Marvel movies

[TychoCelchuuu]

5 hours ago, jennegatron said:

 

I don't think you need to have seen either of those movies follow Infinity war. Basically the only things of consequence are that Thor found the Hulk & lost an eye in Ragnarok. Black Panther is the leader of Wakanda, a secret African nation that has recently opened itself up to the outside world. If you liked Civil War, go see Infinity War imo

I think you can pick up the eye thing via context clues. The Hulk thing too. And the Black Panther stuff. I mean Thor has an eye patch in the movie, you don't exactly need to watch Thor Ragnarok to learn that it's covering up a missing eye!

 

I do think Ragnarok and Black Panther are the second and third best Marvel movies, though, and I like basically all these movies, so they're certainly worth seeing at some point.

[Gwardinen]

Speaking of Thor's eyepatch,  that was a strange and slightly disappointing moment for me during the film. Why did he need a cyborg replacement eye?  The eyepatch looked cool and was symbolic of the wisdom he'd gained and responsibility he'd taken during Ragnarok. Rocket even had a weirdly ableist line about how he couldn't do this with only one eye. Why not?

 

The only reason I could think of that I'd be ok with is if it was just very uncomfortable for Chris Hemsworth to wear all the time. 

[Roderick]

Pretty much all of Ragnarok got stabbed in the back by Infinity War. The whole 'we don't need Asgard, our home is where our people are' line of prophecy is cut short when Thanos outright destroys their ship and wipes out half the population. It makes sense from this movie's perspective, but the Thor films have this thing with prophecy and destiny, and that doesn't gel at all. (And where was Valkyrie?!)

[BigJKO]

I liked it a lot! Was expecting a mess, but found it surprisingly coherent and easy to follow. And it was so much fun. Very solid laughs throughout the film.

 

I'm someone who really enjoys almost all of these films so I guess I was always going to like this. But I thought they did a great job of spending just enough time on each pair-up that it never felt disorienting.

 

The only one that felt really underused was Captain America, although he reminded me of why I love him when he meets Groot. A+ exchange between the two.

 

I for one am super excited for Avengers 4 now.

 

Thoughts on where Avengers 4 is going, based on some set photos:

I hope the originals Avengers, especially Captain America, get much more to do and an actual arc in this one. Considering they're almost the only ones left now (and the fact that this could be the last movie for some of them) that's probably a sure bet. The set photos that have been going around suggest there'll be some time travel shenanigans, which tracks with *half* of the universe needing saving. I'm very, very excited to see Captain Marvel come save the day, but there's a lot of pressure on her solo film being a success. After shaggy, dark Captain America I'm very stoked to see him back in his regular outfit via whatever time travel/flashback device they're going for.

[SecretAsianMan]

The eye patch and Hulk in Ragnarok I was well aware of because they're impossible to avoid if you've seen even a second of the marketing.  And I'm familiar enough with the character of Black Panther to know he's the ruler of Wakanda.  It's mainly that I'm one of those nerds that likes to get all the references and such which is why I'm reluctant to see Marvel Infinite Warfare before the rest.  I've generally enjoyed all the Marvel films though so I'll probably like it either way.

[Ben X]

Apparently Hemsworth was complaining a lot about the patch in Ragnarok interviews, and they started CGing it on at some point.

 

Re Valkyrie, apparently you don't see the Taskmaster's ship at the start of IW, so that combined with the "Thanos killed half my people" line has led fans to assume she got away on that ship along with the Kiwi alien and the remaining Asgardians.

[BigJKO]

My god, if Korg returns with Valkyrie in Avengers 4 I'll be the happiest person ever.

[twmac]

The new Avengers film left me very angry. I was totally into it and managed to ignore some of the very obvious plot holes, because it is a super hero movie. But...

 

Spoiler

That ending felt utterly cynical.

