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.
Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM
![]()
![]()
There are movies that riff on certain genres, yes, and people who are familiar with those genres will ge more likely to enjoy such movies. Someone is more likely to notice a trope being subverted if they’re aware of the trope played straight.
That’s not quite the same as something like IW, where understanding who the characters are, being aware of their relationships with each other, and habving a reason to care about them is largely dependent on having watched (a fair bit of) the rest of the MCU - not just dependent on a general familiarity with superhero movies. You can still enjoy it without that, in its capacity as a big sequence of fight scenes, but the emotional impact is dependent on pre-existing attachment to the characters.
In a way, the MCU is more comparable to a TV series with 3-4 lengthy, expensive episodes per year, than to anything else we’ve seen from the blockbuster film industry. What’s astonishing is how well it’s working. They’ve developed a large enough fanbase that there’s a critical mass of people who do know and love the chararcters.
Edited by Galadriel on Jan 24th 2019 at 8:08:30 AM
I mean I we want to get technical, Black Panther (2018) doesn't entirely stand on its own. If you haven't seen Captain America: Civil War, you're probably going to be confused why the death of T'challa's father happened offscreen in a terrorist attack that doesn't have a major impact on the story of the film.
Yeah, I don't think you need to know who killed T'Challa's father and why. Only that his dad just died, that means he has to be king now, and he doesn't feel like he's entirely ready to shoulder that responsibility.
The transition of power is the story, not the details of T'Chaka's death.
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.You see, that wouldn't be a problem, except it shows a flashback to Civil War showing the UN building getting bombed and T'chaka dying in his son's arms. If this movie existed in a vacuum, that would be a very odd creative decision to do. Like, what movie would have a king and father to the hero dying in a terrorist attack at the United Nations offscreen, and only mention how the man responsible for the attack was apprehended by the hero before the story starts?
My mom watched the film with me and my dad when it was released on Netflix, and this was the one part she was confused by, since she hadn't seen much of the previous MCU films. So I know people going into this blind might be a bit confused.
Edited by chasemaddigan on Jan 25th 2019 at 12:19:13 PM
I mean I feel like if one knows the nature of the MCU then "Oh that happened in a different movie" is an easy assumption to make.
This song needs more love.Yeah.
Although Killmonger came about because of that decision as well. You could argue that he'd have never gotten the opportunity to do what he did if not for T'chaka's death, but then you remember it was probably always part of his plan to use Klaue to lure them out, then kill the latter himself and use it as his way back in.
All the stuff with Zemo was just a bonus that helped his bottom line.
One Strip! One Strip!I think the only part of the plot or dialogue that even references the circumstances of T'Chaka's death is M'Baku taunting T'Challa for being unable to protect him.
Beyond that one line, while his death is shown on the news in the beginning, it's just to establish that he'd dead. It has no bearing on the story beyond him needing to be dead for the plot to happen, so it's not really required to know the specifics to understand the movie.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Jan 25th 2019 at 9:53:51 AM
It could have been more explicitly referenced, especially bookended with the UN scene in the credits, but I think it fits.
Edit: anyone know why paragraph breaks aren't working for me?
Edited by Pseudopartition on Jan 25th 2019 at 11:49:45 AM
Question about foreign monarchs, is it common practice to use style terminology when speaking to them directly if you're not one of their subjects? If I was to bump into Prince Harry on the street would I be expected to refer to him as "Your Majesty"? Or was that just a Hollywood Royalty thing they had Rhodes to to convey T'Challa's rank?
As far as I know, it is diplomatic courtesy to refer to them as "Your Majesty" or "Your Grace" in public settings unless the monarch specifically requests things to be kept informal. Queen Elizabeth is commonly called "Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth" even in countries she has no rule (symbolic or otherwise) over.
After all the Pope is often referred to as "Your Holiness" even in non-Catholic countries by people that aren't Catholic.
"All you Fascists bound to lose."It does indeed serve the traditionalist narrative in Wakanda.
Wakandan political cartoonists probably waited like a week to be respectful and then started passing around newspaper comics of T'Chaka stepping over the boundary line like, "See, there's nothing to be afraid of in the outside world OH WHOOPS I EXPLODED."
Edited by TobiasDrake on Jan 25th 2019 at 11:41:38 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.It's like that for any official position. It's why the term "Mr. President" is still used for ex-Presidents even after they leave office for example. Or when I meet a Catholic priest, I still refer to him as "Father" even though I'm not Catholic myself. Or why ex-Senators/congressmen are still called "Senator" or "Congressman" etc.
Now if they give the ok to be more informal, then that's the exception.
Stark directly had him as an acquaintance during his weapons-dealer days and knew his stomping grounds. So they had a pretty great lead on where he was from that previous relationship between Stark and Klaue. Wakandans just had to start from scratch.
"All you Fascists bound to lose."Except Stark knew him BEFORE he stole the Vibranium, so all he had to go on was an even colder trail than the Wakandans had, and if he had stayed in one location for more than 25 years, that just makes the Wakandans inability to find him even worse.
Edited by Shake-Master on Jan 25th 2019 at 2:11:00 AM

@M84 Depends on the comedy. For example, if you watch Scream without ever having seen a horror movie beforehand, you most likely won't get it. A lot of movies start with a certain expectation regarding the audience.