Marvel's Movie/TV Universe v2 (SPOILERS)

[Adami]

The Russo's have also indicated that Endgame may be the final Stan Lee cameo. I don't know if it's been confirmed if he filmed one for Far From Home or not.

I dunno how his last cameo is going to hit me. I teared up at his Captain Marvel one.

[bosk1]

No, I remember reading several times that Feige has said there is one in Far From Home.  After that, not sure.  I don't know if there are any on the cutting room floor that can be repurposed for any future films.

[gzarruk]

They can always CGI him on future movies, but it’ll never be the same without real Stan 

[Adami]

They can always CGI him on future movies,

Oh HELL no.

Honestly, that one act might sour any future MCU movies for me. Luckily I doubt they're considering it.

[kaos2900]

I have my ticket to Endgame and we have one more movie (Ant-Man and the Wasp) to watch before I post my rankings. The only thing that could make End Game better is if they have the new Star Wars trailer attached. 

[King Postwhore]

I have my ticket to Endgame and we have one more movie (Ant-Man and the Wasp) to watch before I post my rankings. The only thing that could make End Game better is if they have the new Star Wars trailer attached. 

One of the end scenes is important to Endgame.

[Ninjabait]

They can always CGI him on future movies,

Oh HELL no.

Honestly, that one act might sour any future MCU movies for me. Luckily I doubt they're considering it.

I think a nicer way (and credit to reddit for this) to go about doing this would be to have pictures of him hidden away in the background, which is what the Netflix shows were doing. Make it an easter egg thing like the Pixar A113/future movie references

[gzarruk]

They can always CGI him on future movies,

Oh HELL no.

Honestly, that one act might sour any future MCU movies for me. Luckily I doubt they're considering it.

I think a nicer way (and credit to reddit for this) to go about doing this would be to have pictures of him hidden away in the background, which is what the Netflix shows were doing. Make it an easter egg thing like the Pixar A113/future movie references

That'd be cool!

[jammindude]

Or like someone is in a house or apartment watching TV, and an archived interview is on one of the channels.

[jingle.boy]

Something subtle like those things would be ok.  But dear lord... please no Dio-like hologram recreations or CGI.

[Adami]

Something subtle like those things would be ok.  But dear lord... please no Dio-like hologram recreations or CGI.

I take it back. Give me a CGI Stan Lee giving a full blown Holy Diver performance and I'm back in.

[jingle.boy]

Make him the security guard in court of The Living Tribunal, and I'd overlook it being CGI.

[Adami]

I just realized the best potential Stan Lee cameo that will never be.

The One Above All. 

[The Walrus]

I just realized the best potential Stan Lee cameo that will never be.

The One Above All. 

Dude. 

[jingle.boy]

I just realized the best potential Stan Lee cameo that will never be.

The One Above All. 

True dat.

[hefdaddy42]

Best we could do was for Tuesday the 30th.  Man, that's going to be a long weekend.

Looking forward to seeing Ant-Man save the day!  #Thanus

[Ninjabait]

Speaking of #Thanus...

[Adami]

So continuing my rewatch, last night was Age of Ultron.

Man....I have never been so conflicted on a Marvel movie. It had some REALLY great stuff, but also some REALLY bad stuff. I liked it much more on the first watch than this one. I still enjoyed it, but the flaws were more annoying. I say annoying because they seemed easily avoidable. However, the mistakes of the movie also seem to be a point of course correction with Marvel in general.

What I liked.

- Really, any scene where they just slow down and talk. This is something missing in other Marvel movies. The party scene at the beginning is just great. Them being relaxed people just hanging out was really cool. Hope we get more of those moments from time to time.
- On that note, trying to lift Mjolnir was just classic. Loved how Rogers was able to budge it.
- The whole farm scene was great. Again, character moments is where Joss shines.
- The portrayal of Ultron. I know I'm in a minority here, but aside from his dumb plan, I think his overall portrayal was really good. Different, original. Could have easily been a generic evil villain, but they gave him such an odd and quirky personality that Spader crushed. I liked him.
- Hawkeye. Bout damn time.
- Even though I think the ending as a plot is REALLY dumb, the action and how it all went down was really well done. The focus on protecting people instead of JUST punching things. It's a breath of fresh air.
- Klaue. Serkis just is fantastic as this character. I understand why he had to be killed off in Black Panther, but I wish he hadn't. He's just such a fun character. I would love to see more of him. Ah well.
- Vision. Fantastic portrayal. Paul really did a great job with him, and him casually lifting Mjolnir was a great moment.

