As Marvel's most divisive Phase comes to a close, I take a look at all the stories in Phase 4 and how they succeed and fail at creating a shared universe. Is this just growing pains? Or has the MCU lost the magic that made them the biggest franchise on the planet... Oh and also I talk about Moneyball (2011).
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0:00 Marvelball
6:24 To Infinity and Beyond
11:17 About Those Third Acts
16:14 The NeverEnding Story
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Phase 4 feels like like the side quest after you finish the main levels in a game
And you realise you really should have played them before the final mission
It's funny, I remember some reddit forums back in 2015 that WANTED that. I feel like if there was more character crossover within Phase 4 (Wong was great), the phase could have functioned better as the gap phase they wanted
that’s exactly what it feels like
Lol yes, after game content
DLC
It’s almost as if a story should end
As long as Disney can keep making money out of it, it won't though. Star Wars is well enough an example of that
The mcu never ends. Marvel started back in 1939 and is still going. So why should the MCU stop?
Stop overreacting lol. This is literally phase 1 with some Multiversal BS we know fxck about! Maybe it's a thing when you want to introduce and building up to Multiversal War by plotting every movie with its variance and stories for each. The downside is, yeah it's right, I feel they rush it too much. Secret Wars confirmed to be released in 3 years time like the hell? Excited for what's to come for them but it won't surprise me if they fail to fill in Infinity War's shoes.
@@alfrzlbmsyh if they took it slow we would die before they release all the movies
To be fair, the story did end. The problem here is that they then didn't make a new one. We basically traded a longform story for an anthology book and, when the short stories in the anthology book are this hit or miss, it's just not worth investing the energy into it as an audience member.
As much as I miss Gravity Falls. I love the decision to actually just end the story instead of drag it out like Marvel is doing.
As much as id love to see another season, I know damn well it could never hold a candle to the original show.
Phineas and Ferb is coming back for 1-2 more seasons. I wonder how that will play out.
@@phoenixmorphix If it’s still Dan Povenmire and Jeff Marsh, it’ll probably still be good
Marvel is dragging out anything.. they have 80+ years worth of content to work with. They only issue they have it they're worried more about quantity over quality now
I was devastated when I found there wasn’t gonna be a third season, but I agree. I wouldn’t want it to get so drawn out to the point where it’s more confusing and there’s too much going on
One of the main things that drew me in to the early movies is that they took themselves seriously. Whereas now every movie is trying to have all the same comedic relief that was in the original Iron Man movies, but that was what made THAT character good, not every character needs that. If they cut back 85% of comedic relief the new movies would be a lot better.
I felt this especially when watching Thor:Ragnarok it made me cringe......
Gotta reel in the normies
@@lisalamba560right? It was supposed to be dark and the end of the city and their species and they threw a cringe joke every couple of minutes, it was so awful, love and thunder wasn’t much better either
@@victordavalos246Love and Thunder wasn't better at all. Ragnarok is a superior film
@@jasonnelson9141yeah, ragnarok was the best of all the thor movies imo. idk what they yappin bout lmao
Phase 4 feels like an AI trying to continue a song beyond the ending
Wow, what an astute observation.
Like continuing an open-world game just to get all the side-quests completed when you have already finished the main story.
I’ve been searching for the words to explain how I feel after end game for years and this is it
If She-Hulk, dare I say, is MCU canon, that’s exactly what’s happening in universe
perfect analogy
Phase 4 feels like watching a filler episode on a tv show.
It feels like a whole filler season until they finally willing to commit to some higher stakes.
@@ExeErdna Just like everything Disney owns right now... I don't think any of them even know what their higher stakes are right now. It is just filler just to make money.
nailed it. Feels like an episode you can skip
But not every comic is like endgame. They need smaller scale stories. If you don’t like it just come Back when the stakes are higher.
@@justice_productions_ smaller stories like the Eternals or Love and Blunder? These films are borderline unwatchable. Love and Blunder felt worse than an episode of Two Broke Girls minus the laugh track. Try watching The Boys instead it makes the MCU look like a joke in comparison.
My other issue with Phase 4 is the introduction of the multiverse. Where the Infinity Saga was so brilliant at weaving storylines together (all to the credit of the writers), now multiverses give the safety net of nostalgia and mulligans on story structure.
All while giving them the out of pulling a Crisis on Infinite Earths type multiverse collapse should it not work out without it breaking continuity.
@@tjenadonn6158 1:53 what movie is this
@@-chenlanying5818The Dark Knight
@@-chenlanying5818The Dark Knight, one of the best comic book movies of all time
@@-chenlanying5818 One of the Batman movies
The MCU was propped up by the crazy chemistry and charisma of Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansen and Mark Ruffalo. The new group don't mix well
Damn, letting Jeremy Renner out in the rain I see
Definitely not Scarlett. Nothing more then eye candy since black widow was by far the least powerful member....Idc about the comic lore that idk about...just the movies....widow literally added 0 moments or care for me. Sorry if I'm lacking a heart for anyone reading.
@@Maradala Hoenstly I kind of agree, I was mainly there for Ironman and Capt America, Thor (the character) was good, Hulk was good but less than thor and yea, that's all I really cared about. Nick Fury was also kind of interesting tbh, I will exclude SI, that is fanfic to my eyes (never watched it and never will)
My two biggest gripes are: -Shoving jokes in every other line. Everyone tried to have the same snarky sense of humor as Joss Whedon, it's played out -They keep trying to end the world and it's lowered the stakes. Eternals, Moon Knight, Ms Marvel... no, they're not gonna end the world in a D+ show, or in the movie right after Endgame. Come on.
Also Loki singlehandedly destroyed every movie and TV show in the MCU that came before it with it's "we maintain the sacred timeline" bullshit, because that one thing invalidates EVERYTHING that's happened up until now. Every single victory, defeat, sacrifice, hard choice and effort that all the characters have done was just some dude in his ivory tower deciding how things would go. Way to kill your entire cinematic universe's re-watchability in one fell swoop.
One of my main gripes is: Taika Waititi.
No the issue is SJW .. and wannabe strong independent woman in movies
These issues existed even before Endgame lol.
@@carljohan9265 Speak for yourself lmao. I can easily enjoy rewatching classics like Iron Man 1. Just like how I can enjoy rewatching the original Star Wars Trilogy or Pre-Timeless Child Retcon Doctor Who.
