Marvel Phase 5 - The Sludge Must Flow

one of the big things to come out of san diego comic-con this year was the announcement of the entire slate of upcoming movies tv shows video games board games and toilet seat covers for marvel phase five because you know we've got to keep that content pipeline pumping out sludge at full capacity people don't let the audience breathe or think even for a second about what they've just seen go go go now i have to admit my first thought on hearing this was wait phase four's done i mean don't get me wrong it feels like marvel have pumped out more [ __ ] in the past couple of years than all previous phases put together not to mention proving the point that more doesn't necessarily equal better but the thing that's been lacking in this phase is purpose and i'm not talking about the [ __ ] glorious purpose that loki bangs on about every previous phase in the mcu has felt like an escalation of character events and stakes building and contributing to the overarching infinity saga storyline and usually being capped off with a big blowout avengers team-up movie to set up the next major story arc it wasn't exactly revolutionary storytelling but it was a solid and dependable structure that expanded the universe delivered mostly satisfying payoffs and teased the prospect of even bigger things to come phase 4 on the other hand has felt like an extremely long-winded joke without a punchline meandering through a series of disconnected plot threads and ideas with no clear plan of where it wanted to go or how to get there it's like an entertainer that's got to the end of their set only to find out that they still have like half an hour of space to fill so they're just throwing out whatever comes to mind and hoping that something lands properly the franchise really needed to come out swinging after end game with a compelling new storyline and hard-hitting movies right off the bat to prove that there was still a reason for its own existence now that the infinity saga was over instead they used their first movie to tell a pointless side story for a legacy character that was already dead introduced the supposed focus of the entire phase using a goofy tv series on disney plus that only a fraction of their core audience even bothered to watch and capped it all off with a black panther movie that doesn't even have black panther in it anymore chadwick boseman was simply irreplaceable as t'challa his death at such a young age was an absolute tragedy and part of me can't help but think that the respectful thing to do might have been to just retire the character and leave his memory untarnished but hey i guess disney feels differently especially when there's still billions of dollars to be milked out of the character don't worry though i'm sure it'll be another cultural moment which is basically code for don't you dare criticize this movie in any way or you're gonna get labeled as every east under the sun we did learn a few things from phase four though like how it's okay to commit acts of terrorism murder illegal human experimentation the psychological and physical torture of thousands of innocent people and genocide on a multiversal scale as long as you've got a vagina equality it's fantastic when it only ever works in your favor complex global problems of poverty population imbalance resource distribution and historical discrimination can be solved simply by telling people that they need to do better and sacrificing one life to protect literally all of existence is apparently a bad call well i mean only if you happen to be a man of course but hey that's all in the past now we have an entirely new phase of mindless pointless directionless sludge written by mentally deficient children to look forward to like ant-man and the wasp quantum mania remember ant-man remember how his movies are basically seen as the most obscure lightweight and forgettable fluff in the whole mcu and that's saying something at this point believe me remember how he was basically written out of his own story and reduced to a background character for the second movie so that the writers could focus on far more important characters like the wasp well now he's back and he's ready to be overshadowed outperformed and belittled by his far more intelligent capable and important female counterparts can't wait or how about the most likable flawed and relatable character of them all captain marvel you know that scrappy lovable underdog who can slice through city-sized battle cruisers tank a punch from thanos and whose entire character arc was about throwing off the shackles of society and learning to accept her own awesomeness can't wait to see the writers try to construct an interesting story out of a character that's basically superman without the kryptonite played by an actress with all the likability of my underwear after a bite of chronic food poisoning and directed by a woman with a grand total of two film credits to her name [ __ ] train wreck doesn't even come close to this one that being said they should probably get a move on though because if her appearance in ms marvel was anything to go by brie larson might actually blink out of existence before the movie even gets released damn man someone get this girl a cheeseburger stats or how about captain america new world order want to see sam wilson trade in a cool and unique character of his own so that he can be a cheap carbon copy of someone else instead nah me neither giving him the