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ZheToralf Floating Advice Reminder from somewhere in Germany Since: Dec, 2009
#251: Nov 15th 2023 at 1:20:29 AM

If the plot of Secret Invasion hinged so much on the Marvels, why not postpone it until after?

You lost!
C105 Too old for this from France Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
Too old for this
#252: Nov 15th 2023 at 1:51:56 AM

One of the few comments I have read I found myself agreeing with was that, after the smorgasbord of Infinity War / Endgame and the build-up leading to it, any movie that does not include a team-up between at least two different teams can seen as a bit of a step down. This may go to explain why the latest Marvel movies have a harder time to attract the audiences: we are basically back to Phase 1, with new characters being developed and having only a few cameo interactions with one another, and we may have to wait for a few years before another big team-up comes. GoG avoids this because it had been mostly doing its own thing anyway.

Apart from that, it is eerie how some of the negative comments I read about this movie and especially its lead actress remind me of those I have read about the 13th Doctor. Really have to wonder what the common point would be between those two (I hate people who cry misogyny but it's becoming hard to deny that point).

Anyway. More on what I liked in this movie, because the negativity I see online is getting tiresome and commenting on it does not help.

Another thing I belatedly realised is that, unless I'm forgetting someone, this movie marks the first time that a main character introduced in a TV series had a significant role in a movie (Quantumania Kang does not quite count because he's a different character than He Who Remains and Valentina had a supporting role).

I had hoped Kamala would make a remark about the Disney Princess Captain Marvel given that her series referenced The Lion King (and her comic references Frozen), but maybe Disney became shy on that one. I still wonder about Carol's magical dress-changing ability, though - is that a new power (Maybe one that comes with the Disney Princess status) or was it a glamour from the Prince?

For those who complain about the latest movies ending by talking the villain into surrendering, this one subverts it rather nicely by pretending to go that route for a while.

Do we know where the Rambeau house is (I'm still very bad at US geography so I don't remember if they are supposed to be far from New Jersey)? Because the Khans moving there seems like a very big leap on their part that they don't seem to acknowledge. I know this was not the point of the movie, but it would have been nice to have at least a sentence or two about how they feel about leaving their all their friends to settle in the middle of nowhere.

Edited by C105 on Nov 15th 2023 at 10:52:08 AM

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.
grimorie121 Since: Sep, 2014
#253: Nov 15th 2023 at 4:39:04 AM

I don’t think the Khan family are moving in the Rambeau home, I thought they were just helping Carol put Monica’s things into storage and helping put Carol’s meager belongings back into the Rambeau home.

Carol is doing what Maria wanted to do for Monica, wait for Monica to return home. As she told Kamala she was keeping Maria’s plane while Monica was “away”.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#254: Nov 15th 2023 at 4:41:01 AM

Escalation is not needed.

The Avengers don't need to save the Multiverse.

They can save Earth

Or New York

or a bunch of orphans

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
C105 Too old for this from France Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
Too old for this
#255: Nov 15th 2023 at 5:10:12 AM

[up][up] To be honest, I was very confused about what was going on in the Rambeau house and whether anybody was moving in or out. Kamala's mother teases her son that it would make a good place where to raise kids and their New Jersey house has been destroyed so I assumed they may have been moving in, but I found that quite strange nevertheless.

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#256: Nov 15th 2023 at 5:28:46 AM

I was also confused about what was going on at the Rambeau home. Thematically it makes no sense for the Khans to be moving in there since their roots are in Jersey City. It could be temporary until their house is rebuilt, but the movie completely fails to say one way or the other.

Sure, they could just be helping take Monica's stuff out, but it's not obvious and nobody tells us.

That's what I've been saying... the core of this film is very enjoyable, but it feels like it was edited by someone who was off their ADHD meds. Gonna watch it again on Disney+ and see if I have a better experience.

Edited by Fighteer on Nov 15th 2023 at 8:32:07 AM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
C105 Too old for this from France Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
Too old for this
#257: Nov 15th 2023 at 5:53:23 AM

I wonder if there will be a director's cut with plot-relevant deleted scenes. Although to be honest the film felt far less rushed than the relatively short runtime had made me fear it would be.

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.
lbssb The sleepiest good boi Since: Jun, 2020 Relationship Status: is commanded to— WANK!
The sleepiest good boi
#258: Nov 15th 2023 at 6:36:15 AM

One of the items they're moving into the Rambeau house is Carol's weird wedding plate... thing. It's her who's moving in. Mrs. Kahn's comment to Aamir is just lighthearted teasing.