In my head, I like to imagine a world where the MCU ended with Endgame
To me it ended with Infinity War
That's the world I live in. I watched the newest Thor and that was it. It was pretty meh
same, didnt even touched the stuff after that
Yeah i also think a lot of people got off the mcu train after endgame. It was nice closure for everyone that grew up watching the original 6 avengers. Natasha and tony die saving the universe, hulk is basically retired after losing an arm and hawkeye retires to live with his family, steve goes back in time to live the rest of his life with peggy, and Thor only one who is basically immortal overcame his depression after infinity war and is ready to move to a new chapter of his life after giving the title of queen of asgard to valkyrie and leaving with the guardians in search for a new chapter in his life. Its literally the best ending for everyone who has been following the mcu since its early years. All the ogs are either dead or retired and the world is safe knowing they left a new generation of heroes to replace them. All of these new mcu projects (i do mean all of them) feel rushed. unlike the 1 phase of the mcu, where even if some of the movies dragged a little they felt somewhat connected, ig its also because everything was happening on earth on a smaller scale.
It did
I saw almost every single movie before Endgame, and I was so deeply satisfied with Endgame as an ending that I decided then and there that I wouldn't watch another. Every discussion I have seen since makes it seem like the right choice.
literally same
I watched the first few series/movies after endgame and I was disappointed with every single one. After that I said I would only watch the things that genuinely interested me. Almost every piece of media seems disconnected or has major flaws that cannot be ignored. I think y’all made the best choice lmao
They can't do anything except raise the stakes higher and higher. So where do they go after the entire universe is threatened? The multiverse of course, but it just doesnt hit the same now.
You’re missing out on skipping WandaVision. Very solid piece of storytelling with fantastic acting and the humor didn’t feel of place given the sitcom nature.
No Way Home is easily worth watching.
I felt something very strongly when I watched Endgame, at the beginning of the credits where all the major cast members had their signatures show up (shades of Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country), that it really was The End. This was the end of the MCU. The greatest shared universe, beginning and ending with Tony Stark as Iron Man, the last truly epic filmmaking achievement of our lifetimes (possibly of cinema EVER), and now it was over. And it was fantastic. What a goddamn achievement. It felt like anything after that would just be beating a dead horse. Beating a zombie Doctor Strange, maybe. And you know what? Nothing I've seen since then has convinced me that I was wrong.
"The greatest shared universe, beginning and ending with Tony Stark as Iron Man, the last truly epic filmmaking achievement of our lifetimes (possibly of cinema EVER)" Now lets not get over ourselves.
@@davidstinger1134 I mean it basically was, Marvel was the most popular franchise in the entire world for a good 10 years+
My biggest problem is how the raising stakes make endgame seem almost irrelevant
I mean…thats comics in general
This comment deserves more likes
I don't think there is anything inherently bad with having Higher stakes than Endgame But the problem is that there are multiple high stakes which only happen in one specific story and not felt on the others It's like they are separate worlds that have 0 connections with each other Making it feel more like a barrage of movies and stories instead of one sing Universe that all characters live in
So dragon ball z?
True. Phase 4 really should have been a time to ramp the stakes back down (kinda like in Falcon and Winter Soldier) before ramping them back up near the end of phase 4 and into phase 5 and 6.
I've never missed an MCU movie in my life... but then suddenly during Phase 4 I missed several. It was getting hard to keep up with shows and movies all while Disney was trying to sell me their product over and over and over again.
This.
Same here the 1st 3 phases were magic. I wish we could go back to that. Sadly I don't see it happening
If it was good content, I wouldn’t even mind. But I’m not spending money on political propaganda.
Think of them like the comicbooks they bring to the screen. It is unrealistic to try to collect every single edition of a comic series unless you are extremely dedicated, have lots of money to spare, and are a hardcore fan. We're now at the point where you just grab the edition you think "oh that looks interesting, let's see," and leave it at that.
@@noseriouslyimserious4073 facts though. Thor, Dr strange, and a lot of these shows have woke crap and i hate it. I want to watch a show or movie to not think about the world you know?
I’ve always felt that Marvel Studios should’ve taken a long break after Endgame to just bask in what a massive accomplishment that was but also to really sit down and meticulously plan their next steps. I’ve found recent Marvel stuff to be entertaining but not having that sense of cohesion that the Infinity Saga had. Directionless fun is entertaining but directionless nonetheless. Also the amount of TV shows has hurt them in my eyes. I feel that WandaVision and Loki were bangers but everything else after that has been dull fun. This was a really solid video 🔥🔥🔥
This honestly should be the standard. We could've gotten something cool.
In phase 4 the approach emphasis felt like it shifted from centering on "story craft" to "consumer product development" complete with "market segmentation" thinking.
I just feel so exhausted from this phase that it has drove me to genuinely not care any more.
exactly. and every now and then you find out there is another series or movie that fits into the story that came out and you missed it because of sheer volume of all the stuff
Yes! Back when it was just 2-3 movies a year, there was enough space between each new release to give us a bit of a break and build anticipation for the next movie. This year there's been something new almost every month (I think, I haven't been keeping track).
Ok. Ur problem
Yes I agree, I’ll probably give some things a try but I most likely won’t finish every show or watch every movie unless I’m insanely bored and even then I’m discovering more movies than ever before that are much better
@@ScoobyandShaggy5554 ur loss bud
Trying to keep up with all the characters and plots has started to feel like homework.
Exaactlyy!
You’re just old
Pretty much lol
Which is why I don't bother with things like Eternals, she hulk, or ms marvel and will continue to do so
@@NorthernLaw_ ethernals is good
I think the loss of Chawick Boseman really screwed up what they had planned. It was obvious that the "New Avengers" were going to be Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Spider-Man, and Doctor Strange but Chadwick's sudden death made everyone at Marvel have to rethink and restrategize where they wanted to go. It's why Phase 4 feels so disconnected because they're literally salvaging their original plans
Wasn't shangchi invited to the avengers? they could've based that one scene for the next movie
Why'd you say it like he could've changed what happened to him
u really think the death of a black dude screwed the plans of multi-billion dollar franchise. People are coming for the character Black Panther not the actor.
@@ionaskualexander1255 "Death of a black dude"....He couldn't just be a dude it's sounds like you wanted to say something else besides black...
I can see that I know a lot of people in my community that loved Wakonda Forever but will admit it just wasn't the same without Chadwick hell some day they aren't interested in marvel until the next black panther movie.
