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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.
  • While mild digressions are okay, discussion of the comic books should go in this thread. Extended digressions may be thumped as off-topic.
  • Spoilers for new releases should not be discussed without spoiler tagging for at least two weeks. Rather, each title should have a dedicated thread where that sort of conversation is held. We can mention new releases in a general sense, but please be courteous to people who don't want to be spoiled.

If you're posting tagged spoilers, make sure that the film or series is clearly identified outside the spoiler tagging. People need to know what will be spoiled before they choose to read the post.

    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

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78201: Dec 20th 2017 at 6:09:32 PM

[up] I always wanted them to be a group, but with each movie focussing on another member of said group. Like, I really wouldn't mind if we get X-Men: Cyclops, X-Men: Rogue, X-Men: Rogue, X-Men: Gambit (but without Channing Tatum), X-Men: Beast, as, and each movie features mostly the same cast, but someone else blends into the background depending on what fits into the story. That is pretty much what I always wanted but never got.

Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#78202: Dec 20th 2017 at 6:33:20 PM

Sometimes an allegory is misunderstood by some, but that doesn't mean that it is useless as long as there are enough people who do understand it.

For a Disney film, viewed by hundreds of millions of people, “some people who misunderstood” can exceed the population of several states. That’s why it’s imperative that blockbusters like Zootopia and future X-Men films be clear about what they say regarding bigotry. If they’re unclear and half the viewers walk away thinking it’s a movie about how BLM is the “real” villains, well, that’s millions of misinformed people. That’s already happened in cases like “Pocahontas”, still having negative effects decades later.

edited 20th Dec '17 6:35:44 PM by Tuckerscreator

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78203: Dec 20th 2017 at 6:51:19 PM

[up] It is pretty much impossible to create a movie in which nobody finds something which rubs him the wrong way. Especially if you are Disney and there are a huge chunk of people who want to be offended for one reason or another (not that all complains about Disney come from that quarter, but there are a lot of people who just delight in complaining about Disney simply because it is Disney).

Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#78204: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:27:52 PM

It is impossible to please 100% of everyone, I know. That doesn't mean that 40% is a substitute, or that one can't achieve higher like 70%. It is plenty easy to me to tell the difference between the legitimately unpleaseable complaints and those who are accurate misgivings about the film. If 10% of viewers think Pocahontas is bad merely for starring a woman, it is not the same as the 80% of indigenous viewers who think it's bad for whitewashing history and fetishizing a child victim.

Like, "nobody's perfect" is the oldest excuse.

edited 20th Dec '17 7:28:47 PM by Tuckerscreator

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#78205: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:29:59 PM

How accurate are those percentages? Like, if the point is that X allegory isn't going to work because too many people didn't understand it, a ballpark for how much constitutes "too many" and how one would actually gauge that would help.

edited 20th Dec '17 7:34:42 PM by KnownUnknown

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78206: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:33:13 PM

[up][up] We weren't talking about Pocahontas, though, a movies whose failings have been discussed at length and most people acknowledge, we were talking about Zootopia, a movie most people agree has an important message and an allegory which really works. Just like the allegory in Jessica Jones works. And just like the allegory with the X-men can work if handled correctly.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#78207: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:34:49 PM

The idea that we should avoid allegories because they could be misunderstood is always going to be a hard sell, because it's essentially "we shouldn't tell complex stories because people are too stupid to understand them," which reflects badly on basically everybody.

edited 20th Dec '17 8:00:23 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.
#78208: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:37:13 PM

Zootopia has a 92% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, which means 92% of the 99,310 people who've reviewed the movie like it. It has an even higher score among critics, with 98% of the 256 people involved thinking it's a good film.

edited 20th Dec '17 7:37:34 PM by PushoverMediaCritic

VeryMelon Since: Jul, 2011 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#78209: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:43:27 PM

Literally everything doesn't appeal to everyone. That doesn't stop people from making things.

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78210: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:44:07 PM

[up][up] It is also the only animated movie which has the animax seal of approval with a full points rating (what? If you care about animation, that is the reviewer you pay attention to).

edited 20th Dec '17 7:44:22 PM by Swanpride

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#78211: Dec 20th 2017 at 7:57:48 PM

Of course there is a diference between Zootopia and Jessica jones n messages: JJ know Exactly what is telling and to WHO is telling, you have to be reaaaaaaaaally spin things to fix.

