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Multiverse Mania?! The Downfall of the MCU || Marvel Month
24 Plays49 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 Andrew discuss the downfall of the Marvel Cinematic Universe through phases 4 to 6. Released during the start of the lockdowns, how did Marvel's shift to Disney Plus shows affect the franchise? Was there just too much of a good thing? And what particular parts did the Chatsunami duo really dislike? Grab onto your multiverse buttons as we dive into the downfall of the Marvel Cinematic Universe!
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Transcript
Introduction & Light Banter
00:00:01
Speaker
All right, last week didn't exactly go to plan, but don't worry, I've got an idea. Does it involve pressing big red buttons? Not anymore, it doesn't. I don't know, man. People might get tired of the podcast if we jump the shark too much. Wait a minute, I've got it. A few moments later.
Podcast Antics & New Ideas
00:00:19
Speaker
Why would you take us to a dimension where sharks did nothing but jump? No, no, no. In my defense... No, actually, I've got nothing. They just seemed like good listeners, you know? That's it, I quit. Now, hold on a minute. There's still one dimension we haven't tried yet. Might be our most ambitious one yet. One full of adventure. Intrigue!
00:00:40
Speaker
and the Red Panda Lawyer has just pulled our funding. I didn't even we could do that. I knew we should have stayed in the sharp dimension. Welcome to Marple Month.
Marvel Month Kickoff
00:00:56
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome to the second episode of Marvel Month. My name's Satsunami and joining me today is none other than the multiverse master himself, it is Andrew. Andrew, welcome back.
00:01:10
Speaker
They've actually cancelled my appearance in the multiverse concept and I'm being replaced. Sorry, bye guys. Door shuts noise. And joining us today is none other than Martin McAllister. Martin, welcome. Hi, guys. Which we totally planned from the very beginning. See if you go to season, what was it, two? There's like a throwaway line. I'm not going to tell you which episode, though. You have to find it because that's part of the fun. But meta jokes aside, how are you doing,
Casting Challenges & MCU Perception
00:01:37
Speaker
Andrew? What we actually have to do is cast someone who left the show and now come back to play a different role, but no one's actually going to believe it's not just the same person. Do you know how hard it is to get Adam on the line? What if we offered him the role of Doctor Doom? ah Hold on, honey need to make a phone call. Yeah, I've just got off the phone with him there. He says, go to hell. I don't know what that means. Oh, he's talking about the Doom playthrough that we played, that we were going to talk about with him and didn't. Go to hell. thought that was just a Ghost Rider reference, you know? Oh, maybe. Nicolas Cage aside. Both fates worse than death. Hey! Anyway, speaking of face worse than dead, actually for legal reasons that is a joke. Last week we of course dived into what made the MCU so great as well as its rise to prominence and now this week we're going to be bringing the tone down by talking about its... Well, when I say in the title of this episode, it's downfall. I mean, in the sense of how it's publicly perceived, because is it right in saying that technically the MCU is still, well, financially viable, as it were? Yeah, I would say
MCU Evolution & TV Integration
00:02:41
Speaker
so. I mean, there's some movies that have come out recently that have been fairly well received.
00:02:45
Speaker
There's movies coming out that people are looking forward to. There's the new Spider-Man coming out this month, time of release. And there's also going to be the new Avengers film coming out later this year. So there are still some people looking forward to what MCU has coming out. It's certainly not got the same level of intrigue and hype around it that it did during the Infinity Saga, but I'd say it's on a better track now than it was couple years ago. It's quite interesting how... In phases 1 to 3 we still had to Marvel properties both for the films which were the major draw but then we also had the TV shows and it's something we didn't really touch on much. Last week you know you had things like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. which I think went on for At least six seasons, I want to say. It went on for a while. But then we also had the ones like, is it the Defenders or the New York Defenders? It sounds like an American football team. You know, you had Jessica Jones, you had Iron Fist, you had Luke Cage, Daredevil. I nearly forgot Daredevil. I don't know, but of all the ones you could have forgotten, you forgot the one that the most interesting. Yeah, that is very true. Funny enough, back in the day, I think the only one I really watched most of was Iron Fist.
00:03:56
Speaker
I very almost name-dropped you there, just an in- in- incredulation.
00:04:03
Speaker
the censor bun in the corner just getting his wee placard out being like, don't you do Don't you do it? I mean, I watched bits and pieces and I know they had their Avengers moment where they all came together and was it the Defenders or something? It was it was Defenders, yeah. I quite enjoyed that, to be honest. I i thought that was it was fun to having them all kind of come together in that way because I tried Iron Fist. I just lost in interest very quickly. I tried Luke Cage again. was alright, but didn't make it through to the end of the season. I watched all of Jessica Jones and Was that good? Eh, it had its ups and downs. The first season was very good. First season was really, really really interesting. David Tennant's in it and is like a really compelling villain. A really scary villain, in fact. And it had its moments throughout the seasons, but are also was kind of frustrating for a lot of it too. Daredevil, I watched... and really enjoyed the first season, two seasons want to say of it. And then I kind of dropped it after that. And I didn't make it through all of Punisher, despite hearing it it was quite good. But I've come back to watch the most recent two seasons of the Daredevil, not reboot, but continuation, I guess. That's really good.
00:05:03
Speaker
I've really enjoyed that. So I ended kind of getting back in the heels with that. But back at the time when Defenders came out, it was fun. It was interesting. and It was the best thing they'd done with those characters, at least half of them. Yeah. So I quite enjoyed that. Yeah, and it is interesting that Marvel were dipping their toes into that. Obviously, cartoons and animated shows aside there, because I know there was other properties like that that were going on. But for those ones, it is interesting to think that that was still going on. By the time Phase 4 rolled around, would you say it's right in saying that they started focusing a lot more on the TV shows and that? kind of aspect of the MCU, because obviously the films are always going to be there, but yeah, there was definitely more coming out in terms of TV shows, wasn't there? There was certainly a lot of interest around things like WandaVision, Loki. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Oh, right, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, which a lot of people really didn't like that show. thought it was okay. Yeah, we'll get into it, but yeah, I can see why people liked and disliked it, but it's not the worst one for sure. Yeah, for sure. I watched that one with my partner, and she quite enjoyed it and she liked the kind of relationship between Bucky and the Falcon. And so when we ended up watching Thunderbolts later, she kind of like, I know Bucky, I know the guy who tried to be Captain America. Walker? Yeah, John Walker. John Walker, yeah. John Walker's crisps, yeah. Exactly.
