe we get to see some more scenery-chewing performances from her, but I guess not.
00:11:25
Speaker
No, but she allowed some some people she allowed who was trying to remember now. I'm blanking on who? Felicity
00:11:36
Speaker
Oh, uh, Carrie, I can't remember her last name, but yeah, I know what you're talking about. Yeah. They, they allowed her to do some scenery chewing. And then, uh, the, one of the Ty, Jesse Tyler Ferguson from Modern Family, for his very short, uh, in the movie, he, he got to do some scenery. I mean, it was, like I said, it is absolutely cheesy. I love, I love bad movies. I love good movies, but I mean, I, you know,
00:12:00
Speaker
Right like it just finished its run a couple months ago, and I'm waiting for the new season of what we do in the shadows That might be one of my favorite shows on TV right now
00:12:12
Speaker
Okay, cool. Very cool. For my part, I've been recording so many of these episodes in a row lately, so I've been trying to pick something different each episode, so I don't bore the audience, but I keep mentioning the same thing. But one thing is I'm going to be appearing on my buddy's Power Rangers podcast soon, and we're going to be talking about the original Japanese version of Power Rangers, Kyoyu Sentai Zu Ranger. So I've been watching some of those episodes. I'm not sure if you ever were a Power Rangers guy back in the day, but
00:12:41
Speaker
It's really fun going back and watching the original Japanese because there's some things about it that's so similar. Obviously they use the same action footage for a lot of the stuff, but also just to see the different ways that they told the same story with these footage is also a really interesting thing to do.
00:13:01
Speaker
Because you currently live in Japan, right? Yes, yeah. Okay. So I'm guessing that means you are fluent in Japanese? Not fluent, no. I mean, after being here for 10 plus years, I should be, but I'm not, unfortunately. But it is cool to watch it too, because I can also get, I understand a lot more of the cultural stuff than I would have if I'd never been in Japan. So that's also an interesting aspect to watching this show. And it's
00:13:30
Speaker
The Power Rangers were a little after me. I was towards the end of high school when that started, so I was aware of it. I think I probably watched a little bit of it here and there, but it was a little bit out of my wheelhouse by the time it came out. I've been aware of it, and I have no problems with it. It's not like I'm anti-Power Ranger, but I've always just seen it as more of a Voltron ripoff. Well, Voltron is what I had when I was a kid.
00:13:59
Speaker
Oh yeah, there's a lot of similarities to that. I'm not sure which came first. Was it Sentai or Voltron? I'd have to look that up in Japan. But yeah, actually the first time I'd encountered something Voltron was, my first thought was like, oh, is this a Power Rangers animated thing?
00:14:15
Speaker
But yeah, and even when Power Rangers came out, I was about 10 years old when it came out. And at that point in my school, it was uncooled like Power Rangers. So it was like my secret shame back then when I was in elementary school. See, that's sad. I'm so glad that kids these days don't have, well, hopefully don't have the same problems that we had.
00:14:38
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Anyway, today we are discussing, like we mentioned, Captain Marvel, first movie starring Brie
Carol Danvers' Journey in Comics and Film
00:14:45
Speaker
Larson as Carol Danvers. What's your history with Carol in the comics? Have you ever had much exposure in the comic books? Or do you come in with this movie?
00:14:57
Speaker
No, I am. I'm I was I was reading her when she was Miss Marvel before they did the switch to Captain Marvel. And what was I like, oh, eight, oh, nine. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was a fan of her then. So like I was I mean, I I do.
00:15:18
Speaker
I don't know as much about the character as somebody like, yeah, I did some research a little bit here and there and I read I have in oh five when I moved from Florida to Wisconsin, I got back into comic books in a big way and like I started going to a store and buying and
00:15:36
Speaker
The the Captain Marvel character while she was grounded on But yeah, no, I I've always you know, like I've had I've enjoyed her as a character I enjoy whenever they put her in a video game I tend to use her like when they did her in Marvel Ultimate Alliance or Ultimate Alliance to whichever one she she appeared in. Yeah, I think that was Ultimate Alliance to if I'm not mistaken. I
00:15:59
Speaker
Yeah. So I was definitely aware of the character and had a passing familiarity with it before the movie came out.
00:16:09
Speaker
I had known her from, like I'd seen her in the, she appeared in one episode of the X-Men animated series. That was probably my first exposure to her. So I knew about, I knew mostly about her through the X-Men and like that that's how Rogue got her flight and her super strength and all those powers. But when I was, I started reading The Avengers when Kirk Busek and George Perez were doing their run in the late 90s.
00:16:33
Speaker
And she was a member, and she ended up joining the team. And that was my big exposure to Carol as a character. Back then she was called Warbird, but she was still wearing the Ms. Marvel costume. And yeah, I really liked her in that run, and I became a fan of her at that point. And so when they brought her back as Ms. Marvel, I'd read those books after the fact.
00:16:55
Speaker
But then when they brought her back, when they gave her the Captain Marvel mantle, I thought, oh, yeah, this actually makes a whole lot of sense. So I was totally on board for that. I've only read some of the books with her. I've only read some of her solo books as Captain Marvel. I've read her mostly in teen books since then, like when she pops up in the Avengers and all that kind of stuff.
00:17:14
Speaker
Right. Yeah, I you know, I've always just you know, I remember she was binary at 1.2. Wasn't she? Yeah, that was in the after she had because after the thing with rogue she had lost her powers and then she had joined the X-Men for a time just kind of like helping them out. And then they went into space and this was in the this was in probably the 1980s, I believe.
00:17:33
Speaker
she gained like these new space powers as binary and then those powers pretty much they've they've been the same powers it's just now she doesn't transform into the binary form but like the energy manipulation the flight all of that it still comes from the the binary powers like they haven't gone back they've kind of like retroactively given her the super strength and stuff as well i think but mostly it comes from the binary powers okay yeah
00:18:01
Speaker
So what did you think about this movie when you first watched it? Because this was actually, it took a while to get this. They were actually originally planning to introduce Captain Marvel in Age of Ultron, was what Josh Whedon wanted to do, but that plan had been scrapped and then production for this movie just kept getting pushed back, pushed back, pushed back until finally they ended up doing it right after Infinity War. But what do you think at the time when you first saw it?
00:18:28
Speaker
I mean, I really enjoyed the movie the first time I saw it. I do think that the introduction was a little weird because I mean, as a comic book nerd, like when I take my wife to see these movies, she hadn't watched any of those before we got married. We've been married now for about 12 years. So like I've been introduced. She doesn't want to read any of it. She just wants to watch the movies. She doesn't want to hear about it when we're out because then I'll be like, oh, they changed this or they did that.