When they killed off Loki and Heimdal it was the right level of death, it meant that I had the feeling that maybe, just maybe, some of these characters might actually die. Even Gamora, as cack-handed as it was in terms of exposition, felt like it continued to up the stakes and that every time Tony etc, got smashed into something there was a genuine doubt in my mind if they were going to get back up. It felt like the perfect pitch in terms of narrative tension. Maybe Iron Man wasn't going to get killed - but it meant that Vision or the Scarlet Witch might be in danger.

 

But then the 50% thing happened and undid everything. By upping the stakes that high it ended up feeling like none of it mattered. With one wave of the magic hand any and all of the characters can come back. I walked out of the film extremely pissed off because I had been enjoying it up until then.

Less is more Marvel, less is more.

 

[BigJKO]

Here’s a fun review from someone who has no Marvel knowledge at all: http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/the-avengers/feature/a856335/avengers-infinity-war-review-marvel-novice-mcu/

[TychoCelchuuu]

I'm a little unsure how the author thought "Avengers" rhymed with "scavengers," given it's a real word, but whatever. I think her thoughts on the film pretty much line up with mine: the main way to enjoy it is by liking the characters, rather than getting all tied up with the plot or whatever's been going on for 18 movies and so on. I think people who are like "you gotta see all the movies beforehand to know what's going on" are looking to get something different out of the movie than me, and certainly something different out of the movie than what she got.

[Ben X]

Disney bought 20th Century Fox. Bad news: homogenisation of all popular culture. Good news: X-Men and Fantastic Four in the MCU!

 

Anyway, I saw Ant-Man And The Wasp and enjoyed it. Some very inventive action sequences and comedy setpieces. However, the narrative does feel overstuffed and characterisation suffers as a result. Also, the loose improv feel of the comedy dialogue doesn't really work - a Shane Black style polish would have really helped, I think.

I probably prefer it to the first one overall...

[Ben X]

Saw Into The Spider-Verse today and while it's more tenuously connected to the MCU than Homecoming, it's still i"n association with Marvel" so may as well put it in here.

 

It is, for my money, hands down the best Spider-Man film ever (bearing in mind I wasn't a huge fan of the Raimi ones). Effortlessly blends a variety of visual styles and riffs on the audience familiarity with Spidey's backstory while using all of the character's (characters') iconography to full effect. Funny, exciting, touching and intricate without being over-worked.

 

EDIT: oh, and Venom was laughably bad.

[Roderick]

Venom was one of the big superhero movies I didn't see this year, and I'm not particularly miffed about it. Into the Spider-Verse is amazing, both as a Spider-Man film and an animated feature that'll appeal to adults as much as it will to kids.

 

The villains were a liiiiittle to cartoony for my tastes, in their designs. The rectangular Kingpin was cool enough, but I could've done without a monstrous version of the Green Goblin.

[SecretAsianMan]

I recently watched Venom during a flight back from China and I think it's not terrible... IF you view it as a B-movie.  It's got all the trappings of one: nonsense plot, shallow villain, terrible acting (though Tom Hardy was pretty good), bad dialog, etc.  I'd put it on par with other cheesy sci-fi flicks but as a tent pole major motion picture yeah it's bad.

 

Relatedly, I also watched Deadpool 2 on the same flight.  I liked the first one and this was mostly more of the same but much less satisfying I think.

[twmac]

I am still baffled by why people like Iron Man 3 (for example: I had forgotten tha Guy Pierce was in this one and had thought it was Sam Rockwell, which makes me sad as it means Sam Rockwell is in the one that most people think is not great), but I enjoyed this defence of Iron Man 3:

https://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/iron-man-3/64265/the-marvel-movies-debrief-iron-man-3-recap-legacy-and-mcu-connections

 

I have also seen Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse and I loved it.

[SecretAsianMan]

2 hours ago, twmac said:

I am still baffled by why people like Iron Man 3 (for example: I had forgotten tha Guy Pierce was in this one and had thought it was Sam Rockwell, which makes me sad as it means Sam Rockwell is in the one that most people think is not great), but I enjoyed this defence of Iron Man 3:

https://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/iron-man-3/64265/the-marvel-movies-debrief-iron-man-3-recap-legacy-and-mcu-connections

 

I hear ya.  I think there's some entertaining moments in the film but I found myself questioning everything FAR more than I have in any other Marvel movie to date.

