Comic Book Movies

[Dr. Insomniac]

Spoiler

It's been a pretty elegiac time for Marvel heroes. Wolverine died in Logan. Peter died in Spider-Verse. Now Tony's death. I gotta wonder how an 8-year-old would react to all these consecutive superhero deaths, especially the 8-year-olds who were allowed to watch Logan.

I loved seeing Thanos duel everybody with his double-sided sword from Ninja Scroll. How did he lose it in the original timeline?

Speaking of, I'm surprised that main timeline Gamora and Vision stayed dead. I was fully expecting some bullshit reset button to resurrect them alongside Natasha. But no. Guess Wandavision and the Black Widow movie will be prequels.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Regarding your last point:

Spoiler

I was also surprised by this and am happy that Disney and Feige had the balls to leave those deaths permanent. However, while we know that the Black Widow movie will be a prequel, there may be another option for the other two shows. Keep in mind that this movie revealed that the timeline doesn't work like in other movies. Going to the past doesn't change the future of your given timeline, but instead branches it out into another timeline (hence why they were able to kill Thanos and his army from the past without undoing the events of Infinity War). Basically, time-traveling in the MCU works very similarly to time travel in Dragon Ball.

As we saw, the past version of Loki escaped with the Tesseract. And having killed the Thanos from 2014 inevitably created an alternate reality where the events of Infinity War never happened. So, perhaps it's possible for some of these Disney shows to branch out into the multi-verse?

It's just a thought, anyways.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Just got back from my second viewing and it's even better on a re-watch.

Spoiler

I also think I might have a better understanding of old man Steve Roger's which at first didn't make sense to me given how time travel was explained in this movie, but it may still be a plot-hole.

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[Dr. Insomniac]

Spoiler

I just assume he lived out his life in another timeline, lived with Peggy until she died, then asked Strange in that Earth to help him hop to his home dimension and tell his friends what happened.

My issue is what Strange really meant by "it was the only way". Because even if refusing to give him the Time Stone would have led to Thanos horribly murdering all of the team on Titan one by one until Strange either gave it up or died, the stone was necessary to reverse Wanda destroying the Mind Stone. Without it, Thanos would have lost. Maybe a loss where Thanos was still alive would have been more trouble than it was worth, probably would have raged and went on a neverending quest to kill the half of the universe with his own hands, and Strange needed the timeline where he died to occur.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

For sure, the plot of this movie (and really everything since Infinity War) is super contrived to be more in service of what they want to do with the characters and how they want to end their arcs. Like....

Spoiler

People have already pointed out how The Avengers could gave just gone back in time to get more Pym Particles in the first place for more attempts. Also Tony Stark almost immediately figuring out time-travel is complete bull-shit. And really, since Captain Marvel has been stated to be the strongest MCU character to date, there's no reason that she couldn't have used the gauntlet to snap away Thanos's army as soon as Peter gave her the gauntlet.

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However, by the very nature of the MCU since it's inception, and really superhero comic books in general, the story is worked around to serve the characters and themes that the writers want to explore, as opposed to the other way around. So it personally doesn't bother me too much that they went this route even though there is clearly more than one way that they could have won.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Yeah, I don't really mind that much. And it's not like a bad event comic where I keep questioning why these characters are acting the way they are instead of sitting back and watching the action. Also, someone else cameoed in the film.

Spoiler

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[Avaitor]

That was a really good way to end this phase of the MCU. Or almost I guess, since apparently Far From Home is the real end of Phase 3. I wonder if that'll be more like an epilogue, though.

Spoiler

Something else I wonder is how the reincarnated characters will handle coming back into the present, five years removed and unchanged. Also, did everyone at Peter's school not survive the snap? Granted, we only really saw Ned at the end, but I can't help but wonder who if his crew in Homecoming would have graduated and grown by now.

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[Dr. Insomniac]

Spoiler

All of Peter's classmates were on that field trip in the Far From Home trailer. So unless Flash got held back, they didn't live out the five years.

Another thing I'm wondering is who the next overarching villain will be now that Thanos is gone. Galactus? Annihilus? Doom? The Cancerverse? The power vacuum from his death has to be large for someone to fill his shoes.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Yeah, this ending is so perfect (they didn't even include any post-credit stingers to emphasize the finality of it) that it seems like a bit of a slap in the face to all of a sudden make the new Spider-Man movie the final film of the Infinity Saga. That said, I feel like it's more of a case of this being a stand-alone movie that, while being a sequel to Homecoming, will really only make small references to the events of previous MCU movies. It seems like Sony wanted a sequel to Homecoming released as soon as possible, hence why this is coming out so soon after Endgame. It probably doesn't fit in line with what Feige has planned for Phase 4, but it was a movie that still had to be made and released per their deal with Sony. So, in that regard, it'll be to Phase 3 what Ant-Man was to Phase 2, in being a fun, light-hearted romp, but ultimately more it's own thing.

