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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

Julep Since: Jul, 2010
#82076: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:15:17 PM

I'm not even sure we know who the victims of Asgardian imperialism were. The Ice Giants maybe, among others?

Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#82077: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:17:02 PM

I mean, the Ice Giants seemed like they were kinda dicks already.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#82078: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:18:30 PM

Wrong thread

edited 12th Mar '18 3:25:24 PM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
slimcoder The Head of the Hydra Since: May, 2013
The Head of the Hydra
#82079: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:18:51 PM

I'm gonna assume the other inhabitants of the 9 realms.

....... Which means jack shit because I have no idea who those people are.

All I got is the Frost Giants & they haven't been seen since the first movie.

edited 12th Mar '18 3:30:08 PM by slimcoder

"I am Alpharius. This is a lie."
Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#82080: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:19:33 PM

You can be a dick and still be a victim of colonialism. (The Aztec Empire)

Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#82081: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:19:48 PM

@Tobias-

Wrong thread. I get confused too talking about Hel(a).

edited 12th Mar '18 3:20:05 PM by Hodor2

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#82082: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:28:35 PM

I'm gonna assume the other inhabitants of the 9 realms.

....... Which means jack shit because I have no idea who these people are.

Which is pretty much the point. Ragnarok has the equivalent of two white people taking the sides of "Colonialism GOOD" versus "Colonialism BAD", but goes into no further depth on the matter beyond that. None of the people affected by colonialism are invited to the table. We don't even really know who they are.

The film makes no attempt at a message more deeper than, "Colonialism's bad 'cause, like, it being bad is something I heard once and it's popular right now for me to agree with it." It doesn't try to actually explore its own theme. It's not even clear if the movie even knows what that theme is even about. It just pays lip service to the horrors of colonialism.

edited 12th Mar '18 3:29:17 PM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#82083: Mar 12th 2018 at 3:39:45 PM

If, say, Sakaar was a place that was directly influenced by Asgard's conquest, leaving it drained of resources with Grandmaster as basically a governor rather than some random overlord, that would've probably actually given the Hela plot a bit more weight - it would've been an perfect connec: Hela's counterpoint could be that the wastes of places like Sakaar made the glory of Asgard possible. The movie also could've used more Odin in regards to that as well.

It also really hurts the idea that there's an imperialism theme given that the bulk of the movie isn't actually about it. But Hela being a Generic Doomsday Villain doesn't help: a villain being attached to an idea - or, heck, even the idea being something the characters fight over - is not the same thing as their plot being about the idea, and while Ragnarok wants to make a show of having an imperialist bad guy, ultimately it isn't any more about that than Guardians of the Galaxy was overcoming the violence and hatred of war via Ronan.

edited 12th Mar '18 3:41:04 PM by KnownUnknown

Punisher286 Since: Jan, 2016
#82084: Mar 12th 2018 at 4:28:50 PM

The problem is that the Imperialism is all surface level, it's just thrown in there but doesn't amount to much. Not only do we not get to see or hear from any of the victims, not only is Hela too much of a two-dimensional psychotic murder happy maniac, but we don't get to even have a confrontation between her and Odin before the latter dies, nor does it feel like it really drives Thor's actions for the rest of the film, or matter to his battle with Hela, in any real way.

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#82085: Mar 12th 2018 at 4:37:35 PM

Quite.

Like I said, colonialism and imperialism aren't really themes in Ragnarok. They're just character traits slapped onto Hela to enhance her evilness.

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#82086: Mar 12th 2018 at 4:47:51 PM

I think Thor Ragnarok could’ve benefited from being a longer series developing Hela’s reign of terror and the rebellion on Sakaar, but I’m glad for the buddy comedy with unexpected colonial-critical themes we got.

