History FranchiseOriginalSin / MarvelCinematicUniverse

* On a related note, the MCU's increasing reliance on sympathetic villains from Phase 3 and onward has been criticized as stale and badly written since said villains make legit points yet they still act gratuitously evil because they're villains. However, this trend was widely praised with Killmonger from ''Film/{{Black Panther|2018}}'', who is generally seen as one of the best MCU villains. While Killmonger was sympathetic because of how he suffered from systemic racism, and rightfully criticized Wakanda for not helping impoverished black people, he still had gratuitous KickTheDog moments (i.e. shooting his girlfriend [[ShootTheHostage when Ulysses Klaue took her hostage]]) and strong hatred of white people that were added to remind audiences that he was still a villain. However, what Killmonger had that later similarly sympathetically motivated villains lacked was that Killmonger was one of the first such villains to be featured in the MCU after a long history of largely much more generically evil villains, making a sympathetic villain feel fresh for the franchise. Furthermore, Killmonger's characterization was genuinely sympathetic as the film explored his tragic backstory and his rationale in a way that allowed his FreudianExcuse, while [[FreudianExcuseIsNoExcuse not remotely justification for his evil actions]], to be understandable. Yet most importantly, after Killmonger's defeat, T'Challa put genuine effort into addressing Killmonger's arguments and bringing about real change. In contrast, the later sympathetic villains were less well-received because of either their unlikable personalities ([[Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier Karli Morgenthau]]), shallow motivations ([[Film/TheMarvels2023 Dar-Benn]]), or forced evil actions ([[Series/SecretInvasion2023 Gravik]]). Even worse is that after defeating the villains, the heroes seldomly acknowledge their arguments or try to address them in favor of maintaining the status quo. So while Killmonger was seen as a refreshing and compelling anti-villain that holds up, his later imitators have neither his novelty nor nuanced characterization.

** Some fans took issue with the [[TruerToTheText comics-accurate]] depiction of the Skrulls as ScaryDogmaticAliens who use shapeshifting to cause chaos and take over the Earth. However, Marvel had previously switched out a more 'unique' depiction of a traditionally villainous Marvel character with a more comic-accurate depiction with (say it with us now) Wenwu a.k.a. the real Mandarin. After ''Film/IronMan3'' gave audiences a [[spoiler:fake]] InNameOnly Mandarin, ''Film/ShangChiAndTheLegendOfTheTenRings'' depicted a more comics-accurate Mandarin in the form of Wenwu. Like his comics counterpart, Wenwu is a magical Chinese warlord who fights with Kung Fu and runs a secret terrorist organization. However, despite the problematic YellowPeril aspects, Wenwu was embraced by audiences because he was still a cool yet nuanced villain as he personally fights alongside his minions, genuinely loves his wife and respects his Chinese heritage. It also helps that he is the enemy of the Chinese-American Shang-Chi instead of the White American Tony Stark, thereby avoiding the uncomfortable East vs West racial subtext. It also helped that the ''Iron Man 3'' Mandarin was originally a divisive Marvel villain, so his replacement was seen as an improvement. In contrast, the evil Skrulls in the ''Secret Invasion'' are depicted as dogmatic aliens whose sympathetic motives are undermined by their actions of living among humans to plotting genocide, and gets rid of their previous characterization as pitiable refugees fans had begun to grow attached to across multiple other Marvel series and movies (which, while explained as being a rogue faction led by Gravik, with good Skrulls such as Talos and the morally conflicted Gi'ah still making appearances, it can be rather jarring when watching the series and comparing them to their previous appearances). It also doesn't help that their plan to replace government figures drew uncomfortable comparisons to real-life conspiracies about government that lead to political violence.

* Over the course of the post-Covid days, Disney began an attempt to bring back the "everything is connected" angle that hadn't really been present in MCU projects since ''Series/AgentsOfShield''. Scarlet Witch's character change between ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' and ''Film/DoctorStrangeInTheMultiverseOfMadness'' gets some elaboration in ''Series/{{Wandavision}}'', Kang first appears in ''Series/{{Loki}}'' and gets a bigger role in ''Film/AntManAndTheWaspQuantumania'', and so on. However, though these aspects were definitely seen as problems, they didn't outright kill their films (or at least, were considered relatively small factors), since you can still more or less watch just the films and understand who these characters are. Additionally, those films were still mainly based on characters and ideas established in the MCU films. "Wanda's a grief-stricken villain now" wasn't the most surprising place for her character to go, post-''Endgame'', and Kang is a fairly small presence in ''Loki'', so most audiences could still think of him as mainly a film villain who made an earlier appearance in a TV show. ''Film/TheMarvels2023'', though, was when that idea proved outright toxic: here was a film where the premise and pitch was almost entirely based on characters and elements from a Disney+ show, where the characters with second and third billing had featured prominently in Disney+ shows, and where the thrust of the marketing was "remember Ms. Marvel, from [[Series/MsMarvel the TV show]]? She's finally going to meet Captain Marvel!" Aside from ContinuityLockout issues, this created a problem where the film no longer felt like a new blockbuster, but rather the next installment of a TV show releasing in theaters: something that has ([[Recap/DemonSlayerKimetsuNoYaibaMugenTrainArc almost]]) ''never'' proven a recipe for smashing box-office success, certainly not reliably and not in the west, even before the days of big-budget films launching on streaming services.

