Are multiversal stories a problem?

over the last couple of years there have been a decent amount of movies and TV shows using a very interesting concept but with this concept being used more often I've been seeing more and more videos arguing that this concept is bad podcast I will be your guide as we search for the answer so let's Ponder the question our multiversal story is a problem Multiverse stories have been popular for a very long time but in recent years every movie and TV show has a different way to explain it so first let's start with a few different ways movies explain the Multiverse the term Multiverse and timelines Loosely when a decision is made that is not a predetermined one by the TVA the TVA steps in and prunes the time time you know what I'm just gonna let Miss Minix explain it welcome to the Tom variance Authority I'm Miss Menace and it's my job to catch you up in the sacred timeline now the timekeepers protect and preserve the proper flow of time for everyone and everything but sometimes people like you Veer off the path the timekeepers created we call those variants maybe you started an uprising or we're just late for work whatever it was stepping off your path created a Nexus event the TVA has stepped in to fix your mistake and set time back on its predetermined path your actions have left you without a place on the timeline you stand trial for your offenses so sit tight and we'll get you in front of a judge in no time wait why don't you just prune the timeline with the variant did it instead of taking the variant to stand trial just to send them to the Edge of Time with everything that was pruned everything everywhere all at once Multiverse Works similarly just without a TVA every time a decision is made a branch reality is made but each universe is only explained as a universe and not a timeline think of the concept like flipping a coin if you flip a coin it's said that the Universe splits in half to create two universes one where it lands on heads and the other Universe lands on tails for shows like CW Flash the Multiverse and timelines are different going back in time changes the present timeline but doesn't change alter or create alternate universes when I saved her I created a new reality a new timeline so whenever you go back in time it breaks you could reset the timeline you can try to fix it but no matter how hard you try it's never gonna be exactly how it flies similar to Back to the Future right Scott enter the spider vs Multiverse doesn't allow one to be outside their own dimension for long so that is why it differs a bit from the other versions of this concept into the spider versus Universe stands alone and separate from each other but just like the others can be transverse by science Shenanigans stuff so with those explanations out of the way now we can answer the question like I said multiversal stories have been very popular but they've gotten a lot of criticism for things like oh there are no Stakes if you kill this character you could just bring them back sure maybe but only if that's what the story allows it Marvels and flashes and Multiverse if you kill a character they can bring them back I mean just look at Harrison Wells now when you do it a bunch of times it gets old and stale and it turns into not caring because we'll get another whales next season but what made this work for the first few seasons was that each Wells acted and behaved differently that's what makes a Multiverse so amazing we get to see what if Barry Allen never became Flash that's the thing I didn't like about Loki we heard about different universes but we didn't get to see and experience them look at Evelyn and everything everywhere all at once we got to experience different lives she could have had but if you took a version of her from Another Universe and put her into the main one she would be out of place how she interacts with everyone will be different Superman and Lois showcased this really well with John Henry and Lois if you have a story where the characters in other universes act the same then yeah there would be no Stakes because if you kill someone on Earth 52 then you can grab someone from Earth 616 but if they don't act the same and you bring that person over there aren't gonna have the same connection with each other John Henry Lois Lane Harrison Wells Spider-Man if your Multiverse is like Rick and Morty then yeah you could just hop over to the next universe and it won't matter again when the concept is used correctly it makes the Multiverse have Stakes that's not to say that the show is bad just because they take a Rick and Morty approach it just doesn't work on everything multiversal stories are not the problem the problem is that it's Multiverse in name only what's the point of having a Multiverse if we're not going to see the other worlds or our characters learning something from another version of themselves imagine Noe home with three-time Holland Spider-Man all the same age all the same experiences would you rather have that or the Noe home we got with all three Spider-Man all different ages and different experiences that makes the story interesting and dynamic they can play off of each other now you could think what you want about this movie but I think everything everywhere all at once takes full advantage of the Multiverse every time a decision is made an alternate universe is created when the husband wanted to talk to Evelyn the main character he first had to present her the choice that choice created an alternate universe that she could body hop to later the villain could turn any object to anything she wanted by using the Multiverse some really crazy stuff happened in this movie and I would say this is a very good use of the Multiverse side note Doctor Strange is a Multiverse or Madness also had body hopping between multiverses but I think everything everywhere all at once does it better in every reality she was the same person but she had a different life because she did one thing differently now let's address the next critique if you kill this character then you could just bring them back no problem like I said before you can