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Howard the WHAT?! Marvel Films Beyond the MCU || Marvel Month
20 Plays37 minutes ago
With time running out for Season 6, three podcasters must band together to discuss one of cinema's greatest triumphs in superhero history: Marvel. But with so many films and television shows under their belt, how much has it held up? Welcome to Marvel Month!
In this episode, Satsunami and Martin discuss a time before the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But in this wild west period of superhero films, how truly bad were they? Do they still hold up today? And what is it about trilogies?! Well pull over because we might be sick as we discuss the Marvel films beyond the MCU!
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Transcript
Introduction and Predictions
00:00:05
Speaker
At last, my post-credits scene squatting has paid off! Welcome to the Martinverse! Oh my god! Wait, the what now? Here, I can see your past, present and future. For example, did you know you'll be nominated for the Scottish Podcast Awards? Yeah, I know, I was there. But wait, there's more! You'll be invited the guest to get to EpicCon and at Highland Realms Comic Con! You do know we're going to those ones together. Right, yeah, okay. But i said past, present and future. I guess you already know about the 300th episode incident. Martin, I need your help getting out of here. It's bad enough that i got West Side stories here by Andrew and 300th what now? Never mind, it's okay, it's okay, it's okay.
00:00:41
Speaker
I've got it. If we isolate enough bad movie energy from the Marvel franchise, we should be able to create a p*** out of here. But we already reviewed the worst of the MCU. I never said we' we're reviewing the MCU. It's gonna get much, much worse from here.
00:00:54
Speaker
You fiend! Wait a minute. You're talking about Howard the Duck, aren't you? You
Hosts Introduction and Marvel Month Recap
00:01:00
Speaker
fiend! Welcome to the Martinverse of Madness.
00:01:09
Speaker
see whats yeah i see yeah yeah yeah Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Marvel Month. My name's Satsunami and joining me and his self-proclaimed Martin Femerson Madness is Martin McAllister. Martin, welcome back. Thank you, thank you. I saw one billion futures were you invited me on this podcast and I accepted every single one. Happy to be here. You don't have to humour me, you're not ready on... I want to get invited back. Well, true, true. But how are you doing tonight? I'm pretty good. i'm pretty good. I'm really, really excited to talk about some of the best and worst films ever made. I am very hyped for this. Yeah, because in the first week of Marvel Month, Andrew and I talked about the rise of the MCU from 2008 onwards with Iron Man, Captain America, etc, etc. I'm crying a tear away as I think about all these great films. And then, of course, the week after, we talked about the worst of the MCU and how it had a somewhat downfall, you know, without being too clickbaity about it, drawing red circles around the episode going, did you know? He said, what about the MCU? Question mark, question mark. My face circled. Hashtag Martin, love and thunder.
Pre-MCU Era: Nostalgia and Impact
00:02:20
Speaker
But yeah, we talked about that. Then we talked about living in the Marvel world. And now we are here together and we are going to be talking about the precursors. And I say that so with gusto.
00:02:32
Speaker
I'm trying to be positive here, but yeah, we are going to be talking about a time where the MCU did not exist. And honestly, Martin, it was such a different time. I cannot stress this enough. How different a time was it from before the MCU was a thing? It's funny to try even remember it as an i adult now, but how unpervasive it was in terms of the amount of superheroes that people actually knew, superheroes people didn't know, like which ones it was, toys, movies, TV shows, things that were actually Marvel that people cared about. It was such a tiny amount. And you look at these films, we'll but discuss them today, But a lot of them, when they were trying to make money, more on that later, they actually were trying to make money with these films. It was like the big A-list actors. They're trying to get in to try and launch people's careers, try and launch these film franchises long before they had the idea for the MCU. Because not only, i think, we take for granted... the sort of Marvel and superheroes being different but also this whole concept of a cinematic universe had never really been done that was hinted at in DVD box arts and that was about it that's all you ever got so yeah totally different totally just not when we were growing up superheroes just weren't interesting at all do you remember it the same are you kind of what your take on it?
00:03:39
Speaker
So I'm quite nostalgic for this time period because, and I've spoke about it in length in the Spider-Man month episode where Andrew and I talked about the Sam Raimi trilogy. Even to this day, although it's probably not dated as well as some of the other films, it's still got that cheesy nostalgia to me. It's got that heart, it's cold and everything. But it's something that is so, and I don't want to say anti-MCU, but it's so different compared to the MCU.
Marvel's Struggles and Survival in the 80s and 90s
00:04:07
Speaker
You know, the MCU has its own isolated films of, oh, they have to defeat the bad guy, but then there's this kind of underlying current of, oh, but there's a big bad either space monster or cosmic entity that's going to get them in the end and it has to build up and the stakes have to be leveled higher and higher. But these films come from a time where they were all in their isolated bubbles. And to be honest, you can thank legal action copyright and things like that because i'm i right in saying that marvel around the kind of 80s and 90s they were in quite a precarious situation because they had to sell off if i'm right in saying so they sold off the fantastic phone and x-men to fox and they sold off spider-man to sony is that right think so and then there's other even before that we're going to touch on but i'm going to touch on I don't know. There was a Fantastic Four movie that didn't get released. It was sold to a different company before Fox. So yeah, you're totally right. At this point, they didn't really know what they were doing. And they were offloading all sorts of franchises to other companies. And things like Daredevil and Punisher as well that would end up becoming a big linchpin, would call them. In like the early MCU stuff in terms of TV. you know, that had to get brought back into the fold. So yeah, they're in a pretty precarious place when you join them during the Spider-Man trilogy. And it really was Spider-Man. that's carrying them i think to this day certain people from our generation spider-man's on like that mount rushmore of superheroes he is like the biggest marvel one by a mile because the other two that are definitely and again we'll get into it later but the ones that are really prolific are blade and the x-men films yes now i don't know about you but blade i wouldn't have been allowed to have watched that by my parents so that was a non-starter for younger fans of Marvel so yeah X-Men was the next best thing but even then although it had its brutal moments this may sound controversial but I wasn't as big a fan of the X-Men films I thought the second one was really good but I wasn't a
00:06:02
Speaker
big fan of the first one and i think the reason is and it's something maybe it's because dragon ball and anime ruined this for me right but you know how you've got a hero and you want the heroes to succeed and everything i hated the fact that i was watching the x-men and they had the leather outfits on and everything they're oh look they're so cool and everything and they were getting bodied and everything and i thought these guys are just chumps and it wasn't until the second one where there was a bit balance a bit nuance and everything but it's like when you see cyclops especially i genuinely i did not believe when comic fans and things were saying oh cyclops he's the leader of the x-men he is so cool and i'm like this chump the guy who would end up going on road trips with you know cgi animals in the future that guy Yeah, he was just, he was a really badly envisioned
Notable Pre-MCU Films and Performances
00:06:52
Speaker
character. And it's like, you don't really remember that. You remember more of the Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen and things like that. You don't really remember getting jumped everywhere. And then he gets killed off screen in the third one. And you're like, oh, yay, thanks. I think as well, for me certainly, I was watching, when it came out at the time where I was just watching on Catch, like some kind of DVD, I can't remember, but I was watching the cartoon of the X-Men at the time as well, and it had a bunch of X-Men that weren't in the film, so I didn't like the film because Nightcrawler wasn't it, just don't remember because he was in the second one, but I didn't like the first one because I was waiting for Nightcrawler to turn up because he was my favourite of the X-Men at the time, and he wasn't there, and I was like, he's not there? How can this be an X-Men film? Yeah. It was such a weird film, to be honest. I don't know what's weirder, that or the fact that Hugh Jackman managed to only stay for those films, but he managed to weasel his way into the MCU as well. Hugh Jackman has by miles done the best out of Maybe let's structure this conversation a bit more. We'll come back to this. But out of all the actors that's done all the sort of pre-MCU movies, he's probably the only one that's had any real staying power. Tobey Maguire might be the only other person, I can say, but he's only done Marvel films. Or like Hugh Jackman did thingy. Patrick Stewart as well. That's true, he was in a lot Yeah, and Ian McKellen to an extent. But I don't know, Patrick Stewart always pops up and he's like, oh, look, I'm the wise. Yeah. Professor Rags and then he gets killed off screen and it's like oh my god are you just here to get killed off screen I think he's been killed genuinely off the top of my head three times in these films because he was killed in Last Stand and that was the only one pre-MCU and then in the MCU he was killed in Multiverse of Madness and Days of Future Past as well so I was like what's up he's like Mr Stewart are you okay he's just trying to get himself out of the film he's desperate he's desperate Oh, and Logan as well. Spoilers, but he was killed in that as well. love how didn't spoiler tag any of the other ones but Logan.
00:08:46
Speaker
I had to. I'm sorry, had to. But it's funny because those films that we just mentioned, you know, whether it's Spider-Man, whether it's X-Men, those were the latter half of the pre-MCU. And this is when the industry as a whole, and I'm generalizing here, but this is when it felt as if they started to getting the handle on what a superhero film should be and that it doesn't have to be silly. Because even during the late 70s, think it 1979 with the first s superman album And I think that was like a game changer that they could show, oh, superhero films are financially viable, they're enjoyable, they could be serious but also quite silly. Because before that, you know, you had Batman in the 60s and things like that, which as we know is the height of cinema. But at the same time, when it came to the other films, they were honestly all over the place and will get into it in a minute. But there was no consistency.