00:06:28
Speaker
A nice name drop there or something. Are you trying get sponsorship deal? Gary Lineker, if you're listening. Off topic completely, but because you know like walkers over here is Lay's. Yeah. So there's an ad for the World Cups going on and it's David Beckham that's promoting Lay's crisps with Lionel Messi's in it and some other footballers or people are are in it. And I was like, well, why didn't Gary Lineker do this one? I was like, oh, it's because no one outside of the UK knows who Gary Lineker is. I mean, he was famous around the same time that five pounds were being hidden in Walker's crisps, so that was a while ago. And there's only going to be a tiny amount of pandalonians out there listening and being like, oh yeah, I remember that. Moving it back on to Marvel before we go down that rabbit hole. Trust me, that's next week's episode. would be The Crisp Cinematic Universe. universe But yeah, there was definitely lot more focus on these TV shows, and they definitely felt a lot more higher budget, which I like, but at the same time, they did feel like mini-movies. It's kind of the thing that Netflix seemed to have popularised before, you know, when they basically have tv shows that are now an hour long or 45 minutes long and you have to look at them and think am i going to dedicate all this time to the show because it's not just a two-hour film you stick on and and then you go all right okay i'm done because there is that and again we'll get into it soon but there is a lot of these tv shows some better than others but they did this weird thing where they interlocked a lot of the lore and what was going on in the universe with
00:07:58
Speaker
the tv shows they weren't their own separate entities so if you hadn't watched a particular show then you wouldn't really know the context going into the film cough dr strange cough and trust me we'll get onto that film but it is baffling but before we dive in see when you heard about this that marvel were just throwing all their eggs into the tv basket and everything more really than the films were you curious about how that was gonna go Yeah, I mean, my thought, and also kind of the common thought at the time, was the way that they're integrating the TV shows into the Marvel Cinematic Universe meant that whilst it was cool that it felt like it meant something, the shows you were watching, because with a lot of the TV shows, nothing that happened in the TV shows really carried over to the movies. They were only very able to subtly kind of nod to stuff that was happening in the movies, in the TV shows that you'd see on the wall in like Jessica Jones or Daredevil whatever, an article about the Hulk rampaged through X place or there was the Chitauri ships invaded New York, that kind of stuff. There'll be kind of hints towards that, but they're never able to go into it fully because they're their their own thing. But they also they very have their separate legal sound stuff, especially the Netflix ones. Whereas when we got over to Disney Plus and they started integrating those, things that were happening in those shows were directly influencing what was then happening in the movie side of things. things Like the kind of stuff that's happening WandaVision is impacting what would then go on to be like Doctor Strange the Multiverse Madness and the Falcon and the Soldier would impact what then later happened for Captain America, Brave New World and Thunderbolts and these kind of things. That's the case for across so many of these. And so now it felt like the show has became homework for people where if they didn't watch them, then they didn't know what was going on when it came to
Audience Reactions to MCU Complexity
00:09:38
Speaker
the movies. And so the fact that you had so many things you had to kind of keep up with in order to understand what was going on, which pros and cons to that can understand. I don't mind that so much because I enjoy absorbing all this content and having this kind of continuation. And I like to be the one who's like, oh, this person's in this, they were actually in that. If I explain people, whereas a lot of the general audience are like, who, what, where, why? Why do I care about this person? yeah If I have to spend more of my precious time at home getting through 10 hours of a series in order to then be able to kind of continue to understand what is going on in these 90 minutes to two hour long movies, then that's not really my speed. And so you're losing a lot of the audience through that method and whilst enriching and for some people on the other side. Yeah, because it's a thing that I think a lot of franchises seem to be doing, in particular Star Wars as well. I'm trying to think of what else. I mean, Doctor Who, and again, I could rant about that for ages, but that has a similar problem where it begins relatively accessible to the wider audience to say, oh, there's this guy. He's a threat. And you go, OK, that's the bad guy. That's the good guy. Let's go into it. But then there's some of the stories where it's like, oh, right, there's this bad guy, but he was a good guy. But, oh, if you haven't watched this episode 10 years ago of this show, then you're not going to understand. and
00:10:54
Speaker
And it just, as you said, it just it gets too muddled and you don't really want to be thinking of homework. especially with a series that I'm not saying that is geared to kids as geared towards all audiences but it's safe to say that the majority of people who are watching these are generally families and again it's not a great feeling being like who's that what did they do having to know the lore and all of these different films and on that note I think that's the perfect place to jump the shark as it were Hey, call back to 10 minutes ago, 20 minutes ago. Yeah, to jump the shark and go into this episode, explore why the MCU didn't maybe work from phases four to six. And again, we'll touch on phase six because we're only halfway through or about 75% of the way through. But yeah, we'll be right back. after these multiverse messages. Welcome to Chatsunami, a Scottish variety podcast that discusses topics from gaming and films to anime and general interests.
00:11:54
Speaker
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 place! 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'ma do? It's the exact thing.
00:12:14
Speaker
It doesn't well. She had the pointy teeth. What was that about? She looked like Bilbo when he wants the ring back. She turned into it. 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. Trousers are for the working man. You're bursting into your hotel room. Honey, we need to go.
00:12:37
Speaker
Leave the kids. We can milk an odysl. Oh,
00:12:44
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.
00:13:00
Speaker
Stay classy and have a banana. This has been chattsunami. I'm sorry.
00:13:15
Speaker
We're Seismic Cinema, I'm Colin, I've probably not seen it. Paul's watched it in the wrong order. And I'm James, and I've probably written an essay on it. And that's Seismic Cinema, we believe in the power of escapism.
00:13:30
Speaker
Oh, thank God for that. That'll do. And we are back.
Phase 4 Films Overview
00:13:33
Speaker
Let's start with phase four. And in particular, let's hone in on the films, because i have to say, there's not really a lot to work with here. There's only two of these films I think I enjoyed. The rest of them have gone from, eh, to, oh god, why? What is really weird is we finally got our Black Widow standalone film, despite the fact, yeah, despite what happened in and the previous film. Whoopsie doodle, apple stoodle, why would you do that? And start off phase four with that? I don't know, but yeah, I mean, this is a mix, because you've got Black Widow, you've got Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which wasn't that bad. You've got Eternals, you've got Spider-Man, Weehold. You've got Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. You've got Thor, Love and Thunder, also known as Thor, Why Did You Try? Taika Waititi. And then last but certainly not at least, you had Black Panther, Wakanda Forever. Okay, Andrew, where do you want to begin with this list? I guess we'll start on Black Widow. Yeah, you had a very visceral reaction to that film. So, there's a lot that I liked about Black Widow.
00:14:42
Speaker
I quite liked, I believe, it as David Harbour as a Red Guardian. I thought that was quite an enjoyable kind of role. And Florence Pugh as Yelena. was quite good in a lot of it. There was some certain like emotional depth to what was happening in the movie. It was interesting kind of seeing some of Black Widow's backstory, but it felt like such a nothing burger. The story was paced in kind of a strange way. The villain felt very boring. Just fear. Yeah. Yeah, the use of Taskmaster was done in such a bizarre way. That's a very common criticism. Taskmaster is a pretty fun villain in Marvel, and Black Widow is a fun superhero, but having Taskmaster as a villain that Black Widow is able to defeat kind of dumbs it down a little bit. I feel like it should be like a higher tier of villain than that. Am I right in saying that Taskmaster copies abilities of heroes? I believe so. I don't know the full extent of it, but I'm pretty sure Tusk Master can copy powers and stuff like that, not just fighting styles. Yeah, I was gonna say, what's he copying from Black Widow?
00:15:41
Speaker
I mean, don't get me wrong, she's obviously talented. The thigh headlock thing. Yeah, I mean, it's like copying the Hawkeye. Like, oh yeah, you can shoot a bow and arrow. Good luck getting a bow and arrow in the middle of a fight. Katniss Everdeen over here. Yeah, exactly. And that is, it's such a weird film as well because it's like a prequel, isn't it? To, well, not prequel, but it's set before Endgame and everything. It's a weird time placement because some of it takes place prior to the events of most of the MCU and then some of it takes place just before Endgame. But then I think some of it does take place...
00:16:15
Speaker
Is it not Thunderbolt she comes back?
00:16:27
Speaker
down hawkeye so maybe she comes back during hawkeye is it not thunderolt she comes back No, mean she's in that, but in the Hawkeye TV show with Hailee Steinfeld, Yelena's one of the characters that's like trying to hunt down Hawkeye because she believes that it's his fault that Natasha died. She comes back in that one, and then she kind of has her like a somewhat redemption, not redemption, but she kind of figures out that Hawkeye's not to blame. It's not your fault.
