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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

spashthebandragon thebandragoness from USA Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
comicwriter Since: Sep, 2011
#24202: Dec 26th 2014 at 9:50:22 AM

Not when it makes for a boring ass movie.

SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#24203: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:00:12 AM

"A bloo-bloo-bloo! Daddy was mean to me. Everyone likes Thor more. It's not my fault I tried to commit genocide. A-bloo-bloo-bloo!"

My various fanfics.
Mukora Uniocular from a place Since: Jan, 2010 Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
Uniocular
#24204: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:08:33 AM

No! You don't understand, Loki is just a misunderstood precious baby. He didn't want to kill all those people. He just had to because he's so sad! Poor baby.

"It's so hard to be humble, knowing how great I am."
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#24205: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:09:26 AM

So what you're saying is that we should give him a basket full of puppies?

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
Mukora Uniocular from a place Since: Jan, 2010 Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
Uniocular
#24206: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:10:00 AM

"Whoops. Killed the puppies."

"It's so hard to be humble, knowing how great I am."
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#24207: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:10:47 AM

Well I don't see this as a reason not to go get more puppies to give to him.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
GeekCodeRed Since: Sep, 2010
#24208: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:11:52 AM

Loki's a dick who can't see the forest for the trees. He wants to be King, instead of the intelligence behind Thor's rule. He thinks his family doesn't love him, when they clearly show they do, despite him making it very hard for them. He tries to win his adoptive father's love when he already has it.

Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#24209: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:14:58 AM

Well I guess we'll see what happens now that he has the throne he wanted.

My guess is that he'll fuck it up.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
GeekCodeRed Since: Sep, 2010
#24210: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:16:05 AM

Loki's the type to never be satisfied.

swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#24211: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:22:05 AM

I think that it really doesn't matter if Whiplash had gotton more scenes or not, just as I don't think that Malekith wouldn't have gotton better with more scenes. In both cases there is no real relationship between villain and hero because the one who originally "wronged" the villain is death already. And in both cases, the villain is just not particularly impressive. Whiplash and Tony meet each other three times in the movie. The first time Tony wins the fight. The second time Whiplash is in prison and for all his bragging, he did not get what he originally wanted. And the third time is already the final fight. With Malekith it is even worse. The first time he attacks Freya actually manages to win the fight against him before the Kursed turns up and kills her, and the only reason Thor doesn't kill him then and there is because the Kursed rescues him after he took a hit in the face. The second time Loki actually kills the Kursed, leaving Malekith with no protection. That he then looses a leg is just the icing on a very pathetic cake.

With none of those villains I ever had the feeling that the heroes go up against a truly dangerous enemy.

Compare that with Ronan. Yeah, the heroes have some moments of successes against his henchmen, but everytime they encounter him personally, they fall short. The moment he looks for the stone himself, he wins. Nebula nearly kills Gamora, Ronan nearly kills Drax with his bare hands, and there is no doubt whatsoever that this is a truly dangerous foe. In this case, I do feel the stakes. I know that the heroes have an off-chance at best to win.

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#24212: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:30:52 AM

I think a contributing factor to the sense that the villain is the underdog is the fact that Thor The Dark World and Iron Man 2 both try to feature an origin story for their villain. This leads to the idea that the hero is an established power center and the villain is the up-and-coming challenger.

Iron Man 3, Guardians Of The Galaxy, Captain America The Winter Soldier, The Avengers, etc. all benefitted from the fact that their villains had time to establish themselves as a credible threat before entering the film proper. A.I.M. had ten years to build itself, Ronan had a power base and villainous connections well before the Guardians existed, H.Y.D.R.A. had decades to build itself up, and while Loki was scrambling to compete with the established power base of the heroes, he had a gigantic army of doom and an objective handed off to him by an older and more powerful force of malevolence, literally just waiting on the edge of space to swoop in, changing the face of the conflict from "Dogpile on Loki" to an epic warzone at the critical moment.

In Iron Man 2 and Thor The Dark World, A lot of effort is put into making the villain feel like a credible threat to the hero, and this misses a fundamental point of storytelling: that the effort is supposed to be put into making the hero a credible threat to the villain. If the villain feels like a hopeless underdog, it undercuts the tension.

edited 26th Dec '14 10:32:08 AM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
OneEyedDragon Since: Jan, 2014
#24213: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:50:29 AM

Its a mixed bag. Ivan Vanko had good character development, but he wasn't much of a threat. Ronan was a threat, but he wasn't really developed (I actually never felt he was too much of a threat myself, but whatever). Malekith was neither very developed or too threatening, though the main problem with him is that he was just boring and everyone was waiting to see what Loki did.