00:09:40
Speaker
And do you know what it reminds me of? And I'm wondering if you agree with this. It reminds me of the evolution see, video game films. Yes. To a degree. I think video game films got it worse, granted. But what are your thoughts on that? To be fair, if it wasn't for the MCU, who knows what the direction would have been like, oh, it's taken this one franchise, you know, it's correct
Podcast Promotions and Cross-Promotions
00:10:00
Speaker
course. Or I guess you could probably credit Batman as well in big way. Like the... Oh, the Dark Knight trilogy. But yeah, no, to kind of point your point, I actually want to steal a bit of Marvel terminology into this, but I think you can broadly split the pre-MCU stuff into three phases as well, right? So you've got phase one, and it basically starts from Lou Ferrigno's The Hulk into our favourite films in the MCU, I believe, which is How the Duck and Captain America, which we'll discuss. And then there's like the Spider-Man X-Men start kicking off, but there's this the Blanding era where you've got, I'm not going to list them all because there's too many to list, but you've got your Daredevils, your Ghost Rider, your Blade 2 and 3, as you Blade 2 is weird, Blade 3, Elektra, the Fantastic Four movies, where like it's just a whole bunch of the same very noughties, nineties feel, you know what I mean? can't explain it, but they all feel the same. you know what I mean? And then phase three, I would kind of call like the end of Spider-Man, maybe they're trying to reboot it, and then the X-Men ones with Michael Fassbend and, probably James McAvoy. Those ones are kind of like the last phase. Deadpool as well, I guess. And then as the MCU is kind kicking off in the background. So I feel like that's the three phases of the stuff. I feel like they never learned how to nail that tone down. I think Spider-Man, the Sam Raimi, Spider-Man's the only ones in this whole era that manages to nail the tone of what they're actually trying to achieve, you know? Oh, absolutely. We discuss it as we go along film, I think, but... It's either too serious and they miss the entire point of why did they bother making a comic book movie or it's too funny to the point it's absurd. Like our favourite films. And I feel like it really isn't until the later X-Men ones like your Logan, the Wolverine one when he goes to Japan where they start kind of getting that balance understanding what they're trying to achieve. So yeah, that was a long answer for what was probably quick question. But they never did nail the tone, I don't think, until the MCU kind of nailed it. And because there wasn't a blueprint, I think the Dark Knight's one side of the blueprint, and then the MCU kind of films outside the blueprint for what it's worth is what I bring something for what it's worth in this Marvel phase one phase two phase three things I'm talking about I also think the DC films follow the exact same pattern you could slip them into here as well think this is like a comic book problem in general so in that same sort of blending in either way they're just pumping out rubbish you've also got the Green Lantern movies and Catwoman that's Superman which I forget it's actually called maybe it's just called Superman no is it not Superman Returns or something even though Superman's back again yeah Superman's in your world What's he returning from? I never liked! Superman's omnipotent always with you. Do you know, genuinely, the only thing I remember from that film is him getting shot in the eye. That was amazing to me for. Yeah. So yeah, that's in that era as well. So just for what it's worth, for anyone says not a Marvel problem, it's comic problem. I know. It was all kind of crap.
00:12:30
Speaker
And on that note, let's dive into into it. So, of course, we'll be right back after a therapy session, of course, after watching these films. But yeah, no, in all seriousness, we'll be right back after these messages.
00:12:45
Speaker
Welcome to Chatsunami, a Scottish variety podcast that discusses topics from gaming and films to anime and general interests. Join me, your host, Satsunami, as well as the rest of our Chatsunami team for our takes on these very important pop culture topics. Sir, it's clearly a trap. I accept your page! That happens three times in the film. Every time that general goes, don't do this one thing, he goes, do you know what I'm going to do? That's exactly...
00:13:13
Speaker
Does it well? She had the pointy teeth? What was that about? looked like Bilbo when he wants the ring back. ah She did, didn't she? I just want the lightsaber one more time. Parasite says, no, you will get back into your office and work. No, says the man in Zoom. yeah Trousers are for the working man.
00:13:32
Speaker
You're bursting into your hotel room. Honey, we need to go. Leave the kids. You can milk an otage. Oh.
00:13:43
Speaker
That's the worst thing you've ever said on any of the episodes. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can check us out at our website, chattsunami.com, as well as all good podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, stay hydrated. Stay classy and have better... This has been chattsunami!
00:14:03
Speaker
I'm sorry, what?
00:14:10
Speaker
Hey Chat Tsunami listeners, my name is Nicola, I host the Tis Yourself podcast over here in Ireland. It is a chat show where I chat to some of your favourite celebrities from shows like Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Friends, Scrubs, EastEnders, Hollyoaks, some musicians, some sports stars, some reality stars all in there chatting about life, journeys, addiction, banter, crack, the whole lot. I would love you to come and check it out. That is of course after you finish listening to this Chat Tsunami episode. The gang are doing great over there and I can
Early Superhero TV Shows and Films
00:14:38
Speaker
only... all utter success so if you feel like coming and supporting another indie podcast i would love you to come along and check out the tase yourself podcast have a great one so i've got a bit of a bone to pick with you martin what a way to start this episode right but remember how and this somehow worms its way into every episode when i have to remind the pandalorians that once upon a time you used to host a bad movie night and a lot of these films that we were We're gonna be talking about, we did see at your house, or rather your old house, yeah.
00:15:09
Speaker
We had to sell the flat after. You know that way where it's like, oh, do you need to know anything about this house? No. And it's like the telltale Turkish Star Wars buried under the floorboards. Your secret shame. Yeah, I was gonna say, don't un-wallpaper the walls, just DVDs all up the wall.
00:15:27
Speaker
They'd be inside underneath the wallpaper. You think that's plasterboard? No, no, no. No, no, it's a box of DVDs. Actually, do you still have those DVDs in all seriousness? I never thought to ask you. I actually have some of them. Some of them? I do have... So when I moved, I got rid of a lot stuff. Yeah, yeah. What do have is Captain America. Oh, of course. couldn't get rid of it. It's the greatest film in the MCU. Yeah.
00:15:50
Speaker
I can't wait to talk about it. not gonna lie. Yeah, let's get there. Let's start. Yeah. So before we watched that film, and we did watch it, it's burned into my mind for all the best and worst reasons. But before that, the thing that really shocked me when I was looking at the pre-MCU, and don't get me wrong, they had TV shows and things before these films. So they had a Captain America show in, think, 1944? which i have to admit, I know nothing about, but I think that's the same time superhero shows were about, you know, Superman and things like that. You also had Wonder Woman in the, i want to say 60s or 70s, but again, that's DC, not MCU. yeah So there was definitely a lot of shows at the time, because in terms of the MCU, you also had Spider-Man, and this is one that I've been dying to get you to watch for ages. It's called Spider-Man. Spider-Man the Dragons Challenge, where for some reason, i think it's based off the, I want to say it's the 70s TV show, but they took two episodes where Spider-Man for some reason travels to China. And it's just so baffling. It's like he's trying to protect Angus J. Jonah's old, I don't know, roommate, colleague, whatever. from getting assassinated and it's one of the most bizarre things ever and it has one of those really weird shots at the end where they're chatting away but the people in front of them don't know clearly they're filming so they're just walking in front of the camera and it's them really quietly being like gee that was a swell adventure and you're like Oh my god, this is terrible. I mean, you had that and you had Japanese Spider-Man, of course, which, I mean, we both love it, don't we? Yeah, 100%. Fantastic. he what These one, the time I was two, as he said earlier, it's multiple TV shows turned into a film. Yeah, it was like two episodes put into one. That's what saying. It's like the anti-Digimon film. um They just put them together I'm like, yeah, that'll do.
Howard the Duck and Early Marvel Oddities
00:17:37
Speaker
So the first official film for the MCU, and I genuinely, I was blindsided by this, was Howard the Duck. And it was, I right saying it was produced and maybe directed? I know it was produced definitely, but don't know if it was directed by the one and only George Lucas. So it wasn't directed by ni okay a guy called Willard Heuk. What man. Good for him. But yeah, it was a Lucasfilms production. Before Iron Man, before Spider-Man, before X-Men.
00:18:04
Speaker
Howard the Duck. Someone decided, we really, really, really want to make Howard the Duck. And in 1986, so you know people who yearned for the they're like, I was born in the wrong generation. Did you want to be born the same time as Howard the Duck? That's all I'm asking. Stranger Things has romanticised and washed away Howard the Duck. Don't know where was going with that point The point is This is a terrible film And you and I watched it together I genuinely don't remember much of this I just remember it was quite seedy wasn't it Yeah that's thes so weird about this whole film is It's stupid It's not a superhero film No it's definitely not superhero film I think it's trying to be like a raunchy comedy Yeah But they still have like a big fight scene at the end with an alien Not like current MCU beam blasting Fight with an alien Very much practical props and a factory awkwardly bonking into each other Just the very fact this film exists is so baffling to me But yeah, it's incredibly weird And I can't remember most of it Which is a sad sign that the opening a couple of scenes are pretty funny and pretty weird But then you become quite acclimatised to it very quickly You know, like then it's just a duck and a film Yeah, because it's like the beginning is in his own world and there's a really creepy scene where he gets sucked into a portal or something like that and he goes through all these different apartments and then there's one duck that's in a bath or something and you're like, hmm.