And I would say that it’s not really a white perspective on colonialism in the film’s depiction of Valkyrie, which has been argued to resemble that of a displaced Indigenous person, or that the film concludes ‘the only way to grow past an imperialist history is to burn the nation to the ground.’

edited 12th Mar '18 4:48:37 PM by Tuckerscreator

wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#82087: Mar 12th 2018 at 4:54:04 PM

[up][up]You may have read it that way, but it was pretty clearly not “just slapped on” absentmindedly by Waititi.

Here, here’s just a few of the reviews that examined the topic. Taika Waititi is Maori and Jewish. The imperialism themes were intentional. And a film can have different meaning to different viewers; some indigenous reviewers saw something that you found inadequate.

edited 12th Mar '18 5:34:21 PM by wisewillow

VeryMelon Since: Jul, 2011 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#82089: Mar 12th 2018 at 4:57:22 PM

Valkyrie isn't a displaced indigenous person. She's an Asgardian who ragequit after her group was wiped out by Hela. She brings the perspective of another metaphorical white person, except this one fled to get work for a different oppressive culture. If Thor and Hela are English folk fighting over colonialism, then Val's an Englishwoman who went to Spain and was like, "England sucks. You got any openings for a badass military person?"

If the closest the film has to an oppressed minority is a soldier from the dominant majority who peaced out to go oppress minorities for someone else, that's not saying a lot for its presentation of the victims' perspective.

As for the ending, "burn it all to the ground, problem solved," is totally a white perspective. Specifically, it's the perspective of people who've only just discovered the problem and haven't really thought it through much. It's equivalent to kids who ask, "Why can't we just give the land back to the Native Americans?"

There's not really a message in that. "The empire sucks, so we should destroy the entire thing and then go find some new place to colonize, starting the process of overtaking someone else's land from scratch."

The film literally ends with the Asgardians leaving their home land in a ship to sail off to a brave new world they can plant a flag on and make theirs. It's hard to screw up an anti-colonialism message worse than that.

edited 12th Mar '18 5:03:14 PM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
Punisher286 Since: Jan, 2016
#82090: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:10:14 PM

Which is ironic since Black Panther has Killmonger, the villain, who wants to "burn the world" in revenge for past slights. And yet that movie treats it as a bad thing.

Personally, I see burning down Asgard and wiping out most of the previous Asgardian cast as a rather clumsy attempt at soft rebooting.

Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#82091: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:12:32 PM

She's an Asgardian who ragequit after her group was wiped out by Hela. [...] except this one fled to get work for a different oppressive culture.

There’s a reason why Native Americans have the highest rate of military enlistment among people of color despite really despising America as an institution. Sometimes the only work available for someone without a tribe is being someone else’s soldier.

As for the ending, "burn it all to the ground, problem solved," is totally a white perspective.

Thing is, the latter point is very much an Indigenous perspective I see very commonly among spaces like Native Twitter. It’s a concept that’s also been echoed by black activists, like Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Audre Lorde’s quote: “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.” Obviously it’s not meant so harshly as “literally burn down the White House”, but closer to “understand that asking us to participate in American society is unreasonable because your founders designed it to kill us, and we would much rather it be done away with entirely than try to cram us in on top of our ancestors’ bones.”

edited 12th Mar '18 5:25:36 PM by Tuckerscreator

czhang from Canada Since: Sep, 2011 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#82092: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:14:48 PM

[up][up][up] You can have your own perspective on the film, but can you stop ignoring the fact that Taika Waititi is Maori (and that nearly all of his work focuses on Maori people)? It feels like you're ignoring the fact that he has a lot of personal experience with the effects of colonialism and how people should work to solve the problems it's caused.

Like, I don't get how you can look at a guy who makes a deliberate effort to hire local Aboriginal Australian interns, who has Maori actors in literally all of his films, who's been called treasonous for calling out New Zealand's problems with depression, suicide, pollution, and poverty, who's been a vocal supporter of the #changethedate movement, etc etc etc... and call his a "white perspective".

edited 12th Mar '18 5:21:33 PM by czhang

Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#82093: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:15:06 PM

"burn it all to the ground, problem solved" is a dumb perspective, no matter who's saying it.