What I didn't like.

- The opening scene. It really looked like a video game. It was sloppy and just not all that great.
- The entire ending plot of Ultron trying to blow up the world or whatever. Just stupid.
- Thor's stuff. It's so unfortunate. They clearly had a specific idea for Ragnorak at this point but then abandoned it for the actual movie. So it doesn't make a ton of sense any more. Honestly, all of his "vision" stuff could have been cut out and the movie would have been better.
- Those accents from Olson and whatever his name is. Not very good.
- The fact that this movie has major pacing problems. It felt like Joss had a movie in mind, and Marvel had another movie in mind and they just mashed them together. It's a real mess in a lot of ways. It feels REALLY rushed and almost never gets a chance to breathe. Wish they could have just made Joss' version and not worry about all the crap they had him throw in.

Honestly, this movie would have greatly benefited from Joss having a partner. Dude wrote and directed two avengers movies...ALONE. That's insane. Get a partner to help with the heavy lifting. A writing partner specifically.

Ah well. Over all. It had amazing moments and some really blah moments. Not as bad as everyone seems to say, but not great.

Tomorrow night is Ant-Man!

[The Walrus]

I agree with pretty much everything you said, Adami. Age of Ultron is a conflicting film for me. Lots of good, lots of bad. I do love James Spader's performance as Ultron (or I guess just his voice, it rules).

[Zook]

The only thing I didn't like about AOU was everyone thought they were a comedian.

[Ninjabait]

Honestly, I think the farm scene is one of my all time favorite MCU scenes, up with the "I beat you" speech from Daredevil

[gzarruk]

Something else that was really dumb in AOU was how Quicksilver died. I get that he had to die for plot reasons (even though killing Hawkeve would've been a much more emotional moment), but how he died was really really dumb. You're telling me the fastest guy in the MCU can't dodge bullets? No way. Also, the character had great potential and they just killed him right after he sided with the good guys, such a waste of a very good character imo.

Other than that, I remember liking the movie a lot, although Ultron's motive was ultimately kind of generic villain-esque.

[jammindude]

Something else that was really dumb in AOU was how Quicksilver died. I get that he had to die for plot reasons (even though killing Hawkeve would've been a much more emotional moment), but how he died was really really dumb. You're telling me the fastest guy in the MCU can't dodge bullets? No way. Also, the character had great potential and they just killed him right after he sided with the good guys, such a waste of a very good character imo.

Other than that, I remember liking the movie a lot, although Ultron's motive was ultimately kind of generic villain-esque.

I might have to watch it again but....didn't he *jump in front of the bullets* (you know, sacrifice himself?) to protect someone else?   Because what you're implying here is not the way I remember it at all.     You could be capable of dodging bullets and still take one for someone else.

[gzarruk]

Something else that was really dumb in AOU was how Quicksilver died. I get that he had to die for plot reasons (even though killing Hawkeve would've been a much more emotional moment), but how he died was really really dumb. You're telling me the fastest guy in the MCU can't dodge bullets? No way. Also, the character had great potential and they just killed him right after he sided with the good guys, such a waste of a very good character imo.

Other than that, I remember liking the movie a lot, although Ultron's motive was ultimately kind of generic villain-esque.

I might have to watch it again but....didn't he *jump in front of the bullets* (you know, sacrifice himself?) to protect someone else?   Because what you're implying here is not the way I remember it at all.     You could be capable of dodging bullets and still take one for someone else.

I haven’t seen the movie in ages, but if it happened the way I remember it, then he could’ve easily avoided them by going a bit faster. Again, I get why they did it, I just don’t like how they did it.

[jammindude]

Something else that was really dumb in AOU was how Quicksilver died. I get that he had to die for plot reasons (even though killing Hawkeve would've been a much more emotional moment), but how he died was really really dumb. You're telling me the fastest guy in the MCU can't dodge bullets? No way. Also, the character had great potential and they just killed him right after he sided with the good guys, such a waste of a very good character imo.

Other than that, I remember liking the movie a lot, although Ultron's motive was ultimately kind of generic villain-esque.

I might have to watch it again but....didn't he *jump in front of the bullets* (you know, sacrifice himself?) to protect someone else?   Because what you're implying here is not the way I remember it at all.     You could be capable of dodging bullets and still take one for someone else.