00:19:22
Speaker
Didn't have to see that. Did not have to model that, George. Right. He really didn't. Why? And then, yeah, as you said, he goes into the real world and it's like, oh, okay. The whole gimmick is, it's a duck in the real world, except it's not a duck because have you seen the size of him? He's got a love interest. Look, I know I bring Sonic into it quite a lot, but Marvel fans who make fun of Sonic 06 and, oh, look, it's a hedgehog kissing a human. No. It looks like what's in your closet. Yeah.
00:19:50
Speaker
i See, you're skeletons. Howard Dukin getting these feathers ruffled. No. Do you know what the weirdest thing about this song is, though? I'm just looking at it in IMDb. This was a 12.
00:20:03
Speaker
Like, this is rated 12. How the hell did Howard the Duck get a 12? I thought you were going to say the weirdest part of this film is it's now part of the MCU. Oh, yeah. Well, that too. I don't know if this film is, but there is a Howard the Duck in the MCU. And the words of the church have canonised them. They've embraced. Yeah, they've embraced the character. And again, oh, it's goofy. It's Howard the Duck. I was about to call him Donald the Duck. But at the same time, why is that the hell you want to die on? Like, I don't think he's ever come back. Or if he has, he's probably been in the background. I think he was in the background of the Avengers Assemble scene. Oh, quite possibly. You know, like the biggest, most important scene of the entire franchise. I think in that. When your custom character's in. Yeah. So we go from 1986 to Howard the Duck. It was rightfully panned. 28 on Metascore. Jesus Christ. And then we get to The Punisher, which came out in 1989. And I'm not going to lie, I haven't seen this film, but... I have. This is the Dolph Lundgren one. Yeah. Is this the one where it's like he's fighting Japanese gangsters or something like that? Yeah. It's been long time since I've seen it. For what it's worth, it has been so long since seen it. And I also watched this and the other Punisher movie back to back because I thought it'd be funny. Was it funny? Was worth it? No, it truly wasn't. Yeah. This is one of these films for like, and there's a couple of these around this time, like the Nick Fury one as well, it's coming up, where it's just like they've cast a big actor and they've gone, what have we got lying around? Yeah. They wanted to make a movie with Dolph Lundgren where he was a hero main character and it just so happened they had to punish Maybe I'm totally wrong on this, but it certainly feels like it's a movie. It's an action movie first and it happens to be about the Punisher. You know what mean? Just Dread kind of feeling as well. Am I right in saying that Dolph Lundgren, and I could totally be off on this, but was he not He-Man at one point? Probably, man. So, yeah, 1987. So he was He-Man a couple of years before. Two years before the Punisher. What career. Four years before that, he was Ivan Drago in Rocky IV. Wow. Honestly, what a champ. He was too good for getting back in the MCU. Exactly. But yeah, from what know of the Punisher, there's only one funny scene that I saw when I was researching this. And it's not the 1989 one, but whatever the John Travolta one was, where he ties him to car and he blows up all the cars and the cars on fire make the Punisher symbol.
00:22:18
Speaker
Hell yeah. It's one of the goofiest things think I've ever seen. I'm like, hell yeah, this is sick. That's what they should all be though. That's what you want from The Punisher. You want just absolute nonsense. You don't want any nuance or anything. You just want, yeah, just pure unadulterated memes. And speaking of memes actually, then we flash forward one year to 1990. Chris Evans, who that? Matt Salinger. Oh, he is my Captain America. Not my captain, that's what I'm saying. Oh, this film is so baffling because if I remember correctly, it starts off so seriously and actually quite, genuinely quite moody, doesn't it? Where it's like during the Second World War and these Nazis come in and they shoot up a family and one person escapes. It's really brutal. If only the rest of the film got the memo. I would just like to read the review scores. Oh, please do. Please do. IMDb, 3.3 out of 10. Uh-huh. Letterboxd, 2 out of 10. Rotten Tomatoes, 16%. Amazon UK, 4.2 out of 5.
00:23:19
Speaker
That's me being spamming five stars on every week. Amazing. Metacritic, 404, page not found. Yeah, this is the only one with a Metacritic score.
00:23:30
Speaker
Oh my god. I don't know what's worse. This was the kind of Wild West era, see, of trying to translate the costumes into like a major, I wouldn't say blockbuster at this point, but, you know, into the big screen. It sucks bad. one thing I do want to mention as well because I feel like for all this film It's a pile of crap Right As much as it pains me to admit it I kind of thought I was going to do the bit the entire thing It is a terrible film But there's a lot of heart in it in terms like they did faithfully recreate this costume Oh yeah It looks terrible but they've sucked it There's bits in the film where Captain America throws a shield to take out a guard tower And they used miniatures and actually did it They show you the tower getting broken with a shield and they've used miniatures to do it There's a lot of people in this film working really really hard Which I think makes it only funnier Like you know
00:24:16
Speaker
you know, he's like, why did you get such a hardworking team to make this film? Yeah. What will say is, remember Red Skull looking really good. Yeah. The prosthetics and everything looked really good for that. And I think, see the costume itself for Captain America, I think it's fine. But it's this weird balacalava. It looks as if he's about to rob an old woman. He does in the film, to be fair.
00:24:38
Speaker
He's a carjacker.
00:24:41
Speaker
It's two people that way. His ears are hanging out of his costume. I've said this twice and Andrew hasn't seen the film, right? So whenever I say it, he gives a very apathetic, all right, it's a reference to a bad film. I'm like, no, no, this is a warning. Do not trust this man's like a car because he literally he does it twice he does it first of all i think when he dethaws and he does it his love interest yeah oh god yeah we'll get to that in a second can you explain what the whole what is the bit like what is it he does basically whenever he gets picked up by an ally let's say so the first guy's like a reporter or something who's a fan of him and then the second one as you said is his love interest slash the daughter of the woman he used to be in love with yeah very don't ask it was a different time The MCU did it. Yeah, but that's exactly what happens. It's every time they're driving along, and this is with his friends, by the way. This isn't with anyone who has captured him. It's not with Hydra. It's not with anyone like that.
00:25:40
Speaker
He sits in the car. He bends over and he says, can you pull over a second? I think I'm going to be sick. So they pull over at the goodness of the heart. He goes out and he does the whole bit. He hunches over, hunches his stomach. The person comes towards him, puts the hand on his shoulder, and then he loony tunes around. into the car, steals and i don't know why they leave the keys in the ignition, but he runs in, he starts the car, and he drives off without them. So the first time he does this, he leaves the reporter in and the middle of nowhere America, and the second one is his love interest, leaves her in the middle of Italy, where she can't speak the language, she doesn't know anybody, and he's like, it's much safer for you here. Clearly it isn't.
00:26:19
Speaker
A couple of things I'd like to highlight on the scheme, right? The scheme. The scheme. on this bit. So one of the things that we all know and love about Captain America is he's a super soldier and he can run really fast. Both times he does the plot, the scheme to steal the car. He does the bit, the throwing up bit after he pulls over. Not actually that far away from the car. He has to sprint back to the car. The reporter pretty much catches him. Like, in terms of love interest, he's not made it back to the car in time. He needs another 100 metres. He needs to walk further away from the car. Well, he's called Captain America, not Captain Cardio. It's the fact that like it's such a terrible, terrible scheme. The fact that he got outran by like a four foot eight young woman compared to... What's so funny about it in this film is the fact he does it the first time. He meant he does it twice. But the second time he says it, he goes, oh, keep all over. I think I'm going to be sick. And the first time ever watch this film, you are adamant it's not going happen again. Yeah. There's no way a film would do a bit twice because it's not funny. You know i mean? Like, it's only funny to do a bit once and then to flip the script on it. But this film does it twice and it's so incredibly funny. I don't know if maybe... but See if they did it third time. think it would have been the greatest film ever made.
00:27:32
Speaker
Can you imagine if he did it to Red Skull? think I'm going to be sick. It probably would have worked, honestly. But the fact that this film just completely played it straight, did it twice, it worked both times. And like said, both times, at the other person who makes it back to the car pretty quickly could have beat him there, honestly. Phenomenal. But i mean, I don't know what's worse. The fact he repeated it twice or the fact that there's a scene where he lies down. He does like a combat role.
00:27:57
Speaker
and Not even a combat role. It's like what you did in primary school. Yeah, it's rolling down a hill when you're six is what he does. Yeah, but then he holds this shield in front of him, yeah. And then, am I getting this mixed up with Jim Carter, by the way, where it's like, at the end, generally at the end, they have like a speech saying, at the end, the US had a peace treaty with this country or something. and I think that might have been Jim Carter. No, though there was a text ending for that where it's like, and they dismantled all nuclear weapons.
Transition to Blade and Late 90s Films
00:28:26
Speaker
I'm sure there was like a speech or something. Honestly, I mean, there's the thanks, Mr. President. Oh, yeah. has thumb And the Colgate smile, yeah. Yes, I'm gutted that this is an audio-only presentation because I'm currently doing the thumb. LAUGHTER Well, me too. Thanks, Mr. President. Sorry, I just looked up the film there. You are so right. It ends with a news voiceover saying that Kimball's environmental pact is agreed upon by every country in the world. My bad. No, I just, I don't get that ending. I'm not even going to commit to the bat. I don't get it.
