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To Infinity and Beyond: The Marvel Cinematic Universe
- Thread starter Vaeran
- Start date
$0.
karzac
(he/him)
This is mine feeling too. If I had a sweet home theatre set up and lived with other people who wanted to watch the movie, sure, $30 would totally make sense. But $30 to watch a movie on my computer monitor in my bedroom? No way.
Sprite
(He/Him/His)
Endgame was both one of the best and worst audience experiences I’ve had. Best because the entire last hour of that movie was people cheering and laughing enthusiastically, which was electric. Worst because the people next to us spent the entire film audibly complaining and mocking us whenever my husband or I laughed. Then one of them yelled at us for laughing when Hawkeye and Black Widow fight to see who can jump off a cliff first, which I still maintain is an absurd scene (though I didn’t laugh at the end of it, I’m not that callous).
I definitely ruined those people’s experience but I couldn’t help it, I was enjoying the movie
FelixSH
(He/Him)
You pay 30$ for a movie ticket? Wow, here it's like 12€ (excluding snacks, though, maybe that makes the difference?). It's unfortunate that you had this bad experiences. I guess I've been pretty lucky, but I also mainly went, when there were less people expected, preferably at 10 PM or something. But I get you, the few times I was there, when a lot of other people were also in the room, it wasn't great.
I really miss going to the cinema. Always liked the atmosphere there. Can't really replicate that feeling at home.
The only times I ever have kinda-bad theater experiences is when there's an abundance of teenagers.
It's more like $15-18 for an individual ticket, maybe a few more if you're watching in imax or 3d or some other gimmick. But I rarely go to see movies alone in theaters, it's always been a group activity. So we are collectively always forking over at least $30 for the pleasure of seeing a film. If you're watching a movie at home by yourself, ya a $30 rental is steep. But if you've got anyone else to watch it with, it makes sense to me.
Yeah, I definitely was laughing at that same point, and it definitely rubbed some fellow audience members the wrong way, and I don't blame anyone for hating me for it. But I will also go to my grave insisting it is a laughably bad scene that deserves to be laughed at.
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Johnny Unusual
(He/Him)
My theatrical experiences are mostly good in Canada. People usually are politely silent. But seeing Weathering with You taught me a valuable lesson... Don't see films where otakus might feel emboldened.
Phantoon
I cuss you bad
Well that sounds ominous
My usual movie experince is 7€ for tickets, plus 10€ for snacks. If the wife goes too, that's another 7€, but she's a muggle with no interest in Marvel cinematics and my cat and my dog aren't interested either and we're in soft lockdown so no firends so I'll wait for the free version of "Taskmaskter ft. Black Widow" to hit D+, thnx.
One of my all time favourite theatre experiences was watching Terminator Genisys.
I was literally the only person in the theatre and that movie is bonkers, so nobody judged me for laughing uproariously and applauding ridiculous plot twists.
The ushers probably judged me, but they were also probably happy they didn’t really need to clean the theatre afterward so they were probably gentle in their critique
I was literally the only person in the theatre and that movie is bonkers, so nobody judged me for laughing uproariously and applauding ridiculous plot twists.
The ushers probably judged me, but they were also probably happy they didn’t really need to clean the theatre afterward so they were probably gentle in their critique
Oh Jesus the flashbacks to the Madoka Magica "movie" recap and the actual movie sequel oh god.
Me a few hours after watching the new episode: Oh, speaking of Young Avengers...
So, not!USAgent seems like a nice guy, but also like a tryhard and a bit of a prick. And him being a tryhard is what makes him get some superjuice, isn't it? And that's gonna create problems, isn't it? I hope I'm wrong but I feel like that's the natural trajectory of where this is going.
The MCU's in canon with the second Hulk movie right? So the US government would already have a track record of trying to recreate the Erskine experiments with left over serum.
Yeah, the Norton Hulk is cannon.
