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Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM
Cross is almost the exact same character as Stane, except Cross actions come off as less organic (I suppose because he's being driven off the deep end by the Pym Particles, but the movie doesn't really back it up well) and is less good of a foil for the hero.
Them trying to sell Cross as a supervillain also didn't work as well as it did Stane - Yellowjacket's fight with Ant-Man came off less like a moment the movie was building up to and more superfluous, especially since it involves dropping the characters he actually had a feud with to go after Scott's daughter because evil.
Or in short, Cross comes off as a poor man's Stane (or Hammer or even Killian - Marvel's made a habit of this character type), which is actually totally fine because the movie isn't really framed as "Cross' philosophy vs Scott's," and he isn't a personal enemy to Scott until the story suddenly tries to make him one. However, I do wish the movie had played up the comparing and contrast between Cross and Hope more, and had a little bit more of the foil-ing between Cross and Hank.
edited 11th Aug '15 9:30:17 PM by KnownUnknown
It's the performance that makes Cross work - it's not an especially meaty role, but the actor (I don't know his name, sorry) gave it all he had, and it paid off.
Oh God! Natural light!Cross works precisely because of how unhinged he is, the fun thing of his character is watching the character's proggressive Sanity Slippage as the movie goes on and on until the climax which he is in full Ax-Crazy mode and butchering everything on his path.
His massive Daddy Issues also help to flesh him out more, and you can actually feel a bit sad for him when he expresses such resentment for Pym abandoning him.
"All you Fascists bound to lose."He went after Cassie because he had a hate-on for Scott.
And he had a hate-on for Scott because Scott a) blew up everything and b) was trusted with the Ant-Man suit when Pym wouldn't even confirm that it existed with Cross.
He's yelling stuff at Scott in the final battle that basically amounts to jealousy jealousy I'm jealous at your perceived relationship with Hank.
Forever liveblogging the AvengersI don't know if I found Stane all that great a villain, for the odd reason that Jeff Bridges is too good in the role. As in, he's so good at playing this "cool old uncle" type of character, that when he's inevitably revealed to be a villain, it's disappointing. It's not an unexpected twist, but the character ceases to be much fun to watch the instant he's revealed to be evil.
My problem with Stane is that he was so sleazy that I honestly didn't get how Tony could trust him for one minute. That's why Alexander Pierce was so much better in The Winter Soldier. His role was kind of similar, but he played the concerned leader so perfectly that I had started to doubt my assessment that he is the most likely villain.
Captain America: Civil War Rumor: What “International Incident” Triggers the Sokovia Accords?
http://www.themarysue.com/captain-america-civil-war-rumor-international-incident-sokovia-accords/
About Antman's Rogues Gallery, Pym actually does have an Arch-Enemy in the comic. Problem is, said nemesis is Egghead, a bald Mad Scientist... and that's it. The YMMV page makes a good job at describing how the writers never were capable of making him a serious villain^^
Its sort of hard to come up with decent villains for a shrinking hero.
When he was Giant-Man you could at least give him tough guys to punch.
And I think he had Black Knight as a villain too but he wandered over to the Masters of Evil and then got his ass killed by Iron Man.
What makes a good villain? I don't really know. A physical threat, an intellectual threat, an existential threat?
Forever liveblogging the Avengers![]()
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Depend, but if I had to say, I would say the villain needs to represents something that match the hero in some way. Not power-wise, obviously. I did discuss this in the DCEU session already but here are some Marvel example:
- Spider-Man: Green Goblin represents both a warped/inverted father figure to Uncle Ben, being an Abusive Parent who encourages his son to care only about him and focus on being great rather than take responsibility. Dr Octopus represents an adult version of what Peter could have become. And Venom, obviously, represents his Spider-Man alias' darker side.
- Iron Man: The Mandarin represents pretty much the opposite to Iron Man's ideal, being a guy using magic-like alien tech, with a traditionalist ideology, and who wants the world to go back to the past rather than toward the future. Iron Monger represents what Stark would be without his moral standards and good side.
- Captain America: Red Skull, regardless of weither he really is a nazi or not, remains a psychopath who incarnates pretty much everything horrible in humanity (whereas Cap represens everything good) and is fighting for an order that would amount to a dictatorial dystopia.
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Nice Jojo's reference^^
edited 12th Aug '15 7:37:51 AM by Theokal3

I liked AOU Ultron.
He was hilarious, and kinda evil too.
Yeah, his motivations needed work (since he couldn't stick to one, but considering how unstable he was, I'm not surprised he was changing his mind every 20 seconds. I mean, he was kinda like a kid.
Plus, he was funny. That makes me forgive a lot.
Oh, and I liked Thor The Dark World too, since everyone wants to rag on that all the time.
I will fight all of you over this.
One Strip! One Strip!