Also, Valkyrie screwing off to join another army doesn't matter if she's still Asgardian. She's still part of what is supposed to be an analogy of an imperialist group, not the oppressed.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#82094: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:15:06 PM

I agree. Though FYI that quote is from Audre Lorde, not Coates.

wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#82095: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:19:38 PM

It won’t let me edit because our comments were at the exact same second, but I’m agreeing with Tucker [up]x4.

edited 12th Mar '18 5:20:04 PM by wisewillow

RavenWilder Since: Apr, 2009
#82096: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:27:16 PM

Nothing about Hela really suggests colonialism. There's no indication that, either in the past or in Hela's planned future, Asgardians are settling en masse on other worlds and displacing the local population.

She's imperialist, certainly, but imperialism is a very broad and very common thing, both in real life and especially among villains in fantasy epics. Heck, Loki was being an imperialist in The Avengers, and even had one scene comparing him to Hitler, but no one really bothered to read a deep metaphor into that fact.

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#82097: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:32:27 PM

Which is ironic since Black Panther has Killmonger, the villain, who wants to "burn the world" in revenge for past slights. And yet that movie treats it as a bad thing.

This is the brilliance of Black Panther. Killmonger is depicted in the film as having a legitimate point, one that T'Challa recognizes and acknowledges. He's a villain because he goes too far, becoming a fanatical extremist in pursuit of his cause, but the film also asserts that his cause itself is a righteous one. It ends with Wakanda stepping out of the shadows, abandoning the isolationism and nationalism that Killmonger criticized, and reaching out to help kids just like him across the globe.

"Where do you think all this gold came from?" is kind of a neat line. Like, it came from the dirt, but if you're implying that the dirt it came from was someone else's dirt, it might be have been nice to see them. It's supposed to be a gotcha but, like, is it really an unfair assumption to think that maybe gold as a natural resource is available in Asgard? It's alluding to colonials searching for gold but, like, they had gold where they came from too. They were searching for more gold.

By contrast, there is no mistaking the power and meaning in the line, "Bury me in the ocean with my ancestors that jumped from the ships, because they knew death was better than bondage." With his dying words, Killmonger drives home one final condemnation of the horrors and tragedies that Wakanda stood by and allowed to occur. One last indictment of the evils of colonialism from the lips of a man whose life has been defined by it.

edited 12th Mar '18 5:33:24 PM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
Tuckerscreator (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Drift compatible
#82098: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:35:43 PM

, is it really an unfair assumption to think that maybe gold as a natural resource is available in Asgard.

Asgard is pretty tiny to have supposedly found all that gold on there. Like, those are skyscraper height golden towers.

Julep Since: Jul, 2010
#82099: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:41:53 PM

Waititi's previous filmography isn't enough to warrant than any movie of his automatically tackles colonialism, and in a subtle and interesting way t that. The offhand remark that Asgardians were conquerors is hardly enough to overinterpret the actual content of the movie. That would be like trying to analyze the racial dynamics in Spike Lee's Inside Man - in which it's really not a central point, even if the bad guy is a nazi sympathizer.

It shows what Waititi's opinion of it is, but it is not explored here. Just like I assume the Coen brothers have Jewish characters in movies that are not as much about Jewish communities as A Serious Man. Some filmmakers focus on various themes - which is important in the MCU's case where they have to work with a lot of "red tape" (some actors already hired, the universe has already been built, the story has to go from A to B because there is an Ensemble Movie coming later...).

Some like Coogler decide to focus on colonialism and imperialism. Waititi focused on funny slapstick and having Thor and Hulk become bros again.

Xopher001 Since: Jul, 2012
#82100: Mar 12th 2018 at 5:44:02 PM

I think you guys are reading way too much into Thor Ragnarok

edited 12th Mar '18 5:44:21 PM by Xopher001


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