But with Zootopia while it said a lot of things about bigotery, it leaves the who out which create the issue here, I think it does to be general about the issue of privilege or assumptions(that because X people did something before means the truth now).

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
Unsung it's a living from a tenement of clay Since: Jun, 2016
it's a living
#78212: Dec 20th 2017 at 8:05:57 PM

It's a good movie, maybe even a great movie, but it'd be better if it was specific. Not specific to any single group, but rather specific and recognizable in the events it depicted, having them correspond to real world experiences of racism instead of generalizing them to the point where the same basic thing could have happened to anybody.

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78213: Dec 20th 2017 at 8:10:00 PM

Sigh..... I was just using Zootopia as an example for an allegory which many people would agree works in relation to the possibility of the X-men working as allegory if handled right. For an in-depth discussion about Zootopia, there are a number of fitting topics, from the movie itself to "Disney and Pixar in General". It was not my intention to turn the MCU threat into a discussion about Zootopia. The point stands: Allegories can work and they are not inherently worse or better than a more direct approach to a sensitive topic.

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#78214: Dec 20th 2017 at 8:14:53 PM

[up][up]The problem here with mutant and racism is that Mutants ARE diferent, from having wierd powers to having pretty much diferent organs and what else you can stick at them, like those bullshit ideas of Jews being somehow master shapeshifter who always infiltrate into society or Black being one step away from being Hulk.

If anything I must said I like AOS using the inhumans as Mutant stand in: it show a way to properly introduce them in the work, they can be anywhere(which mean it produce the "othering" efect) and we see them being use by good and bad organization.

I dont know, I feel it was one of their best ideas.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
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
Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#78216: Dec 20th 2017 at 8:33:41 PM

On the topic of Zootopia, I really liked the movie. If I were to describe its approach to the racial allegory, I'd say that it comes close to doing a Persecution Flip but avoids that and the Unfortunate Implications of the trope by having both predator and prey characters experience aspects of racial prejudice. And what I find most striking is the extent to which the movie "gets" how prejudice isn't just overt acts of violence and/or discrimination. It also comes in the form of the microaggressions of daily life.

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#78217: Dec 20th 2017 at 8:59:31 PM

[up]I think the "prey no longer prey" come as the idea of X people doing something before but not anymore, like christians a muslism kill each other? they dont do it anymore, Germans are not longer nazis and so own and so own, it feel the idea of privilege as perception and notions which is worst than acts of bigotry.

But anyway, if it was for me I will just made the whole "they are inhumans everywhere" like AOS did and use the inhumans as mutant stand in since it works better that way.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#78218: Dec 20th 2017 at 9:37:30 PM

[up][up][up]Those Thor posters are cool. They remind me of the ones that shipped with the Phase 1 boxed set.

How accurate are those percentages? Like, if the point is that X allegory isn't going to work because too many people didn't understand it, a ballpark for how much constitutes "too many" and how one would actually gauge that would help.

They're made up; though I can say with confidence that the vast majority of Indigenous Twitter despises Pocahontas. Even in the cases of visible numbers, though, it's tricky to gauge the full assessment of a movie. Like, Zootopia may have a 92% RT score, but there's little data on how many of those reviewers judged it as either "everyone has to assess their own preconceptions and be careful of how casually they can harm entire groups of people" or as "fighting the Klan makes you as bad as the Klan."

The idea that we should avoid allegories because they could be misunderstood is always going to be a hard sell, because it's essentially "we shouldn't tell complex stories because people are too stupid to understand them," which reflects badly on basically everybody.

I would never argue that. But I'd say it's more dangerous the idea that a poorly assembled allegory that is distributed as wide as possible is better than nothing.

If Zootopia were instead a movie about how Judy the cop is legally corralled into arresting suspects by species despite her misgivings, it would be more accurate than "cops profile minorities because a minority beat them up as a kid". The film would certainly not be as popular as it is now, but I'd say popularity is worth sacrificing if it's an allegory that inevitably will impact millions of lives either way. If anyone can afford to sacrifice some popularity with their blockbusters, it's Disney.