Fake Cap is basically the kind of soldier who Erskine did not want to give the serum to. He sees Cap as a great soldier & combatant, but completely missed his inherent goodness. He sees Bucky & Sam as Cap’s sidekicks, whereas Cap saw them as friends & equals. He’s signing action figures of himself & relishes the spotlight whereas Cap was never comfortable with that stuff. Yes, he’s a nice guy and the show is humanizing him a bit, but it’s also setting up a huge conflict over what Cap stood for and what his legacy will be.
Fake Cap is basically the kind of soldier who Erskine did not want to give the serum to. He sees Cap as a great soldier & combatant, but completely missed his inherent goodness. He sees Bucky & Sam as Cap’s sidekicks, whereas Cap saw them as friends & equals. He’s signing action figures of himself & relishes the spotlight whereas Cap was never comfortable with that stuff. Yes, he’s a nice guy and the show is humanizing him a bit, but it’s also setting up a huge conflict over what Cap stood for and what his legacy will be.
They introduced him as not liking any of this stuff either, but he embraces doing it because he's under the mistaken impression that this junk is an important, quintessential part of the job. He really has no idea what being Cap is like. Part of it is because he doesn't know the guy, but part of it is because he only knows the propaganda. Neither of that is his fault really.
Is it weird that... I kinda want him to succeed and do well as Cap? He doesn't seem remotely irredeemable or hateable yet. And there's this weird sense of entitlement, nepotism, and inherited royalty this show is playing with, with regards to Bucky and Falcon being the more "legitimate" inheritors to this imaginary throne. He's got a lot to learn, but so did Cap when he was first in the Army.
Falcon complaining and seething about being hamstrung by 'rules of engagement' also is uhhhhh, mildly problematic and weird.
USAgent continues to be a dweeb and a tool. I want to give him all the swirlies.
The show realizes this.
Was not expecting Weapon Plus to show up, but I really can’t say Im surprised!
The show realizes this.
Was not expecting Weapon Plus to show up, but I really can’t say Im surprised!
In the comics John Walker is not a good Captain America but he's not a bad man either. They seem to be taking the same course with the show.
Jeanie
(Fem or Gender Neutral)
It's similar to that. Walker seems like he was captain of the football team, dated the head cheerleader, was prom king, etc. He was never the underdog. Sure he worked hard to get what he's got so far, but he's never had additional obstacles. And now that he getting that from Sam and Bucky, that's what's making him mad. Who are these people to say I'm not worthy.
So yeah, John Walker may be a good soldier and he'll do the right thing, but I'm not going to root for him like I do for Steve, Sam, or Bucky.
Edit: also the reveal that he was awarded three goddamned MoH made me irrationally mad. I can suspend my disbelief only so far. It's not the aliens, androids, or wizards, it's that.
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John had provoked one of the most immediate and visceral (and perhaps unearned) dislikes Ive had of any character in anything I’ve ever seen.
The only other possible contender is for Jake Buseys in Starship Troopers
The only other possible contender is for Jake Buseys in Starship Troopers
karzac
(he/him)
Did Bucky and Sam's relationship completely fall flat for anybody else? Like, I found it really weird that they don't interact at all in the first episode, or even really talk about each other to other people (I mean, I guess it comes up in Bucky's therapy session?) and then in the second episode we're supposed to buy that they're a bickering couple who need to fix their relationship in order to move forward with their lives. Like, why are they bickering? And why do they need to work together in the first place? I can up with plausible answers to both of those questions, but I don't think the show itself has done even work to answer either of them. It feels very much like they jumped straight to the buddy action comedy stuff, but didn't actually lay any of the ground work down to make that buddy action stuff work or feel honest.