00:28:55
Speaker
I'm going to watch this film after this. Oh, same. Absolutely. was it That's honestly, I know we've spent a lot of time on that, but I cannot emphasise how fundamentally different that was. You know, we had Howard the Duck and then we went from that to three years later, a standalone Captain America film. It's just, it's honestly baffling. and That's the thing as well, though, because there was definitely films in between 1990 with Captain America and 1998 with Blade. You know, you had your Incredible Hulk film. You had, and no, I'm not talking about Anne Lee's Hulk, but you had the Hulk, Spider-Man, those kind of things. It wouldn't be until 1998. As I said, we get Blade with Leslie Snipes. And while I think in hindsight, as an adult who's watched it, I think it's a good enough film despite the effects being janky, but it caters to a very particular audience, doesn't it? Yeah, it's a lot older. I think if that film had came out now, and of course, if anyone's in-depth in the MCU, they'd know that they've been trying to make a Blade film for 10 years or something And it keeps falling apart But I think if that film Came out now It would have been received Just as well Just in terms like The violence And the vampire stuff It was quite in vogue In the 90s obviously And think it's still Pretty big now I think the reason It did so well Reception wise Is it was quite culturally On the zeitgeist If you know what Yeah It just so happens It was a Blade movie But like Wisnysnipes was big Vampires were still Kind of in that whole Matrix i don' want to say Demolition man Because that's passed By that point But you what mean That kind of like Futuristic leather stuff like It's like Super on the zeitgeist At the time It's a great film In terms of it's Of it's time It's a perfect time capsule. It's funny you mention that about the outfits and the uniforms and everything, because with X-Men, what I find, and this is the scene that always sticks out to me, I don't know if you remember this, where they suit up for the first time to find Rogue, and Wolverine points out, oh, why the leather, you know, jackets and everything, like bikers, and Cyclops start drowning, and he's like, oh, what did you expect? Yellow spandex? Ha ha ha. Which is so weird, because we would go back to that in the MCU. Ha ha ha. To a degree, not overly, but you're completely right. It was definitely a time capsule of what this period was of yeah superhero films. You know, they wanted to be cool and edgy and everything because that carried over as well with Blade 2. I mean, Blade 2 was a fantastic film as well. I don't quite know why the meta scores are so low for it, but i think maybe it's because the genre, like it's a vampire film, it's probably not everyone's cup of tea. Action movies as well. Like, typically, I would say action movies typically always trend down the way as well and i mean x-men that did all right it was popular at the time i remember but as i said in the intro i just i didn't like it i thought it was all right but it wasn't my favorite film for a film where it's like oh we're the x-men let's focus on wolverine It's like, yeah, great. And oh, yeah, we've got two others. yeah It had great elements on that.
Challenges in Concluding Superhero Trilogies
00:31:41
Speaker
That's the thing. It's the same with Spider-Man that came out the same year as Blade 2 in 2002, that it's great how they laid the foundation for what was to come later. Because Spider-Man, that has its very awkward and janky moments. And as I said, I've spoke about it in length in the Raimi trilogy episode. But it showed that there was potential for that franchise and especially for superhero films. And we get to that, and then, am I right in saying here that this is a period that feels very much like a Russian roulette of quality? Yeah, this is what I would call I called it the blandening in the intro, which think is maybe a wee bit unfair. But everything feels very samey around this time, and there is a couple of good films, but they still feel like the same vibes, if that makes sense. But it's one thing I always wanted to note real quick before you kind of moved on Just in terms of the X-Men, Blade and Spider-Man All three them interestingly have the same problem Where they keep wanting to make, were talking about stakes earlier They keep wanting to make the stakes bigger And each time the third film's kind of a mess of like 100 ideas To which obviously X-Men had to get shut down in rebooted later. Spider-man doesn't recover for a long time and they never made another Blade film again so do think it's quite funny that none of them nailed the trilogy. All three of them ran full of trying to make themselves more than they were. Well think Spider-man 2 is like the perfect of these pre-MCU superhero films. and Yeah, we've spoke about Spider-Man 2 before and stuff, so we won't go into it, but i do think that's a perfect encapsulation of what they all should have been. While Spider-Man 3 is a perfect encapsulation of what so many of them tried to be in. Messed up.
00:33:09
Speaker
Sorry, to go back to your point, there's a real mad bit of quality exchange here, but a lot of them just fall into this. In true Russian roulette terms, there's five blanks in one shot. What? the Spider-Man ones especially and even X-Men 2 I think they started to realize what they could do with these films and show that there was going to be emotional stakes that they could afford to be a bit of a character character's study even though it was a superhero film quote-unquote for some of them but even though it leaned more into those tropes and everything it was really cool to see them do something different compared to what came before but In 2003, a year before Spider-Man 2 and a year after Blade 2 and everything, like 2003 was a contagious year because we've got X-Men 2, which, pretty good, not bad. but then we've got two in the chamber with Daredevil and Hulk.
00:33:58
Speaker
Daredevil, I'm good in that. only seen bits and pieces of it, but from what I've heard... It's fine. Yeah. The only thing I know about it is Ben Affleck fights Jennifer Garner in a playground and the children cheer them on. So basically what you're seeing is a bunch of kids cheering on a woman beating up a blind man. It's them, Stephen.
00:34:19
Speaker
There's no context where you think, hmm, if you didn't know he was a superhero, this would be pretty messed up. But speaking of messed up, you know, you've got Daredevil, which, as you said, is there. And it was so much there that they managed to get a spin-off later on, which we'll touch on. But yeah, then you've got Ang Lee's Hulk, which is Pretty much something that really, I think, terrified when the MCU came about, that it terrified them to do the Hulk because film was so bad. And what I will say in defense of the Hulk for this is at least it tried something different. I mean, it failed completely. Yeah. But at least, much like a Sonic game, at least it tried. God damn it. And what I always remember, and I don't know if you remember this, see when you went into a place like Curry's PC World, that kind of thing. Remember TVs would have all of these films that were out at the time and it was obviously to show the visual fidelity of what the TVs could do. It could show off the colour, you know, the detail. And for some reason at the time it was always the Hulk and it's the scene where he's beating up the tanks and everything. I don't know why that in particular. That's weird. That's how I unlocked the part my brain you're saying that. That's so funny. Yeah, because when I was thinking about it, thought, I mean, it was everywhere. And I remember when the MCU one came out, I was like, did they not just bring out a Hulk film? I was like, no, no, no, that was the other one, the bad one. It's got that one funny moment where the guy blows himself up by accident and he becomes like a cutout. And he's like, ugh! And it's so funny. Love it. Then you get to 2004, you've got the Punisher film, as you said. We've got Spider-Man 2, which is the absolute peak of this era. say the technical one these kind of this era yeah yeah i mean you've got the goodish x-men ones later on but that kind of coincides with the mcu yeah would kind of call that phase three i was talking about earlier yeah that's kind of that you know but i mean in terms of these films properly pre-mcu this is definitely you know it's got heart it's got personal stakes and everything it's not too i mean it threatens to blow up new york but It's like, other than that, what has he done recently? But yeah, it's a great film. Fantastic. Which is such a shame because then after that, we've got Blade Trinity. And I remember one of my good friends, we watched the trilogy together and think we kind of spaced it out. So we watched the first two. Fantastic. I can't wait to watch the third movie. Yeah, and people said, oh, it's bad. And I thought, how bad can it be? And I don't know what it is about Ryan Reynolds just being an absolute stinker. You know, because he had that, had Green Lantern. And I don't know whether these characters were in the comics or anything, or they were meant to be part of a spin-off or anything. This is also the time, and it's very controversial, that Wesley Snipes was quite, allegedly, quite difficult to work. with on this and i remember there was a rumor and i don't know how true this is they said that he refused to open his eyes love this have you heard this yeah they had to cgi his eyes open or something don't know how true that is if that's real or not i just find that so funny that he just did not give that much of a you know what that he was like no i'm not putting my all into this also sorry just another mark of course quality on this film of course is that Triple H the wrestlers in it and as we all know films with wrestlers in it are always fantastic oh yeah 100% how's Suburban Commando doing by the way phenomenal never been that 10 out of 10 3 nungers who dat
00:37:41
Speaker
I know it's the same wrestling, but still. Yeah, this one was a bit of a bust. It's been a while since I've watched it, but I just remembered it was like, oh, it's Ryan Reynolds annoying Wesley Snipes for two hours. And was like, oh, great. Well, one hour 53, according to this. And then get to 2005. 2005 is a weird one because we get a spinoff, which I've got a serious question for you. Do you think there were 10... testing the waters, see for a cinematic universe here, because Elektra technically is a sequel to Daredevil. I mean, the same actress, same character. Yeah, I don't know how much however they were serious about it though, you know what mean? In terms wanting to do it and I feel like it was a spin-off for spin-off's sake. Yeah. You know what mean? don't think it was ever meant to be anything more than that.
Unreleased Films and Financial Motivations
00:38:24
Speaker
Because there was I Am Legend has the joke in it about the Batman Superman movie. And it was such an obscure bit of trivia and sort of a weird thing at the time that I just don't think they'd thought about it in any great detail. You know what I mean? I feel like they did it and went, that's funny. And that would have been it.
00:38:37
Speaker
You know what I mean? like I think there's a few cameos kind of like that dotted around these films. And it reminds me much more of, you know how Finding Nemo has a sequel, it's Finding Dory. I feel like it's much more similar to that kind of concept them trying make an MCU. You what mean? It's like a sequel from a different character's point of view. But that's what I think. I don't know if you've got any other opinions on it, but i just feel like they didn't quite have the idea to build up with that way. Well, just wait till I get my PowerPoint out. Number one, Elektra. She stabs Bags of Santa. She so does. That's literally all I remember.