with the Rick and Morty approach but I think there's a very good example of how to handle this let's look at Guardians of the Galaxy vol 3. context and Avengers Infinity War Thanos threw Gomorrah off a mountain in exchange for the Soul Stone then an Avengers end game somehow Gamora returned okay but seriously gomor returned by traveling to the future with past Thanos remember this is a Gamora from before she met the Guardians after Thanos Was Defeated Gamora stayed in the present her future time travel what Guardians of the Galaxy vol 3 picks up a few months later I think I'm still kind of confused about the timeline posting game anyway the Guardians are now running nowhere and Gamora has joined the ravagers whenever Peter Quill and Gamora interact it's not the same as it was before gold still has feelings for Gamora but Gamora doesn't because she hasn't experienced volume 1 and 2. going from working alongside Thanos straight to joining the ravagers will build a different Gamora than we had previously she didn't care about any of the Guardians besides nebula because she didn't fight alongside them on xandar or get the power Stone from Ronan or have to fight a living planet it could have been very easy for Marvel to bring her back to the character she was in Volume 2 by having her get explained everything and looking at some photos like they did in Loki but unlike Loki they didn't take the easy way out this Gamora was different and she didn't rebuild the connection she had with the Guardians and cool had to accept that the Gamora he knew was gone Loki could have done the same thing instead of having him watch a replay of his life and reverting back to the same character I think they should have went the opposite direction because this isn't Ragnarok Infinity War's Loki this is 2012 Avengers Loki this guy is dangerous they should have had him see himself in the video and it makes you say oh well I'm not gonna let that happen to me because I'm smarter or something and then at some point he betrays the TVA and maybe I don't know he becomes president Loki which would have allowed us to see just to kind of Mastermind he is and this wouldn't even change the ending king would still offer our Loki the same deal you kill me start the cycle over again or you let me live and I give you the life you want in another timeline Loki decides not to kill him because if he kills him he would have to deal with all these other Kang variants this would fit in with Loki running away from certain things like his reaction to seeing Hulk and Ragnarok together this planet I hope this makes sense and I'm not saying doing it exactly like this would work but a kind of variation I think would have been better and I'm actually a fan of the Loki series with Evelyn we got to see everything everywhere all at once but in Loki we see everything one time first we're on Pompeii then lamentis then rocks on why should I care about roxon last time I chat Cloak and Dagger isn't Canon and that wouldn't matter anyway because that's centuries in the future and the momentous sequences could have been in a Guardians movie Loki is more planet hopping than time travel Multiverse hopping so of course some people say why should I care because they shouldn't these places hold no weight in this story they should this is where Rick and Morty has the advantage there are times when the planet gets destroyed or the status quo changes that's when they hop into the next World for a clean slate this works in Rick and Morty because the emphasis isn't placed on where they are because everything's treated as normal on the other hand the places we go to in Loki are treated as big deals if they would have used nowhere zandar or even New York that would have made us care because we know those places Even Rick and Morty We Care somewhat about the destruction of the planet Loki is trapped in a place we don't care about in a random part of the Galaxy going through an apocalypse Phineas and Ferb handles this much better in the movie called Phineas and Ferb Across The Second Dimension there's a sequence that requires the run through a bunch of different dimensions before returning to their own these Dimensions don't matter but the focus isn't the dimensions the focus is on getting back home you could argue the same for Loki and that he's just trying to get home but the difference is the whole show uses the idea of hiding in apocalypses so it could hold more weight of these apocalypses happen in places we're familiar with what if we had him go to Asgard or yotenheim because he grew up there and he knew a way off the planet like a back door sorts I mean isn't that how he kept outsmarting Heimdall and Thor look I'm a huge fan of this show so don't get me wrong I'm just trying to explain how you could fix some of these critiques Dr Strange and the Multiverse of Madness also uses the Multiverse in the movie Dr Strange and American Chavez are running away from Wanda who is trying to use American Chavez in order to see her children one thing about this movie is characters not being used for their fullest and characters not being used at all you have the Illuminati being used instead of a multiversal team or a time travel team you could have had Excalibur the Britain Corps the Council of reads just to name a few using the Multiverse and you don't have a multiversal team like what's what's that all about into the spider-verse also had these different versions of the characters in Iraq and they interacted in a way that they didn't really interact with other people it's not the exact same okay while these critiques are valid we can't write out the whole concept because they decide to poorly execute it or take a Rick and Morty approach there are four multiversal movies coming out between this year and next year and I hope they're up to the task anyway I hope that makes sense let me know what you think in the comments below do you agree disagree like comment subscribe and until next time

Channel: Something's Fishy

Views: 46,585

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Id: HO_UzyyF3Sg

Length: 13min 9sec (789 seconds)

Published: Fri May 26 2023