00:16:49
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. And then she has her all like... No, no, it's not your fault. No, I know. It's not your fault, man. Don't do this to man it was real to me, to me. LAUGHTER the real oh god the accents in this yeah at least yelena commits to it and stays with it natasha loses it completely yeah whatever like she was trying to integrate into north american society so she had to kind of keep that and so she kind of just kept that but then you have people like wanda maxwell who's in age ultron had that eastern european fake country accent and then immediately dropped that she's like yeah i'm not doing this for 10 films like no nope, nope, we're just robbing it. Yeah, I'm not a dialect coach, I'm not. But yeah, does, it seems kind of all over the place. Again, you summed it up perfectly. It's just such a nothing burger. And the thing is as well, i can't remember if this came out in cinemas, but I don't think it did. It was supposed to, but then COVID happened. And so it was quite famous for this. It became the first movie on Disney Plus that dropped on Disney Plus and had like a paywall. And so you were supposed to have to pay to be able to watch Black Widow. And I can't remember if I watched it another way or if we just waited until it was free to watch it. i remember watching it at my wife's parents' house at the time. And that came out and then Eternals came out soon afterwards, I think. Because they both came out just on Disney Plus, I believe. Yeah, because Shang-Chi and The Legend of the Ten Rings, that came out kind of in between those films. Oh, really? Because that one I did see at the cinema. Maybe it got a delayed release, to be honest. I wouldn't be surprised because it was September time, which, to be fair, was the tail end of the lockdowns. 2020, obviously, was the height of it and half of 2021. I can't actually remember when the lockdowns were lifted. It's like we all blinked, ironically enough, much like the snap. We all blinked and were like, Oh, it's over. Oh, what now? Yeah, Shang-Chi, that.
00:18:46
Speaker
I mean, I enjoyed it, but then on the flip side, it has Aquafina, so... So my impression of Shang-Chi, unfortunately, was slightly sullied by how mad I was in the cinema. Aquafina...
00:18:57
Speaker
No, when we arrived to the cinema, someone was sitting in the seats that we'd purchased and the cinema was quite full. And so we then had to find a seat really awkwardly at like the back. And I asked the guys, i was like hey, you're in our seats, do you mind moving? And they looked at me, just like blank stare, just looked at me like, no. They didn't say that, but they just like looked at me like, no. And so I sat in the back being like really mad with them. This would have never happened in Iron Man. Exactly. Well, it was one of those ones where it was the first film that we saw after the pandemic had been lifted. And so i was like, society's ruined. No one knows cinema etiquette anymore. This better be the best damn film I've ever ever seen.
00:19:31
Speaker
And then the man to then pops up. pretty sure also during the film someone got a phone call and answered it during the film and then that happened again the next film i went to see at the cinema i don't remember what the next film was after that but someone else took a call during the film and people was like being really noisy and disruptive and i was like we weren't in lockdown long enough that you've forgotten how to act in public let alone in a cinema don't don't know what to call it, it is definitely a symptom of the lockdowns because although I haven't experienced that to the same degree in cinemas yet, there have been a few times where I'm looking over going,
Cinema Experiences & Societal Change
00:20:03
Speaker
really?
00:20:03
Speaker
This is a cinema, this is a holy they place, as I turn around to watch Eternals. Shang-Chi, though, i thought it was a fun film. It was cool having the kung fu aspect in the MCU, which we've not really had before. Iron Fest. Cough.
00:20:24
Speaker
No. no I can't see your face, but I can just tell you're looking disgusted like, ew, Iron Fist. No way. Netflix doesn't even really count as the MCU, let's real. The Netflix show is like, and they've now since been kind of reintegrated, but... Re-canonized, yeah. Yeah, we don't talk about Iron Fist. Even in the Marvel What If, they like did like a cowboy thing, and Iron and Fist was in that, but it was like a young East Asian kid. And so they've already been like, no, Danny isn't Iron Fist anymore. He's smelly. Yeah, that was quite a prominent trope, wasn't it? Because remember Green Arrow came out roughly the same time? And it's like, yeah, let's just get this dishevelled white man
00:21:04
Speaker
Well, it's that's so funny you should mention Green Arrow because it's such a similar setup with the two characters where both spoiled rich kids who are supposed to inherit their parents' grand company fortune then have this horrendous thing happen because someone within the company, I think, set up for them to go die on a trip away. Green Arrow gets stranded on this island and after his boat gets sunk and then Danny, I think, something happens on a plane ride something through the Himalayas or something. I'm just moon doesn't making that up I don't remember. I remember.
00:21:33
Speaker
It was terrible. And then they learn the secrets of fighting and stuff and they return to fight crime in their cities. And so there's a very kind of similar setup in that way. But unlike Iron Fist, Green Arrow is actually compelling. That was a CW show, wasn't it? It was. Those CW shows, they were fun.
00:21:48
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, you've got the Flash, you've got Supergirl, you know. Yeah, as you said, I'll need to watch them one day, but I've seen c clips and bits and pieces, and they they do seem really goofy, but in like a good way. There was the something of Tomorrow. What the hell are they called? There was like a yeah, there was Guardians the Galaxy kind of thing, but they would like travel through time. And the guy from Doctor Who was in that, ironically enough. He was married to Karen Gillan's character.
00:22:10
Speaker
I think it's Arthur Dowell. Oh, you've played Rory, right. Yeah, that's the one. joe I should have just led with that, because I'm like, I don't know if you know Rory or not. The guy from Prison Break was in it as well. He was a villain in... Was it Arrow or Flash? One of the two He was one of like the main characters in a redemption thing where he was becoming like a good guy or something. i think the whole point was they were all... Most of them were bad guys, I think. Getting like redeemed or something. i can't remember. It was good.
00:22:35
Speaker
We're getting off topic. We're talking about... DC CW shows instead of the MCU, but... Maybe next year we'll go into the DC... CWU. CWU. That's a mouthful. Ironically done better than the DCU has been, to be honest. Yeah, true. I mean, the MCU's still here.
Eternals & Phase 4 Critiques
00:22:52
Speaker
way So, speaking of things that are no longer here, the Eternals, this one definitely, and I mean, I've seen bits and pieces of it, I'm not going to pretend I'm an expert in the lore of the Eternals anything. You remember Gilgamesh and others? Yeah, sure, why not? I remember, what's his face? Robb Stark. Robb Stark's in it, yeah. Robb Stark's in it, Jon Snow's in it. Angelina Jolie's in it. Is she? Yeah, she's, I'm to say she's like Athena, she's not Athena. Yeah. I don't remember what she's called, but she's some sort of like warrior lady. I know Gemma Chan's in it. So, yeah, did you say that, what's the bastard called again, what's his name? Jon Snow. Jon Snow, yeah.
00:23:28
Speaker
What's the bastard called something? Oh, yeah, yeah. You mean Ned Stark's son? No, no, no, the bastard. Yeah, Ned Stark's son. Yeah, Kat Hardington. Kat Hardington, that's the one. Kamau Nanjiani's in it, and Kamau Nanjiani got like super buff for the role, and he was told that he was going to get buff for this role, and it was going to step into loads of MCU stuff. i think It only ended up being Eternals. Do you know, I'll tell you how bad Eternals is. I actually got it mixed up with the Immortals. And when I saw Black Bolt, you know, the guy who shouts really loudly in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, I was like, oh, that's one of the Eternals. When I rewatched in preparation for this, I'm like, oh, I missed him. eternal but i'm like is that not the same thing and there is a marvel fan calling for my head right now i apologize but so funny with the immortals as well again it came and went with absolutely no impression the fact that who ended up still being in that doctor strange movie was wild it's absolutely crazy but i mean speaking of crazy and moving away from the eternals before it sullies the podcast i've Spider-Man No Way Home, which came out right after. And we've talked about it on, at least I think we've talked about it on the... Spider-Man month, yeah. Yeah. Did it come out the same time? I'm hoping it did, but I'm sure we did talk about it. Yeah, yeah, because it the third Tom Holland Spider-Man. We yeah talked about the trilogy, the duology, and then the other trilogy. So we went through all eight movies. That's what i thought. And I'm like, wait, did we? There's so many episodes of this podcast this year. You didn't re-listen to it in preparation for this? I was getting to okay? Speaking of fa doing your homework, yeah, Spider-Man No Way Home, listen to that episode that we did if you want our full thoughts, but long story short, Spider-Man No Way Home much it was just a nostalgia fest, wasn't it? You know, it was like, oh, people who loved Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man, who loved Andrew Garfield, and who tolerated Tom Holland's Spider-Man. You know. You're so mean to the Tom Holland Spider-Man. So many people love the Tom Holland Spider-Man. I think he's good. For legal reasons, that is definitely a joke. I do think he has a good Spider-Man. I think he's too fresh for me just now because... It's been a decade.