Discussion on Phase 4 shows feels incomplete without making comparisons to the MCU's prior shows such as Daredevil and what made those hit (or miss) when compared to say, She-Hulk
Their movies went from mostly being action adventures with some comedy and comedic characters that fit their personality into every movie being a comedy with some action adventure, and every character trying to have a stand up routine in every scene
Marvel's been like that since the original Avengers.
That’s only Thor 4
@@john_smith_john They always had humor in their movies before, but I feel it's gotten worse since the release of Guardians of the Galaxy and then Deadpool. It's like they tried switching to full comedy and it worked so well (in the money department) all the movies now just have to be the same. Like they're all just part of an episodic series with just a bunch of forced jokes in between exposition and some colorful effects here and there.
Its literally a FILLER
Thor Love & Thunder was so fucking absurd that the only way I could justify it being like that, was imagining that the entire thing was a movie of Korg telling us how things happened and embellishing it to the point of madness. It honestly felt like a complete parody of reality, like an Abridged Series of the real movie. I kept expecting the film to cut off and reveal a bunch of people sitting around a table with Korg, and then asking him if he was serious about Thor giving the kids his powers somehow and one of them wielding a goddamn lightning teddy bear. I was waiting for a punchline, but it never came.
Ive been saying since the end of Endgame, the MCU would struggle to fill the void left by Tony Stark and Steve Rogers. They were the bedrock of the MCU and you can feel that something big is missing.
Its literally just phase 1 with introducing new characters and stories. Moving on from the old crew and building new worlds.
@@Kirasfox yeah, they are doing a shitty job at it. Thanks shehulk
@@Kirasfox it’s trash
@@Kirasfox the phase 1 stories were better
@@Kirasfox As robert said It's trash
Ironically, the release of the moneyball book and subsequent movie got almost every other team in the mlb to use its strategies as a status quo. Ever since, the A’s have been a laughing stock team once again, and I think that’s a pretty telling part of the analogy you used it for
This video hits even harder after Quantumania
Disney tried to make Star Wars fit into the MCU mold, when it was Star Wars (particularly under George Lucas’ care) that had the more important lesson: take your time to craft the story of each episodic film and then take a necessary break in between trilogy sagas (it doesn’t always have to be a 10-16 year hiatus, but it’s painfully obvious when the creative team hasn’t taken a necessary sabbatical: “Somehow, Palpatine returned”).
Also, the MCU has been primarily created and envisioned like this from the beginning, something that can't be said for Star Wars. Many other movie studios have tried to apply the "MCU mold" to their properties and have failed tremendously at doing so. Even DC, a company that is of very similar nature to that of Marvel's, is still trying to understand how to make their cinematic universe work. Thing is, not everything needs to be a cinematic universe -- certainly not Star Wars.
Don't these writers have experts who know these universes on board?
@@TekkLuthor They do--but their comments don't mean jack when the directors/writers can do almost whatever they want. For better or worse, even Dave Filoni has retconned SW lore (some were even Disney canon) if he feels like self-inserting his own characters.
I don't agree. I think the lesson from both Star Wars and the MCU is "commit to new characters and new stories," a lesson it's incredibly hard to accept, when the shiny lure of beloved old characters dangles like the promise of gold. The theory is that fans love Star Wars and Marvel for the characters they know. But what made those characters great was the experience of being introduced to them, falling in love with them, and then seeing them reach a satisfying conclusion. When you bring them back, that satisfaction gets complicated. You're inevitably messing with what people liked about them. You have to, because if you don't, the characters become static. We love all these characters because we watched them become what they are. We don't necessarily want them to become something else. And we don't necessarily want complications to the story of how they became who they are. So I think what's dragging both Star Wars and the MCU down is the erroneous assumption that it's the specific characters that made it what it is, rather than the thrill of living in this magical world of potential. Star Wars suffers the most when it trots out beloved old characters and trues to resell them to us. It succeeds when it introduces new characters, From Finn, Rey, and Kylo to Din Jarin and What's-His-Name from this new Andor show people seem to love (haven't seen it yet, but I see the fan response whether I want to or not). It's when they try to repackage Boba Fett and Obi-Wan that they get bogged down. With the MCU, they can't seem to commit to new characters without trying to prop them up on old characters' shoulders, with diminishing results. Of course, the MCU also seems to have a cookie-cutter problem, demanding every character follow a formula rather then letting them tell their own story. You can see in every new Marvel film a strong character imprisoned in a rote plot that has little to do with who they actually are, and the kind of story they actually want to tell. Shang-Chi was great for the first seven minutes, and the final three, but in between, a long, tiresome, overdeveloped backstory hijacked the plot away from who the character actually is in the here and now, to tell the dull story of how he fits into the overstuffed, under-cooked mystical side of the Marvel universe. The problem with both, as I see it, is the problem of serving the universe instead of the story, trying to appeal to what fans responded to in the past rather than risk creating something new. It's a shame, because what built that fan base in the first place was creating something new. Movies aren't Coca-Cola. You can't sell the same one over and over again forever. You can't sell the new one entirely on what people liked about the last one. The more they do that, the less effective it is.
@@rottensquid Great points. I finished Cyberpunk: Edgerunners recently, and I think it's a perfect example of your points. I went into it not knowing one thing about its universe or preestablished lore (other than the relentless memes mocking 2077). Despite all that, Edgerunners's 10 episodes managed to make me connect and care more about its universe and (most of) the characters. Can't say the same for MCU Phase 4. I even grew up with the very start of the MCU and have read the comics from when I was a little kid. So many of the MCU characters feel like a version of diet Tony Stark. They don't feel like actual characters. Going to go the opposite direction, but Shang-Chi was the closest to hitting a home run for me. First 2/3 of it was going well, but I'm disappointed they decided to throw the boring demon, dragon, kaiju, whatever thing fight at the end. Felt like the creators didn't have the confidence to write a strong story between the conflict with the dad and son. And yeah, all the mysticism stuff felt pretty shoehorned in and bloated; probably would've worked out stronger if they decided to lean into it in the sequel.
what strikes me as odd is.. phase 3 already felt like it was introducing the new generation but then phase 4 has been introducing an even NEWER generation; multiple new generations and teams.. and we're just holding out and waiting for those teams to form those young avengers won't be so young anymore by the time they put that team together lol
I feel like the first wave of films were 95% story and 5% set-up for future stories. So the set-up was extra exciting because it was so sparse, and people talked about it as much as the stories. The problem is, the set-up part of these movies isn't actually the content, it's just the promise of content. in tiny doses, it's wonderful. But when producers think we're more interested in set-up than story, the promise of the next story begins to replace the content of this one. It's like if every cereal box contained an empty cereal bowl, with an add at the bottom telling us about the next exciting marshmallow flavor sensation I can one day eat out of it. That's fun, except I just payed the same price for half the cereal and promotion for the next cereal, which I many not even be interested in.
i disagree..they're building the premise to introduce everything all at once.
