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Welcome to the main discussion thread for the Marvel Cinematic Universe! This pinned post is here to establish some basic guidelines. All of the Media Forum rules still apply.

  • This thread is for talking about the live-action films, TV shows, animated works, and related content that use the Marvel brand, currently owned by Disney.
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    Original post 
Since Thor and now Captain America came out this year, I wanted to get what Tropers thought of the concept and execution of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in general. Personally I love the idea and wonder why this idea hasn't been seriously tried before. It sorta seems to me like the DCAU in movie form (And well, ummm, with Marvel), and really 'gets' the comic book feel of a shared universe while not being completely alienating.

Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM

Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#48777: Dec 30th 2015 at 4:58:21 PM

[up] That's pretty much my view too. Or at the very least, I don't mind Thor being on Earth but would like to see more of Asgard/see Earth stuff not necessarily related to Jane or the Avengers.

alliterator Since: Jan, 2001
#48778: Dec 30th 2015 at 4:58:51 PM

Then have Jane come along! Seriously, it's not that hard to fit her into the Asgard plot. In fact, have Thor road trip through the nine realms while Jane is in Asgard as part of the Council of Worlds, trying to keep the peace like she is currently in the comics.

edited 30th Dec '15 4:59:55 PM by alliterator

PushoverMediaCritic I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out. from the Italy of America Since: Jul, 2015 Relationship Status: watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out.
#48779: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:03:12 PM

[up]Agree.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#48780: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:04:36 PM

Hasn't "God living on Earth" been the entire premise of the character since the 60's?

So I guess I'm the only one here who likes Natalie Portman as Jane? I mean, she really wasn't given much to do in the first two movies, but that isn't her fault, that's the writers, directors, and producers.

Now, if they actually gave her something substantive to do, that would be great.

I wholeheartedly agree.

However, if I know fandoms like I think I do, I suspect that even if she was written perfectly into the plot and was totally awesome in the next movie she would get a lot of dislike simply for being in it. Eventually, in fandoms dislike of characters because of circumstances turns into hatred of characters regardless of circumstances, which is why Rescued from the Scrappy Heap is so unnecessarily difficult.

edited 30th Dec '15 5:07:58 PM by KnownUnknown

PushoverMediaCritic I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out. from the Italy of America Since: Jul, 2015 Relationship Status: watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out.
#48781: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:07:51 PM

"Thor on Earth" worked perfectly fine in Avengers and Age of Ultron; I don't know why it refuses to work in his own movies.

Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#48782: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:10:12 PM

He's teamed up with other characters there and works off of them better.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#48783: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:11:15 PM

[up][up] To be fair, Avengers had him just arriving on Earth halfway through and Ultron had him offscreen constantly taking trips. Neither film gave him all that much character focus, even taking into account that Loki was the Big Bad of the first film.

Thor 1 flubbed it royally by making his time on Earth more limiting than developing - instead of seeing Thor among people and being forced to face his own humility in dealing with humanity, he mooches off of Jane while quickly falling in love with her.

I maintain that Thor 2 actually got it right, though. One of the few things I really liked about that movie was the way Earth and the final battle was portrayed - rather than a place that prevents Thor from really having experiences, Earth is played as another world and battleground like Hogun's, where he teams up with friends to battle great evil. It really feels like one of the nine realms.

edited 30th Dec '15 5:12:12 PM by KnownUnknown

Victin Since: Dec, 2011
#48784: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:22:16 PM

My opinion on Thor is that I found the first movie to be hilarious, and I don't remember the second enough to comment on it.

KarkatTheDalek Not as angry as the name would suggest. from Somwhere in Time/Space Since: Mar, 2012 Relationship Status: You're a beautiful woman, probably
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
#48785: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:23:24 PM

I don't know. On one hand I wouldn't mind Jane and co. being absent, but at the same time I found it extremely annoying how both Avengers movies handwave none of the characters' significant others being present (because they are offscreen doing something awesome, we promise!)

Well, Pepper was in the first movie briefly, which was something.

It would have been interesting to see Jane share/take Selvig's role in the plot, though. What sort of expertise does she have that could have been used for Loki's portal device?

Speaking of which, regarding Jane!Thor - I haven't read many comics featuring her at the moment, so I don't know how well she's been handled. From what I understand, the decision to keep her identity a secret for so long hurt the book somewhat, but the relaunch might have done a better job?

In any case, I have no problem with the idea of Jane!Thor, and fully support the concept. But I'm not sure if MCU!Jane would be ideal for it.

edited 30th Dec '15 5:27:54 PM by KarkatTheDalek

Oh God! Natural light!
KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#48786: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:27:31 PM

All of the science in the first movie was hers, iirc. Selvig was her advisor and co-scientist, but it was her theory/research/equipment/etc.

KarkatTheDalek Not as angry as the name would suggest. from Somwhere in Time/Space Since: Mar, 2012 Relationship Status: You're a beautiful woman, probably
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
#48787: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:29:44 PM

[up] Do their fields differ at all? Basically, I had the idea of Selvig providing the hardware, while Jane would chart the coordinates of Earth and the Chitauri, so that the Tesseract could open the portal in the correct location.