The real crux of the matter is that in most cases, the characters they are based on are far, far more interesting AND threatening and that makes them poor adaptations. Comic-Ronan is an antagonist, but not a villain; Comic-Malekith is a villain, but not boring; Comic-Whiplash works better as a lackey, not main villain material (he's technically the Crimson Dynamo, but he falls short in some respects there too); Comic-Red Skull is much more scary; Comic-Stane is more obsessively deranged, etc.

The other issue is that in terms of setting up a larger universe, a bigger mythos, they should have developed their supporting cast- including their villains- better than they did, and some are interesting enough that they could and should have been kept around longer because they have things to contribute. In the Iron Man movies, Tony's worst enemy is consistently himself, and the tension of Iron Man 3 is derived more from his suit breaking down and insulting a terrorist on television and his PTSD and his inability to pick up a phone and call Nick Fury and say "Hey, Nick? Remember that time you and sHIELD all stop round for doughnuts? Well, the President has just been kidnapped..." Killian and Vanko and Stane were all threats more because Tony didn't have his head in the game rather than Tony not being a match for them.

Basically...I have a list of issues.

WarriorEowyn from Victoria Since: Oct, 2010
#24214: Dec 26th 2014 at 10:50:44 AM

The movies with the most effective antagonists have been Thor and The Winter Solider. In the first case, because Thor and Loki have a relationship rather than just antagonism, and because Loki's conflicting loyalties add dimension to his character and make it hard to guess what he's going to do at some points. For example, his intrigue with Laufey. "And you were killed by the son of Odin" is my favourite dramatic moment in the movie, no contest, because I wasn't expecting it at all.

Loki in The Avengers didn't have much more depth than Marvel's other villains, but remained effective because of the character development he got in Thor.

HYDRA is an effective villain in The Winter Soldier because of the form they take - as evil organization go they're not particularly unique, but the realization that they've effectively been running SHIELD for much of its existence and have manipulated decisions that were made by the "good guys" (for example, Fury's choice to use to Tesseract to make weapons in Avengers), and that the organization that's been presented to us as "the good guys" for several movies is, in fact, villainous, is a very powerful realization and central to the movie.

Looking at comic book movies overall, characterization of villains has generally been most effective when 1) they are in some way sympathetic, whether due to having compelling reasons for their actions, having a complex relationship with protagonists, or both (Magneto is the best example, but it's also notable that the best villains in the Spider-Man films had some kind of positive relationship with Peter Parker - generally as scientists he admired - before going evil; Loki also fits in this category); and/or 2) when they're smart and have plans and tactics that keep you guessing (in The Dark Knight, everyone knew the Joker was going to be a great villain right from the bank scene at the start); and/or 3) challenge the hero on an ideological level (HYDRA in The Winter Soldier; Ra's al Ghul and the Joker; also Magneto in the X-Men films).

In contrast, most of Marvel's villains are generic types with generic plans in the vein of "revenge" or "take over the world".

edited 26th Dec '14 11:04:00 AM by WarriorEowyn

OneEyedDragon Since: Jan, 2014
#24215: Dec 26th 2014 at 11:12:55 AM

For a bit of contrast, David Goyer has said that when they were writing the Batman and Superman movies, the villain was the generally one of the LAST things they came up with, and they preferred to choose one who fit the theme or story of the movie rather than build a movie around the villain as many comic book films up to that point (eg. the Raimi Spiderman series, or the Burton / Schumacher Batman series) had done.

I mean, there are a LOT of problems with those Goyer / Nolan / Snyder movies as well, but the villains at least seem to have been dealt with properly.

WarriorEowyn from Victoria Since: Oct, 2010
#24216: Dec 26th 2014 at 11:17:16 AM

Ra's was a fairly good villain, the Joker was a great one. Zod had the same problem as most of the Marvel villains - there wasn't anything interesting about him. Despite being from Krypton there was no connection between him and Superman, and his plan wasn't an interesting or creative one. As a result, the big battle scene was mainly a contest of who could hit things harder, which (at least for me) got tedious pretty fast.

I agree that having a villain who fits with the themes of the movie is key, and most of the good superhero movies that aren't by Marvel have succeeded in doing so. For example, the theme of Spider-Man 2 is persisting in doing the right thing even when it costs you things that matter to you deeply, and it contrasts with Ock, who becomes a villain when he loses his wife and his life's work on the same day (in addition to the effects from the negative mental influence of the arms).