@@samuraipizzacat5586 no
@@rottensquid Agreed. It was more focused on the story at hand, while laying a foundation little by little for future projects. Now it feels like mostly setup and very little payoff so far.
@@xnortheast1106 bet
This is my first time stumbling upon one of your videos and I have to say, this was a wonderfully crafted list and you really nail down each individual point. Very impressive. I'll be tuning in again.
The biggest issue with the tv shows is really the exclusivity to disney plus. A big proponent to netflixs declining users is the fact we replaced cable with like 15 different apps, like disney plus and hulu. We can’t afford 15 different apps to watch shows.
Torrents my friend
Endgame was the ending and Far From Home & No Way Home was the after credits scene as far as I'm concerned.
Exactly. I consider No Way Home to be Phase 3, lol.
@@bro-be3bd because it was actually good?
@@ieat10kittens94 it was ready written out, just like pretty much the whole of the MCU for phase 3 Before this SJW nonsense destroyed cinema. Hollywood is just detached from reality and looked to Twitter for ideas thinking that was the actual direction culture was going when in reality people were tired of the behaviors on display at Twitter. So much so that the richest redditor of them all bought it just to shut that shit down.
@@ieat10kittens94 lol that’s a good way of putting it. It wasn’t a terrible movie so it can’t be phase 4
FFF was a lame epilogue, and NWH was totally unnecesary (if you consider that Endgame was the true ending)
Doctor Who faced the same problem and has suffered for years. Once you have a universe-ending event every week, it gets tiring. We need low-key bad guys and less-severe stakes.
"Local neighbourhood Spiderman" anyone?
Exctly, when every movie or show has a possible world ending event, it just makes you not care about it anymore.
Thats true for so many series nowadays. the power scaling gets so ridiculous that you stop caring entirely
@@darrengordon-hill couldn't remember the word "friendly"?
Funnily enough this was also the reason to why my M&M ttrpg group decided to reset the universe.
I saw one comment that said "Phase 4 feels like finishing disconnected side-quests after completing the main story." 👌
I think marvel is overstaying their welcome now. If they needed a phase after endgame to close stories that’s fine but now it’d waaaay to much.
From high school to college to adult life, I really enjoyed everything up until endgame. It felt like the end of the wait I had as a child. Everything else now isn’t a question I wanted answered 😂
"Everything else now isn't a question I wanted answered." This sums up my point entirely. Well said.
I feel ya
Because it literally was the end of the Infinity Saga. The phase4 is not suppose to lick your phase 1 to 3 wounds.
Ahhh yes like the confirmation that Steve didn't die a virgin...when we all saw him go back to Peggy
Everything woke turns to crap
in a normal world endgame would have been the END, but we knew that was never going to happen
This is such a dumb talking point, should the comics have ended after the first big event.
@@aspacelex surely comic books are consumed differently though and appeal to a less broad audience
you gotta milk the cow until everyone end up hating it.
It would have been a perfect ending but I don't agree, I think what they should have done was not release anything new unless it was up to the standard of Phase 3.
I'm glad that world isn't this one. Imagine a world without the brilliant planning and storytelling of MCU. Such a loss.
Imo the biggest thing for me is the characters. Are these new characters going to be something im interested in teaming up in the future or want to see the future. Like remember how hype we were in the first avengers movie or when thor met the guardians. Will that same hype be met. I know there is a rumor floating around that the possible new lineup is sam wilson, shuri, she hulk, ant man, shang chi, and captain marvel. Maybe seeing their chemistry together might change my mind but right now the original 6 are still gets me more exicited.
I don't usually sit down to watch videos like this, but I must say this video was awesome. I watched the entire thing, I truly enjoyed your take on the MCU
I always felt like they should have stopped or at least take a considerable break after 'Endgame'. That was such an impressive end, but, they didn't even let it breathe.
yeah, covid also was kind of perfect timing for this. if they had waited a couple or even a few years to release everything that takes place afterward, it would have left people wanting for more of that familiar marvel consistency, instead of feeling smothered. a longer pause would have also let them develop phase 4 stories more, i think they could have tried to fix a lot of the problems if they wanted to but instead chose to fall back on the reliability of loyal fans and such
@@JaviBee Exactly.
Because it’s not the end. Steve Rogers and Tony stark are NOT the base of marvel. Get the fuck over it
@@Lovemetender757 You dropped your napkin.
Yup. That’s exactly how I feel. It peaked at Endgame, but rather than let the achievement stand on its own for a half minute, they felt like they had to drown us in a litany of mediocre Phase 4 content in this seemingly desperate attempt to keep the momentum going. That’s why at the end of the day I decided to buy the infinity saga box set. Yeah, it was a lot of money, but to me at least it was worth investing in it as the MCU that I want to remember.
Keeping up with the MCU is starting to feel like a job, but I'm paying to do it. The moment you start to fall behind it's overwhelming to catch back up. I haven't seen many of the very newest shows or movies, and I'm not sure if I'll ever find the time
It's like trying to catch up to anime or any long ass show. Feels like a chore
Just read a synopsis on a show. It takes 5 minutes max. Im fully caught up and haven’t watched 90% of phase 4.
Same here, if feels like a never ending job.
Just let it go man...
Just watch the last episode of she hulk season 1 (of 1) and that’s all u need baby 😂😂😂
thank you for validating the disappointment I’ve felt for so long but not been able to put into words!
Some of the shows don’t feel like setups for anything in the future, like at all. Aside from wandavision, They feel like self contained stories just meant to try and make the studio money and nothing more.
The problem with introducing already existing characters in phase 4 is they now always have to explain where tf they were when Thanos wiped out half the universe. It’s one of my big problems with The Eternals. So when they realized that the planets they are “helping” actually get destroyed and then they get their memory erased, suddenly they feel bad. But when Thanos wiped everyone out and the celestials told the eternals don’t get involved they were like “oh ok”.
I think that’s why they’re coming in with all this multiverse stuff. So they have a plausible reason why Professor X and Dr Doom haven’t been affecting the universe for the past decade. Honestly, I’m not crazy about going this route. It seems like pure fan service to just bring fully developed fan favourite characters into the MCU with a handwave.