00:39:06
Speaker
I can't remember what she does that to in terms of like the soundtrack. Genuinely don't know if it's like Breaking Benjamin or EverSense or something like that. It was probably so Breaking Benjamin, isn't it? Yeah. I genuinely don't know, but it's something so 2000s. You know, I'm going to be so annoyed. I'm going to go look it up. Yeah, please look it up. I remember that scene where she's just doing that in the dark and it's like, it's supposed to be so cool and everything. Don't get me wrong. Yeah, sure. Why not? There's Evanescence is on it and Breathe No More. Switch foot sooner or later. Evanescence just made so much money off these films, the way. Good for them. But and then after that, we've got the Fantastic Four, which is something we actually haven't touched on there. So you were saying that, was it the 80s or that they technically made a Fantastic Four film? Yeah, so this is quite interesting. So this was 1994. They made a Fantastic Four movie. By day, actually can't who that is off top. But basically this company had the rights to Fantastic Four and didn't want them to go back to Marvel So they made a film and then just binned it So never got released And it wasn't until years later I think, to be fair, I think it circulated on DVDs and public sales and the rest of it for a long time But the film did get a release unofficially through that And then once of streaming and YouTube and stuff popped up It was all over that But yeah, they were planning to release it in 1994 And then went, nah And pulled all So all the actors, everyone got paid, I think But yeah, it was just a bit a tax fight off and means they keep the rights and yes we didn't see a fantastic full movie until 2005 crazy though I mean see what happened nowadays you know people would be drumming up support to get a release yeah look at yeah yeah yeah this is well I can't tell you that and yeah that phone is very similar stories that it got made and then went as not worth listening Batgirl as well few years ago yeah and he's folks just gets that one it's bizarre isn't it who does the paperwork I mean, I'm not a rich billionaire, sadly. Crying, crying myself to sleep there. I've been saying my pile of money, but what money? Patreon.com forward slash Shatsunami.
00:41:05
Speaker
make me a beinina dot com make me Please, guys, please. Do me a solid. I will fund the next Fantastic Four film. Legal reasons as a joke, etc. But yeah, it's just it so wild that you would put so much effort effort into making a film. You know, you've got to hire the actors, you've got to get people who do costuming, you've got to get the cameras, you've got to get a director and everything. And just for them to go... yeah, nah, it's not worth it, and just write it off. I know why it's money, but that thought process just seems utterly baffling to me. It's like if you and I did hundreds of episodes and then I'm like, yep, tax write off. It's supposed to be baffling to me. We're seeing this in lots of kind of companies just now. Obviously, video games are having a big problem with us just now with various studios getting closed down. Yeah, yeah. But the rights to things are often worth more than actually making anything. about the rights. You know, in selling the rights to the Fallout game franchise is probably worth more money than actually making a Fallout game though and things like that. There's this really weird flux. So I think for them just to make this film to keep the rights, they must have thought the rights to Fantastic Four were so much money that made Because, I mean, if I remember ah correctly, I know Iron Man, I think they were owned by New Line Cinema at this time, but they never far got the chance to make their film, which probably for the better, because otherwise we wouldn't have the MCU as we know it today.
2000s Superhero Films and Reception
00:42:29
Speaker
But... Again, i don't think it's a massive butterfly effect of what could have been, but you still do wonder what would have happened if the Fantastic Four film came out, because if it was that bad, would they have made this one in 2005? Oh, fun, yeah. Yeah, to be honest, much like your analysis on Daredevil, it's alright. It's been a while since I've watched it, but it's alright. It's not the one I would choose personally to put on in the background, but it's there. It's got the same stink of all the other films from this era. Yep.
00:42:56
Speaker
looks the same and feels the same yeah yeah it's weird and then of course we get to 2006 we are as you were saying before with x-men we've got the last stand even in 2007 this is kind of the era of trilogies to be honest because we had blade trinity in 2004 that was a flop we had x-men the last stand which i wouldn't say was a flop but i think it was just too ambitious Yeah, it was messy. Yeah, because they wanted all the different mutants. They had the juggernaut. They had the archangel, angel, whatever his name is. The one who flies with angel wings, that one. They had all of these different mutants and they had the big battle with the Golden Gate Bridge. Yes, and they move it. I have to admit, that is a cool image. Although it is weird how he moves it during the day and then it's night time by the time they arrive. I haven't been able to unsee that ever since. I'm like, oh my god, how long did it take you to take this bridge over? You've got that, and then you had the studio interference with Spider-Man 3, which we all know, and that is such a shame for that film, because it could have been such a poignant send-off for it, but the fact they said, oh yeah, we want Venom in it, and you're like, hmm, I don't think you do.
00:44:04
Speaker
to be honest. Yeah, I don't think it ever could have been a send-off. You know what mean? Like terms of like marketing and, sorry, the film could have been, there was no way the industry was going to let it go. The marketing people and the executives were never going to let that film franchise end. If it was good, then maybe they would have made the fourth one. But yeah, unfortunately, think it was supposed to come out in 2010, fun fact. And I think because it didn't come out, that's why they released Thor. Yeah, there's a fun fact for you. As far as I remember, they had the... And I've mentioned this a couple of episodes ago, but they had the suit for the Vulture and everything ready to go for it. Have you heard about this? No. They had the Vulture wings and everything, and the image got leaked by... Have you ever heard of Ken Penders? Yes. Yeah, it got leaked by him, of all people. And I was saying this to Andrew as well, like, of all the people... It was just like, hey guys, look what I found and it's this picture of the wings. I was like, this is the weirdest crossover of my life. don't know it's like this. That's still specifically funny. It is.
00:45:04
Speaker
I remember scrolling being like, that's cool, who leaked this? And everyone was going wild going, oh my god, it's Ken Penner. I'm like... Why is my sonic life seeping into my other interests? But speaking of other interests seeping into one another, the last, well, the last couple, and I think this is where your phase three comes in, because even before that, we had one more film in 2007. Ghost Rider. Yeah. It's Nick Cage. That's all I can say. it's literally a Nick Cage film masquerading as a superhero film I think Nick Cage is good at what he does and his Nick Cage-isms I mean even in his new I don't know if you've seen it the Spider Noir series have to admit he was good in that I don't think the series would have worked as well if he wasn't in it no he is the main event of that absolutely Yeah, everyone else does a good job, but it's like if it was just played completely straight, you would have been like, eh, I don't know. But I think it's the same with Ghost Rider. Can you think of, and not to put you on the spot, but can you think of any other actor who would have been able to do it? I mean, other than John Travolta, of course. Face-off reference. problem is with Ghost Rider, I don't really understand what he is. I think that's kind of a, I don't know comics well enough. And I think as well, the fact he's never turned back up in the MCU, despite being pretty wrecked, This is when someone's gonna tell me he is
Ghost Rider Films and Potential Reboots
00:46:21
Speaker
in the MCU. Is he in the MCU?
00:46:24
Speaker
If he is, he's not in one of them. He's not been in it yet. Was he in a TV show? Yeah, I think he is, but not in the MCU ones. I'm sure, I could be totally wrong in this, but I am convinced that he's in one of those, you know, the Marvel Defenders ones? Oh, okay, yeah. Like the ones in the Netflix series? I'm sure he pops up in one of them. Yeah, either way. So back to the point, the fact that he's never turned up in that goes to show you that it must be way trickier to figure it out, and it should just have brought back Nicolas Cage. Yeah. Yeah.
00:46:52
Speaker
Do you disagree with me? No, no, I agree with you. Like, see if they did a legacy thing where it was an older Ghost Rider, because it's something that Andrew brought up last week when we were talking about, ironically enough, Nick Cage in Spider Noir. He said, I don't get why they got Nick Cage, because he's a lot older and everything. And I think in the kind of context... him as like an older version of the character that makes sense and everything. But for Ghost Rider, I feel as if you need someone, and again, I love Nick Cage, but i feel as if you need someone either with the same energy or you need to age Ghost Rider up because he's like an Evel Knievel kind of guy. so if he breaks his bone, at least you're not worrying about him. But in that, I don't know. Again, it could be like, what's his name? You know, Sam Elliott, who's in the first Ghost Rider. He's the guy who rides the horse. Yeah. And it's like the horse catches fire, he catches fire, and he's like a ghost rider. Maybe if they did something similar with a new ghost rider and him, yeah, but again, you're completely right, because he's so OP in terms of a character. like, oh yeah, I'm fighting the literal devil. You're like, well, where do you go from there? Because even in the second one, the second one was terrible. I actually saw that in the cinema, would you believe? And I remember the excitement. I don't know, all I'll say is, and you'll know exactly who I'm talking about, but there was a guy in school. Right. yeah You know exactly who that is now, but there was a guy in school, and we used to go to the cinemas quite a lot, because back in our day, was a lot cheaper. Well, cheaper-ish, but I remember we would go to all these silly films, you know, some were better than others, some good, some bad, but we would always check it out. But I remember seeing Ghost Rider 2 in 3D. It was not worth the price of admission. I think if you include inflation into the ticket price, I could have probably bought a second home by now. That's right, avocado and toast. yeah Exactly, yeah, i could have bought half an avocado and maybe a slice of toast, but yeah, it was grim.
