credit: MCU
If one looks at the box office numbers and tries to say this, there’s going to be a torrent of comments that will seek to deny that this is true, especially given that financial success equates to overall success in the minds of many fans and others around the world. The fact that box office numbers don’t mean as much as people want to think is a point that’s lost on those that don’t want to understand, or refuse, that the Marvel Universe that many of us grew up with wasn’t perfect, but it’s slowly being trashed by the MCU as more and more movies and TV shows begin to dull down the edges while attempting to bring about a new era that is ready to act like it’s far more important than the source material that spawned it. The number of digs that have been taken at various characters over the last several years and the fact that much of the material seen in recent shows and movies has been leaning in a direction that’s far different than what the MCU was when it started wouldn’t be a huge problem had the Mouse House decided to resist the pressure to go woke, but at this time that appears to be the trend, and Disney is nothing if not trendy.
credit: MCU
Trolling a large part of the fan base isn’t the smartest move.
This has been done in a few ways, but the most noticeable as of late has been She-Hulk since the 4th wall-breaking heroine made it quite clear that she was there to troll the MCU and wasn’t shy about it at all. Badmouthing the heroes that had come before and being so open about it might sound cute and even funny to a lot of people, and it kind of is when one loosens up and decides to take the joke, but once the joke starts repeating itself, it becomes a little less funny, and it becomes even less so when it’s revealed that yes, the show was meant to deliver that joke hard and quick and means every word of it. The fact that someone was ‘trolling the trolls’ is a bit saddening since there was no need for it, as people just wanted to see a fun and engaging show, not a snarky sitcom about an accidental and reluctant hero that did nothing to earn the status she’d unwittingly been given. Sadly, She-Hulk isn’t the first offender, just one in a line of them that continues to grow.
Of course, fans are still going to watch everything. They’re hoping to see signs that it will evolve past the current mess it’s become.
There’s a reason that the box office numbers have been jumping, and it does have to do, in part, with the idea that fans want to see if each new entry is going to be up to the standards of the movies that started the franchise. There’s no getting your money back after watching a movie that fails to live up to the hype that’s been given to it, meaning that the record is going to show that people paid to watch the movie whether they liked it or not. The hype that’s been given to so many entries into the MCU hasn’t exactly been earned every step of the way through since the comments and opinions that have been flying about the internet for the past several years, ever since Captain Marvel came out in fact, have made that kind of clear.
credit: MCU
The hypocrisy of respecting cultures has been kind of hilarious.
In some ways, Disney has managed to respect other cultures as Black Panther did, in fact, come off as a well-made movie. Was it a revolutionary movie? That’s a matter of opinion, to be fair, but the upcoming movie, Wakanda Forever, is already drawing heavy criticism by changing the character of Namor and his entire race. It’s true that all of this is fictional and that it doesn’t matter quite as much as it would if it were all derived from factual data, but the idea of changing Atlanteans into another culture feels like something that could have been avoided since Namor and his people were already well established and could have easily been used as they were. But for some reason, it was decided that they weren’t good enough the way they were, and changes were made. It’s worth it to see how they’ll work out in this current form, but it already feels as though this was a bad mistake.
The MCU feels bound to fall to its own hubris.
Pride always comes before the fall, right? Those in charge of the MCU are rather confident that the decision they’re making is going to propel the MCU to even greater heights, and if they have any doubts, they’re hiding them incredibly well. Hopefully, they’re reading the comments that are continuing to roll across the internet since, right now, it feels as though a fall might be coming at some point.