This. I'm really over hearing about the blip and having 10-15 minutes taken to re-explain it to the audience
Yeah I guess, phase 4 is introducing new characters while trying to connect them to the previous movies?
This is explained in Eternals though: Thanos actually had a pretty big impact by giving Earth MORE time before hatching it’s Celestial, but that ultimately since the Eternals goal is just to ensure a Celestial hatches from its planet, Thanos doing something that postpones but does nothing to stop that cycle doesn’t actually effect them that much.
Tbh how much time would they even have to react? The entirety of Infinity War took place in a day and it took them like a week just to collect all of the eternals. They didnt know he was coming. The didnt know anything. I just wrote it off to the being suprised and not even able to reactas a team
My biggest problem is that there’s just too much of it. It used to be maybe we’d get 2-3 movies a year and that was it. That’s easy to follow. Plus, Agents of SHIELD eventually became its own fun thing with the movies in the background. But 3-4 movies and 6 shows all in a year? Yeah it’s too much. Maybe have 3 movies and 2 shows a year. That’s so much easier to deal with and would prevent the burnout we’re all experiencing.
I would much prefer more spaced movies but with good quality (and good cgi, which we lost). I hate that whole series thing. I hate watching series in general because it almost always end up being terrible.
@@jonathaningram8157 Honestly, I kind of agree. But maybe have a movie in February, May, and November with a show starting in June that ends in July and then another show in September that ends in October. That would be much more manageable. Three movies decently far apart from each other and the shows taking up the late summer-early fall mantle.
This only happened due to the pandemic. All the projects slated for 2020 came out in 2021, and some slated for 2021 came out in 2022. So 2021 actually had two years worth of content, which wasn't originally planned. In 2022 we got 3 movies and 3 series, and it will probably continue to be like that or even less in the following years.
3 movies and two shows sounds like a great balance.
@@masamune2984 It would also not put near as much stress on the poor CGI artists. Much less work on them too.
You just explained my feelings perfectly thank you, Love your content
My favorite Marvel project since EndGame has been Guardians Of The Galaxy 3 - great bit of story telling!
Didn't know it, but I watched to hear this line: "Without that discussion, these projects stop being stories that impact culture, and instead become … content-a momentary distraction before ushering the audience along to the next attraction." Brilliant and necessary POV on not just the MCU but "content" in general.
Yep that line was exactly it
I mean you can tell it's just "content" when you see how many bad jokes they throw in the movies now.
I drew the line at Endgame. I’ve even found myself doing the unthinkable and missing numerous Phase 4 films and am not invested in their characters any where near as much as pre Endgame Marvel films.
Same. I've skipped on several of the Disney+ shows and have no intention on seeing them. There doesn't seem to be any cohesive and well thought plan for the MCU like everything pre-Endgame. It all feels very much like a greedy cash-grab to pump out as much content as possible with very little reverence for the source material or telling quality stories. Sad.
I also stopped after Endgame, which itself was very flawed. Too much, too big, too many moving parts. It's the problem with the source material, comics. It's hard to tell a continuous story with tight continuity when you keep expanding the list of characters, worlds, stories, timelines, etc.
@@apostolostvable I also felt that Endgame was very flawed and oddly rushed. They had been planning it for years and it seemed like they still couldn't quite figure out how to make the time travel thing make sense and not be full of plot holes. Peggy Carter suddenly being Steve's reason for being felt weird too. Makes me think the original draft had him dying like Tony and they took a left turn suddenly and needed a way to retire the character without killing him and just inserted Peggy back in. It was odd to me.
I agree but spider man no way home was still very good
@@ScarletVoodoo it’s not that they couldn’t figure out how to make time travel work, it’s that time travel was like the only thing that could undo the stakes of infinity war and they found a way to make that into a clip show to bait fans
When I finished The Infinity Saga, I remembered every single thing that happened in each movie. When I finished The Multiverse Saga, I couldn’t remember a thing.
I think the big problem here is that Infinity War into Endgame felt like an ending. It was an ending. Hell, they literally called the final "Endgame" You're explicitly promising your audience an end. And by creating a bunch of new movies, you're just failing to deliver on that promise. Doesn't really matter if the new movie is good or not. A large percentage of the audience will hate it, because this whole thing was supposed to be over. If Marvel wanted to move forward with the MCU, they had to do so without creating the impression of an ultimate ending in Endgame.
Using moneyball as a way to explain marvelball was genius and incredibly well written/spoken.
Here to comment this. Brilliant.
Agreed. That part was more well written than anything in farce 4.
Yeah it was depressing but incredibly effective
Yeah that was actually pretty good and I like that
@@carloscortes1577 ok
I actually thought Endgame struggled and the big fight at the end bumped it up alot, the MCU peaked at infinity war for me
Underrated comment, endgame was emotionally the movie we’ve all been waiting for and a cry because we knew it was no good ending. But as far as plot, movie & overall masterpiece Infinity War is the best movie made this century.
@@ramonmabry Oh man. Infinity War is a great superhero movie. It is not the best movie made this century, it’s not even the best movie released in 2018. 😂
@@ramonmabry Best movie made this century? I just gagged in my mouth reading that. Wow. Can't expect too much from a marvel fan though.
@@oscaraltman8122 gotta agree with this, you had Hereditary and Annihilation to contend with. Honestly I love Infinity War, but Vice takes the win for me.
@@cowtowncaptain7649 Have you seen The Ballad of Buster Scruggs? Amazing western anthology from 2018 with the incredibly talented Tim Blake Nelson, check it out!
So true about the heroes only sticking to the conflicts created in their stories. It feels like marvel makes a whole story around a villain only for that villain to be destroyed or killed in the end
I used to be able to name every character in the mcu, I can confidently say that I can barely name a handful of the new characters introduced in phase 4
The problem with the current state of the MCU is that it has become a convulated self-aware satient being. The She-Hulk finale is a testament to that. Instead of writing compelling and well connected stories, the MCU has become a conduit of fan service with social comentaries, cameos and breaking the fourth wall anticts. The strength of the MCU was in the interconnection of stories and characters, not characters mentioning other characters. Actually the Loki finale was great and the consequences should have been felt in the movies that followed after. Spiderman breaking the multiverse should have been the result of Loki's actions. Dr Strange into the Multiverse of Madness should have been as a result of Spiderman's actions. Wanda should have been manipulated by a Kang variant to cause shenanigans all over the multiverse. The Gods in Moonknight should have imprisoned a Kang Variant Rama-Tut. Gorr The God Butcher should have killed a lot of gods including many from the pantheon of Gods in Moonkight setting a Kang variant Rama-Tut free and causing Bastet the panther god into exile. This weakens the strength of Wakanda and T'challa dies, then the events of Wakanda Forever play out. These events do not even need to be on the screen they can just play out in the background and ateast show that there is a direction and connection going forward to Avengers Kang Dynasty. You will have multiple Kangs roaming the Multiverse and no one knows which Kang or Kangs pop-up in Antman Quantumania. Instead the MCU has a lot of different stories with loose ends and end credits scenes that will be explained by a random person in an MCU TV show as a by-the-way comment rendering the whole scene obsolete.