So if Marvel brings in the mutants in the MCU as a allegory for bigotry, I can see it working... if, as Tobias said, they're more careful with the analogy than "politicians openly advocate genocide and folks who even accidentally cause natural disasters are the same as folks attracted to more than one gender."

edited 20th Dec '17 10:28:44 PM by Tuckerscreator

RavenWilder Since: Apr, 2009
#78219: Dec 20th 2017 at 10:58:55 PM

See, I don't think either X-Men or Zootopia count as allegories, at least not in the strict sense of the word. They're metaphorical, certainly, but they don't go "this character represents this particular thing, and this character represents this particular thing, and this event represents this particular thing . . ."

Zootopia is about prejudice, but (other than the Little Rodentia = Little Italy gag) it doesn't draw any one-to-one parallels. For someone to conclude that the moral of the story is "fighting white supremacy makes you as bad as white supremacists" would require them to first identify which animals are supposed to represent white people and which are supposed to represent minority groups, but the movie doesn't really allow for such simplistic identification. People can still interpret it that way, of course, just as people can interpret Harry Potter as being Satanist propoganda, but any popular work of fiction is going to draw those sorts of weird interpretations based on tortured logic.

Similarly, while the X-Men are almost always used as a metaphor for oppressed groups of people, they're not usually meant to represent any specific oppressed group. I've seen people go "The X-Men are obviously a metaphor for being black" and "The X-Men are obviously a metaphor for being gay" in about equal measure, with each argument having about the same amount of textual support (barring the odd case of Depending on the Writer that tries to make the metaphor explicit).

edited 20th Dec '17 10:59:43 PM by RavenWilder

windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#78220: Dec 20th 2017 at 11:26:35 PM

Do you think people have that freedom now? Do you really?

When did I claim I did?

Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#78221: Dec 21st 2017 at 12:07:37 AM

[up][up]I think I'll take my response to the Film Diversity and Representation thread since it has more to say about Zootopia than about the X-Men at this point.

edited 21st Dec '17 12:07:52 AM by Tuckerscreator

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78222: Dec 21st 2017 at 3:25:27 AM

Those posters are really cool. Especially the way the bifrost turns into mjolnir.

On an entirely different note: I am becoming kind of frustrated with the Marvel TV shows. I mean, I was originally okay with the Netflix shows being on the cheap side, because they did a good job to hide it - until they didn't. Both Iron Fist and Defenders could have used a bigger budget.

The Inhumans was one big exercise in "how to save money by getting rid of exactly what makes the property popular in the first place".

Runaways...I really want to like it, but if they don't step it up, the show gets a resounding "meh" from me. It obviously keeps delving into subplots involving the parents so that it has to spend less money on the abilities of the children, but the children are supposed to be the protagonists. And the one time they did use their abilities to actually DO something instead of just testing them out, it looked bad.

The only show which still delivers great action scenes and amazing CGI on a regular basis is Ao S, but that is mostly because the writers got really creative in order to deal with the budget cut they got hit with (plus, I guess that Ao S budget was originally quite high).

In a way I can't even blame Marvel....after all, they seem to get a better resonance for their cheaper shows . Still, I feel they need to step it up a little bit.

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.
#78223: Dec 21st 2017 at 5:02:27 AM

Well, giving screentime to the adults might not just be because they can't afford the CGI for the kid's powers. I haven't seen any of Runaways, but I know that you can only legally have a minor work so many hours on set. Kids can't really be the center of attention for too long because you can only have them on set so many hours of the day and you only have so many days to shoot, so you need to write around the hours you can't use the kids and fill in the time with adult-centered subplots.

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#78224: Dec 21st 2017 at 5:31:42 AM

[up] It's a ten episode show and it is not like you need to have all of them in every scene. You can start with the scenes of one group and then go to the scenes of another group to keep the working hours reasonable.

Punisher286 Since: Jan, 2016
#78225: Dec 21st 2017 at 8:47:36 AM

I think that its more simple than that. They're doing more with the parents because they want to make the parents more nuanced and flesh-out character, at least that's what I think it is.

Because TV and comics are different medium and they think that this works better for the former.


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