00:18:57
Speaker
And she's like, whatever, I just, you know, I want to enjoy the movie. So at the end of Infinity War, when we got the Captain Marvel symbol, and knowing that movie was coming, I was like, Oh, I'm so excited for like, what that meant. I enjoyed it. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought Brie Larson did a, you know, better than good job at it. Having rewatched it.
00:19:19
Speaker
it, I see some problems, but nothing that wouldn't put it, you know, squarely middle to upper end of the pack of the Marvel movies. I mean, I know a lot of people hate it, and I'm sure we'll get there. But yeah, this movie got tons of unjustified hate, I'd say, because I really enjoyed it, too. Like, like I said, there's some issues, I think the the whole idea of setting it in the 90s, and having such this big
00:19:44
Speaker
you know, sci fi type thing in a time before Iron Man was supposed to kickstart this whole idea of like sci fi superheroes in the MCU feels a little incongruous. I mean, I think they managed to mostly they managed to stick the landing, but it still feels a little odd to think about this as being in the MCU past. Because like just like that whole space battle feels like somebody would have noticed something like that going on.
00:20:12
Speaker
Well, and the one thing that my wife asked me and is that like, during the Battle of Manhattan, or during Ultron, like Fury never thought, hey, maybe I should use the pager for this. Like, so I, you do, I did hear somebody and I don't remember who it was, whether it was one of the Russos or Brie Larson herself was like,
00:20:35
Speaker
Why didn't Fury ever use the pager? And they were like, well, who said that he didn't? And she just either refused to answer or was like, that's not big enough for me to come bother with. Right. Yeah, I was thinking about that too. And I agree. I think your wife makes a really good point. And I don't think there's a... My headcanon of trying to resolve that was just that, well, Fury had the Avengers. He probably didn't think it was a big enough...
00:21:01
Speaker
concern to summon Captain Marvel for that, which is definitely an iffy explanation, but it's kind of like the timeline here. It kind of works. It mostly works. It's not perfectly, but it mostly works if you think about it that way.
00:21:20
Speaker
No, and I agree with you that the hate is completely unjustified. And I think most of the hate comes from the troll forms. Yes. I think the people who actually watched the movie either were like, well, it's not bad or, you know, quite enjoyed it. I mean, you know, I'm, you know, we can pick apart some scenes that, you know, didn't work or, you know, just kind of were a little bit cheesy, but, you know,
00:21:44
Speaker
Overall, I think the tone of the movie works setting it in the 90s Does create some timeline problems because then you're like wait, how did nobody notice what was happening over here? Especially somebody especially somebody like Tony Stark No But I mean that that is the problem with all the solo Marvel movies after you've had the Avengers Yeah, is that you now have a world where like Iron Man could call any of these people
00:22:15
Speaker
And he doesn't like or any of these people could look at the TV and say hey wait spider-man is over here fighting Massive people on the Statue of Liberty. I think he's got it. We'll just hang out not we'll just watch Yeah, I remember
00:22:31
Speaker
And I kind of reconcile that away the same way I do when that happens in comic books. It's just you assume, okay, well, they're off on another adventure somewhere else. But there are definitely times when it seems like, feels like someone else should have gotten involved here.
Challenges and Humor in Captain Marvel
00:22:44
Speaker
Like, you know, I love Winter Soldier, but the whole thing about...
00:22:47
Speaker
bringing down Shield, that feels like it's a time to at least give Tony Stark a call, see what he's up to maybe. Right, yeah. He didn't think, hey, maybe I should go check out what's going on over here. I mean, surely the news has to cover it.
00:23:02
Speaker
Helicarriers are crashing. That feels like something that would make headline news that night. Yeah. But also too, the past thing too, I think it works with certain things. I thought Ant-Man worked really well when they had revealed that Hank and Jan were operating in the past because they're operating as covert agents, basically. They can shrink down. It makes sense why nobody would be able to see them.
00:23:27
Speaker
It's a lot harder to buy that when it's spaceships blowing up right in front of the moon. You would think also, I was just trying to watch it again because I like to try to watch everything twice before I do it.
00:23:46
Speaker
you know, she's chasing these aliens down on a train in the middle of Los Angeles and Like that you feel like that's a story that makes the news or like, you know The tabloid is like oh these alien like, you know, there's gotta be story. So I would I would love to see
00:24:04
Speaker
Like a like maybe like a damage control series or or some sort of You know series that's either going through and covering that stuff up kind of like a Marvel X-Files. Mm-hmm where or or you know the the On this on the other side of it the group of people who are like trying to uncover all the secrets because they're like You've got to believe like this is really happening. Like hmm. Well, I think actually that's what agents of shield should have been Yeah way to handle that approach
00:24:34
Speaker
And I do think that if Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was to happen now instead of prior to the Fox acquisition when they could use the word mutant, we would have gotten a very different show. Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. And also, if Kevin Feige was in charge of it instead of, like, Perlmutter 2. Right. And they probably wouldn't have destroyed the inhuman thing. But yeah, I mean, I enjoyed Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. up until, like, the last season or two when it got weird and time-travel-y.
00:25:03
Speaker
I haven't seen actually the last two seasons of it. And for the most part, I liked it more than I didn't like it, but I also felt like it could have been so much better than what we got. And I think if you had done something like exploring, I think what it was at its best was probably season two right before the Inhuman stuff started up. That was probably for me, the end of season one beginning of season two was probably like my peak time for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
00:25:28
Speaker
Well, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., when it led directly into the age of Ultron, and then when Winter Soldier happened and Dark World happened, it was actually involved in the show. And then at some point, they were like, we're not going to be involved with the movie people anymore. We're going to go off and do our own thing.
00:25:47
Speaker
I think that was when, that was around the time, because after Age of Ultron was when Feige threatened to quit, because Perlmutter was trying to push him out, and then that's when Disney moved Marvel Studios into its own branch, and then Marvel TV stayed under Ike Perlmutter. So I think that's when that shift happened.
00:26:04
Speaker
Yeah, so yeah, but I mean, overall, you know, up until I think about the point that you're pointing out, it was it was an enjoyable show. But I, you know, I, you know, try to steer it back into Captain Marvel, I guess. Yeah, it does. It does raise timeline questions. But I still I think I know a lot of the complaints about phase four, the one that we just ended or currently and I'm never really sure.
00:26:31
Speaker
I think it just ended with quantum mania, if I'm not mistaken. The complaint is that it seems all over the place and it's not connected like it was in 1 and 2 and 3. But I think we don't know what's going on. I think that we might get a movie that goes back and connects things and put some stuff behind the scenes that we didn't know about.