shield in end game felt cheap manipulative and forced as [ __ ] at the time and absolutely nothing has changed since then and it's such a shame because anthony mackie is a really good actor he was awesome as falcon but he's nothing more than a second-rate pretender as cap as far as i'm concerned steve rogers is was and always will be the one and only captain america but hey remember blade remember how he basically kicked off the modern era of superhero movies back in 1998 with an r-rated action film that was dark and violent and gory remember how he was played to perfection by wesley snipes giving the world an awesome black superhero 20 years before black panther came along to take all the glory yeah well forget about that because now we have the modern disney fight version to look forward to because trying to fit this character into the light-hearted family-friendly mcu sounds about as feasible as trying to hold a prayer meeting at a bdsm club the two just aren't gonna mess with each other and if something has to give i suspect it'll be blade's dark and violent tone in which case it's just not blade as far as i'm concerned but on the plus side at least we've got the tv shows to look forward to right like loki season two you enjoyed watching one of the coolest and most interesting antagonists of the mcu getting turned into a whiny emotional insecure and dumb as [ __ ] sidekick whose only function is to get humiliated broken down and outclassed by his superior female opponent right well can't wait for a whole new season of that or how about iron hearts ever wondered what would happen if iron man was a flawless idealized teenage prodigy named mary sue sorry riri nah me neither can't wait to see how the show tries to convince us that riri is smarter and more talented and more capable than tony stark ever was while taking subtle digs at the flaws in his personality to slowly break down our perception of him not a great plan [ __ ] off iron heart you're never going to fill tony's shoes and all you're ever going to be seen as is a cheap plastic imitation of something far better or how about echo the story of a deaf mute protagonist who can't communicate with other people in any meaningful way who has to go back to her hometown and reconnect with their native american roots yeah thrilling stuff almost as thrilling as agatha harkness the ridiculous pantomime villain from one division this apparently got her own spin-off show now because it was agatha all along don't you know honestly how long is it going to be until we get a series about young obadiah or red skull the early years or the continuing story of fake mandarin from iron man 3. where does all this stuff ends oh yeah it doesn't and i guess that's the real takeaway from phase five six seven and who knows how many more it'll never stop disney are just gonna keep turning this stuff out becoming ever more lazy and complacent slotting new actors into familiar roles rebooting entire franchises and universes trampling over beloved characters and storylines rewriting past events to fit current trends sacrificing quality storytelling with universal appeal to pander to whatever political cause happens to be in vogue that week they'll do all of this stuff and more because people let them get away with it they'll never stop and they'll never improve as long as audiences keep paying to see what they make it's the bachelor chow of entertainment the lowest common denominator designed to be mass produced quickly and easily and consumed in exactly the same way guys like myself mauler nerdrotic and others tried to warn you that this was coming we could see the cracks appearing even before end game but it was like trying to stop a runaway train with a feather duster the momentum was too strong the brand loyalty too entrenched the piles of money too big and well i hope it was all worth it because those piles of money may start getting a lot smaller as time goes by the law of diminishing returns seems to have claimed the mcu at last the box office returns for phase four have been dwarfed by their predecessors black widow shang chi and the eternals all failed to break even despite what the mainstream media would have you believe thor love and thunder is under underperforming badly right now and doctor strange too only got as far as it did by coasting on the momentum of no way home the only movie of this phase to crack a billion dollars and it wasn't even made by marvel even the endless deluge of lazy hastily written tv shows designed to plug the gap has done nothing but dilute once invincible brands but you know what i'm perfectly fine with that every genre in hollywood has its time to shine and it's time to fade sooner or later people get tired of things no matter how popular they once were it happened to westerns it happened to war movies and sooner or later it'll happen to superhero films maybe it's going to take a while but the decline is absolutely happening and if phase 5 is anything to go by well that decline may come a lot quicker than anyone expects anyway that's all i've got for today go away now

Channel: The Critical Drinker

Views: 1,935,097

Keywords: Marvel Cinematic Universe, She Hulk, Captain Marvel, Falcon, Captain America, Iron Man, Ironheart, Black Panther, feminist, feminism, girl power, Disney, Kevin Feige, Riri Williams, shuri, review, funny, critical drinker

Id: FLutO6Uhq-U

Length: 9min 44sec (584 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 26 2022