[unimural]

9 hours ago, twmac said:

I am still baffled by why people like Iron Man 3 (for example: I had forgotten tha Guy Pierce was in this one and had thought it was Sam Rockwell, which makes me sad as it means Sam Rockwell is in the one that most people think is not great), but I enjoyed this defence of Iron Man 3:

https://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/iron-man-3/64265/the-marvel-movies-debrief-iron-man-3-recap-legacy-and-mcu-connections

 

I have also seen Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse and I loved it.

 

I'm somewhat baffled why people don't like Iron Man 3. I do suspect part of the reason why I enjoyed it is that it did not feel like a Marvel movie, so that may be a part of it. But it did something with Tony Stark after the meaningless Iron Man 2. I also think it's a very solid movie by itself. The main reasons for me are the character focus, the Shane Black humor and great pacing. The movie has a real heart, and that's quite an achievement for a silly action movie. Most of the performances are good, and the kid is great! I don't really have strong feelings with regards to the twist, but Ben Kingsley is great. I do admit Guy Pierce is thoroughly boring, the script doesn't do him any favours either. It is a shame it is a Marvel movie and has to have the customary CGI-actionsnooze ending.

[Roderick]

Iron Man 3 grew on me, after first being slightly baffled by it. They'd been talking up the Mandarin since the first movie, so I was just so primed for him to be the big bad that the twist threw me off in a major way.

 

But really, as Unimural says, it's so much more rewarding and has more heart than the forgettable second part. The PTSD-angle comes in very nicely and the intermediate section with the kid is just superb.

[SecretAsianMan]

I agree that Iron Man 2 is boilerplate and pretty uninteresting but Iron Man 3 was one non sequitur after another for me.  I found the entire movie very jarring and hard to stay into for more than 5 minutes at a time.  I think everyone in general did well in the roles they were given, I just didn't like any of those roles.

[Ben X]

A simplified version of my IM3 opinion is that all the stuff with Tony out of the suit is great, the stuff with him in it not so much.

Re. the twist, I think I would have enjoyed it more if Killian hadn't clearly been set up as a villain already - rather than enjoying the film's bravado of suddenly removing the main villain, I was immediately thinking about where they were clearly going to go from there.

 

Just saw Captain Marvel, and didn't enjoy it much. Some charming elements, but has the same old MCU issues - overstuffed, weighed down by the series arc, and terribly directed fight/action scenes.

[twmac]

On 27/03/2019 at 5:44 AM, unimural said:

 

I'm somewhat baffled why people don't like Iron Man 3. I do suspect part of the reason why I enjoyed it is that it did not feel like a Marvel movie, so that may be a part of it. But it did something with Tony Stark after the meaningless Iron Man 2. I also think it's a very solid movie by itself. The main reasons for me are the character focus, the Shane Black humor and great pacing. The movie has a real heart, and that's quite an achievement for a silly action movie. Most of the performances are good, and the kid is great! I don't really have strong feelings with regards to the twist, but Ben Kingsley is great. I do admit Guy Pierce is thoroughly boring, the script doesn't do him any favours either. It is a shame it is a Marvel movie and has to have the customary CGI-actionsnooze ending.

 

I think I mentioned it already (and is betrayed by my comment of the Guy Pierce/Sam Rockwell mixup) but Iron Man 2 and Iron Man 3 were basically the same film to me - I could not tell you anything about how they differed except for the twist with the Mandarin, that I liked. Everything else was just Tony Stark quipping, there is a big bad, there is some flying/shooting and Pepper Potts is there, the end.

 

Still, I like reading about people enthusing about a film that I have discarded.

[unimural]

Thanks for your responses. @SecretAsianMan's view of the film as a series of non sequiturs does make a lot of sense, even if I don't share the view.

 

With regards to Iron Man 2, I found that movie a mess. Admittedly I don't remember it that well any more, but what I do remember strongly is being bored the entire time. The bits about Tony's dad didn't work for me, I seem to recall some weird War Machine jokes that I didn't understand, and everything very much feeling like a sequel: the constant need to one-up the first movie.