YES
damn. they should had hire you to write the next mcu phase. the way you describe in few sentences how all of the stories could built up on each other makes more sence than what we have right now
Although I enjoyed all the phase 4 content, I would KILL to see them do this direction instead
Fucking conservatives.
This comment is underatter, bro you just wrote a whole a whole story. Idk how much time you spend writing this but I can tell you put a lot of time and thought and your are one hella of a creative and visionary peroson
You bring up something that I've sincerely been annoyed by, and it's the fact that it feels like Phase 4 wasn't planned. It feels like they intentionally plotted out everything up to phase 3 and realized they were making so much money that there was no way they could stop. Except now things are being whipped off the cuff while they try and figure out how it's all going to come together.
Did you know “Dr Strange Multiverse”was supposed to come out before “Spiderman No way Home”? That’s the reason the movie feels slightly off in regards to plot points. COVID threw everything for a loop but Marvel couldn’t adapt tbh.
Nothing is going to "come together". They can't bring all this crap together because it would be utter sht.
Thats it, they dont wanna spend time planning everything anymore, if anything goes wrong, they will use multiverse as excuse to undo
Disney bought it
@@tableswithoutchairs1168 in 2009
Problem is after Endgame MCU clearly has no plan and just releases random stuff using established characters name to milk this thing
The problem I have with phase 4 and phase 0 is that it’s too much of a potpourri of characters that they are trying or gel together and at the same time, trying to get us to forget the past character(some of which never developed, Iron-Lad)
I think another thing about keeping stories all set to come together is it helps audiences keep track of what's going on. Between all the shows and movies, I can't remember much about stakes, villains, or even some entire characters. Besides, it feels like the shows don't matter - Wandavision was about her grief hurting others, and she realized that was wrong. She decided to deal with it in a healthier way. Multiverse of Madness - screw all that, now she doesn't care who dies
Yup, all continuity is just out of the window. That goes for character motivations, just like you said, but also for power levels. One movie they are fighting intergalactic threats, then in the next movie they struggle with some random local villains... makes no sense.
When watching MoM, I thought "This makes almost no sense if you haven't watched WandaVision. But if you HAVE watched WandaVision, it repeats the same story in a more cartoonish and less nuanced way." Wanda's villainous (although restrained) acts in WandaVision due to her grief for Vision made sense, while her mass-murdering people to have extra health insurance for a couple of kids that just popped into existence seemed over the top to me.
Lmao, *did* you watch WV? It ends with her reading the Dark Hold in search of her kids. She absolutely does *not* choose a healthy way of dealing. She is literally forced to let down the hex and then flees into isolation. Not healthy at all.
@@brianburkhardt3692 This is exactly the point. Not everyone watched WV. How were we supposed to know that and watch an actual film having that in mind? Like he mentioned, it’s a lack of cohesion.
@@azathothdemonsultan3595 feels like a comics holdover to me. There were always story arcs in comics that crossed over multiple publications (like, say, a villain built up in a X-Men related comic that then faces the Avengers in full form) and if you wanted the full story you’d have to read comics you normally wouldn’t or just get enough context sticking with your usual comics to get most of the plot. I didn’t love every D+ show, but I watched all of them because I’ll know they’ll at least tangentially relate to future films.
Phase 1-3 I watched most films on opening night, the characters they created felt special and they gave us reasons to care for them. Now a days there's just too much going on. They pump out more and more stories and characters and don't give them the time to develop or for us to form a connection with. Those connections are the reasons that made Tony's death so painful, its what made Steve's Endgame scene so powerful to us as the viewers. They need to slow down and let us develop these connections to the new characters and the new stories that they want to tell.
I feel like phase four took a DC approach to things
WRONG, these characters have only had 1 movie as they were introductions, all phase 1 characters the og had SEVERAL MOVIES TO get introduced and get development for 3 whole phases and lastly Kang is the villain of this as we going towards cosmic entities and everything around this as phase 5 will definitely be mutants as soon as their contracts end in 2025
@@vispiralgamingiv8462 no. Civil war introduced spiderman and black panther. Ant-man only had a single movie before the team up as did vision and Wanda. No one felt it was jarring when watching civil war. The amount of times you see the characters isn’t the problem. The problem is that these shows and movies just aren’t very good. The quantity has gone up but the writing for these stories has gone down. I watched the first 3 shows and haven’t bothered with anymore except spiderman and shangchi. The content is just bad. Audience retention is hanging on by a thread because they’re waiting for end game magic to happen again. People don’t wanna watch 10 mediocre shows to know what all the characters are up to
@@vispiralgamingiv8462 WRONG
@@supermelonbread The connection people have to iron man, Thor, and captain America is a lot stronger than ant man, spiderman, or black panther. Why? Because they had movies detailing their backgrounds, which is exactly what the guy was saying. You can't use the characters you are trying to use to prove your point, they are the exceptions. They are the ones people don't graduate towards. Spiderman is a weird one, however. He has many movies prior to the team up, just with different actors and a different studio. So, some people really connect with him while some don't.
This is so interesting to me as someone who only started the MCU after endgame. I also don’t like a lot in phase 4 but I also didn’t get to experience the big phase 3 movies with the fandom. I still really enjoyed it, but I feel like I missed out.
same
Now people will say whatever But phase 3 is always remain best What ahype for avengers Infinity War and endgame
i recently started catching up on all the marvel projects i missed and holy shit it was rough. not only because i missed so much, but because all of the projects were sooooo bad and didnt seem to be going anywhere. it feels like homework trying to keep up with everything and if you don’t watch one show or movie, you won’t understand some other projects.
One of the core problems is also definitely that they lost their two keypieces, which they failed to replace.