I haven’t seen the movie in ages, but if it happened the way I remember it, then he could’ve easily avoided them by going a bit faster. Again, I get why they did it, I just don’t like how they did it.

But that's what I'm saying.   If he would have avoided them, they would have gone into someone else.  He took the bullets *on purpose*.  I thought that was the entire point.  To "avoid them" would have meant sacrificing someone else.  By taking them himself, he sacrificed himself to save someone else.   

[Ninjabait]

Since we were talking about deluxe MCU boxsets, looks like they already exist. They have ones for Phase 1, Phase 2, and one (soon to be two) for Phase 3. The three that are out would be $210 for DVD, and they do come with special features. It'd probably be about $270 to get all of them.

[faizoff]

I have all the blurays of the MCU apart from the two Ant-man movies. Only reason I don't have it is because I've been unable to find it for around $5-7 which is my usual price of purchase of all movies.

I did see the MCU phase 1 & 2 boxsets have an extra disc of some bonus material but the high price isn't enough to push me to get that instead of them individually.

[Adami]

So continuing my rewatch, last night was Ant-Man.

You know.....this a flawed, but good movie! When this movie was announced, and the process by which it was announced, made me very nervous. Like most people, when they first announced Ant-Man, I assumed it was going to be about Hank Pym and Janet. So when they announced that Paul Rudd was playing Scott Lang, I was confused but intrigued. I really love Scott Lang in the comics and I am a HUGE Paul Rudd fan. And I thought it was surprisingly inspired casting. Then Michael Douglas is playing Hank Pym. That was different. So Hank isn't the same age as the rest anymore. Hank isn't an Avenger (despite being a founding member in the comics, as well as the creator of Ultron). But sure. I like Michael Douglas. Then they said Rashida Jones was in talks and I was losing hope. I like Rashida Jones, but it was sounding too much like a Judd Apatow film with the casting. Luckily Kate from Lost was cast and I was like, okay, let's see where this goes.

So this movie is good. It has problems, that I'll discuss below, but it has VERY inspired visuals, a good story, great characters, and just an overall well written script (minus the problems I hinted at). I think the biggest problems the movie faced were based around its role in the MCU. The movie, and it's sequel if I'm remembering correctly, were both released right after an Avengers film. This after Ultron, and the sequel after Infinity War. People were high for the big team up moments. They wanted to see how all the stores affected The Avengers. But then you get an Ant-Man movie, and it largely is unrelated. So people, not all of us, but plenty, just weren't looking for that right then and there. I'd say the releases were too close. Give it 6-8 months. Give people a breather. Another problem is that by this time, Marvel movies were making HUGE money. Ant-Man isn't supposed to be like that. No one at Marvel expected Ant-Man to be a billion dollar movie. It's just a different target. But people, in general, don't get that and thought of Ant-Man as a flop because it didn't make all the money.

Anywho, things I liked and a surprisingly small list of things I didn't.

Liked
- Paul Rudd. In any movie. Ever. His charm and charisma is through the roof. I just love the man. Also dude doesn't freaking age.
- It's a heist film. Different for Marvel. I thought it was a neat story.
- The visuals were really creative and amazingly well done. Haven't seen that kind of stuff before in a super hero movie ever.
- The supporting cast are all fantastic, with Louis as an obvious stand-out.
- The final battle scene was a great mix of typical 3rd act hero movie stuff, and subverting expectations. Like when Yellowjacket is about to be hit by the Thomas the Train and is ready to die then it zooms out to the little toy falling off the track. All of those moments were just really fantastic and creative.
- Ant-Man vs. Falcon. Neat little fight. No real purpose, but it was a nice link that at least FELT a little natural and was fun to watch.

Didn't like
- Disappointed with Darren Cross. You had a lot of potential there about a good person who REALLY wanted to be acknowledged and respected by Hank, and a mixture of that craziness and the craziness of the tech drove him past the edge. Instead, you had a little bit of that, but also mainly just a bad guy with no real sense of morals. If they had made him a relatable person who was just trying really hard and went too far, that would have been a lot better. But overall, the actor brought some personality to it.
- Way too much exposition. Michael Douglas acknowledged that too. Just too much of people explaining stuff, even stuff we didn't need to hear to understand. Show, don't tell.

But yea, I really liked it.

Tonight is Dr. Strange. Not sure it's 100% the correct film for in-universe timeline, but it works well enough. Especially since Black Panther and Spidey follow Civil War too closely for me to put it in there, and he needs to be Sorcerer Supreme for a little while before he's believable in Infinity War or even Ragnarok, so I can't put it right before Thor. Ah well. Close enough.