00:26:53
Speaker
Kinda like when, um, Ant-Man brought, you know, Hank Pym in and we're like, whoa, Hank Pym was there. He was there at the beginning of SHIELD. He just got mad and he left, but that's why SHIELD had stuff that they had. That's where some, you know,
00:27:09
Speaker
No, and this one does that fills in some of those gaps to like with the Tesseract, right? Like what happened right in all that time? It was just sitting in a box somewhere. But no, we find out that no, they were trying to do stuff. Marvell was trying to do experiments with it and everything. So that that filled in some of those gaps here, too.
00:27:28
Speaker
I think one of the biggest the timeline I think is one of the biggest things I would probably I'm fine with the Parts of this being set in the 90s, but I think I would have moved a lot of the action set pieces Which is why I think maybe you you come out with this
00:27:43
Speaker
before Infinity War or something like that, and maybe have some of those action set pieces in the present day, or at least in a post-Avengers realm, or something like that to have it fit together a little bit more. I don't know, I'd have to, even that as I'm saying it, maybe doesn't sound exactly right either.
00:28:03
Speaker
No, you know, I'm with you on that. And, you know, then, you know, the one running joke of the movie that was kind of like a hot tub time machine, like, when's it gonna happen? Like, when's the eye patch coming? You know, yeah, like, yeah, that constant joke or, you know, the Stan Lee, Kevin Smith cameo, the mall.
00:28:23
Speaker
Yeah, like as as a big-time Kevin Smith nerd as a big-time Kevin Smith fan Like I was super excited to see that and I'm just like where are we you know? That opens the door to maybe you know bring him in at some point which I know he's been resistant to but Yeah, I mean I loved all that part So let's talk so you mentioned Brie Larson like I thought she also did a great job in this I mean she
00:28:52
Speaker
A lot of people, they're saying like her performance is too wooden. And I'm kind of wondering if we watch the same movie, because I don't get that at all from her. There are obviously parts where she's playing it very straight, but like her interactions with Fury, she's a joy to watch in those. Like she's quipping with him. She's having fun with him. Like when she's asking him about like, you know, tell me something about you that no one would ever know. And he talks about how he can't eat toast if it's cut diagonally. And she's like, and then he says like, wait a minute.
00:29:20
Speaker
that's not really a test is it she's like she just kind of smiles like no i just want to know what you would say yeah i mean you you have to also think about it like here's a woman who woke up six years ago remembers nothing about herself on an alien world and now is under the belief that she's an alien coming to the planet now discovering that she's not like she's not a kree
00:29:42
Speaker
She really is a human and trying to rediscover her own place in the world. She's been interacting with a group of shape-shifting aliens.
00:29:59
Speaker
anybody could be anything at any time so you have to you know be careful of who you're opening up to and and so I I don't know I thought she played it very well um when she was more wooden like it was felt like it was necessary for that scene and then she had the she had the wry smiles and a more of a dry sense of humor you know which we don't tend to get I guess we don't tend to get that out of
00:30:23
Speaker
You know female actors as much so I think people you know misinterpreted that that and you know to get into the you know The real world aspect of it because she was willing to stand up and say some things that you know were were true You know the the the troll army wanted to attack her Absolutely. Oh and and try to take her down for you know daring to have an opinion. Yeah, I
00:30:49
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with you. I'll 100% cosign all that. And one of the things I do wish too is maybe if they had played up the mystery angle because it, I think there would have been, because one of the things that happens to Carol in the comics is after Rogue drains her powers and her memories, Professor X is able to restore her memories, but she has no emotional connection to them.
00:31:14
Speaker
So I think that aspect of her character, you know, would have kind of been interesting to play with here if maybe she gets her memories back, but she can't feel that same emotional connection to them that she used to. And it would have been a cool way to play with the idea of memory and all that kind of stuff too. Again, we might be wasting too much time then on that kind of stuff, but I think that would also be something interesting way to play with that concept in the comics.
00:31:38
Speaker
Yeah, and I will say I do appreciate this new wave of superhero movies where the first movie isn't necessarily a true origin movie anymore. Like we're skipping over the boring parts of the origin story and just trying to get into it. But with a character like Captain Marvel, who is familiar to people like you and I, but isn't familiar to your general audience, you kind of have to do some backstory to build it in.
00:32:06
Speaker
like you can't like i you know in the world of batman you don't have to kill you know the parents anymore you don't you the next batman movie you don't have to you can just skip over that and go right into it right i mean well they didn't even in the batman they didn't even they they talk about it they reference it but they never they never go back and we don't see the pearls falling in slow motion for the 50th time
00:32:26
Speaker
And that's what I loved about No Way, not Homecoming. Because you don't deal with Uncle Ben again. He's already Spider-Man. We don't have to go over that again. We've seen it twice now. Well, maybe more if you include the animated shows and the 70s shows. But everybody knows Spider-Man. Everybody knows Batman. Everybody knows Superman. You can skip that. Yes. So in a way with, like,
00:32:53
Speaker
Captain Marvel you have to find a way to do sort of an origin but get to the fun stuff and get to the good stuff right away. And that I think you're still stumbling with characters that aren't as well known and I think there is a little bit of a stumble here but I think for the most part they hit it well.
00:33:10
Speaker
Yeah, I like that. I like what she said there too. I agree with you as well.
MCU's Character Development and Storytelling
00:33:14
Speaker
Like a lot of the origin story stuff, for the longest time, all we got in superhero movies was the origin story because that's a very easy story for Hollywood producers to understand. It's the classic hero's journey story.
00:33:26
Speaker
You know, the hero discovers, gets these fantastic powers, ends up going through this journey, ends up putting on the costume of the third act. All of that totally makes sense in the hero's journey arc. But as you're doing more and more of these movies, it starts to become...
00:33:42
Speaker
old hat. Especially when you're doing multiple movies and building up this franchise. Having a new origin story every single time you have a new character. Audiences are talking about superhero fatigue now. I think superhero fatigue would have set in a lot earlier if Marvel just kept doing origin stories.
00:33:58
Speaker
Yeah, well, and I think that's what like that's where Black Panther really worked. Well is that they introduced the character in in Civil War, right? So that we when he got a solo movie, they didn't have to do as much, you know, origin movie, they could pretty much just get right into it because you already know this character, we've shown them to you, you kind of have an idea of what he's about and who he is.
00:34:20
Speaker
so here here he is already and then maybe we'll just talk about it or do some flashbacks to the origin just to you know kind of give you some hints but like we were good we're golden like yeah move on yeah and this this um i still think incredible hulk was one of my favorite ways they did the origin because they just had it in that montage in the opening credits and that was all you needed to know about how bruce banner became the hulk
00:34:43
Speaker
And here in this movie too, having it unfold like a mystery works very well. I mean, this is actually how I think they should have done X-Men Origins Wolverine. They should have had him waking up, no memory of who he is, and then trying to piece it together by going through and investigating it and treat it like an actual mystery.