The only Marvel film that's done a really good job in that respect is Captain America The Winter Soldier.

edited 26th Dec '14 11:22:18 AM by WarriorEowyn

swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#24217: Dec 26th 2014 at 11:28:39 AM

Batman villains are not exactly layered characters either. They are flashy and crazy, but overall very disneyresque. They would fit perfectly in the Disney villain line-up (which is a compliment, btw).

I think that might be the problem...marvel is struggling because they don't have the time to built up the villains the way the comics do, since every main villain needs to get defeated in some way by the end of the movie. But I think they are changing their approach now and are thinking more long term concerning the villains, too. Aside from Loki, there is now Nebual, Thanos and Hydra in general as recurring enemy. And the ten rings, I guess, but the ten rings were woefully underitilized in the Iron Man movies.

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#24218: Dec 26th 2014 at 12:04:35 PM

The Ten Rings were a mistake.

The Shout-Out was clever when Iron Man 1 came out, but it introduced a necessary problem into the character of the Mandarin: in order to portray him, they would either need to disregard the Ten Rings setup, turning it into a Red Herring, or cheapen the character by reducing him to some pissant Middle-Eastern warlord squabbling for a piece.

The way they chose to play the Mandarin in Iron Man 3 was about the best thing they could have done with the character given the utterly atrocious setup he was provided. It would have been a cute Mythology Gag if the franchise hadn't taken off the way it did, but because it did, that cute Mythology Gag is now a set of shackles diminishing the value of Iron Man's most iconic villain no matter how you play it.

As mentioned, Marvel seems to be thinking more long-term these days, and are being more careful about introducing elements into the canon that they can't take back.

edited 26th Dec '14 12:08:39 PM by TobiasDrake

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#24219: Dec 26th 2014 at 12:15:02 PM

They could've done something similar to what they did with HYDRA - having the Mandarin be this chessmaster who controls and manipulates a lot of organizations around the globe, including the warlords of the Ten Rings organization, for his own nebulous causes. But since they ended up doing that to what would surely have always been better effect with HYDRA, meh.

At this point I don't particularly care. The last thing I want them to do is spend another movie or storyline on the Mandarin, unless they do so in a way that doesn't feel like repeating themselves (which, knowing them, they probably won't).

edited 26th Dec '14 12:16:40 PM by KnownUnknown

washington213 Since: Jan, 2013
#24220: Dec 26th 2014 at 2:53:39 PM

Cosmic Marvel follows the Star Trek model of aliens being humans with funny noses.As far as the movies go humans are from Earth and only from Earth.

I'm not really bothered by the aliens that look like blue/green people.

But if humans are only from Earth, why is there an entire society of them in space? That planet with the big city (can't remember name. Guessing it's the capital of The Federation) was filled with humans. But Earth humans are still on Earth in normal 21st Century tech.

LizardBite Shameless Self-Promoter from Two Galaxies Over Since: Jan, 2001
#24221: Dec 26th 2014 at 3:08:51 PM

[up] They aren't humans.

They're aliens who look just like humans.

Like Kryptonians but without the solar-powered superpowers.

Falrinn Since: Dec, 2014
#24223: Dec 26th 2014 at 5:20:28 PM

[up][up]

Out of curiosity, did Marvel ever give an exploitation for why there are species that look identical to humans running around in the comics? I haven't found one in my perusing of the Marvel wiki just yet.

I know in Star Trek they eventually explained it as being the result of most life in the galaxy being seeded, or at least influenced, by an ancient species of humanoids that was the first species to develop interstellar travel.

TrashJack Confirmed Doomer from beyond the Despair Event Horizon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
Confirmed Doomer
#24224: Dec 26th 2014 at 5:34:40 PM

[up] Some Marvel comics (Earth X being chief among them) say that the Celestials (remember the Knowhere mining colony in GOTG? That was the head of a Celestial.) did exactly that.

edited 26th Dec '14 5:35:13 PM by TrashJack

"Cynic, n. — A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be." - The Devil's Dictionary
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#24225: Dec 26th 2014 at 5:36:29 PM

Doctor Who's explanation is that Rassilon (big important Time Lord founder guy) is a huge asshole racist that made it so that everything evolved looking roughly human.

He did this to make it easier on the BBC costume budget.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

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