So, in other words, it's a movie that probably doesn't have a specific place in any phase, but is just being called a phase 3 film for the sake of convenience. As far as I'm concerned, though, the Infinity Saga ends with Endgame.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Spoiler

It probably won't happen, but it'd be nice if Peter mentioned in Far From Home that between getting dusted and waking up, he thought he saw Uncle Ben guiding him back. Something to honor the two father figures he's lost in his life.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Spoiler

All of Peter's classmates were on that field trip in the Far From Home trailer. So unless Flash got held back, they didn't live out the five years.

Another thing I'm wondering is who the next overarching villain will be now that Thanos is gone. Galactus? Annihilus? Doom? The Cancerverse? The power vacuum from his death has to be large for someone to fill his shoes.

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I'm personally hoping for Doom. Galactus or Annihilus are more likely though since Feige said that he wanted Phase 4 to focus more on the cosmic side of the MCU. Feige even originally wanted Galactus to be the big bad of the MCU but couldn't use him because Marvel Studios didn't have the rights to the character back then, so I wouldn't be surprised to see him capitalize on the opportunity here. Also, I find Annihilus to be a pretty bland villain (I do love the concept of the negative zone, though), and going with him would inevitably lead to yet another big battle with a generic CG army. I'd personally prefer they go with a more powerful foe that they have to take out strategically rather than one that relies more heavily on yet another army.

On another note, since time travel is now a thing in the MCU and it has been heavily implied that Hemsworth is not done playing Thor after all, I'd like to see either the God Butcher tackled in the next Thor film. Or at least finally give us characters like Baldur and Beta Ray Bill.

Spoiler

After GOTG Vol. 3, of course.

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[Dr. Insomniac]

If time travel's a recurring thing from now on, they could always do Kang the Conqueror. Or Dormammu since he's already been introduced.

And something else on my mind: I've noticed at the theaters since Civil War that people get really hyped whenever Ant-Man shows up, but always whenever he shows up in other superheroes' movies instead of his own two. He does something awesome in his own movies, people go "Okay, I guess that was cool". But whenever he so much as sneezes in Civil War or Endgame, I heard people cheer or clap. I don't get it. I guess people like him a lot more when he's a side character?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I think the same is true of Doctor Strange as well. I noticed a lot more people cheering for him in Infinity War and Endgame than in his own movie. That actually brings up one of my main concerns for the MCU going forward. Both RDJ's Tony Stark and Evans' Steve Rogers were by far the most charismatic performers in the MCU. Both were key pillars of the franchise that could easily play the leading role in any crossover films. With both of those actors' contracts up and them confirming that they aren't returning for any more MCU films, one has to wonder who could be a new pillar for the MCU.

I feel like Feige and Disney were really banking on Captain Marvel to be the new Captain America, but aside from Brie Larson's extraordinary ability to piss off the majority of the fanbase, the general reaction to her movie was pretty "meh" at best, and she was barely even in Endgame. Making her the lead would be the equivalent of how the WWE tried to push Roman Reigns as the next big star. Trying to do it forcibly without the character earning it just gets the fans to turn on them and the franchise. This is essentially what happened with Carol in the last few years of the comic books.

T'Challa would most likely be their next choice, but while most people liked Black Panther, a common criticism is that he felt like a supporting character in his own movie at times.

There's also Tom Holland's Peter Parker, and while fans really seem to like him, Disney's initial contract agreement with Sony will expire with the release of Far From Home, so a lot of that is up in the air with whether they want to renew it or screw Marvel Studios over and take the character back.

[Avaitor]

Yeah, I don't really see a particularly worthy replacement for Tony or Steve with the newer heroes, especially since Marvel has to share the rights to Spidey. It seems entirely possible that we'll get one more Thor, and I think along with the Black Widow movie and Guardians 3 (which even if it isn't the last, the franchise is very likely closer to the end than the beginning), we'll have enough presence to tide things over for a while, but we need an anchor.

Trying to give T'Challa, Carol, or Strange more of a personality and purpose in their next installments will help, but it might finally be time to give the Fantastic Four and/or the Surfer an MCU shot.

[Dr. Insomniac]

It took a while to get Thor to work and become an audience favorite, so it's not hard to assume they'll retool T'Challa and Carol to be more well-rounded characters too.