00:35:03
Speaker
Even though I quibble a little bit about how well they handled that mystery aspect, I think they could have executed it better. I really like the attempt here, and I really like how they're trying to do the origin story in a different way. Because you're right, with a character like Captain Marvel, you have to find a way to tell that origin story, especially because in the comics, her origin is so tied to a completely different character.
00:35:24
Speaker
So having to figure out how are we going to explain this to people A, who are not familiar with this character, and B, who are familiar with her in a very different context, this is a really good way to do it. And I was actually surprised that they worked in Mar-Ville at all. I was not expecting that. Yeah.
00:35:41
Speaker
And I know a lot of people quibble when they change anything, but I'm okay with it because when I got back into comics, I got really into the ultimate universe. And I really came to appreciate the ultimate universe as well as I was reading the 616 stuff. It's like, you can have the different universes going on. So as long as we take 616 and put it aside and go, that's the books, that's just for reading.
00:36:08
Speaker
This is, I don't know what MCU's number is supposed to be. I know at some point, I think they said it in Multiverse of Madness. Multiverse of Madness said it was 616, but then I think What If said it was a different one, so I don't know. I don't think there's official clarification on that. It basically gives you the ability to tweak it, change it a little bit. As long as you stay close enough,
00:36:34
Speaker
Right, you know, which I feel like this did, like it stayed close enough, like it changed it a little bit to make it more sense. Plus, you know, other characters have already kind of taken some of this origin and they, you know, they didn't have time to introduce 30 new characters on top of the one or two that they already were trying to introduce.
00:36:53
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with you. I feel like when you're adapting these things, it can't always be a one-to-one translation. It just doesn't work. You're talking about two different mediums, one of which has 60-plus years of monthly stories that you have to sift through to try to make it all make sense. You can't cram all that into a two-hour movie. You just can't. So you're going to have to make compromises and make changes here and there. And I'm fine with that. And I think my main thing is
00:37:20
Speaker
And this is what I like about the MCU, as opposed to, say, a lot of the Snyder films, was that they captured what I felt was like the essence of these characters. They stayed true to who these characters were at their core. And so even though Robert Downey Jr.'s Tony Stark isn't exactly like the Tony Stark in the comic books, he's got that same core of the character, right? Where he's this arrogant guy who feels like he's the smartest person in the room.
00:37:47
Speaker
Same thing with Chris Evans as Captain America, right? Chris Evans' version of Steve Rogers is just slightly askew of the comics version, but he managed to synthesize the core aspects of what that character is. And that's what I appreciate about what a lot of these movies are doing now. Or even some of the X-Men movies. I mean, right before this, we recorded the episode on X2.
00:38:11
Speaker
That movie is very divorced from the comics, but they get so much right about the core of what the X-Men are in that movie that I can live with the changes they make to the characters or to the backgrounds or anything like that.
00:38:23
Speaker
Right, and I'm with you on those characters. I mean, I might be one of the only people on the planet who really loved Taskmaster. He is one of my favorite characters. So that was the biggest annoyance to me so far in the MCU is what they did to Taskmaster in the Black Widow movie, because you can't go back and do it. I agree with that. I'd also co-signed Ghost from Ant-Man and the Wasp. That was another disappointment for me, because I love that character in the comics too.
00:38:54
Speaker
I don't have as much. I knew there was a little different, or actually a lot different. But I didn't have a love for ghosts, so that one didn't bother me as much. But like I said, I'm probably one of the few people on the planet who are like, Taskmaster? Oh. Because most people are like, who's Taskmaster? Right. Yeah, I mean, speaking of Ages of S.H.I.E.L.D., I remember the chatter at the time was a lot of people thought
00:39:23
Speaker
I'm blanking on his name now, but the guy who ends up being the double agent for Hydra, a lot of people were thinking at the time, maybe he's Taskmaster. It was kind of like the big story, which would have been fun to see. I think that would have worked out better than what they did, but whatever. But yeah, I agree with you. I was a little bit disappointed in Taskmaster as well for that reason. And I think
00:39:45
Speaker
Taking it back to Captain Marvel, this is an example where they stay true to who that character is. This is who Carol Danvers is. There may be some differences in her origin story, right? Mar-Vell is a woman now instead of a man, and she doesn't actually don a superhero costume. All of that's fine, because the core of who Carol is is with that character.
00:40:08
Speaker
Right. I would say that the only thing, and I feel like based on the trailer that just came out for Secret Invasion, it's going to be fixed. And I wondered at the time, the biggest complaint I had at the end of the movie other was then just the Skrulls being the good guys. They've pretty much always been the bad guys.
00:40:32
Speaker
So there's been a bit of back and forth on that, so one of the things I liked about this movie is that they didn't go with the straight good guys, bad guys, because instead they tried to show that there was a lot more complexity in this, and I think we'll probably see this when we get to Secret Invasion and also maybe in the Marvels to a lesser extent, we might see some of it there, but this idea of
00:40:56
Speaker
My impression watching this movie was that it was, uh, Ben Mendelsohn and his group that were just refugees of this war and doesn't necessarily mean all the Skrulls are the good guys. It just means that maybe this one group is. So I think, and it'll be interesting to see how they play with that because they've done some stories in the comic books with different factions of Skrulls. There was a story they did in the X-Men books in the, um,
00:41:20
Speaker
I think it was the early 2000s where there was a group of scrolls that were actually mutant scrolls and were actually being persecuted by the rest of the scrolls and they ended up becoming heroes and Professor X ended up going out with them in space for a time. So they've had different
00:41:35
Speaker
factions of scrolls throughout the Marvel Comics. And that was one of the things that disappointed me about Secret Invasion was it felt like the comic book that is, was it felt like they had ignored all these other stories about the scrolls that had happened since the 1970s.
00:41:53
Speaker
I mean, and I know that the scree scroll, I just keep trying to put those two words together. The scroll crew war has been raging from the beginning of, you know, the bay when both of these groups were introduced into the comics in the first place. And, you know, who's the bad guy? Who's the good guy? It's very, you know, fluid based on, you know, who's telling the story and what side you're looking at. But
00:42:17
Speaker
And you know You know, there are not not just like it not every Cree is bad either I mean they just tend to they tend to be same thing with the scrolls not every scroll is bad They just always tend to be right, you know, so to but it was so it was very jarring to see them like being portrayed solely as the good guys when like I know there's this history of mainly they are are bad and
00:42:44
Speaker
And so I do wonder, and obviously whatever the Secret Invasion show that we're getting on Disney Plus is going to be vastly different than the Secret Invasion book.