00:25:38
Speaker
Listen, you deal with it your way, I'll deal with it with mine. It's like when Andrew Garfield came in and I was like, I don't like him. And then you rewatch the films and you're like, actually, he is really damn good in this. He's the best part of those two films. But yeah, Tom Holland, I'm waiting for someone else to come in. I actually heard a rumour of that where he was like, and again, don't think this is verified at all, but there was a rumour going around where Tom Holland had said, oh yeah, you know the kid from Adolescence? He should be the next Spider-Man. And I'm like, hmm, bold choice of words, Mr. Holland. choice. I know that he's toyed around with the idea of retiring from acting quite young. Really? Yeah, but I think he said that once, again, don't know if this is confirmed or that once he and Zendaya have kids, that he wants to pull away from acting. But he's been doing quite a few other projects stuff. He's doing that Odyssey movie, the Christopher Nolan film. I do laugh at that, that he does one Christopher Nolan film and he says, that's it, I'm out. What's quite funny is he's been doing is that from the set of The Odyssey he's been calling the Spider-Man producers and being like, Chris does it like this, we should do this in the next Spider-Man. That's quite funny. Yeah, because that is coming out actually as of recording this episode in a couple of weeks. Oh really? But yeah, going back to Norway Home, it was just a complete nostalgia fest and it was a great film.
WandaVision & Multiverse Connections
00:26:52
Speaker
And I thought, great, I wonder what they're going to do next, only to be hit with a massive trailer at the very end for Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. I'm going to veer off for a second here, because at this time, concurrently with the films, you had the TV series coming out on Disney Plus, and the one that you had to have watched before, again, I use this very loosely, but the one you had to have watched before was WandaVision, which I have to say see in terms of original tv shows and everything actually thought it was pretty good what was so fun with wandavision was that it felt like a water cooler type show because you're getting it week to week it wasn't all just at one time there's so much speculation about what certain things meant and who the ultimate villain was and everyone's like it's mephesto it's mephesto mephisto mephisto the guy's like the devil in marvel yeah no no i know the one the one who erased mj from existence yeah who we thought in no way home was coming back it's like it's my pistol it's like no it's not it's benedict cumberbatch go sit down but anyway sorry and so wandavision was really really fun for a lot of it being so weird out there something was wrong you could tell things kept kind of deteriorating in this world It was really, really compelling and interesting. And it was arguably the best thing TV series-wise that Marvel's done one of the best shows that Disney Plus has done. But yeah, the end result of it, the end of it was weird and generic fighty lasers kind of fight. Oh boy, I love laser beams in the sky. It's like Dragon Ball. Oh boy. So that was kind of a bit of a disappointing ending. But the end result of WandaVision leads into Multiverse of Madness, so kind of became quite important to understand that. Devil's Advocate, you could say that you don't necessarily need to watch WandaVision. Just having seen Infinity War and then Vision dying would be enough. But no, that was not strictly true, because the whole thing is she wants her kids back. The kids were exclusive to WandaVision. You know, I could totally be wrong in this, but I'm sure I remember someone saying that they wrote Multiverse of Madness, but they hadn't watched WandaVision yet because it hadn't come out or something like that. So they were told, oh, she has to be the villain, she wants her kids back. But the characterisation between her at the end of WandaVision versus the absolute psychopath that she becomes in the Multiverse of Madness... is just, it's really jarring and I don't think it helps because Sam Raimi, who is an excellent horror director in the sense of he's really goofy but at the same time he can bring a lot of really gruesome and horrible moments in but at the same time it just doesn't match up with the TV show versus the film. It's kind of all over the place and I mean there's a lot wrong with Doctor
Doctor Strange: Plot Inconsistencies
00:29:31
Speaker
Strange. Yeah, I did feel that the end result of WandaVision, she kind of felt like she'd come to terms with what happened for the most part. And then I think there is an end credit scene in WandaVision where she's got this scary book thing and she's kind of gone a bit crazy there. So it has hinted it. presume that's because they already knew what was happening with Multiverse of Madness. And so they kind of maybe had to add that in later.
00:29:52
Speaker
And Benedict Cumberbatch gets a third die. They never mention that again. Well, there's still time. I mean, he'll probably return for Doomsday, but even then, it's like, oh, look, there's a character. It's a cult shuttle character. And, oh, he's got off third eye, and he's going into the weird old dimension. I'm like, oh, okay, okay. There's so many end credit scenes that have not been and followed up with. Remember Harry Styles rocks up in one of them or something? And then there's, at the end of Thor, Love and Thunder, there's Hercules or something that rocks up. End of Eternals, Jon Snow gets the black sword. Whatever the hell that does, yeah. It's supposed to be because there's a character that's essentially like a Black Knight, essentially. And so it's supposed to be that character. There's loads of end credit scenes that just haven't actually happened or been followed through with. But they did set up Adam Warlock in like Guardians. And going off of that, you know, we go from what the hell was that with Multiverse of Madness to Love and
Thor: Love and Thunder Critique
00:30:43
Speaker
Thunder. I wouldn't be surprised if this was the breaking point of why Chris Hemsworth wants to hang up the hammer and say, I'm not going to be Thor anymore. Again, I think this is peak Taika Waititi. hubris where it's like oh look I'm so funny I'm the class clown and they took a character that he was a bit too serious in the early run and then they gave him a bit of levity with Ragnarok and things which was a good film and then with this they just I don't even know they just made it quite yeah and again that's all I can say because geekly we didn't think of the script and that am mind right now There are aspects of Thor Love and Thunder that I enjoyed, I thought was alright, but there was a lot of moments where I was rolling my eyes where I felt like they were trying too hard. The goats thing, I just hated. i mean, that's a dated meme. The screaming goats, it's such a dated meme. There were still people in the theatre that really enjoyed it, and I watched it with my wife and my sister-in-law, and they both thought it was funny, and people in the audience did as well. It still hits the mark for some people, I just found it bit tired. The use of Natalie Portman was an odd choice. I was quite on board in many ways for what they were doing for having her be new Thor. Lady Thor was like a big thing in the comics. She was Thor for a very long time. i can't remember the actual canon and context around it, whether or not Thor is just... it is still Thor and it's a woman. The god Thor is... becomes a woman or whatever, or whether it's like someone else that takes on the mantle of Thor. I'm not super clear on that. But regardless, I was pretty content with the idea of Natalie Pong being like, okay, she's now Thor, this whole thing where taking on the power of Thor is what saves her from dying from her sickness. But then at the end, spoilers for it, but she dies. And it feels very odd to have done it in that way. I feel they should have committed to having, especially with Chris Hemsworth seemingly not that interested in continuing with the property, that they should have had that transition at that I kinda wish they did pull a Witcher where it's just they don't acknowledge it and it's like, hey guys, I'm Thor and they're like, oh, okay. You're the different Hemsworth brother. Silence you. It's the third Hemsworth, it's not even Liam. But it was honestly just a bit of a mess and I don't think we have really seen Thor since, which is very bizarre.