* Over the course of the post-Covid days, Disney began an attempt to bring back the "everything is connected" angle that hadn't really been present in MCU projects since ''Series/AgentsOfShield''. Scarlet Witch's character change between ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' and ''Film/DoctorStrangeInTheMultiverseOfMadness'' gets some elaboration in ''Series/{{Wandavision}}'', Kang first appears in ''Series/{{Loki}}'' and gets a bigger role in ''Film/AntManAndTheWaspQuantumania'', and so on. However, though these aspects were definitely seen as problems, they didn't outright kill their films (or at least, were considered relatively small factors), since you can still more or less watch just the films and understand who these characters are. Additionally, those films were still mainly based on characters and ideas established in the MCU films. "Wanda's a grief-stricken villain now" wasn't the most surprising place for her character to go, post-''Endgame'', and Kang is a fairly small presence in ''Loki'', so most audiences could still think of him as mainly a film villain who made an earlier appearance in a TV show. ''Film/TheMarvels'', though, was when that idea proved outright toxic: here was a film where the premise and pitch was almost entirely based on characters and elements from a Disney+ show, where the characters with second and third billing had featured prominently in Disney+ shows, and where the thrust of the marketing was "remember Ms. Marvel, from [[Series/MsMarvel the TV show]]? She's finally going to meet Captain Marvel!" Aside from ContinuityLockout issues, this created a problem where the film no longer felt like a new blockbuster, but rather the next installment of a TV show releasing in theaters: something that has ([[Recap/DemonSlayerKimetsuNoYaibaMugenTrainArc almost]]) ''never'' proven a recipe for smashing box-office success, certainly not reliably and not in the west, even before the days of big-budget films launching on streaming services.

* On a related note, the MCU's increasing reliance on sympathetic villains from Phase 3 and onward has been criticized as stale and badly written since said villains make legit points yet they still act gratuitously evil because they're villains. However, this trend first started with Killmonger from ''Film/{{Black Panther|2018}}'', who is generally seen as one of the best MCU villains. While Killmonger was sympathetic because of how he suffered from systemic racism, and rightfully criticized Wakanda for not helping impoverished black people, he still had gratuitous KickTheDog moments (i.e. shooting his girlfriend [[ShootTheHostage when Ulysses Klaue took her hostage]]) and strong hatred of white people that were added to remind audiences that he was still a villain. However, what Killmonger had that later similarly sympathetically motivated villains lacked was that Killmonger was one of the first such villains to be featured in the MCU after a long history of largely much more generically evil villains, making a sympathetic villain feel fresh for the franchise. Furthermore, Killmonger's characterization was genuinely sympathetic as the film explored his tragic backstory and his rationale in a way that allowed his FreudianExcuse, while [[FreudianExcuseIsNoExcuse not remotely justification for his evil actions]], to be understandable. Yet most importantly, after Killmonger's defeat, T'Challa put genuine effort into addressing Killmonger's arguments and bringing about real change. In contrast, the later sympathetic villains were less well-received because of either their unlikable personalities ([[Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier Karli Morgenthau]]), shallow motivations ([[Film/TheMarvels2023 Dar-Benn]]), or forced evil actions ([[Series/SecretInvasion2023 Gravik]]). Even worse is that after defeating the villains, the heroes seldomly acknowledge their arguments or try to address them in favor of maintaining the status quo. So while Killmonger was seen as a refreshing and compelling anti-villain that holds up, his later imitators have neither his novelty nor nuanced characterization.