00:42:58
Speaker
I know they're leading up to uh, king dynasty and then secret war and I just don't I don't know what Ultimately the game plan is with all of it and I think You know, we I think there's been hints laid in the movies that we've seen but we just don't know we've seen it yet Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think they're going to be playing around with that and i'm looking forward to secret invasion that trailer We got looks looks great. I'm glad we're going to get finally get a chance to see um, samuela jackson played nick fury as a lead character
00:43:28
Speaker
Um, and, uh, it'll, I like how they, the idea of who is the good guy, who is the bad guy in a war and also the, you know,
00:43:40
Speaker
Carol, as she reveres in this part of her life, she's only experienced one side of things. She's been essentially brainwashed by the Kree into thinking like this is a fight of good versus evil. And then we have that all flipped on its head and we find out that whole idea of one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. I like that they're playing around with that idea of there are two sides in war. It's not always a black and white situation.
00:44:06
Speaker
and i do wonder if going into the marvels movie that we're getting here in a couple months or the secret invasion that we're getting you know in a couple months as well if
Complexities of MCU Connections
00:44:15
Speaker
because as of yet you don't have to have seen any of the disney plus movies to enjoy any of the marvel movies right
00:44:25
Speaker
So like, you know, seeing WandaVision before Multiverse of Madness helps, but not necessary. But I do wonder if going into Captain America, whatever, New World Order, if you don't see Falcon Winter Soldier first.
00:44:45
Speaker
You know, and I do wonder, you know, where that's going to put some of the movies or even some of the shows when when we get to the point of like, oh, you didn't watch it all. Well, now you're lost. And, you know, I do wonder if at that point, if superhero fatigue isn't going to actually set in.
00:45:05
Speaker
Yeah, it's a good point. I'm wondering about that myself because someone like me, I'm all in on the MCU. I watch everything when it comes out. But other stuff, I've only seen the first episode of the new season of Mandalorian. I've only seen the first episode of Boba Fett. I still haven't watched all of that yet. I've only seen about half of Andor. So I'm really behind on the Star Wars stuff.
00:45:30
Speaker
And I do wonder when we get to that with the MCU, because I do know there are a lot of people who are not up to date on some stuff. I've spoken to people, I'm like, oh yeah, She-Hulk was amazing. And they're like, what's She-Hulk? And I'm like, it blows me away, because that's one of my favorites in the show. I love She-Hulk. Oh, that was so good. I mean, Tatiana Mazzalani is just amazing. Orphan Black was just mind-blowingly good. I still have to see that.
00:45:59
Speaker
Oh, if you can hunt it down, I highly recommend it. I actually want to rewatch it because they just did a podcast where they they did like two seasons of a podcast where they actually had Tatyam Aslani come back and do voices. Oh, where it was like, I continue with like, see, like, so they think that it was basically like season six and seven of the show.
00:46:20
Speaker
I want to go back and rewatch the first five, but my wife gave up on She-Hulk two or three episodes in. She was just like, I'm done. Her tolerance for that fourth wall breaking is not as high as mine.
00:46:41
Speaker
Yeah, my wife hasn't. My wife is still she's still for the movies like she'll still watch the movies but yes, she's she's less interested in the TV shows like she'll she'll pop in every now and then I think she watched a few episodes of Ms Marvel she watched a few episodes of moon knight. She watched all of WandaVision I think she watched all of
00:47:01
Speaker
low key and a few others, but other ones, she's just kind of like, ah, I'll pop in here and I'll maybe I'll get to it later at some point. But, but yeah, she's definitely much more invested in the movies as opposed to the TV shows. So it is going to be interesting to see. And we're in completely untested waters at this point, right? We're in now a point where
00:47:18
Speaker
If you haven't watched everything, are you going to be able to understand this? And it's a gamble Marvel's taking to see how much they're going to be able to make these accessible for people while still also having all this content out there. Well, and that was something a few years ago they were talking about doing with Dark Tower.
00:47:39
Speaker
When they were trying to do Dark Tower, they're like, all right, we're going to do a movie. And then we're going to do a season or two of a show. And then we'll go back to doing a movie. And then we'll do a scene. And that just people are like, that's never going to work. You're not going to get you're you're going to have people watch the movie, then not watch the show and then try to watch the second movie that you've now hinged on watching a couple of seasons of a show. And so that idea died. Well, Marvel apparently was like, I think we can make it work.
00:48:05
Speaker
Yeah, and I hope they do. I hope they do. Or at least that they are able to make it work enough where they're able to keep doing this stuff because, you know, being a longtime comics book fan, like it's I love seeing all this interconnectivity. But also, I know that horror that I get when I talk to people who are interested in comic books.
00:48:25
Speaker
Or even just now, I'm teaching a class where I'm using comic books in the class and I'm just like, shit, what comics can I give my students to read where they won't be lost? So it's definitely a challenge.
00:48:36
Speaker
Well, my that was something that would come up when I talked to friends because I, you know, I'd be buying like, you know, 20 or so different titles a month or whatever it was. And like, how can you keep all of that straight? And it's like, I don't I just how I was raised like, right? They read the books raised me that way. They taught my attention span to be able to focus on this book, then focus on that book, and then put the two together where I need to put them together in the appropriate timeline.
00:49:01
Speaker
Yeah. And so they are trying to do with the movies and the TV shows what they've been doing with the books for 70 years. Yeah. Yeah. And it'll be interesting to see if it translates to a wider audience. Anyway, let's talk about some of more of the performances in here. So we talked a little bit about Brie Larson. I mean, Samuel Jackson is always great as Nick Fury, but I love that he had so much more to do in this movie than he's gotten up to date in the MCU.
00:49:32
Speaker
I agree. And we get to see a different side of him, right? We get to see a bit of a more of a human side to him, as opposed to always the cold badass we get in most of the movies. Yeah, well, because he hasn't, whatever he's experienced between Captain Marvel and, you know, Avengers, you know, Iron Man, Iron Man 2 is when he gets he really shows up. Like, whatever we haven't, we haven't seen what he experienced there yet. So we don't know what turned him bitter, you know,
00:50:02
Speaker
Yeah, but also just like to see that different side of him was just such a nice change of pace and just kind of see like where he will where he was where he started off where he will end up later on where he becomes so so bitter and cynical and untrustworthy.
00:50:20
Speaker
Right, exactly. I think it was amazing that they were able to pull out Annette Benning. It was also interesting that you pulled out Annette Benning and then you barely used her. Yeah, I mean, I loved her as Mar-Vell. I kind of wish we I'm kind of hoping we'd get like a Mar-Vell series or something where we get to see more of Annette Benning playing that character.
00:50:42
Speaker
Yeah, it just seems like such a... Well, I guess Glenn Close in Guardians 1 or 2. I don't remember which one now. Guardians 1, yeah. Guardians 1. Like, wait, you spent the money to get an actor of that caliber.