00:32:46
Speaker
He doesn't usually show up unless it's either a Thor movie or Avengers movie and we haven't had that yet. So he'll be coming back in Doomsday. Yeah. I've heard that he might be doing God Rune, Rune God Thor, whatever it's called, where he's at his most powerful. So I hope that's what we kind of get, especially if it's going be Chris Hemsworth's last outing as Thor. I hope we at least get to see him in that role, because the stuff with Ragnarok was really cool, where he powered up and learned the kind of true power of his godhood as the Thunder God. That was really fun.
00:33:12
Speaker
And then it it felt like such a backward step with Love and Thunder. So we'll see where Thor goes from that. It was unfortunately a misstep. I like Taika Waititi generally, but I do think that he got a bit full of himself. Moving on from, again, getting tainted by Thor Love and Thunder, the poignant swan song for the fourth phase was Black Panther Wakanda Forever, which unfortunately it was because of the death of the actor Chadwick Boseman, who I think, I can't remember the specific type of cancer, but he passed away, even though I don't think he told any of his fellow actors or whatever, and he kept it secret and everything, and It was just, it was a really sad state of affairs. And of course, when they brought this out, there was a lot of conversation about whether they were going to pass on the mantle of the Black Panther. They do to the sister. The whole film, most of the film is about her fulfilling that role and learning to be that person.
00:34:05
Speaker
And then at the very end of the film, maybe like a closing credits, they're like, but also he has a son and he'll take over the mantle when he's old enough. And so it kind of felt like I guess a very temporary kind of thing of she's going to be Black Panther, but not for that long. We'll have someone else there soon enough. Don't you worry. It was like, well, this felt pointless that if you're not going to give it the time, maybe they will. Maybe they'll have her be the Black Panther for a while longer, but it feels like they're setting up to have her handed off for long. What I find really odd about this phase, and this is my summary before we go into phase five, is the fact is this is the beginning of the multiverse
Phase 4 & Multiverse Challenges
00:34:38
Speaker
saga. And other than obviously Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, and I mean, even the Spider-Man one technique.
00:34:45
Speaker
but we don't really, yeah I mean, we deep dive into it at the very end, but we don't really see much of it. There's no kind of hints about the overarching villain that's going to come in, which I find weird because jumping quickly onto the TV shows that came out at this time, the only major one that really touches on this is Loki, and that introduces Jonathan Majors, who plays, is it Kang the Conqueror? Yes. And we will touch on that in the Phase 5 retrospective. But, you know, other than that, we've got really different genres. Like, we've got the Falcon and the Winter Soldier, which is more action, the espionage, which was fairly decent for what it was.
00:35:25
Speaker
Then we've got Loki, which is... a kind of fun ah romp into time shenanigans. I'm, and this is probably going to get me crucified, I'm personally not a massive fan of it. Not because of Tom Hiddleston or any of the actors or the characters or anything, I just, I don't like the concept of multiverses because ah it really undercuts everything that happens in the one universe. You know, time travel kind of skirts that line of, oh if you can time travel, why didn't you just do this or that? But See, I'm mixed on it because I think the idea of multiverse can be quite fun and it's done in different properties. I think as well, because multiverses seem to be such a hot topic at that time across so many different movies, you had Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse movies. You had Marvel doing it. You had had various other properties doing it. You had the Everywhere, Everything, All at Once movie winning in like the Oscars. kind of thing. Lots of properties were jumping into that idea. With Loki, when you had the multiverse, it gave you the opportunity use lots of fun stuff like pull stuff from the comic books that otherwise wouldn't see. Like Kid Loki and Alligator Loki and Old Man Loki who was wearing the old school attire that Loki used to wear. So there's lots of fun little kind of bits in there, and it does allow you to pull elements together, like having the Fantastic Four, for example, toll talk about a later point, but having multiverse means that you can go like, these people who otherwise would have made no sense that they've not been addressed up until now, because they're quite an important group of characters, they exist and have had their own adventure, and now they can come interact with the rest of the storyline, but they were independently doing their thing in a different universe, essentially. But then after we get Loki, we get your favourite show, What If? Which you love. You've told me that several times. I was so excited by the premise of What if Season 1, there was a couple of interesting ideas. I think Marvel Zombies was one of the ideas in Season 1 that was kind of interesting, but mostly it was kind of boring. And then Season 2 was really lame. And then they did that Marvel Zombies individually. realised, okay, this is the best idea we had, so let's try and do more of a thing with it. I don't particularly like the animation style that they went with for What If? I don't like the style of comedy and storytelling that they utilized in it. I feel like they were kind of flanderizing a lot of the characters through the What If?
00:37:41
Speaker
storylines. It made everyone seem less compelling. And a lot of the choices they made for like What If? stories to tell were kind of boring. They could have done something a lot more fun. I think one of them was a Wacky Races style race on Thor Ragnarok, that world with the person there. Like who cares? There was a What If? storyline around Darcy and Howard the Duck having a baby together. And the whole story was them protecting the egg that they had, which had some elements that kind of funny, but it just felt like Baby's Day Out. Which we all love in Chatsunami. It's definitely a divisive one because it does, much like Loki, it spans between phases four and five. And of course, it off, we've got Hawkeye, which was okay, I guess. It was fun. don't like Jeremy Renner the person. But the character, yeah, he's alright. But the character of Hawkeye's alright. A lot of people are kind of like, oh, who gives a crap about Hawkeye? I find him fun. I think he's cool. He's like the Aquaman of the MCU. He is not the Aquaman of the MCU. Oh, come on, he is. It's like people roll their eyes and go, oh, what's the fish person gonna do? Same with him. What's the bow and arrow guy gonna do? Although it did come out at Christmas time and it was very much a Christmas centric story. So that was quite cool. Now I will give it the I quite enjoy doing that. They've done a few things around Christmas time. Remember there was that Guardians the Galaxy Christmas special as well. But then we've got Moon Knight though. I don't like Moon Knight, I'm gonna be honest. I tried. really, really tried. got so bored. Nothing against, is it Oscar Isaac? Nothing against him. He's not working with Disney again after the Star Wars stuff and Moon Knight stuff. He's very much against working with Disney again. thought the idea was cool, but it just annoyed me in all the wrong ways. I agree the idea is cool, and I think they executed it well for large parts of it. I don't hate it as much as lot of people do, but I do agree that it is one the weaker shows. And I'm just gonna group the last two shows together, Ms. Marvel and She-Hulk Attorney at Law. Both of these shows, think She-Hulk more than the former, they are... so much hate there was so much hate and don't get me wrong i watched a bit of miss marvel and i watched a bit she hulk not my cup tea right a hundred percent i thought this is a bit weird it's a bit goofy but at the same time am old enough to know that i am not the demographic for she hulk or miss marvel and the amount of absolute idiots online being like oh marvel's woke now and oh it's this and that not everything has to be made for a single person yes you can still watch it because again as was saying these end up becoming quite important to the movies you need to watch miss marvel in order to understand the marvels you also need watch one division to understand the marvels it is important to watch to then get the other shows but these same people who didn't like miss marvel and she probably also didn't like the marvels because that film also got lot hate but i didn't think miss marvel was fantastic but i really liked the actress I thought she was really fun in the role, I thought she was written quite interestingly. It was cool having a very different kind of cultural identity to as well. It was very South Asian focused. I think they are from Pakistan. They even look back in time at the partition of India, when India and Pakistan were divided up, to my understanding, if I'm getting that wrong I do apologise, but they kind of go into that kind of side of things. And it was part of history that, as a history student, I actually have very little knowledge of. And so that was quite interesting kind of looking at that and the kind of the context of that around this Marvel mythology that's happening. But the villains were kind of lame in it. So they also changed up Ms. Marvel's powers from the comics quite substantially because they didn't her to be confusing with regards to Mr. Fantastic because I believe Ms. Marvel has stretchy powers. So they gave her energy