 

On the other hand, Iron Man 3 takes the opposite approach, and steps most everything back from the previous films, and focuses on Tony as a character.

 

I kind of liked Captain Marvel. I was bothered how much the movie serves the audience, instead of supporting the characters. For me, the soundtrack was perhaps the most glaring example. Yes, it's cool you have Garbage and No Doubt on the soundtrack, but compared to Guardians of the Galaxy, where the music is very clearly something that's personal to whatshisname, so emphasizing the nostalgia-soundtrack is in service to the movie. Here, the music is only for the audience. And similar use of overt references is way too common.

 

But I did really enjoy Brie Larson practically in every scene, and I also liked the buddy cop movie featuring Samuel L Jackson and Brie Larson.

[eRonin]

Hey I watched Avengers Endgame yesterday. Here's my spoilerific thoughts:

 

Spoiler

Overall the movie is a great experience, as long as you don't think too hard about any given thing that is happening. Unfortunately I think very hard about all of it. A lot of characters have very satisfying arcs, particularly Captain America, and Iron Man, though I'm not really a fan of the latter. Thor's arc would be great if it weren't for fatphobia being the butt of a lot of jokes involving him. Really disappointing. Hawkeye has room to grow. I have no idea what the filmmakers actually want to do with him, still. Hulk...sort of found peace with himself but it was very much a tell, don't show affair and I'm disappointed by that. Now...Nat. Nat Nat Nat. Black Widow. What on earth have they done to you. While Hawkeye has a real family that he's fighting for, Natasha claims her only family are the other Avengers. So now that she's realised that, apparently the only way for her to continue her story is by ending it, sacrificing herself so that Hawkeye can claim the Soul Stone. This was one of my least favourite parts of Infinity War, because I didn't buy the whole Thanos loving his daughter thing. So it upset me greatly that they basically decided to do it all again and fridge someone else.

 

The whole time travel stuff was very fun to an extent. I enjoyed the adventures they actually had while they were in the past, but the whole framing around it didn't make much sense and contradicted itself a bunch. There was one deliberate hole that was made because Loki escaped with the Tesseract (the heroes don't have the capacity to deal with that right now because they have way bigger things to worry about). I assume this was so that Loki can have a TV show. But there was other gaps made with the time travel, specifically Thanos never returning to the original timeline, and Steve deciding to stay in the past and live out his life with Peggy (I thought his super soldier serum prevents him from aging? Or are his youthful looks merely a product of being on ice for all those years)? Either way, again, really fun and great as long as you don't think about it too much.

 

My other chief concern is how the superheroes never really feel super. MCU's power levels have always been all over the place; Captain America often seemingly as powerful as Thor, and in this movie, that is basically true, given he wields Mjolnir and is thus granted the Power of Thor. Besides that though..in Infinity War, Thor with his new Stormbreaker axe/hammer proves a match for the Infinity-Gauntlet-powered Thanos. However, in Endgame, Thor with the power of both Stormbreaker AND Mjolnir combined is unable to overcome Thanos with NO Infinity Stones to his name. It's silly and inconsistent, and makes no sense at all. Thanos with 4 stones was also brought down by Iron Man, Spider-Man, Dr Strange, etc. in Infinity War, but Thor, Iron Man, Captain Marvel, and more were unable to put a dent in him this time around. Related to this, the continued use of Wakandan soldiers as fodder is both upsetting due to the needless slaughter of thousands of people, and that a team of 20+ superheroes SHOULD be sufficient to handle Thanos and his army. It diminishes the supposed might of our superheroes when they need an army of thousands to match the fodder army that Thanos commands. It's pretty clear they want thousands of bodies on screen just to make a huge spectacle, but it would be much more impressive to me to see just the couple of dozen (that's plenty, don't you think??) of superheroes we now have take on the wave of enemies brought to them (as they have done in the past over and over again)!