[kaos2900]

After many months we finished our run through of the MCU films. While there are some not great films, there really are no stinkers. Here is my current rankings prior to End Game!

Tier 1
Avengers: Infinity War
Captain America: Civil War
The Avengers
Iron Man
Gaurdians of the Galaxy Vol 1.
Avengers Age of Ultron
Captain Marvel
Black Panther
Thor: Ragnarok
Tier 2
Iron Man 2
Spider Man: Homecoming
Gaurdians of the Galaxy Vol 2.
Ant-Man
Iron Man 3
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Dr. Strange
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Tier 3
Captain America: The First Avenger
Thor
Thor: The Dark World
The Incredible Hulk

[Adami]

Continuing my rewatch (which is getting a little condensed due to a training coming up causing me to miss 6 days of watching)..last night was Doctor Strange.

This was a....frustrating movie. It felt like a half baked idea. Actually, it felt like they came up with the big crazy scenes, because it takes so long to work out the FX for those, and just wrote the movie around them later. I think Benedict Cumberbatch was a good choice and did a good job, but I feel like the script and the directing were just on two different pages. Which is weird since the director is also one of the writers. But Scott Derrickson is a horror movie director, and I think when they tried to go in that direction, it worked really well. However, a good amount of the movie is trying to be a generic Marvel phase 1 movie with quips and fun, and that just kind of doesn't mesh with the super trippy/slightly horror/mind expanding elements of the movie. Also the time of the movie is super confusing. The beginning of the movie is in 2016 and the rest of the movie takes place over a few months. If they had began the movie in say 2012 or 2013, then ended it in 2016, that would have made more sense. Have crazy Avengers stuff in the background so we can see time passing. That said, here are my likes/didn't likes. Sadly, more dislikes than likes.

Liked
- The casting. Script aside and character development aside, I thought this was a great cast.
- In that, a special shout out to Tilda. I know a lot of people lost it when they read The Ancient One was going to be a British woman instead of an Asian man, but I thought it was smart. If it had been an Asian man, it would have been a pretty bad racial stereotype that it was in the comics. This was a nice switch, even acknowledging it when Stephen thinks the random old Asian guy is The Ancient One. She brought such gravitas and charm to the role. Her facial expression at the end when she's facing her own demise was fantastic. It was this great mix of wonder and acceptance.
- The magic. God damn this movie went for it and knocked it out of the ball park in that department. It is SO complex and confusing, but you can tell that the director never lost sight of what was happening. It all came together and was just mind blowing. All of it.
- The ending. It was a fantastic subversion. You go in expecting the traditional 3rd act huge CGI fight slug fest with explosions and stuff. Instead you get a short fight with time going in reverse around them and then a lengthy bargaining scene. I thought it as super inventive.

Didn't like.
- The movie needed a different beginning structure. It just goes SO quickly from douche bag doctor to hands broken in wherever. I think the movie could have started with him already in training or him looking for the place in Nepal. Have the rest done through flashbacks at random times if necessary. But it felt like the first act of this movie was in a hurry to get to the next part. If you're rushing to get to point B, then just start at point B.
- Awful villain. I like Mads a lot, and he's just totally wasted here. His motivation is paper thin. His character is barely 2 dimensional. His minions are completely random. You could have replaced the actors in every scene, hell every cut, and no one would have noticed anything. Sad.
- Mordo's change was forced. Great character til the end. They just didn't give him enough depth to justify his actions. They just kind of say stuff about him and then we have to accept it. They just tell us he's black and white and rigid but no idea why or anything. Then he suddenly wants to get rid of all the wizards? Eh. The idea of feeling betrayed because you put your savior on a pedestal and then they turned out to be flawed is good (if a bit cliche) but he needed more to work with here.
- The clashing tone, as I said earlier. It's like Marvel decided all of their movies need 200 jokes. The Mister Doctor whatever scene with Mads and Benedict was just bad writing. Strange is NOT a funny quippy guy. He's a pretty serious character that gets annoyed at everyone else' quips. Dude doesn't need to be making Beyonce jokes and trying to make Wong laugh. Just not the right character for it.
- Should have just been a more straight forward horror/sci fi (ish) film. Go into all the magic and make it crazy and scary. Doesn't have to be as light as it was. Would  have been a cool contrast to the generally light tone of the other Marvel movies.
- Lastly, and this one REALLY bothered me...............the score. THE GOD DAMN THEME IS ALMOST NOTE FOR NOTE THE SAME FROM STAR TREK 2009! Same composer. I hate this guy so much. Stop giving him work! Sorry.