Phase Three Superhero Films and Oversaturation
00:48:49
Speaker
One scene that always sticks out in my head where I thought, this is the laziest film ever, is there's a scene where they joke saying, oh, Ghost Rider is so cool that he pisses fire, and then it cuts to him standing in a black background, and he's got back to the camera, but he's peeing fire. And I thought, right, okay, that's a trailer shot. That is something that they did for the trailer. They're not going to include it in the film. You know where I'm going with this? They included it in the damn film. Hell yeah. Black background and everything. They didn't. hate it anything they just said oh the ghost rider he pees fire and then they have to give a visual I don't like this film good to be on
00:49:24
Speaker
And Ghost Rider 2 came out in 2011, so again, this probably goes into your phase three, is that right? Yeah, this is when I feel like they start to nail down, or maybe not nail down, but they start to kind of... said was such confidence earlier, and now I'm looking at a list of films that includes X-Men Apocalypse, so... And Finforstic. Yeah, so you know what, um maybe they don't quite nail it. But they certainly felt like they kind of had the vision at this point, so yeah, you get the Fantastic Four reboot, but X-Men, it certainly does stuff. Some of it's good. LAUGHTER I've lost my confidence so quietly looking at this list of films. You wouldn't have slapped that in the box.
00:50:01
Speaker
In my head I was like, my god, what a run. X-Men has, you know, First Class, The Wolverine, Days of Future Past, Logan. And then i was like, oh no wait, hang on, there's X-Men Apocalypse in the middle of that. There's the Fantastic Four reboot. There's Phoenix one. Yeah. There's the X-Men Origins Wolverine, which is one of the terrible CGI, which is very funny. Oh yeah. I'd kind of forgotten those films existed. So maybe my phases aren't quite correct.
00:50:25
Speaker
It is a different time though. This is now the MCU's up and running. What i will say though it was is true to its roots, wasn't it? I mean, they're like, we're going to be the most generic, terrible adaptations ever. I mean, X-Men is in a very weird state right now. I think the all-seeing, what do you call it, gelatinous cube of Disney is going to absorb the X-Men eventually. Because, I mean, they've got Fox, don't they? Yeah, I think this is pretty much, it's happening and in the next episode. Avengers film oh after that. You've hinted out at it a couple of times. A couple of X-Men have appeared under like different guises, haven't they, in the MCU? Yeah. It's going, going, going. Obviously Deadpool and Wolverine are now in the MCU as well, so it's happening. Because, I mean, you have Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, they are technically, which I didn't realise they were X-Men, and I was like, oh, I thought they were their own thing. I was like, nope, X-Men.
00:51:16
Speaker
Oh, right. And I always, I've said this before, maybe it's just old man Logan in me right now, but I never understand. See what the X-Men in their own world, you know, or their own kind of isolated films, you can understand why the public are more afraid of mutants and their powers and things. But when you combine them with superheroes and things and the like, and again, I made this reference last week where it's like that HR meme, you know, the, hey, I'm here to save you. Oh, thank you so much. And then it's like Wolverine. hey, I'm here to save you, Bob. Hello, human resources. thats like I never got why they hate one but not the other. And I know story-wise, narrative-wise, the allegory behind it, you know, there's obviously a thing there. But yeah, it always just seemed kind of weird when you see superheroes out in the open, you know? Yeah, I think this is...
00:52:02
Speaker
For me, there's a superhero enjoyer at a distance. This is always something I've struggled with with the comics in general. is And this is kind of something, think I've mentioned this. You guys will have covered this when you spoke about the fall of the MCU. But like I can't keep all this information in my head.
Impact of Comic Book Complexity on Films
00:52:15
Speaker
The best comic books for me are the Batman graphic novels, where you open the first page and the story starts, and you get to the end page and you go, brilliant, and you close it. Any Batman graphic novel, typically you pick them up and that's what happens. Some characters have been set in positions depending on where it got released in the timeline, right? But typically, Batman as villains are all self-contained. On the other hand, I've got the MCU Civil War graphic novel that they released, and you need to have about 20 supplemental comics to understand everything, you what mean? And I've always, like, this is something I've always struggled with superhero movies, is the more complicated these things get, and I think X-Men kind of became, like, a bit of a problem for itself, where it had sort of merged the two timelines together, and you had all that stuff. Dave's a Future Past was just on the edge, I think, in terms of i'm managing it, and I don't think we need about about Mobius, Sony Spider-Verse stuff. What, you mean you don't want to talk about Madame Web and Craven the Hunter? Brother, I've not seen them. Do you know what's funny? It came on Netflix for free and I was like, you know what, save for a laugh, I should really watch it. And then I think it's off Netflix now and it's like, oh, the last day to watch it. Do you want to watch it? I'm like, I don't think I do. The problem is, right, this does kind of tie into this phase three thing I was talking about. yeah These films are now competent and they're not funny anymore. Yeah. Right. There's a...
00:53:25
Speaker
There's a problem with a lot of these films that are bad, where they're not funny anymore. and I think a lot of the later Spider-Man ones, sorry I feel like I've totally gone off tack here, but, and then like the X-Men ones as well that aren't good. The X-Men Origins Wolverine ones, pretty funny actually, but apart from that, I'd say a lot of them aren't funny enough to be bad good. You know what mean, like they're just bad. and i'm not sitting through a long film to watch but nothing i make this joke all the time but do you genuinely think that it is that that idea of oh was a different time because as we said before these films before the mcu they were time capsules and really reflections of what superheroes were basically perceived as you know they were quite
00:54:05
Speaker
goofy they were very colourful and everything and then when the 2000s rolled around they had to be a little bit more gritty and dark with some exceptions you know you had maybe daredevil well daredevil's kind of on the fence but you had like spider-man for example that was bright and colourful while you had the contrast of existential dread and leather suits with the x-men and whatnot But I feel as if, although we talked about this before, that you've got the good parts of the MCU and then you've got the terrible parts of the MCU, but there is still that consistent core of them. Whether they get good, whether they get bad, they have basically nailed down the formula.
MCU's Formulaic Approach and Risk Aversion
00:54:43
Speaker
You think this is an MCU film, whether it's good, whether it's bad, it's still an MCU film. But when you have that high standard, whether it's with the visual effects, the story, whatever, it's really hard to compare, especially when you're in the same universe, because I think the DCU probably gets, not a pass, but you know, I wouldn't say that you could really compare it because it's in its own characterisation, its own world and everything. It's a bit like comparing Marvel to the boys or something like that, or maybe Invincible. might be a more apt one, but it's like comparing two completely, know, like apples and oranges of universes. And you know my feelings on this, by the way. My brain cannot comprehend C when it's like, it's The Simpsons, but Marvel's in it. And it's like, no, I can't imagine Thor and Spiderman and things, the whipping around and whatnot with the grounded Simpsons. And I know they've done specials, you know, that's a whole other rant. But yeah, do you think it is just, as I said, sorry, that was a long-winded way to say, do you think it is just a product of its time and they can't get away with it now? Yeah. think something you mentioned, I think this is a very big point in terms of, I think you see this across all things just now, companies are so risk averse. They're not making massive blockbusters and video games and whatever without knowing the formula to begin with. And I think we end up with this very samey kind of output. Even, I'm just thinking of like the MCU off the top my head. Guardians of the Galaxy feels like the last time they went, oh, we're taking a massive risk here. You know, that feels like the last risky film they ever did. And they went, we've nailed it. We've now got a formula that works every single time. And I feel like, despite the fact that these Sony films, the Spider-Man adjacent films and the X-Men films don't always work, they try to hit that same formula every single time. And I think it's to the detriment lot of the time, because for all we clowned on it, you're never going to see A Howie the Duck again, unless it's made by an indie film developer. You know what mean? You're not going to see Lucasfilm make a comedy film about a duck like a squirrel girl movie I'm trying to give another example you're not gonna see a shovel knight I'm give something for random a shovel knight film made by a massive studio these things have gone away people are very risk averse now and not to say don't get wacky wonderful films like the Barbie movie been sort of going off the top of for the last years it like they made a very stupid film and it paid off that film shouldn't have worked as far as
00:56:56
Speaker
As far as I'm saying, it's one of my favourite films ever. It shouldn't have worked. But yeah, I think as much as we've kind of slagged a lot of the films off, they are such a perfect time capsule of an era that has just gone now. was joking about the Phase 1, the pre-Sony stuff. It's weird. and It's wonderful. And you'll never see it again. And even the era where they're trying these films, they've got Blade. They can't make a Blade film now. That isn't me being like a boomer thing. They literally cannot make a Blade film. They keep trying. You know, Spider-Man has to be connected everything else now. He can't have Spider-Man be on his own. po Fantastic Four's now being swamped into the MCU. Are they going to make a Ghost Rider film? You know, probably not. Everything has to be something. Everyone's become quite risk-averse. And yeah, so like to kind of sum it all up, these earlier pre-MCU films are such a perfect time
Superhero Film Eras and Evolution
00:57:35
Speaker
capsule the era. And I feel like that's kind of gone. That wacky, weird, will it be good film is kind of gone. I can't think of the last time a superhero film came out that I didn't know if it was going to be good or bad in advance. Do know, make sense? Yeah. It's funny you mention that because one film that came to mind just as you were talking, especially about Spider-Man, was the Into the Spider-Verse films. Yes. Which was such a risky move, but it was so good that they greenlit a sequel, they did the sequel, and as of this episode, they've still got the third one to make. They're trying. Yeah, think they'll start.