powers instead, which then allowed her to fit in more with the Captain Marvel and the Marvels side of things. But the show itself, it was cute. And so I think It was worth watching. She-Hulk, again, got way more hate than it deserved. It was enjoyable, I would say. There was some funny stuff to it. It certainly didn't take itself very seriously. It was very Deadpool-y in the way of, like, fourth wall breaks, and the big kind of criticisms of it were largely the budget of having her turn into She-Hulk was not fantastic for how it was animated, because it wasn't on a Hulk from the MCU level design, and so it felt more cartoonish. It felt a bit more like Shrek. yeah true and so that would be a big criticism of it and then the writing was very not parody but it was very self-referential and very yeah very meta yeah very meta and so large parts of i enjoyed and it was fun in a way where it was dealing with a lot of legal cases that were mcu specific that she was kind of dealing with like shape-shifting elves from asgard causing havoc and she was doing a case surrounding that and those kinds of things it also kind of had daredevil integrated into it so was quite fun So after that shocking impact into the MCU, we get to 2023, where we kick off with a couple of, let's face it, this is not the strongest phase at all film-wise. We kick off with Ant-Man and the Wasp, Quantumania. I watched that film to see how bad it was, and is one of the worst films think I've ever seen in my life, genuinely. What? Not really? Well, maybe not. I'm being hyper- As say, you've seen some bad movies. Yeah, okay, maybe one of the worst Marvel films I've ever seen. And I've seen the 1980s Captain America film where he steals two people's cars despite the fact that we're trying to help him. If you ever hear someone in a Captain America suit say, pull over, I'm going to be sick, be very careful because he will steal your car. But anyway... Noted. Quantumania. Quantumania just sucks, man. Which is weird because feels as if... We've got a bit a theme here. We've got Quantumania. Terrible. Guardians 3. Fantastic. The Marvels. Eh, not great. I liked Then you've got Deadpool and Wolverine. Which... I really liked that movie. I liked it, but I can see why people are tired of Deadpool. I felt as if they really incorporated the multiverse really well into that film. And it was just such a fun romp to see Deadpool and Wolverine come together, but I will never hear that NSYNC song again the same. I was not insulted by that like a lot people were. I thought, yeah, it's Deadpool. It's so tongue in cheek. It's not desecrating that movie. I wouldn't say I was offended by the use of the song, but it's the fact that as soon as I heard it, I thought, you just know that TikTok and everything is going to be flooded with this dance and with the song. I was right, but that's another thing. But then after that, I went to see it in the cinema and it was a great experience. I didn't see Captain America Brave New World in the cinema. I did. I mean, I watched it with my mum and dad and my dad was like, oh, it's got Harrison Ford on it. Oh, let's check it out. And he's not a massive superhero fan. But I thought, well, if it's anything like the Captain America films before, then, you know, keeping them with the same theme, then it should be fine. And the beginning was really compelling. And then they turned Harrison Ford into the Hulk. And yeah.
00:44:36
Speaker
yeah to be honest. what Yeah, I didn't mind that so much. I thought yeah see you could see they were building up to that for ages. and You knew from the trailers and stuff like that as well it was going to happen. And the Happy Meal toys, don't forget.
00:44:46
Speaker
Of course. That spoiled it. The movie itself, whilst... And like I've said this for so many of them. They're not fantastic. These movies are not fantastic. But they're watchable. They're popcorn flicks. I think that I enjoyed the Hulk bit of it probably more than most of the rest of that movie. It was a bit of a... It's Hulk, yeah. Yeah, I went to go see it by myself in the cinema. It was fine. I'd love to think you went there and it's the same guy sitting in your seat and you're like, oh, mother! The cinema's not in full. I was like, Yeah.
00:45:16
Speaker
with his Hulk popcorn bugger. But yeah, then we wrap up with Thunderbolts, which I liked it. I actually watched it recently in preparation for this month and I fairly enjoyed it. Here's the conflict I have with Thunderbolts. I thought as a film it was great, but I personally really don't care about the characters that are the quote-unquote new Avengers, which they, by the way, they spoiled that in like a day. two days yeah i was fortunate that i saw it day of i think or very soon after so i wasn't part of that spoil session spoil train yeah i think they probably had this plan prior but they definitely were like people aren't seeing this we need to get them in to see this movie so we have to put new avengers on there to get them in to come see it But like I saw before, the drop of saying like these guys are the new Avengers was like a kind of moment. But it does cut that in the after credits thing being like, oh, actually, there's another group of people that are like the proper Avengers that are fighting a legal battle with us about who the actual Avengers are. Yeah. Which I think that we get from another movie or something where we find out that, oh, the other team must have won because they are still the Avengers. Again, i think the film itself is great, but the whole, oh, they're the new Avengers and, oh, look, who have we got? We've got quirky Russian assassin. We've got the guy from Stranger Things. Oh, don't call a quirky Russian assassin. That's not fair. She is really good in that film. Yeah, she is But I don't know. There's just something about her characterisation that really... Again, I don't think she's offensive in any way. Or Florence Pugh, she's a great actress and everything. But it's sometimes where she's... And again, i think it extends to the whole cast of that film where the Marvel humour kind of seeps in a wee bit. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. Dial it back. We've got a serious plot thread with Sentinel. Come on, apparently. back be a bit more serious oh no how are we gonna fight them as well oh here we go but yeah overall i think it's a great film and yeah they definitely dropped the whole i mean they still have multiverses and everything but they dropped the whole kang the conqueror thing after quantum mania because of the real and again i'm saying for legal reasons alleged real life crimes of jonathan major's I believe he was cleared of the charges, to my understanding, if I'm wrong, apologise. So there was like a, well, are they going to bring it back? But there was so much around it that it probably wouldn't have been great PR to do so. And also because they'd already kind of decided they were dropping it because it wasn't working really either, that they just moved on to the doomsday thing. They might return to the Kang stuff at a later point. They could recast him if they don't bring Jonathan Majors back. But that's the thing though. It's like, can you imagine if you built up in the Infinity Saga to Thanos? that was... Yeah, and he got one-shotted by Howard the Duck in an alternate universe, and I'm sure there's a comic out there where that happens, but yeah, you wouldn't take him seriously. The whole mystery of, oh, who's Thanos, and oh, he's building him up, and he's this very intimidating character, that was the whole point. But have Kang just get bodied by a giant ant, you know, well, several ants, to be fair, but still, that was a dumb film, I hated it. I hated MODOK, just... I hated it all. That was Spy Kids level. It was Spy Kids level. And MODOK is a ridiculous character in Marvel. In the comics, he's ridiculous. He looks stupid. But that was very poor representation of him. I'd been watching the those out the people who made Robot Chicken did a MODOK TV series. Oh, yeah. forgot about that. It's quite fun. And so I quite like the character of MODOK. And then they did this. And i was like, oh, no. No. Put him back! Oh god! It's just so stupid. And I think what's worse is they do that thing where it's like, oh haha, it's stupid, we're in on the joke as well, guys. And it's like, no, no, no, you don't get to stand there as a multi-billion dollar company and be like, ooh, we're in on the joke. Because I think between phases four to six, there was a lot of behind-the-scenes drama where they were letting, and I think they still are, were letting go a lot of the visual effects people. There was also accusations of, especially for the TV series Secret Invasion. Oh, I forgot about that. They were accused of using AI in the opening. I don't know how true that is. I believe they admitted it, they used AI. I could be wrong on that, but pretty sure they did. The fact is Marvel is so CGI heavy. It's like, why would you not pay these people what they're rightfully owed? you know it is baffling that they're like, oh no, we can do it without them. They give Robert Downey Jr. $100 million dollars and then aren't willing to pay their special effects team. I mean, Robert Downey Jr. is obviously a large part of why they've been so successful, but the special effects are so important in that you aren't paying the people to do it, then you're not going to have a product that's going to make the money. Yeah, because I mean, other than maybe Loki season two in this phase, and what if as well as we've gone over, you know, I mean, we've got Echo, which... I didn't finish Echo. Was it bad, or...? No, i just didn't continue with it. My and i watched a bunch of it, and we were like, how incredible is it that they have found an actress who is native, is deaf, and is missing a limb, and can act.