Anywho. It's not a bad movie, by any stretch, but its flaws are very noticable and drag it down a whole lot. Hoping the sequel fixes a lot of those.

Tomorrow is Civil War! WOOO!!!

[bosk1]

Also the time of the movie is super confusing. The beginning of the movie is in 2016 and the rest of the movie takes place over a few months. If they had began the movie in say 2012 or 2013, then ended it in 2016, that would have made more sense. Have crazy Avengers stuff in the background so we can see time passing. That said, here are my likes/didn't likes.

YES!  This is EXACTYLY where this movie went wrong.

Liked
- The casting. Script aside and character development aside, I thought this was a great cast.
- In that, a special shout out to Tilda. I know a lot of people lost it when they read The Ancient One was going to be a British woman instead of an Asian man, but I thought it was smart. If it had been an Asian man, it would have been a pretty bad racial stereotype that it was in the comics. This was a nice switch, even acknowledging it when Stephen thinks the random old Asian guy is The Ancient One. She brought such gravitas and charm to the role. Her facial expression at the end when she's facing her own demise was fantastic. It was this great mix of wonder and acceptance.
- The magic. God damn this movie went for it and knocked it out of the ball park in that department. It is SO complex and confusing, but you can tell that the director never lost sight of what was happening. It all came together and was just mind blowing. All of it.
- The ending. It was a fantastic subversion. You go in expecting the traditional 3rd act huge CGI fight slug fest with explosions and stuff. Instead you get a short fight with time going in reverse around them and then a lengthy bargaining scene. I thought it as super inventive.

YES AGAIN!

Didn't like. ...
[random bunch of silly criticisms]

  Just...no.  None of that is even in the same zip code as "spot on."  Just no, no, no, no, NO.  The ONLY valid criticism is the one in the first quote, which you absolutely nailed.  Other than that, you are just wrong.  Like, as in, Stadler in P/R wrong.  Well, actually, no.  That isn't strong enough, because Stadler makes as many good points in P/R as bad ones.  You are as wrong as...um...Stadler talking about Mike Portnoy wrong.  So there.  Take that.

[Adami]

All of those are perfectly valid, and if you don't hear the score problem, you have ears like Samsara.


Also, in the news, Kevin Fiege said that it'll be a "very long time" til the X-Men show up in the MCU. I think that's smart. I just hope it's not that long before FF characters show up. Not necessarily the team themselves, but just anyone from their comics.

[Dream Team]

Unrelated to the above discussion, but after watching Ragnarok and Infinity War recently: just how small a population did Asgard have? They all fit on a not-very-large ship, and yes I realize Hela slaughtered quite a few but seriously the population appears to be less than one Midgard city.

[The Walrus]

I agree with pretty much all of... bosk's response to Adami, hahaha. I really like Doctor Strange, it has its problems, and I totally agree about the villain sucking eggs and Mads being wasted, but otherwise I don't have many gripes. I guess it is "Iron Man but with magic" in terms of structure and pacing however the magic really is amazing and I regret not seeing it in theaters. Tilda was excellent in her role, I agree.

I have no problem with the score though 'cause I don't like Star Trek. 

[Orbert]

I agree with most of Adami's gripes.  I got what they were after with the transformation from arrogant asshole doctor to the crushing blow (!) but it still felt oddly paced. Either somehow spend more time with it, or cut it and do it through flashbacks as suggested.  The in-between approach was okay but could definitely have been better or smoother or something.

Ditto Mads Mikkelsen.  I don't actually like the guy (he'll always be the dude with the drippy eye from Casino Royale to me) but okay if he's gonna be the bad guy, make him the freakin' bad guy.  He seemed to have some game and was quite confident about it, so maybe he shouldn't be messed with because you could be underestimating him, but he never felt outright threatening or scary to me, not really a serious danger.  Just a plot point.

The uneven tone and overall weird pacing of the film kinda worked for me because I was completely unfamiliar with the character and how he fits into the MCU (if at all?), and his world had just been turned upside-down and he was on a journey with no idea WTF he was doing, so things feeling just a bit "off" seemed appropriate.  But I can see why it didn't work for everyone.