Oh God! Natural light!
Theokal3 Since: Jan, 2012
#48788: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:35:41 PM

Well, the reason Thor on Earth doesn't work in his movies is actually very simple: the part of the Universe he comes from just looks more interesting. Every time we get to see a bit of Asguard or another of the Realms, it tends to look gorgeous (The Dark World being the exception) and hint at interesting things. Even character-wise, people like Odin, Sif or the Warrior Three just feel more compelling than Team Comic Relief Scientist on Earth. Everything suggests a movie focusing on Asguardian stuff would be more interesting, yet they insist on focusing on the Earth side of things, or at least bring the Earth characters as much as possible.

comicwriter Since: Sep, 2011
#48789: Dec 30th 2015 at 5:55:23 PM

Then have Jane come along!

I'm wary of that if only because I want to see them actually provide some focus for non-human characters not named "Loki". Lady Sif and the Warriors Three all got royally shafted in the last movie in favor of Jane and her pals making stupid quips on Earth, and I don't want the same thing to happen with Valkyrie and other potential new characters.

wehrmacht belongs to the hurricane from the garden of everything Since: Dec, 2010 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
belongs to the hurricane
#48790: Dec 30th 2015 at 6:12:40 PM

I hope thor 3 is an improvement.

i never saw dark world because the first thor was one of the weakest mcu films i've seen, and everything i've read about DW after it came out basically told me i wasn't missing out on anything.

MousaThe14 Writer, Artist, Ignored from Northern Virginia Since: Jan, 2011 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
Writer, Artist, Ignored
#48791: Dec 30th 2015 at 6:17:17 PM

After the first Thor movies you know what I wanted the sequel to be? The adventure of Thor, Lady Sif, and the Warriors Three. It's not that I didn't like Darcy, Selvig, and Romantic plot tumor Jane Foster, I just found the Asgard stuff infinitely more interesting and I wanted Thor's Asgard friends to be more fleshed out and be characters and stuff over Earth stuff.

edited 30th Dec '15 6:17:31 PM by MousaThe14

The Blog The Art
wehrmacht belongs to the hurricane from the garden of everything Since: Dec, 2010 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
belongs to the hurricane
#48792: Dec 30th 2015 at 6:18:46 PM

yeah the earth stuff in the first thor movie had me pretty bored.

loki was the only redeeming factor of that movie.

PushoverMediaCritic I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out. from the Italy of America Since: Jul, 2015 Relationship Status: watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out.
#48793: Dec 30th 2015 at 6:58:29 PM

In the second movie: Frigga's funeral is still heartbreaking and really well-done.

TargetmasterJoe from Velocitron Since: May, 2013 Relationship Status: I like big bots and I can not lie
alliterator Since: Jan, 2001
#48795: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:14:05 PM

Speaking of which, regarding Jane!Thor - I haven't read many comics featuring her at the moment, so I don't know how well she's been handled. From what I understand, the decision to keep her identity a secret for so long hurt the book somewhat, but the relaunch might have done a better job?
During the first Jane!Thor book, they kept her identity a secret until the very last issue (and even then, it wasn't enough to stop spoilers for revealing the twist before it even came out) and a lot of people were put off by that fact, as well as the fact that Jason Aaron put out a lot of red herrings just to keep people guessing. It was still a good book, but because we didn't really know who Thor was, we couldn't really get any good characterization.

The relaunch has been much, much better primarily because we know that it's Jane Foster, we know why she's doing this, and we have a truly epic story going on around her (the War of the Realms). Also, we have the fact that being Thor is killing her - she is being treated for breast cancer, but every time she transforms into Thor, the magic flushes her body of all toxins, including the chemotherapy, but it doesn't get rid of her cancer (which is, after all, a part of her body). So each time she becomes Thor, it slowly kills her.

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#48796: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:27:35 PM

I've been digging Jane Foster as Thor. I especially like her villains.

Can you imagine if Christopher Ecclestone played the comic Malekith, as opposed to the wet noodle we got?

Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#48797: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:29:02 PM

Isn't Comic!Malekith basically MCU!Ronan?

Edit- I like the sound of the Jane Foster as Thor comics (haven't read them as of yet) although I will say that the "being Thor is slowly killing her" element is a bit hard to take seriously because no one ever dies in comics (at least not permanently).

It's like I'd have to expect that eventually the comic will get to a point where she dies and then she'll be resurrected/ascend.

edited 30th Dec '15 8:31:50 PM by Hodor2

Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#48798: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:31:31 PM

I don't have anything against Portman or Jane, but I don't think Jane-as-Thor would work in the MCU. MCU Jane is just way too meek for it to work.

VeryMelon Since: Jul, 2011 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#48799: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:41:31 PM

[up][up]No, he's more like The Joker.

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#48800: Dec 30th 2015 at 8:44:00 PM

Isn't Comic!Malekith basically MCU!Ronan?

I really don't know. I didn't start reading Thor until the switch, so my understanding of Malekith is that he's an Evil Overlord universal conqueror-type, who's as ready to cut a deal or stage a strategic withdrawal as freeze someone to death or cut off Thor's arm and wear it like a fur stole(!). MCU!Ronan is more of a religious fanatic, someone who doesn't care much for subtlety or nuance but will literally hammer his enemies with everything he's got, all the while yelling about how he's going to get them.

When MCU!Ronan gets the Infinity Stone, he calls up Thanos to threaten him, then takes off to the planet of his enemies to blow it up. If Comics!Malekith got an Infinity Stone, he might keep it and quietly run off. Or call Thanos and arrange a meeting to hand it over, where he totally won't backstab Thanos, promise. Or maybe arrange to hand over the Stone in exchange for something more suited to Malekith's plans.


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