 

So after all this, I think I'm ready for Phase 4 of the MCU to just focus on smaller concerns, and I'm still quite excited for Spider-Man Far From Home, though I'm also a bit confused as to where that's supposed to go in the timeline, given it's pretty awkward if Peter disappeared for 5 years and suddenly returned. We'll see.

 

[SecretAsianMan]

My Endgame musings

 

Spoiler

I'm somewhat disappointed.  I was never especially excited to see it, but it still felt like it didn't live up to the expectations.  There's a lot of threads in the movie that don't really feel like they come together all that well. 

 

Then of course there's the many, many plot holes.  Loki escaping is a big one, so is Gamora just disappearing.  Like did Tony kill her with the rest of Thanos' army?  He had never met her so she could have possibly been included in the scope of his snap just because she's associated with Thanos. 

 

Speaking of Gamora, they effectively brought her back to life by bringing her past self into the present.  Couldn't they do that with Natasha as well?  Fridging aside I felt like the main reason they killed her off was just because they had no idea what they wanted to do with her. 

 

Peter Parker came back after 5 years but shouldn't that mean his buddy Ned is in college by now?  Did he stay in the same grade for 5 years? 

 

Why the hell did Nebula not jump back into the present once she was able instead of letting herself get captured?  She was able to try and contact Natasha and Clint but apparently couldn't leave once it became clear she couldn't reach them. 

 

How come they struggled so hard at the end?  Didn't 6 of them repel an entire invasion of New York in the first Avengers?  This is pretty much the same army, right down to the armored space whales.  And they're way more powerful now than they were then. 

 

I could go on for quite a while but I doubt anyone wants to hear my ramblings so I'll leave it at that.

 

One scene I did dig was watching all the Marvel women line up and kick ass. 

 

Also, is snapping a requirement for activating all the infinity stones?  Everyone who gets them all always snaps.  If that's the case then I could never wield them because I can't snap.

 

[Roderick]

Endgame

 

 

Everything you're saying, all of it, makes perfect sense. I didn't trip over a lot of it in that way, though I must admit that Ned not being in college and not being FIVE YEARS OLDER to Peter Parker is actually a big weird thing.

I liked the movie, but mostly in the way that I like most Marvel movies: it was fine, just fine. It was also silly in a way I hadn't expected, after Infinity Wars' perfectly balanced gravitas. The time travel shenanigans felt very "Ant Man" and there were two body morphing comedies going on, one with Thor becoming the Beach Bum Lebowski and the other, less problematic of the two, Hulk's entirely off-screen resolution into Hipster Hulk. I didn't mind either, though it was only amusing at best. Iron Man and Captain America's arcs were satisfying and well done. Hawkeye's started out very strongly, then dissolved into nothingness.

Some bold choices (FIVE YEARS LATER), some ho-hum feelings (retreads of the earlier movies, which weirdly gave Endgame less of an identity of its own), a tiring finale blow-out (wasn't expecting them to keep it small, but meh), and a poorly developed time travel plot.

The time travel is weird. First they lampshade that the normal way of time travel in movies is wrong and say that even if you go back to the past, that's still your future, so you'll never be able to actually change anything, you're just, like, changing scenery as if you're rewinding a movie and taking props from the decor. And sometimes those props can travel along with you to the present, like Thanos and his army did. But then Tilda Swinton tries to turn the thinking back to the standard timelines-going-awry stuff, and in the end the movie tries to have it both ways? For some reason the infinity stones need to be brought back (though Thanos didn't have to!), and Steve can stay behind and yet reappear in the timeline he left behind.

I don't mind stories to choose the emotionally satisfying resolution over plot coherence, but this was some major fumbling.

Then again, the disappointing inclusion of Captain Marvel said a lot already. It's a boring character that is all-powerful (until she isn't), and there was nor eason she couldn't have appeared ten minutes earlier to save the day. Or stick around. Even Endgame considered her such an inconvenience that they had to find ways to keep her the hell away from this movie - which raises the obvious question of why did they even set her up as the savior to begin with, and why bother with her in the first place?