00:50:30
Speaker
That's insane that they found someone like that. That's who the character is. And yet they can't pay their VFX stuff. Yeah. Go for that. Yeah. Echo was cool. It followed a lot of stuff with Kingpin. And so you got a lot more kind of interaction with him. So that was fun because he's fantastic. I can never remember the actor's name, but he's really, really good. And she's really compelling. But I'd watch probably maybe two thirds of it. just haven't got around finishing it. And then to finish off this phase, we've got Agatha all along, which... I liked Agatha all along. Did you watch it? No, not really. I wouldn't say, oh, it's terrible. Why did they make it? You know, a lot of people love Agatha's character and it looks like a kind of fun, hocus pocus-esque show. Yeah, it's just, it's not for me personally. When I say that, you know, I still need to try it out, but it wasn't one that grabbed me and I was like, oh, I have to watch it. I'd recommend you watch it. You need to keep going to the end. It's fun. It's interesting throughout. The end a really interesting perspective on it. No, definitely need to. But again, it's one of those shows that I wasn't like, oh, I should really watch it. at the same time, I wasn't sitting there going, this show's not made for me. Again, I've moaned about those people enough. But then you've got your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man. I have no idea what that is. Oh, it's a Spider-Man cartoon. It's in like a different world. It's not Tom Holland's Spider-Man. It's a different universe, through my understanding. Yeah, fair. It was okay. And then you've got Daredevil Born Again, which I really have to watch and keep up with because I've heard it's really good. Everybody praises it, but it's one of the few shows that I genuinely haven't sat down to watch because don't know It's just, I don't know if I have to watch the Netflix one first. No, because as I said, I didn't finish the Netflix Daredevil series and I don't feel like I missed... much it helped i remembered a lot of what happened in those first two seasons of dead devil like i didn't need to go back and re-watch it i remembered and that has helped a lot it has not made it super hard to jump into if you don't know that much about the character like there's certainly characters that they talk about and reference and stuff that are included but it's something that you can just join it does have some callbacks to other shows like the hawkeye show because there's a character in the hawkeye show that's in it but like i think you can just watch anyway And then to wrap up in terms of the TV series, then we've got Ironheart. I didn't enjoy Ironheart. I tried really hard with it and I just didn't find it interesting. It seems like it's more of the writer's fault for this one, where they're trying to have someone who is this character that's gifted and everything, and they want to be separate from Tony Stark and everything. And from what I've heard, especially from the backlash, some people, you know, you think, I think, and disregard what they're saying, but then there's some genuine criticisms where it's like they just haven't characterized Ironheart very well, and I think that's probably what put a lot of people off, because I think she was introduced in Wakanda Forever. Yeah. And then they brought her in this, and again, as I said, I mean, I've only seen an episode or two. I can't fully go into They seem to be setting Young Avengers. Yeah. I think she's going to be part of that. She'll be part of it. Hawkeye, Kate Bishop, she'll be in it. Miss Marvel's going to in it. The boy from Agatha All Along going to be in it. I won't spoil the significance of him because you learn more about him in Agatha All Along. I wonder if Black Panther's son will be in it. Maybe Thor's daughter? don't know. Yeah, probably. Yeah, because it's not technically Thor's daughter. It's Christian Bale's daughter that Thor adopts. What a wasted plotline. They had Gorr, the god butcher, and they're like, yeah, you know what we're gonna do? Nothing. Kill one god and then that's it. Yeah, great. Ten out of ten. Anyway, let's see Thor naked. hated that film. He killed a few gods, didn't he? Yeah, off screen, though. It's like, oh... You have Kratos going through the pantheon. Disney, give us a good Thor film and my life is yours. Oh god, but... Yeah, speaking of things I never realised happened until it was too late, Phase 6. Which I am actually really shocked at how little films there are in Phase 6. It is very short one, yeah. There's like four of them. So there's fantastic four first steps, which I have to say, I enjoyed it for what it was. But it feels very much a filler film up until the very end when they kind of... have you experienced these characters, experience Galactus and the Silver Surfer and that kind of stuff before then throwing them in be with the rest of the Marvel gang. So I really liked I liked the world, the very kind of 70s retrofuturism kind of I thought that was really cool. And so I really enjoyed Fantastic Four. I thought it was breath of fresh air from a lot of the other lamer Marvel stuff had been coming out. Yeah, it definitely had an identity to for sure, which I think was pretty good. We can definitely nitpick about certain things in it, but think overall it did its job as the one that kicked off Phase 6, which, again, maybe it's just because I don't follow the MCU as closely as I used to, but I genuinely didn't realise we were in Phase 6. I said it to you in one of the episodes, I was like, what phase are we on, like, four or five? And you're like, no, we're in Phase 6. And I was like, what? No. Oh my god, because in a couple of weeks, as I said, we've got Spider-Man Brand New Day, which we're both hoping to see in the cinema. Because have to say, although I'm not a big fan of everything the MCU's churning out, I still like Spider-Man. You know, he's still one of my favourite superheroes, so I'd be interested to see not only what they do with that, but also what Glasgow looks like, once again, dressed up New York.
00:56:05
Speaker
was going say, you have to far and what Glasgow looks like. Well, very true. But then we've got Avengers Doomsday and Secret Wars coming out, which I'm laughing at because I'm pretty sure Doomsday was called the Kang Dynasty, wasn't it? Or something like that. That was the film that it was supposed to be before they decided that A, they were going to get rid of Jonathan Majors and B, I mean, sort of, because they were going to like a Kang Dynasty part one and two kind of thing. That was supposed to come out a year or so ago, I think. And so when they cancelled that and then brought forward Doomsday, because Doomsday had been a plan for a while, but they just kind of reset where they were going to bring forward certain things. because what i find quite interesting is especially in this phase is see for the tv shows is just the fact that there's not really and i mean i could totally be wrong in this but there's a lot of kind of filler maybe with the exception of daredevil born again because i haven't seen that but you've got the eyes of wakanda you've got marvel zombies you know spin-off and then you've got wonder man which we have done an episode on so good it's an excellent show genuinely and that one really blindsided me because I was like there is no way this is going to be good and I thought okay give it a chance it's an interesting concept we did a whole episode on it that shows you how good it is but there's not really any coming up and saying oh you have to watch these to understand the other ones you know Yeah, I'm curious because there's talk about the X-Men being introduced pretty soon into the MCU that we'll have either in Spider-Man or in Doomsday or whatever, if they'll announce stuff soon afterwards. Because they're keeping everything very hush-hush about X-Men stuff, other than the fact that we know that Magneto McKellen is going to be in Doomsday. So I suspect we'll probably have some X-Men-y type shows that are going to announced after that. That would be my guess. And we've got X-Men 97, think it's called, coming soon as well. No, that's true. And to be honest, it is very early days to see what they're going to pull out for phase six because Avengers Doomsday comes out, as of this episode anyway, it comes out on December 18th this year and then the next one's going to come out a year later.