00:58:09
Speaker
on it but again it's always back and forth they say they've started out they haven't etc but that was a fantastic interpretation of the story it focused more on miles morales who is more of a wasn't just the typical peter parker route anything else it was just it was so well done but for every film that you get like that which was definitely lightning in a bottle because i don't believe for fact that anybody in the studio looked at that and said this is going to be great it's going to be a hit everyone's going to love it like i think they had confidence but i don't believe for a second they thought oh this is going to be you know one that people are going to be clamoring for and everyone just loved it and they wanted more but for every spiderverse film you've got something like as we joked about you know madame web and things but even in the mcu itself you've got things like the eternals the immortals honestly insert any phase four or five show or even film because not all of them are bad but you do get a lot more stinkers than you do good ones and the fact that you see ones like that as i said the eternals where they were trying to build up certain characters and think even with thor love and thunder they were trying to build up think Hercules as well, who, as far as I know anyway, hasn't turned up. And all of these characters, they were like, yeah, we're going to bring them back and blah, blah, blah. And then they never did. And because this is just such like a big blob of a conglomerate, as it were, a blobglomerate even, the fact is that, as you said, they're never going to take a risk because they've got a formula. The formula works. And even if it's bad, the fact of the matter is that they're still going to do it if it makes them money. I mean, look at the Mandalorian and Grogu film. I've not seen it personally, but from what was reading about it, again, it is exactly what we're saying about the early days of this phase. It seemed okay. You know, it wasn't something people were rushing to see or anything, but it made them money. And the fact is, it's like if the MCU fail with something like that, yeah, they can shrug it off, can't they? You know, they think, okay, that was a bad film. Let's never do that again. and just focus on a popular character so they've got that safety net. Whereas think the goodwill for Sony especially, and we all know why, but for Sony where they've made bad film after bad film, same with Fox as well, it's a precarious situation to be in, isn't it? yeah and I think you raised a really good point but into the spider verse because that is so different as well it helps it's fantastic right I think it won a bunch of awards the year it came out there's like this animation stuff but yeah can see they probably weren't expecting it to be so good and the fact that has taken them so long to get a studio together to start making these films and there's no you know spin-offs in that universe it said obviously spider-man noir kind of the spin-off but you know there's no other animated spin-offs so you can see the kind of almost weren't ready for it to be popular and yeah outside of the main spider-man movies all these sort of other spider-man movies are flawed and you've probably spoke with us to death i feel like there's just a general superhero fatigue now we're recording this shortly after supergirl came out and it's done pretty poorly in the cinema budget-wise box office-wise i don't think it's going to be a bad film by any means but it looks like every other superhero film to me and sab probably won't bother and that's not a dig it that film or any of the people involved in it it's just like a I'm just tired of that kind of film. know what mean? I'm trying to think of the last superhero film that saw in cinemas and it might have been Way Home. Probably the same for me, actually. Yeah, because I can't actually remember if I went to others. Was that before or after the Batman filmed in Glasgow? No, did see that. Oh, that was awful. That's my controversial take. I did not like that. Wow. To extend the podcast by half an hour. Another time, another time. Another time, yeah. We'll do it for Batman month. I actually have been thinking about doing Batman month. We should really do it. Adam West, get ready. I think I need to re-watch it, but I just remember watching it at the time thinking, wow, I did not like this one. i don't know what there was something about it where i was just like uh yeah it's okay i do want to quickly mention sorry yeah yeah i'll bring this up again when we talk about the batman but my biggest pet peeve reading reviews for that movie was it was obviously filmed in glasgow where me and are both quite close to yeah and i would consider to be my hometown and love glasgow i think it's phenomenal place to live and whenever the reviews came out for the batman it would always be like gosselin's never looked so disgusting Gotham's never looked horrible. At the end, they drive through a disgusting graveyard. Like, yeah, that's it. Glasgow, lads. Please leave it alone. It upsets me the amount of times that Glasgow's been used for Gotham and it gets mentioned in reviews how disgusting it looks.
01:02:42
Speaker
What really baffles me about that whole film is it's like, oh, it was filmed in Glasgow, and genuinely, you really can't tell up until the end when it literally comes out. Yeah, it's like, it's literally Glasgow. So good. They barely dressed up as anything else. It's literally just the graveyard. It's the necropolis in Glasgow. But then he goes down the hill, and he stops at the lights, and I'm like...
01:03:05
Speaker
The tennis factory is on the left, brother. That's Glasgow. That is a hundred. You didn't even put like a this way to Gotham downtown. It's like that is Glasgow. The most offensive one of all is The Dark Knight Rises as Glasgow is used. So Chicago is used for Gotham in that franchise, except from after Bane destroys the city. Then it's Glasgow.
01:03:29
Speaker
Honestly, we need to do an episode on American films that are set in Oh, that's in Glasgow. Really? Yes. Wow. I was driving about on a motorbike and it's like, he goes through the same street four times. If you'd know the city, it's so disorientating. There was one remember. Did you ever watch the Eurovision film? Yes. Yes. Yeah, they go down to the SEC, don't they? Yeah, it's like they're in Edinburgh and they take a turn and they've edited it so it's like the SEC in the distance or the Hydro or something like that in the distance. I'm like, well, that's the wrong city. I mean, you've got that, you've got World War Z, that's the famous one, Indiana Jones, the fifth one. Try and think of the other one. Batgirl. Really? The one that didn't get brought They filmed that in Glasgow because then that was ones that got canned. Oh, yeah. Maybe feel offended. Yeah. Well, then, of course, leading to my point, of course, there is, of course, the new Spider-Man films from there. But I remember looking at the trailer for that, and don't get me wrong, it looks all right. But again, I think it leads to what you were saying about superhero fatigue. I don't think it looks bad by any means. I don't think it's going to be a bad film. I think it's probably going to be good, because I like Spider-Man, have to say. He is probably my favourite Marvel superhero out the bunch. But
Impact of Interconnected Storylines on Viewing Experience
01:04:45
Speaker
yeah, Glasgow. yeah yeah for me i just miss the days and this is great i feel old saying this but just miss the days of being confident if i pick up a film on the stand-up i have this problem with star wars and marvel and dc and a couple of things now but i often get don't know if paranoid is i would but a bit kind of in my own head when i'm watching a film right and a character turns up and the main character now says oh hi satsu and i go oh no have i forgotten who this character is are they in a different film you know mean to the point where like that was part reason i gave up on Mandalorian I'm watching it and then everyone's addressing each other turns out this character was in like one episode two seasons ago of the Boba Fett show you know and it's like how am I supposed be keeping track of this and that's my one thing and I probably will not bother seeing Spider-Man for the same reason that I'm not confident if I start watching this film that a character from the Andrew Garfield Spider-Man that was in the background for five seconds turns up and everyone knows who he is except me and it's pivotal to the plot somehow or Madame Web turns up and I need to know who that is or more you know what mean and it's just so much stuff now that I'm like give me Howard the Duck That's actually the perfect summary of, and again, I use this very loosely to say everything wrong with the MCU. But I don't mean that in a disparaging way to be like, it's terrible, how dare they have an interconnected universe and everything. Because it's bloody impressive. Yeah, they truly did something one of a kind. Yeah. Like no other franchise has managed pull this off. No. I mean, it was the DCU. No other franchise has managed to pull this off. All the franchises have tried. Remember the... Oh, God, I forgot it with Andrew as well. The dark... Yeah, the... Dark monster universe or something. Johnny Depp was going to be the Invisible Man. Is that why he's not in the poster? The Hasbro cinematic universe. Oh, of course, yeah. Transformers and G.I. Joe. Was that actually going to be a thing? Yes. Oh, my God. There's honestly going to be so many. I mean, I think... Nintendo are aiming towards that. I haven't seen the last film that they brought out, but from... Oh yeah, Star Fox, isn't it? Yeah, I think they're definitely aiming towards that now that they know that kind of thing works, so I wouldn't be surprised. We've actually not spoke about one of the best MCU movies, so Not MCU movies Oh no And you've just reminded me Big Hero 6 Is that Marvel? It is It was made by Disney Based off a Marvel comic Ah Okay This I guess This kind of fits Into the brackets Of Men in Black And comics That vaguely Marvel That aren't actually Superheroes You know I mean And be a Big Hero 6 Phenomenal film Yeah I just thought would quickly Name-drop that Men in Black as well we're talking about Comics Marvel comics But again It's not really superhero Yeah I genuinely Didn't know they were Marvel Well learn something new Every day in this podcast This is when I got this Completely wrong I'm so sure they are. It's actually DC, thank you for the name of the Larcher. The Watchmen, that was pretty good as well by Marvel. So was that The Boys?