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Chaosjunction Since: Feb, 2010
#259: Nov 15th 2023 at 6:52:08 AM

[up][up][up]

The movie did tell us though, just before that scene we see Fury and the SABER crew putting Maria's office in storage. There's even a helpful shot of her degree (from Rice University) in a box to signal to the viewer this is what is happening. It's a perfect natural segue.

TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#260: Nov 15th 2023 at 6:55:19 AM

One of the few comments I have read I found myself agreeing with was that, after the smorgasbord of Infinity War / Endgame and the build-up leading to it, any movie that does not include a team-up between at least two different teams can seen as a bit of a step down. This may go to explain why the latest Marvel movies have a harder time to attract the audiences: we are basically back to Phase 1, with new characters being developed and having only a few cameo interactions with one another, and we may have to wait for a few years before another big team-up comes. Go G avoids this because it had been mostly doing its own thing anyway.

That is part of the issue, yes. Phase 2 went hard on roping things together and making it feel like it was all connected and ''going somewhere, even when those connections were only a small part of the individual movies - We have a thing that does a thing for our movie but if we say it's an "Infinity Stone" then all of a sudden this is BOOM PLOT CRITICAL.

Even Phase 1 had a bit of this, with each film ending in what was basically a snappy trailer for the next, and with S.H.I.E.L.D. as the glue tying everyone together and keeping balls rolling until Avengers 1. Part of what got people so invested in the MCU was the theatricism of interconnectivity.

Arguments have been had over whether Phases Four and now Five actually were less connected than 1-3. I, myself, have written pages on how MCU continuity is all show, no substance. But deep analytical essays don't matter from a marketing perspective. What matters is how people feel in their gut. That's what sells tickets to people who don't know what the product is going to be.

Did it feel like the films of the Infinity Saga were all in their own way steadily moving in one narrative direction? And does it feel like the films/shows of the Multiverse Saga are doing the same?

Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 15th 2023 at 6:56:04 AM

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Chaosjunction Since: Feb, 2010
#261: Nov 15th 2023 at 7:03:43 AM

This is a great point. Earlier phases felt like they were interconnected because the stories were focused around Cap, Thor and Tony, a central plot (the Infinity Stones) and a central villain, Thanos.

The stories were broad but they were all going the same place.

The MCU might be more tightly connected but it lacks those elements since Endgame.

Larkmarn Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Hello, I love you
#262: Nov 15th 2023 at 7:34:22 AM

Escalation is very much not necessary.

Look at Guardians. The sequel escalated to potentially the fate of the universe. The third one was primarily about saving one person, and then getting embroiled in stopping a madman who was only a threat to his own people and random individuals.

It was also actively self-contained. As mentioned many times, the movie was better off for being more self-contained, for Thor splitting off of the Guardians in his own movie (potentially to his own detriment).

What is the issue here is movies feeling like they need escalation and then handling that poorly. Audiences will do fine with lower stakes. Audiences will do fine with higher stakes. Audiences have trouble when stakes are supposedly high but don't feel like it. IE Shang-Chi where the movie was fairly universally-liked for being the kung-fu family-based romp set in a Marvel backdrop but suddenly the end insisting there's an interdimensional threat and the bands are tied to the cosmos and oOoOoOooooOoOOOOowo what's gonna happen next? is the weakest part of the movie.

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TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#263: Nov 15th 2023 at 7:47:06 AM

At the end of the day, the scope of a story doesn't matter as much as creators often think it does. Escalation is a trap for creatives, that things being MOAR EPIC makes them better. But what audiences generally care about is the personal stakes of the thing.

People care more about the personal growth and development of the characters than they do about the world or the lore. They get invested in the effect that the villain has on their protagonist, much moreso than the number of lives that will be lost if the villain succeeds.

Guardians 3 has a perfect example of this in the destruction of Counter-Earth. Watching Counter-Earth be destroyed, how many people felt even a fraction of what they felt when Rocket had to watch his friends die? How many people were as invested in the survival of bat-lady as they were in Rocket recovering from his injuries and returning to his family?

Feige seems to have fallen into that mental trap, that in order to move forward from Endgame we need to go even bigger than Thanos. But bigger isn't what makes satisfying movies. Characters are.

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C105 Too old for this from France Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
Too old for this
#264: Nov 15th 2023 at 7:52:56 AM

[up][up][up] To be honest, it took a lot of time to get there. Thanos' role was very downplayed until Infinity War, and even the term "Infinity Stone" took some time to appear. Looking back now it feels as if everything was connected from the start, but it is far from being how it felt at the time, where the main connection was Coulson's appearances.