Dr. strange seemed so promising but has been so disappointing in this phase. If his character had been well used he could be a good keypiece for this phase
@@igorporfiirio4915 True, I thought his character could also carry the franchise like Iron man or Captain America. He definetly has the charisma. Not so sure why it doenst work. Maybe he works best as (extremely cool) sidekick character that shows up once in a while. Maybe hes abit too stoic or overpowered dunno.
@@joerileijdsman3279 ii jus think they don’t do enough with him. His powers in Infinity War were really cool but in his newest movie he really only does 3 things. The music scene was kinda cool, thats it really
@@joerileijdsman3279 the problem with him is that he doesnt take the lead. Iron man and Captain America took the initiative in being a leader they competed with each other as rival leaders, but also friends and allies as seen in Avengers and Civil war. They had greatly differing ideas on how to handle things, but had matching charisma so the audience grew attached to both of them. but Strange doesnt do that. He “mysteriously” does fuck-all before spider man or thor solves the problem for him. He “strangely” lacks a personality outside of freaky wizard magic. He has been very underdeveloped since infinity war.
@@joerileijdsman3279 I think this hits the nail on the head. Even in the comics, Strange was never the "hero" character. He was always the cool mysterious guy who the actual hero calls up to help. And I think that's how he shines best.
Okay no one else is really saying it but the way you compared the MCU too MoneyBall was really clever. I’m gonna subscribe just for how well put together this video is.
He got you too lol
Me too! I’m definitely subbing and watching the other videos.
*one week later* ...oh I get it! Because money
Meanwhile Phase 4 feels like Brooklyn Nets at the moment LOL No cohesion whatsoever
If Marvel was the '02 A's, DC is the '22 Angels- constantly tripping over itself and wasting the careers of two Hall of Fame players.
Something I always thought of. Those you were in an airplane during the blip, came back in the AIR and fell to their death 5 years later.
The best parts of phase 4 were the projects that tried to distance themselves from the typical marvel formula but unfortunately some of the projects that did try to distance themselves were forced to bend over backwards to put certain story beats in just to fill the quota or whatever
I've said this numerous times now: *_No Way Home_* is gonna end up being the only Phase 4 movie that's gonna be rewatchable for generations to come.
It's distributed by Sony, so it's sort of doesn't count
Have you not seen shang chi? Even dr strange is rewatchable it gets way better when you rewatch it
I doubt it. It's a product of hype. People were hyped to see every actor that played spiderman together. If you re watched it now you will realize how empty and contradictory the story is. It's quite bad.
Not really, that one makes bank off of nostalgia more then anything which in itself is telling
I don’t think so. It wasn’t terrible but the only reason it got so much hype and fan attention is because of nostalgia for the other spiderman actors. In twenty years, no one is going to care at all about that. Nostalgia is a horrible way to try and improve a story.
I’m still mad at the ending of The Eternals. They revealed of the unimaginable size of a celestial and how insignificant earth is in comparison to them, and all it did was fetch the Eternals and leave. Not a single mention afterwards of it, or the massive statue that appeared in the middle of the ocean, even though an event like that would be world changing. Such a cool reveal with so many implications and possible characters reactions wasted on literally nothing
That's the problem with a lot of phase 4. There are a lot of major events happening but none of them feel like they have any lasting impact on the overall narrative, and it's not like you can say it's because they just want to be their own thing because these next phases of films hav been marketed as the multiverse saga
100%
@@kbreezy1581 kang.
@@kbreezy1581 half the universe was snapped out and snapped back into existence, superhumans and aliens and gods and magic were all revealed to exist, I don’t think a giant celestial would cause as much panic in their world as you think it would. especially since he didn’t really do anything and just disappeared shortly after.
The ending of Moon Knight had the entire world getting slaughtered by an Egyptian deity judging humanity for future crimes and no one cared. Not a single reference to this event after Moon Knight at all. How tf is that even possible?
Idk why but wandavision, Loki and last guardians were seriously the only MCU things cared about since endgame They shoulda just don’t a FEW dope TV shows for like two or three years and built up the hype/figure out next movies phase
okay Quantumania exists now. but Loki in my opinion is the only show with an actual tv ending. it’s resolution is a conversation. it has a cliffhanger that actual felt substantial. the characters actually have arcs including Loki and Silvie.
Really wish Marvel had taken a well earned rest after Endgame or Far From Home. The virus seems like a nice built in excuse to back off for a year or so and just let it breathe. It's just become exhausting trying to follow all the shows and movies now and the compressed release schedule has a lot to do with that. One of the problems that didn't get mentioned in this otherwise excellent video is the meshing of TV continuity with the films' continuity. In the past Marvel TV and Marvel Studios kept things apart from each other. Agents of Shield and Agent Carter didn't really factor into the movies. Now we have the new big bad introduced in a TV show and he'll be moving into the films. And if you didn't watch WandaVision you'd be confused as to why she was all of a sudden evil and trying to find her children (of which she has none) in Multiverse of Madness. It's not right for the more casual fans who are into the films but don't care to watch all the D+ shows or just don't have the time to.
agreed
Pandemic was the opportunity of a lifetime for pushing content to people online. That's why we got the influx of awful shows like Ms Marvel, Moon Knight, She-Hulk, etc. It's all a cash grab orchestrated to please the shareholders of the megacorps.
@@chillaxTFcouldnt agree more
That's basically it. They threw away their fandom. People that were okay and liked watching their movies twice a year, couldn't give less of a shit to these tv shows and now these people feel lost in the stories told in the movies and discouraged to even watch them.
@@rodrigopfs Its just overwhelming. I feel like I'd have to make it a full time job to get caught up at this point and frankly, I dont care.
The lack of cohesive storylines hit the nail right on the proverbial infinity stones. It feels like they stepped over their own feet in order to try and tell too many isolated narratives with too many different hands passing over them. Btw, the editing on this was top shelf. 👌
it’s literally phase 1 just more characters for development and bringing in new ones and taking away the old ones
@@Hatterway But at least the phase 1 films had their own coherent endings to keep us satisfied during the wait for the ultimate event. The incompatible tone and quality of the phase 4 films will make the ultimate event less impactful because it won't be as natural as Infinity War. Also, we haven't really seen true character development in these shows. They get introduced to us in their ultimate state almost immediately, or they start off undeveloped and then abruptly become fully developed (very little time for them to transform).
@@TexasIronLegend I agree 💯 Starting them off as one step away from an avenger/superhero is so underwhelming because we don't really see the development (like you mentioned) of a real character arc but instead, they either start off close or they go from a normal person to a superhero in a single episode. Well said.