00:50:56
Speaker
for barely more than an extended cameo. Same thing with Jude Law. I thought Jude Law was, again, knowing the comics before helped me. So when Jude Law ended up being the villain, you're like, oh, well, yeah, I wasn't surprised by that.
00:51:19
Speaker
You know, his, his role, like you kind of pick up on it early, you know, if you knew that the Cree were who they were. But I think he played it well enough that like for the people who didn't know that were genuinely like, you know, when he had his heel turn, like, you know, genuinely kind of shocked by it. Yeah.
00:51:38
Speaker
I agree. I thought Jude Law – if you had asked me what part would you want Jude Law to play in the MCU, I'm not sure what I would have said, but it definitely wouldn't have been Yon-Rogg. It's a surprising choice to have him in a role like this, but he does a really good job in it. I really enjoyed him in this movie.
00:51:59
Speaker
Also, it was great seeing Clark Gregg as a young Phil Coulson and just like he's like, you know, just so green in this movie. And it makes sense why he's so cool in later movies and like nothing affects him because he saw all this shit in Captain Marvel. Right. Because, you know, they're calling him rookie. And, you know, so I mean, I don't know how many days on to the job he is, but, you know, he's still young enough that he's called a rookie and he's being shot at by, you know, space cannons and having his identity stolen by aliens and, you know,
00:52:27
Speaker
Yeah, cats puking up cosmic rocks on it. But I think maybe my favorite performance in this is probably Ben Mendelsohn is Talos. He he displays it in. And it's funny because I saw him in The Outsider recently, which is a completely different type of role. So it's really funny to go back and watch him in this now and just like how much fun he's having playing this character.
00:52:58
Speaker
Yeah, I'm I can't say I'm overly familiar with Ben Mendelsohn. I mean, I know him like, you know, but I you know, I just I don't know where I can't place where I know him from other than this movie. He was also in The Dark Knight Rises. He was the Daggett, the the corporate guy.
00:53:15
Speaker
Okay. Yeah, I mean, it's one of those like, I'm sure if I was to go look at IMDB and glance through, I'd be like, Oh, that's where I know I'm from. Oh, that's where I know I'm from. That's, you know, sometimes my encyclopedic memory of random actors playing random things fails me. But you know, when you get to when you get to your mid 40s, it starts, you know, falling apart. Right.
00:53:39
Speaker
But I liked what he did here. I'm really looking forward to seeing him back in Secret Invasion. Also, I like the brief bit of him we get at the end of Spider-Man No Way Home. We find out he's been impersonating Fury the whole time. Yeah. I do wonder, have they said, or I'm guessing they'll get to it with Secret Invasion, have you been able to figure out where the Talos Fury switch happened?
00:54:07
Speaker
My, I don't think they've ever said it, but my guess is it happened, uh, after end game would be where I'd say it happened. Cause it, it makes sense that he was, he was fury the whole time in, uh, no way home because I mean,
00:54:23
Speaker
Fury in that movie, he gets punked a lot by, he gets run circles around quite a bit in that movie, so it makes sense that it's Talos impersonating Fury as opposed to Fury being in that movie until the end. Yeah, and that little post credit scene did make more sense because there was that like, wait, Fury repeatedly fell for this?
00:54:45
Speaker
you know um and then it makes sense okay but i was just wondering like because i know some people like wait does that mean fury has been you know talos the entire time even during avengers and i'm like no i think the switch happened some point after you know either daring or outright you know somewhere between infinity war in in game or after end game i think it happened after end game because he was dusted at the end of infinity war so it makes sense that after coming back from that he's gonna want to take
00:55:15
Speaker
Space threats more seriously, so that's why he goes up into space starts working with Talos So that fits a lot better than I think Yeah Because I'm guessing that's gonna also lead to sword being introduced. Yeah, they were introduced in Wanda vision that was that organization was going after oh It wasn't it wasn't just space though. That was it would set of sentient world. It was sentient weapons and
00:55:42
Speaker
OK, yeah. So they'll probably combine them together and create the space-based sword in Secret Invasion is what seems to be what's happening. I wonder. I'm curious. And I know this is getting off topic by quite a bit, but that's what I do on my show. So welcome to my world. That's fine. We do it all the time here as well.
00:56:03
Speaker
Um, when they get around to finally introducing Norman Osborn in the Spider-Man universe, um, if Norman Osborn is able to take over shield and rename it hammer and do that, like, you know, the dark Avengers and, and that whole, you know, that, that whole storyline, which could be really fascinating in.
00:56:25
Speaker
They might be doing a different version of that because it seems like they're setting up the Contessa for that kind of Osborne-like role, Julia Louis-Dreyfus' character, because she's gonna be running the Thunderbolts, it looks like, which is probably gonna end up being like the Dark Avengers type of thing. So, which I think is actually a better way to do that as opposed to what they, I've got very mixed feelings on Dark Rain and what they did with Norman Osborn in that story. I felt like they were taking him,
00:56:54
Speaker
I felt like that kind of role didn't really suit that character. If it was someone more like Baron Zemo, I think it would have made a lot more sense. But for Osborn, it never really fit very well with me, even though I like some of the stuff they did in those books. And of course, that's a question of if they're even going to bring Norman Osborn in after they had the Ultimate Universe one pop up in No Way Home. I'm curious to see what they're going to do with the Spider-Man stuff now after they'd set all that stuff up.
00:57:24
Speaker
Yeah, I don't because I i'm i'm guessing because I mean we've talked about the x-men a few times already And they've sort of introduced the concept in In multiverse of madness when they brought professor x and they finally said the word mutant with miss marvel Uh,
Future of MCU: Mutants and Kevin Feige's Legacy
00:57:43
Speaker
they said a mutation with miss marvel, but it was actually uh namor in in uh wakanda forever who says i'm immune then So he literally is the marvel's first mutant because he's the first character to call himself a mutant
00:57:55
Speaker
Right, I've always wondered, you know, I was wondering if the blip would do it, but now I'm wondering if this multiverse war that's coming isn't going to... Because I do think that same problem with the origin stories is that now you have to figure out a way to create the mutant.
00:58:16
Speaker
Problem yeah i mean for lack of a better word where you either have to say this entire group of people have been hanging out in connecticut ignoring everything.