MCU's Future & Fan Expectations
00:58:15
Speaker
That'll let people ruminate over what happens in Doomsday, the twists, the turns. But see, as a closing point though, overall from phases four to six, What's your thoughts on this period of Marvel? What do you think it says about the future of the MCU? I think there was certainly a lull. There were still some decent things coming out in that poorer time, but it was certainly a lull in post-Endgame. And then I think things are starting to pick up again. I've really enjoyed Thunderbolts. I really liked Fantastic four wolverine movie isn't everyone's cup tea but i really liked it and so i think that things are going to be more interesting it's just unfortunately we don't have the same kind of compelling characters in place that we once did the lack of iron man is so telling marvel themselves knows that they had to get robbie dine jr back to bring in and that chris evans is coming back for doomsday as well kind of shows their lack of faith in the captain america storyline that they had set up post him leaving so there's hope for the future but you also worry what their plan is post these people leaving again because they've not really handled it super well I think it will require a reboot at some point because they can't keep telling these stories in this kind of fashion without the characters that everyone loves so much It is true I feel as if they are victims of their own success because although it had its highs and lows, least for phases 1-3 in the Infinity Saga as a whole, they definitely stuck the landing and they managed to build that hype and everything. And I get that through phases four to six, there is that superhero fatigue setting in that people are like, oh, great, another superhero film. Oh, right.
00:59:51
Speaker
You have to watch this TV show to get this film and, you know, et cetera, et cetera. And it is quite a shame, to be honest. And I feel as if it's almost inevitable that's what's going to happen, that they're trying to expand and do different things, which I love it when a franchise tries to do different things and does different genres and whatnot, but I feel as if there's a lot more duds than successes. You know, for every Deadpool and Wolverine or Guardians of the Galaxy 3, we've got Quantumania, we've got Love and Thunder, For Every No Way Home, we've got The Eternals, A Multiverse of Madness, you know, it such a mix, and especially with the TV shows, i feel as if they are definitely trying to lean into that, and I like the idea of that, that they're making the films and the series more accessible in that regard, because let's face it, streaming is so popular nowadays, you didn't have to hear that from me to know that, but i would netflix like, Netflix, what's that? But at the same time, it gives new fans this accessibility point to be like, oh, do you want to watch Ms. Marvel or do you want to watch the Falcon and the Winter Soldier? You know, there is a genre for everyone. And I think even in the multiverse saga, they do that so well by appealing to all different types of fans. But with that being said, I think they've probably spun the webs out maybe too much in that regard. There's no real core consistency with this arc, and that is just a shame, to be honest, because I know they were hedging their bets on Kang and everything, but it still baffles me that they introduced Kang in Loki, which, again, as I said, it's a good TV show, but, I mean, it's the main gag, fucking For sake, it's the main villain. And you introduce them in a TV show that not everyone's going to watch. It seems like there's a lot more missteps in this saga than there are triumphs, to be honest. And would you say that there is still time for them to turn it around? Oh, I think so. I think there is. As a saying there, it does seem like they are coming to a point where they're going to have to reboot everything. Yeah. To reset, have a new Iron have a new Captain America, and just kind of tell, not necessarily origin stories again, but just kind of go through these different kind of storylines with people who are set up so you aren't stuck in this kind of continuity, because that's what comic books do. The comic books don't is necessary can keep going and going and going because otherwise we've already killed XYZ who do we have left? So they'll need to do that at some point and if they don't it's going to be the death of comic book movies at least from the Marvel side of things for a long time because people are just going to lose interest because they're going to run out of fun things. There are comic book storylines to be told there's no problem in that way but you need the characters there to tell them and if you don't have Iron Man if you don't have Captain America if you don't have Thor you need to have these people available. Oh no 100%. Again, when we talk about the downfall of the MCU, this isn't coming from two people who want to see the MCU fail. It's coming from a place of we're both fans of this franchise and it's just it's a shame to see it spiral the way it has but I don't think by any means that means it's going to be a total failure you know like they're gonna say oh we're not gonna do this or that but then again we've got things like the blade film and the armor wars which they are just stuck in production hell right now i genuinely i don't know what's going on with that because they really picked it up and they're like oh we're gonna do this we're gonna do that they pulled marish early onto stage i'm pretty sure they did yeah this is the new blade and people were like what cool yeah and then it just fell through and what i find quite and maybe this is just a post-covid thing but i feel as if nowadays there's not the same excitement and the same hype towards the mcu no there's not i mean you're not gonna get that back in the bottle like you had never yeah for infinity war because that whole setup was a filmmaking masterpiece It was incredible how they weaved those films together to kind of form this ultimate storyline. There were duds along the way, but it was still done um in a way that made sense and that had an ultimate goal. And I think what's happening now is not an obvious ultimate goal to what is happening in these movies. They're isolated, which there's nothing wrong with that. That's how superhero movies used to be. They didn't all have to be weaved together in that way, but it does just feel like they're wandering aimlessly. All I can hope for for the future is that for Doomsday and Secret Wars is that they managed to stick the superhero landing and that they managed to basically... Again, I'm not expecting them to rekindle what we went through growing up with the franchise and everything, but the other thing I would say is that I hope that the new generation of Marvel fans... get some enjoyment out of these films because it is it's so easy to listen to all this negativity online people saying oh the mcu's dead it's you know not worth watching and to some degree there are a lot of films and tv shows that just are absolute duds but just because of that doesn't mean that people can't get enjoyment out of other parts of the franchise and i think that is what's so special about the mcu is there's just something for everyone i mean if you told me that we were going to do a whole episode on one cinderman of all things i would have been like yeah yeah andrew very funny but no we did and we both loved it and it just shows that they're not creatively bankrupt i mean the films are in some degrees but they really aren't i mean between that between the fantastic four film there is still some creativity there so yeah fingers crossed that they stick the land in there and yeah disney if you're listening give us free tickets
01:05:24
Speaker
what are the odds that's going to happen, Andrew? I'll get Kevin on the line. Feige, please. i want a ticket, please. Do you know the Odeon in Dunfermline? Even I don't know the Odeon in Dunfermline. But I'll go to it just for you, Mr. Feige. Mr. Iron Fist, do you have tickets?
01:05:45
Speaker
Danny Rand. Danny Rand, that was it. Oh my God. That's a blast from the past. That just came to me just like a fever dream right there. The prophecy is complete. We can end the episode now. Nice. Oh, nice. Bye everyone. But yeah, on that note, Andrew, thank you so much for joining the me. And yeah, reminiscing about, yeah, maybe not the most desirable part of the MCU, but still interesting to look at it. Oh no, thank you so much for having me. It's been a wonderful time talking about the ups and downs of this time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and hopefully we can see some more positive things coming. We're looking forward to watching this Spider-Man movie. We'll hopefully have a soon after reaction to it. We'll be quite the in-the-car-park-of-the-cinema style reaction that you have for some of the films. that I'm so used to it. The War of the Rohirrim. I've done that twice, by the way. Godzilla and War of the Rohirrim. Oh, back-to-back classics. Yeah, when I come to Canada, trust me, I'll be finding the first car, breaking into it and being like, okay, quick, let's review whatever. oh Go, go, go. Satu, I have a car. No time, we gotta go. But yeah, if you want to listen to more episodes from ourselves about Marvel Month, as well as, yeah, just general chaos from ourselves, then you can check us out at our website, chatstunami.com, as well as all good podcast apps. I also want to thank our amazing Pandalorian patrons, Robotic Battle Toaster, Ghostie and cryptic 1991 thank you so so much for listening to the show but if you would like early access to episodes exclusive episodes that come out twice a month commentary tracks as well as andrew and i's in-person episode for legal reasons that one is a joke for now but maybe one day then definitely check us out our patreon page patreon.com forward slash chat tsunami this podcast is of course a prime member of PodPack Collective. For more information, check us out on Twitter slash X page at PodPackCollect. But until next time, thank you all so, so much for listening. Stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, stay hydrated. And you know what? I am so glad that we don't have any big red buttons sitting beside me for a post-credit scene. I mean, that would be very silly if I just... Oh God, I pressed it again. Oh no.
01:07:50
Speaker
Oh God. Oh God. no