Fell flat for me too, for all the reasons you described. They clearly want a buddy-cop movie with Bucky and Birdo. But buddy cop movies always either establish that these dudes are friends first, or that they're being forced into cooperating against their wills. When you're part of a police unit, and your chief says, "You're partners now, make it work or I'll have your badges!" then we have the appropriate context for them to work together. But once Bucky confronts Birdo about giving up the shield... I don't really know why Bucky sticks around after that? And continues to follow Birdo around? Ostensibly, it's because he wants to convince Birdo to claim his rightful title, but he's doing a really shit job of convincing Birdo he's worth it and stuff by constantly antagonizing him and being a chode. Now, if I'm being generous, Bucky is just very maladjusted and has communication problems, so he probably does want to push Birdo in the right direction, but it's not coming across well. I assume that was the main point behind showing Birdo the Tuskegee Experiment victim. I'm sure they'll be tru BFFs by the end, but for now it definitely feels like the show is putting the cart before the horses.
On a basic formal analysis side of things, buddy-cop is such a successful formula because it is a natural fit for the funny-man/straight-man, tsukkomi/boke comic duo dynamic where two opposite personalities bounce off of each other and complement one another. But here it's just two grumpy straight-men just being grumpy at each other? Which predictably isn't great. It's like how lots of junk these days want to copy the Star Wars cast model, but end up missing the point and making a ship exclusively full of Han Solos without any Lukes or Leias or C3POs to balance things out. (Guardians of the Galaxy says hi!) Either they don't realize how any of this works at all, or they're trying their best to fit a square peg into a round hole.
Yes, critical and commercial failure Guardians of the Galaxy, which tried to copy Star Wars and ended up junk
If you enjoyed a movie about four Han Solos and a Chewbacca, I'm glad for you. But I think those films suffer immensely from an imbalanced cast among other things. Guardians is very good surface level action glitz, but doesn't really have much substance underneath. They're mid to bottom-tier Marvel movies for me, but this is all just my opinion so naturally ymmv.
Also, "it made a lot of money and was popular!" is a poor and illogical argument for a thing's quality and value. The Transformers franchise says hello.
Also, "it made a lot of money and was popular!" is a poor and illogical argument for a thing's quality and value. The Transformers franchise says hello.
Seems kind of relevant to the subject of making things that people like, mind.
GotG works at a very surface level that's fine for being a popcorn flick. It looks great, it sounds great, it has a good sense of humor, and it's nonstop action that's generally entertaining. For most people, that's enough. It's a generally fun time! But it doesn't really work for me from a character-drama perspective because the characters are mostly interchangeable and one dimensional. That's not as big of a deal when it's a 2 hr film and never really has time to slow down to let you think about what you're watching. But Birdo and Bucky is a mini-series with lots of downtime to examine the characters and let them interact with one another. Some of the character drama so far has been solid, but IMO it's mostly been the moments where the characters are by themselves in their own worlds. Now that the title characters have been brought together, their scenes together haven't clicked with me, and a lot of it is just down to a lack of chemistry, exemplified by what I was saying before. Nobody cares about Starlord and Gamora's complete lack of chemistry when there isn't enough time to even think about why do these characters even like each other. But this show is overwhelmingly slower downtime between action, and it needs the character drama and chemistry to click. I think it'll get there eventually, but the foundations so far are rocky to say the least.
karzac
(he/him)
The silly thing is there's such an easy fix to this - have Falcon find out about the potential super soldier on his opening mission (which was otherwise totally extraneous), think to himself "seems like maybe old Hydra is involved - who do I know who knows about super serum and Hydra? Aww dang, I gotta work with Bucky, but he's such a grump". That's a super straightforward and sensible setup. What they've gone with just feels like a stitched together mess.
You guys should maybe rewatch Civil War. That movie very immediately establishes the beginnings of the Bucky/Sam "friendship" and this show doesn't miss a beat coming off of that established relationship.
karzac
(he/him)
Civil War also came out five years ago and Sam and Bucky have gone through about 8 in-universe years since then, with them both having to go into hiding and also both being snapped out of existence in the intervening time. It's not unreasonable to expect that they're relationship might have changed and even if it hasn't, it's reasonable for a show that is centered on that relationship to re-establish it even if it's been established in previous movies. I understand that this is part of an ongoing universe, but that's not a reason to abandon basic good storytelling principles. Most seasons of good TV shows start by reestablishing the main characters and their relationships.