Another issue is that the MCU has been teasing too many arcs - and the follow-up is taking a looong time to come (and in most case has not come up yet). Right off the bat the only stinger I can think of that was followed upon was the Loki bit at the end of Quantumania - and that one was not even a new arc. The stingers in Chang-Shi, Eternals and MoM all reference new mysteries that have been left pending. This in contrast to phase 1 where stingers would generally be about the next movie, and Phase 2 and 3 where at least one stinger would refer to the ongoing arcs (I remember being outraged at the time that the first GoG ended with a surprise appearance of Howard the Duck instead of another teasing revelation).

So I got [nja]ed but it more or less overlaps with what was said above.

Edited by C105 on Nov 15th 2023 at 4:55:03 PM

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.
TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
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#265: Nov 15th 2023 at 7:58:34 AM

Coulson's appearances weren't nothing. S.H.I.E.L.D. was the connecting tissue throughout Phase 1.

S.H.I.E.L.D. went away at Winter Soldier, which was pretty earthshattering at the time. It had been such a mainstay of the MCU until that point, that losing it seemed almost unthinkable. But by that point, the creatives had settled on Infinity Gems to be the big thing going forward (something they settled on during production of Thor: The Dark World), and made that the new connective tissue.

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Silasw A procrastination in of itself from A handcart to hell (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
A procrastination in of itself
#266: Nov 15th 2023 at 10:53:33 AM

I do think there’s credit to the theory of there being to many irons in the fire. Right now it feels like we’re prepping for Multiverse/Kang, for Young Avengers and for Thunderbolts/Masters of Evil.

Any of those three could make a great saga and you could link stories in one by one. But trying to establish all three at once? It’s caused a giant mess.

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Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#267: Nov 15th 2023 at 11:07:05 AM

I kinda like it in theory

I assume the build up to Thunderbolts and Young Avengers will serve the Kang stuff when we get to the big big crossovering Avengers movies

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#268: Nov 15th 2023 at 12:35:21 PM

Yeah, at the moment they’ve been doing terrestrial spy stuff with the government collecting anti-heroes to be unknown ends, cosmic timeline stuff to set up Kang, plus setting up more magic stuff here and there.

I don’t really mind them having multiple plots at once on the surface, but I do think the way they’re handling it has resulted in the MCU not being a good medium for it - it takes so long for them to make new installments and every project is so tied up and tangled going years into the future that all of those plots feel like they’re stagnating all the time.

Chaosjunction Since: Feb, 2010
#269: Nov 15th 2023 at 2:59:33 PM

[up][up]

Young Avengers is definitely a tie-in to Kang and the spy stuff leads to Cap and Thunderbolts. This is nothing the MCU hasn't done before, it just lacks the 3 main actors as a pull and the speed of releases has gone way down.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#270: Nov 15th 2023 at 3:33:07 PM

I wonder how young or old the Young Avengers are going to get.

Like, Kamala calls Kate a “kid hero,” but - like - Kate’s in college. I’m not sure exactly how old Cassie is supposed to be, but she’s definitely also older than Kamala too. Or Skarr, who is technically like ten but due to growing up in a Time Abyss is an adult.

The writers are probably not going to be out a lot priority into precise age restrictions, admittedly. I’m mostly just wondering about Skarr, really.

ArthurEld Since: May, 2014
#271: Nov 15th 2023 at 3:35:32 PM

Cassie was born in July 2008, so shes only a little older than Kamala.

C105 Too old for this from France Since: Jan, 2012 Relationship Status: Yes, I'm alone, but I'm alone and free
Too old for this
#272: Nov 15th 2023 at 3:58:34 PM

Another belated realisation I had about this movie: I'm not sure we ever had so many flashbacks before. I understand that the goal was to avoid Continuity Lock-Out for people who had not seen Wandavision or Ms Marvel and did not remember Captain Marvel, but it's still curious they took the time for these in such a relatively short movie, while the previous movies seldom bothered with such reminders.

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.
ArthurEld Since: May, 2014
#273: Nov 15th 2023 at 4:03:30 PM

The first CM movie had a lot, and for similar reasons.

A big theme of the movie is the difference between a person and other people's (or their own) memories/ideas/reputation of them.

Mizerous Pet Owner from Hell Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: Brewing the love potion
Pet Owner
#274: Nov 15th 2023 at 4:50:36 PM

[up]x5 The New Mutants err Avengers

Just Makima.
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#275: Nov 15th 2023 at 4:53:25 PM

Out of all the ways the team could form, Kamala going around and recruiting them because she stole Fury's rolodex is probably the funniest.

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