01:07:26
Speaker
You what like? Spawn. And Invincible. I was about to say invisible there. Big Hero 6 is an American superhero team created by a man of action that first appeared in Marvel Comics September 1998. Hell yeah. But no, you're completely right though. I feel as if, going back to what I was saying though, I feel as if although they have done such a good job at interconnecting these universes, is just such a shame that... You have to
Marvel Films Outside the Traditional MCU
01:07:50
Speaker
kind of read up on these characters and although you could probably jump into it and enjoy it for what it is, it's a bit like when Andrew and I were watching that Wonder Man show, which is a fantastic show by the way, it's MCU and everything, but they've got a character called the Mandarin in it. Have you seen Iron Man 3? Yes, vaguely am aware of the plot of Wonder Exactly. That was in phase two, I want to say, or maybe early phase three. But it's the fact that I had to explain to my partner when we were watching I'm like, okay, this is the Mandarin. was pretending to be a bad guy. And also he was actually a bad guy in the first Iron Man film in phase one, but then he wasn't. And then he was a bad guy in phase three. Yeah. Yeah, and then he was in Phase 4 in Shang-Chi, and you're like, oh god, here we go. But that's the thing, though, it's like trying to explain, and fortunately that's the only thing I had to explain, but you're completely right. The fact is that it's very rare nowadays that you can go into an MCU property or just Marvel in general without having to know, you know, everything. But don't get me wrong, you still had to for Blade 2 or X-Men 2 or, you know, like any of the sequels. Yeah, but that's a sequel, you understand. concepts. Yeah, you at least know that you're going to catch up fast if you don't know it. Whereas, yeah, there's just so much homework for the MCU, which, again, it's a blessing and a curse. It's a testament to the work and it's extra homework for us, to be honest. But What I think quite interesting as well, and sorry, this is the last point, I swear, but what is quite interesting, it's something you brought up there when you were talking about life outside the MCU films, and it's something I never thought of, because when I thought of this episode, I thought, alright, we're going to be talking about Howard the Duck, we're going to be talking about Captain America, etc, etc. And it never really crossed my mind to think of films like Deadpool or the First Class films or any of the Wolverine films, so ask technically the X-Men films, or, you know, any of the Fan Force stick film and all of those ones kind of outside, because it's kind of unheard of, isn't it, that you would have and a Marvel film that isn't directly tied into the MCU? Yeah, and even like these X-Men ones, that's them, as we're saying, getting absorbed in now, so it's kind of, it does feel like that's it. And a lot of the ones, we joked about How the Duck, but the Spider-Man films are canon to MCU now because of No Way Home. Yeah. I don't know if i quite, I don't quite understand if they're canon or not in terms of like the actual events. know mean? Like the characters are canon, but i don't know if those, you get the point. Yeah, yeah. The events of those films may or may not have happened in the MCU because obviously Doc Ock's alive and blah, yeah even those films are now getting brought into the mcu so it feels like we're running out films that aren't brought into that umbrella so basically once the 1990s captain america turns up we know do you think they'll do what they did in the flash film where it's like the cgi version of them and like the multiverse bubble looking down i'm just thinking and it's like dr doomsland and his big spaceship and then guys like can you pull over for a second i think i'm gonna be sick yeah
01:10:45
Speaker
Obviously, Doctor Dooms, he's a rules-following villain, gets out of the spaceship. Captain America runs back on, and sets off. to again End of film. End film. So I was going to finish this episode and ask you, would you like to see a sequel to any these films? Like an Amazing Spider-Man 3 or a Captain in America 2 or Howard the Duck 2, you know? But see, with the multiverse theory and everything that's come in and the fact that Disney are basically absorbing all of these properties, It's kind of a given now, isn't it? That maybe they might make an appearance or they might point to them and go, oh, look, it's that person. Yeah, 100%. And
Potential for Unique Adaptations and Sequels
01:11:20
Speaker
like, it's so hard, especially with Disney, for all we know, Alien might end up in the MCU. Maybe they'll do a Predator film stuck in. You know, you know it's so hard to tell. These franchises are so gigantic. And I know that sounds absurd that these aren't even related, but, you know, they'll push the button on these things eventually when they run out of ideas. Well, I mean, Godzilla's done worse. Yeah, Godzilla's in the comics. Wait till he turns up in the films. Can't wait. 10 out of 10. Honestly, really good.
01:11:40
Speaker
I'd like Big Hero 6 to get a sequel, because that's like the one that hasn't. Yeah, I mean, it's got... There was a TV show. yes Yeah, Disney did the thing where it was like, there's a low effort TV show and there's all the shorts that they did with it. But yeah, no, a proper sequel would be great to see. And I mean, as in a proper sequel, not in the way that they treated Megamind. Yeah. over in Dreamworks, which the less said about those sequels, the better. I haven't seen them personally, but from what I saw of them, I'm sad. Martin, I'm not going to lie. Dreamworks famously terrible at sequels. Oh, come on. I mean. It's our part from Puss in Boots Last Wish.
01:12:18
Speaker
Shrek 2. Shrek 2. That's true. Kung Fu Panda 2. How to Train Your Dragon 2. Oh, How to Train Your Dragon 2 is pretty good too. There was a specific era where they were like on their game. you said, they're at the second of a franchise. I'll give you that. Yeah. And then the third is like, yeah.
01:12:33
Speaker
Anyway, MCU, I think I all sequel'd out. I think Big Hero 6 is probably the only one that I think really does exist on its own that I'd like to see a sequel. Obviously, I'd like to get the end of Into the Spider-Verse as well, because that ended on a cliffhanger, which is weird. What about yourself? Have you got any? To be honest, for nostalgia reasons, my heart says, oh I'd love to see, like, Spider-Man 4, or... I would like have seen Spider-Man 4 when it was due to come out. yeah I don't want to see Tobey Maguire acting now. No, I feel as if he'd probably be quite angry. But I mean, yeah, I totally agree with you. At the time, it would have been great. I think Andrew Garfield might make a good job of like The Amazing Spider-Man 3, but The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was a rough watch. He was the best part of that film, but... Everything else, it was a real slog. Do you know what one I really want to see outside of the MCU? I really want to see a Japanese Spider-Man film. Yes.
01:13:27
Speaker
I am not even joking. See a dedicated, full-on, even if they have to make it multiverse jargon of, oh, this is universe 1234. It's like, I don't care. him in Leopard on. Psst. pumping through New York in this big mech. That would be amazing. That's my dream adaptation, personally. Everything else, I feel as if they've been adapted well enough, because we've got the Punisher TV show, we've got the Daredevil show, we've got the Fantastic Four film, we've got, well, Spider-Man, as we mentioned. We're just, for the most part, everything seems to have had a happy ending. Well, except for Elektra and Blade. But the less said about them, the better. Yeah, I think that for the most part, most so of them are in a better place now. And I don't mean that in a morbid way. It's okay, Toby. Think of the spider rabbits. I can't believe that's the second episode in a row I've made a mice and men reference. Here we are. That would genuinely be the one I would be interested in seeing, but... Again, it's such a cop-out answer to say only time will tell, but only time will tell for these sequels. It'll be interesting to see if Fox, and again, i know they're technically Disney, so maybe they'll just get absorbed, but it'll be interesting to see if they make any more, especially with Morbius, which is really weird, because correct me if I'm wrong, but it's not like an after-credits scene where the vault is there or something i don't know maybe then you've got the venom films as well which yeah that was a mix they were a thing that's all i'll say they were a thing and again they're trying to absorb them into the mcu so basically what i'm trying to summarize is disney is venom and it's absorbing everything right now i mean it's got his tendrils and everything so we'll see if a lecture gets her sequel
01:15:07
Speaker
We'll see. She was in the Daredevil show, was she not? Oh, I actually don't know. I genuinely haven't seen the Daredevil show. I've heard great things about it, though, but i haven't seen it. So she did get the seagull after all. I mean, technically her and Blade were in the Deadpool and Wolverine film. which was kind funny. But again, multiverse theory and all of that cameo. We'll see. We'll see. But on that very optimistic note, Martin, thank you so much for yeah going down memory lane with me and yet discussing life outside of the MCU. It's been
Closing Remarks and Acknowledgments
01:15:39
Speaker
an absolute pleasure and going to go watch Captain America 1990. Be careful, Mr. President. Can you pull over the podcast? Sorry, I think I'm going to be sick. Well, i wish I'd ended the episode like that. Or put that the skit. Do you mind if we stop the film? I think I'm going to be sick. Just put Herbert the Duck on. but But yeah, before we wrap up where can the amazing Pandalorians at home find your content? You can find me across Instagram and TikTok at Martin McAllister any of those platforms.
01:16:06
Speaker
I've also got some news in the works, cooking up, so keep an eye out. My content will be more than just wrestling, but from now, it's mainly wrestling and a little bit just dragging stuff. Watch this space. And yeah, if you want to check out more episodes from ourselves, as well as more episodes a about Marvel Month, then you can check us out at our website, chatsanami.com, as well as all good podcast apps. I also want to thank our amazing Pandalorian patrons, Robotic Battle Toaster, Ghost Day, and Cryptic 1991. Thank you so much for supporting the show, but if you would like early access to episodes, exclusive content, as well as Martin and I's full reenactment of 1990s Captain in America.
01:16:44
Speaker
Line by line. Yeah, trust me, we had to steal a lot of cars for the part. And of course, you can check us out at our Patreon page at patreon.com forward slash chat tsunami. This podcast is of course a proud member of the Popat Collective. For more information, check us out our Twitter slash x page at popatcollect. But until next time, thank you all so so much for listening. Stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, oh my god, is that the portal out of here? I've finally done it. All the bad energy, the mojo, the gemojo mojo, I've done it. oh Can you hold the portal aside? I think i'm going to be sick. Yeah, yeah, sure, sure, sure, hold on.
01:17:22
Speaker
Martin, Martin, it's closing. Martin, Martin!