00:58:28
Speaker
And now they're showing up and doing something or you have to bring in an entire universe that's had the mutant thing. And now these two universes are sharing the same world. Yeah. So there's, I've got a, I've got a theory of how that could work. You know, people who listened last week's episode, you're going to be hearing this again because I, we just talked about this at the end of the, the X2 episode. We literally just finished recording before this. Um, and, uh,
00:58:53
Speaker
My guest, one of my guests who was on that one, Oscar Owens, he said that the multiverse thing makes more sense to him, especially when you bring in the whole the whole mutant angle. So it makes sense for the X-Men to come in and mutants to come in from a different world. My way of thinking is I think they're setting it up with the blip. And because you see that in WandaVision, it's revealed that
00:59:14
Speaker
Wanda seemed to have some power before she came into contact with the Mind Stone. The Mind Stone just kind of like jump-started it. And so I think what it was, and then also in Endgame, from Infinity War to Endgame, we had three different snaps, uses of all the Infinity Stones on Earth. And Rocket said when Thanos did the blip, it was this surge of cosmic energy that had never been seen before.
00:59:40
Speaker
And then we get those same surges twice more in Endgame. So my theory is that mutants have existed, like Namor has been around for a while now, but they've been in such small numbers. So you could have something like Krakoa, which is a sentient mutant island. It can move around from place to place. So my theory is that mutants have existed for years, but the numbers have been so small. You're talking like one in a million or something like that.
01:00:05
Speaker
and Xavier and Magneto have been gathering up mutant refugees, living with them on Krakoa. But now with the blip,
01:00:14
Speaker
there's this surge of cosmic energy and it's jump-started the X gene. So whereas a lot of people now, if their grandchildren or great grandchildren would have become mutants, now instead they're happening. So the mutant gene is being activated several generations early and there's this big explosion in the mutant population. I think that can work with what's been established in the MCU and can also give people that fear of mutants because they came from what was the worst tragedy that humankind ever experienced.
01:00:43
Speaker
That makes way more sense than anything I've really thought out. I think about this way too much.
01:00:54
Speaker
But yeah, I mean, because I would say like, you know, with the with the coming of the mutants, because that's going to happen. We're going to get it. I mean, they have to figure out they're making Deadpool three. So they're going to have to figure out how to tie that in. Right. And they're bringing in a multiversal Wolverine in that one, too, because Hugh Jackman coming back. But they said it's not going to be the same Wolverine from the X-Men movies. Also, we had Patrick Stewart playing Professor X. But again, wasn't the same Professor X from the X-Men movies.
01:01:21
Speaker
Yeah, and you know, who knows and that, you know, I know they introduced the idea of Reed Richards, and they keep saying they're doing a Fantastic Four movie. Who knows if it's actually going to be John Krasinski or any of the other 157 actors that have been officially listed as in final talks. I think
01:01:44
Speaker
I would love to see same with they did with Black Panther. I would love to see the Fantastic Four introduced in a Spider-Man movie or maybe even the idea of having them introduced in the Marvels. I mean, I doubt because there's been no, no rumors that it'll probably be introduced that fast, but introduce them in that so that when we get the Fantastic Four movie, we can go right into it. We don't have to do the origin again. Yeah. Yeah.
01:02:12
Speaker
Yeah. And in fact, I think it's funny that they started off with they did Captain Marvel in the past because the Fantastic Four going on their space mission would have made a lot of sense in the past and then like in like some sort of time warp or something and then bringing back in the present. And maybe they'd had adventures out in space or something like that in that time period. I think something like that would have made a lot of sense for them.
01:02:36
Speaker
I mean, I will say my dream casting for Reed Richards is now out of the question, but I was hoping for William Jackson Harper from The Good Place. Someone had mentioned him as Reed Richards, and I thought that was a great choice. But then he popped up in Quantimania, so probably not gonna happen. Although Gemma Chan appeared in This is Minerva, and then she popped up as Cersei in Eternal, so you never know.
01:03:03
Speaker
Right, you know, it wouldn't be the first time they've just recast an actor and used him a second time or just straight up changed altogether. Who knows? Well, it'll be interesting to see going forward.
01:03:16
Speaker
Yeah. And I like the idea of introducing a character in a movie so that we can kind of skip the origin and go right into something else. Although that being said, like Shang-Chi was amazing. Yes. And that was just a straight origin. So I mean, it can be done and it can be done well.
01:03:38
Speaker
Well, also, I think Shanchi did a lot that what Captain Marvel did as well is they kind of they mix up the origin. So it's it's not all front loaded at the beginning of the movie, but it's it's peppered out throughout the movie. So you get these flashback scenes of him as a kid growing up. And it works very well that way. And I think
01:03:57
Speaker
I think that's a good way to do it so that people don't, because I think that was a big problem with the first amazing Spider-Man movie is you had the origin stuff all front-loaded at the beginning of the movie. And so much so that when you get to the Uncle Ben death scene, it just felt very by the numbers by the time you're watching Uncle Ben die. Whereas in Shaan-Chi and Captain Marvel, the origin felt a lot more organically weaved into the overall story.
01:04:30
Speaker
But yeah, that's do we have anything else you want to say about Captain Marvel anything? We haven't quite touched on that you wanted to oh one thing we didn't talk about was Lashana Lynch as a Maria Rambo Okay her and her relationship with with Carol. I would say that I
01:04:49
Speaker
Don't I'm not overly familiar with her character from the comic books to begin with I know that Monica Rambo becomes photon or Captain Universe or whatever. So she yeah Monica started off as Captain Marvel. She was actually the second Captain Marvel and then When Marvell's son, Janice came into the picture She gave she gave him the name back and then she became photon later on she becomes
01:05:19
Speaker
She comes.
01:05:21
Speaker
There's another name she takes on for like a hot minute. And then she eventually becomes Spectrum in the Mighty Avengers books. And then I think now she's back to Photon, if I'm not mistaken. Okay. I, you know, I just, it felt like, and maybe we'll get more of it. Well, probably not because we're so far into the future now. And that, you know, we've missed that entire relationship that like, there were supposedly like these great friends and super close.
01:05:50
Speaker
But I don't think that was one of the things that did feel a little disingenuous in the movie is that you don't get the buildup of them being friends. He just shows up and they're like, yeah, we're best friends again. We thought you were dead. You've been gone for six years. And then this woman is just like, oh, okay, we're great friends. All right, jump in this spaceship. Let's go fight some aliens.
01:06:17
Speaker
Yeah, no, I agree with you. And I think that kind of touches on, again, this idea that I had of playing with the idea of giving Carol her memories, but not the emotional attachment to them would have made for some interesting dynamics between the two of them. And also because when we see Monica in WandaVision, she seems a little bit, you know, bitter or angry towards Carol. And I feel like it's one thing to have it, you know, while she was gone this whole time,
01:06:45
Speaker
Yeah, again, I think it would make more sense if it's this idea that she has these memories, but she doesn't know how to connect to Monica anymore would have worked better. Because they seem to have a pretty good relationship when Carol leaves at the end of the movie here.