* Over the course of the post-Covid days, Disney began an attempt to bring back the "everything is connected" angle that hadn't really been present in MCU projects since ''Series/AgentsOfShield''. Scarlet Witch's character change between ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' and ''Film/DoctorStrangeInTheMultiverseOfMadness'' gets some elaboration in ''Series/{{Wandavision}}'', Kang first appears in ''Series/{{Loki}}'' and gets a bigger role in ''Film/AntManAndTheWaspQuantumania'', and so on. However, though these aspects were definitely seen as problems, they didn't outright kill their films (or at least, were considered relatively small factors), since you can still more or less watch just the films and understand who these characters are. Additionally, those films were still mainly based on characters and ideas established in the MCU films. "Wanda's a grief-stricken villain now" wasn't the most surprising place for her character to go, post-''Endgame'', and Kang is a fairly small presence in ''Loki'', so most audiences could still think of him as mainly a film villain who made an earlier appearance in a TV show. ''Film/TheMarvels'', though, was when that idea proved outright toxic: here was a film where the premise and pitch was almost entirely based on characters and elements from a Disney+ show, where the characters with second and third billing had featured prominently in Disney+ shows, and where the thrust of the marketing was "remember Ms. Marvel, from [[Series/MsMarvel the TV show]]? She's finally going to meet Captain Marvel!" Aside from ContinuityLockout issues, this created a problem where the film no longer felt like a new blockbuster, but rather the next installment of a TV show releasing in theaters: something that has ''never'' proven a recipe for smashing box-office success, even before the days of big-budget films launching on streaming services.

* Over the course of the post-Covid days, Disney began an attempt to bring back the "everything is connected" angle that hadn't really been present in MCU projects since ''Series/AgentsOfShield''. Scarlet Witch's character change between ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' and ''Film/DoctorStrangeInTheTheMultiverseOfMadness'' gets some elaboration in ''Series/{{Wandavision}}'', Kang first appears in ''Series/{{Loki}}'' and gets a bigger role in ''Film/AntManQuantumania'', and so on. However, though these aspects were definitely seen as problems, they didn't outright kill their films (or at least, were considered relatively small factors), since you can still more or less watch just the films and understand who these characters are. Additionally, those films were still mainly based on characters and ideas established in the MCU films. "Wanda's a grief-stricken villain now" wasn't the most surprising place for her character to go, post-''Endgame'', and Kang is a fairly small presence in ''Loki'', so most audiences could still think of him as mainly a film villain who made an earlier appearance in a TV show. ''Film/TheMarvels'', though, was when that idea proved outright toxic: here was a film where the premise and pitch was almost entirely based on characters and elements from a Disney+ show, where the characters with second and third billing had featured prominently in Disney+ shows, and where the thrust of the marketing was "remember Ms. Marvel, from [[Series/MsMarvel the TV show]]? She's finally going to meet Captain Marvel!" Aside from ContinuityLockout issues, this created a problem where the film no longer felt like a new blockbuster, but rather the next installment of a TV show releasing in theaters: something that has ''never'' proven a recipe for smashing box-office success, even before the days of big-budget films launching on streaming services.

** The same problems would become further amplified when the MCU expanded to television streaming services. The increased output of MCU streaming shows meant that there wasn't enough time or resources for quality control, meaning that the franchise's problems like tonal inconsistency and garish visuals became all the more apparent. Furthermore, whereas MCU movies were seen as the gold standard in cinemas, MCU shows faced stiffed competition from acclaimed ongoing superhero shows like ''Series/TheBoys2019'' and ''WesternAnimation/HarleyQuinn2019'' as well as limited series like "Series/Watchmen2019". Subsequently, the incursion into TV made the MCU's problems all the more blatant whether judging the shows on their own merits or in comparison to their rivals.

* On a related note, the MCU's increasing reliance on sympathetic villains from Phase 3 and onward has been criticized as stale and badly written since said villains make legit points yet they still act gratuitously evil because they're villains. However, this trend first started with Killmonger from ''Film/{{Black Panther|2018}}'', who is generally seen as one of the best MCU villains. While Killmonger was sympathetic because of how he suffered from systemic racism, and rightfully criticized Wakanda for not helping impoverished black people, he still had gratuitous KickTheDog moments (i.e. shooting his girlfriend [[ShootTheHostage when Ulysses Klaue took her hostage]]) and strong hatred of white people that were added to remind audiences that he was still a villain. However, what Killmonger had that later similarly sympathetically motivated villains lacked was that Killmonger was one of the first such villains to be featured in the MCU after a long history of largely much more generically evil villains, making a sympathetic villain feel fresh for the franchise. Furthermore, Killmonger's characterization was genuinely sympathetic as the film explored his tragic backstory and his rationale in a way that allowed his FreudianExcuse, while [[FreudianExcuseIsNoExcuse not remotely justification for his evil actions]], to be understandable. Yet most importantly, after Killmonger's defeat, T'Challa put genuine effort into addressing Killmonger's arguments and bringing about real change. In contrast, the later sympathetic villains were less well-received because of either their unlikable personalities ([[Series/TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldier Karli Morgenthau]]), shallow motivations ([[Film/TheMarvels2023 Dar-Benn]])), or forced evil actions ([[Series/SecretInvasion2023 Gravik]]). Even worse is that after defeating the villains, the heroes seldomly acknowledge their arguments or try to address them in favor of maintaining the status quo. So while Killmonger was seen as a refreshing and compelling anti-villain that holds up, his later imitators have neither his novelty nor nuanced characterization.