01:07:00
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it'll be interesting to see with the Marvels because the trailer doesn't really show them really interacting very much. So I don't know what the relationship is supposed to be or where it stands. I'm sure there will be some. But you left for 20 years or however long it was supposed to be. So it'll be interesting. I'm definitely looking forward to it. Looking forward to it.
01:07:28
Speaker
Yeah, i'm i'm sure the little girl is a little disappointed They just jumped her character, you know that far into the future so like she didn't get to continue on but you know Such as life. Yeah. Yeah Same thing with the actress who played cassie in the atman movies, right? She had the same. Yeah. Yeah Um, uh, well also probably the the young tachala they introduced at the end of wakanda forever He's probably going to be aged up in the multiverse stuff. I'd imagine I would assume and and it it that
01:07:57
Speaker
That allows them to bring T'Challa back in and call Black Panther T'Challa. And I was like, oh, that's how they're going to recast T'Challa by just calling him T'Challa Jr. or whatever. Yeah. Which is funny. They did that with Nick Fury in the comic books to bring in a Black Nick Fury. So he looks like Samuel L. Jackson. They brought in Nick Fury Jr.
01:08:21
Speaker
Well, and they introduced Nick Fury as the African American gentleman in the Ultimate Universe. Right, yeah. But now he's also in 616 too. Right, where they just totally patterned him after Samuel Jackson. And Samuel Jackson was like, that guy, I owe quite a bit of money to that guy because he gave me this entire career when he drew me as this character. And they were like, well, now we have to cast him.
01:08:47
Speaker
Yeah, that was actually part of the deal because they went to Jackson and asked if they could use his likeness and Jackson said yes, if I get to play him in a movie. So they said yes. And then that's how they got to do it. Oh, so far. Wish we could have seen David Hasselhoff play that. No, no, I'm not. I'm not mad about. I actually I've got a bit of a soft spot for that. I thought Hasselhoff did a surprisingly good job as as Nick Fury in that movie.
01:09:11
Speaker
I mean, I should just go back and watch it again. You know, there's, there's some stuff that's clunky about it, but I think Hasselhoff plays it surprisingly well for what you'd expect. It has been, when did that movie, it was a TV movie in what, 98, 99? 97, 98, something like that. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's probably been since then, since I've seen it. So yeah, I could, I could watch it again.
01:09:37
Speaker
We covered it on one of the very early episodes of the show. We covered it. So you can go back and listen to our conversation on that. And yeah, I mean, I thought Hasselhoff, Surprisingly, was one of the better things about that movie. Sandra Hess's Viper, on the other hand, not so much. But I mean, personally, I think Kurt Russell is still who I would have loved to see play Nick Fury, especially back in the day. But that ship sailed now.
01:10:07
Speaker
Yeah, I think one of the I think another disappointment is that we may never see I loved the the Captain Marvel series from the early 2000s that Peter David did starring kept Marvell's son, Janice. So that guy was that was my Captain Marvel, because that was the one I read when I was when I was in high school. But it doesn't I don't think we'll ever see him in the movies, which is kind of a disappointment to me.
01:10:34
Speaker
Who knows, they've found ways to bring characters in and tie them in later in ways that I've been surprised by. Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, the Shan Chi thing, right? That's a good example of it. After I was really disappointed in Iron Man 3 and what they did to the Mandarin, and then when they did that, the All Hail the King one shot, and I'm like, oh, there's a real Mandarin out there. That's probably the last we'll ever hear of him. And then we get Tony Long playing him and doing an amazing job of it, so.
01:11:00
Speaker
Yes. I trust Kevin Feige.
01:11:08
Speaker
Yeah Yeah, I you know to to do what kevin feige has done like they're they I don't know if there's been another and obviously he's not doing it as on his own but To to do a 20 plus 24 25, whatever 26 movies they're up to now and all the tv shows and make them all interconnected and work and very very rarely ever contradict or
01:11:34
Speaker
you know force each other you know force you to retcon a whole bunch of stuff like they've made it work and I would say for the most part have kept true to the comics and true to the vision of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko and and all yeah yeah yeah Kirby that was the name I was trying to come up with but you know
01:11:54
Speaker
No, no, I mean, what what Feige and his team have been able to do is is absolutely unprecedented. I mean, like even Star Wars, like Star Wars is the the closest thing you have to a competitor and they've had nowhere near the same amount of continuity of leadership or just sheer number of movies or TV shows. So
01:12:17
Speaker
Right. So, yeah, it's definitely. Yeah. And like we were saying, we're going to be in uncharted waters to see how they're able to to keep threading this needle where they're able to make it accessible for people who don't watch everything, but also make it packed enough so people who do watch everything feel like they're being rewarded for that. Right. But I think that's a pretty good note to end on.
Closing and Podcast Information
01:12:44
Speaker
Anyway, Nicholas, can you tell people where they can find your stuff?
01:12:48
Speaker
We are at media pod smash.com backslash pop culture roulette I mean, that's the that's our website, but it's easier just to find us at pop culture roulette on Facebook Our pop cult roulette on Instagram because they wouldn't let me have all of the letters. I Had that problem. I use your name, too
01:13:09
Speaker
Uh, they, you know, we, we try to put episodes out every Monday. Uh, we're, we're pretty good about it. Um, like I said earlier, uh, we, we try to stick to pop culture. We, you know, one of the two guys that I do the podcast with is in superhero fatigue. So I've been trying to back down on always talking about, uh, Marvel or DC stuff and bringing in other stuff. But, uh,
01:13:33
Speaker
We just, you know, the three of us, we've been friends now for a long time and we enjoy watching, you know, TV and movies and talking about them and just bullshitting with each other.
01:13:46
Speaker
Okay, awesome. And we'll have links to that in the show notes so people can go and check that out. As for us, our website is superherocinephiles.com. Supercinemapod is the Twitter and Instagram handles. And if you subscribe to our Patreon page, then you get these episodes a week in advance. Plus you get access to the Superhero Cinephiles Book Club once a month where we talk about comic books, graphic novels, all that fun stuff. Thanks so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.
01:14:13
Speaker
If you enjoy the Superhero Cinephiles, then you'll also love my companion podcast, the Superhero Cinephiles Book Club. All my Patreon subscribers get access to this exclusive podcast where I review superhero comics and graphic novels. Not sure what comics you want to read next or what you should dive into? I've got you covered on that. I'll be doing reviews, recommendations, and also talking to you about useful entry points.
01:14:34
Speaker
If you're interested in reading some comments and don't know where you should start, plus you'll get access to all episodes of the main show a week before everyone else. On all of this, for as little as just a dollar a month, all you have to do is go to patreon.com slash SuperCinemaPod and you can sign up at any subscription amount to get started. Thanks so much for your support and please don't forget to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
01:15:17
Speaker
Thank you for listening and as always good night. Good evening. God bless.