Now that we're getting to Secret Wars, I hope it gets better. but MCU really needs to stop doing the lighthearted joke bits. they hardly ever let serious moments play out anymore without some dumb quip
The way antman 3 made endgame a stupid joke.. I feel like now Loki S2 should reboot the entire MCU or else change Kevin 🤷🏻♂️
My main two problems with the MCU nowadays are that it feels bloated and that everything had built up to Endgame. That’s what I had invested my time into. I feel what they managed to pull off with the infinity saga just can’t be replicated.
Let's hope they can atleast mimic some of its success with the introduction of Mutants, Fantastic 4 and Doctor Doom
It’s like none of u saw the phase 5 line up. Phase 6 alone is gonna shit on endgame and infinity war and phase 1,2&3 combined.
@@josuafraser4865 Yeah? At the rate they're going I wouldn't be surprised if it was mostly mid.
@@josuafraser4865 they can have a great line up and still have meh / bad movies, which has been most phase 4 content so far (imo moon knight was the only thing that felt just as good as pre phase 4)
@@ConcealedWeaponry at this rate I wouldn't be surprised if most people stopped watching
This is what I explained to my friends lmao, the avengers are pretty much gone, and they’re just tossing all these new characters and issues at us with minimal crossover making one big mess for the average fan to follow through, personally I’m just waiting for the midnight suns or at the very least a ghost rider to appear
Do you remember what phase 2 and 3 were actually like? Constantly every movie everyone was wondering where the other hero’s are and why they aren’t interacting, the nostalgia goggles for the first 3 phases is insane to me
@@bertmanstew5598 Omfg finally someone with some sense I agree wholeheartedly with you. It's all going to make sense in Phases 5&6.
They brought the whole Marvel universe together for two movies to fight bad guys and then suddenly no-one talks to each other ever again. Infinity War and Endgame should have been the new formula. No more single hero movies while the entire world/universe is going to be annihilated. I get the super heroes have their own charms but they translated perfectly in the group dynamic movies. Sure give them a single movie to establish the character if you want, but from there introduce them to the actual world, not their own little bubble that nobody else is allowed to enter. I was really disappointed that we didn't have a proper Guardians + Thor movie.
@@bertmanstew5598 I was writing a literal essay for this, how everything should be making sense now... until I remembered that the Marvel movies were released in disorder and there where numerous big problems and every other hero just didn't seem to care. If we wait maybe everything will make sense.
@@SolarTxl also people complain about the quality going downhill when it’s always been mostly mid, a couple garbage movies, and a few that shined. Civil War came out around the same time as Thor 2 and Iron Man 2/3, Antman 2 and Captain Marvel came out around the same time as Infinity War and Endgame, etc.
I think phase 4 was always supposed to be a mess, they're tossing everything at a wall to see what sticks with an audience, except the audience just got bored and left.
are you sure? because as far as i saw even absolute messes like Quantumania and Thor 4 were financial success.
@@frankhorrigan1508 well obviously, but just because something is profitable doesn't mean that it was a success
@@mustacheman3000 maybe in your eyes. In THEIR eyes as long as they make money they will continue to produce this garbage.
@@mustacheman3000kinda does
@@Carmenbratan343short term yes, but long term most likely not.
Honestly, most of the Marvel haven't really changed that much. What's changed is people's expectations where they compare them to the greater story rather than something building toward them. None of the originals had what I'd call compelling villains beyond a couple of exceptions, and the new movies are much the same. The Legacy Endgame did leave (and I should clarify that I'm not a fan of Infinity War or Endgame), is that they now feel the need to pump tons of CGI into every outing that is now more often and not taking place in alternate realms, multiverses, and space with intergalactic villains rather than mutants on earth. Not saying that's always bad, mind, since Guardians of the Galaxy is, imo, the best movies to come out of the Marvel project, but Guardians of the Galaxy, despite their name, often deal with small scale villains that have personal connections to them, which is where the better stories derive from. Another thing I've noticed since Endgame is that they also seem to be weaving TV series into the story, which is a bit silly when the audience for TV and movies, while overlapping in places, are different, and many move-goers who'll happily shell out for a visual experience on the big screen aren't going to spend hours sitting on their couch watching the catch-up exposition in between.
The Shang-Chi ending part was so facts, they really could’ve just had Wenwu be angry at the village for her death or for not giving him their powers and they didn’t need to include the dragons at all
I didnt even watch shang chen until the end
The dragons were a key part of the movie. The mother got her powers from the dragon, and the village entire purpose was to be protecters, the father being mad at the village for her death would make no sense. He also had his own powers called the 10 rings, and has never been shown to be in search for more power. Having a battle because he doesn’t have even more power when no one has posed a single threat to him makes 0 sense. It was his enemies that killed his wife. He only went to the village because he was being called by the dragon. Did you even watch the movie?
@@hlbwlt4867 Same, I enjoyed its sequel Shane Chang though
To be honest i went to watch it with my Girlfriend and it was so boring we ended up just making out
@@famus801 And then you woke up.
I think the problem is simpler: the initial phases started with being grounded in reality and built to a cosmic, ultimate stakes conclusion. In phase 4, they seem to be trying to top that - now building from something already fantastical and outlandish and getting ever more so - which makes keeping things relatable on a human level very hard. I think a better strategy would have been to “get back down to earth”; focus initially on the street level heros whose lives are more similar to our own, building empathy with the characters we’re supposed to care about. The big stories about timelines and multiverses can come, but you must first make care about the characters again. So tl:dr: it’s a all a bit too much.
It really does feel like an anime where the "power levels" have grown over time, and now we have villains who can blow up entire universes, so where the heck do you go from there? You can't.
I think that’s why I’m so excited for the next Spider-Man. The new suit and new scenario seems to be like they’re trying to introduce the classic Spider-Man story: Peter Parker has a life trying to get into education, paying rent, and balancing all that with being Spider-Man.
That's why I actually liked Hawkeye.
The different timelines really throw things off. It’s too much.
Yes 100% you've put this really well, this is why they've struggled. That's why I thought Falcon & Winter Soldier was quite good, it was smaller scale & real world.
Abandoned by Marvel. Abandoned by Disney. What Marvel should've done with the MCU was reveal Endgame as kind of like the few passages in Romeo and Juliet, basically, framing Endgame as the end. It ties up everything that's worth tying up in the moment and all of the satisfying endings for all of the characters that started this franchise. Everyone in the original group either retires or dies, and those that retire from international superheroing can finally have solo adventures that have not much really to do with each other because retirement. So, different writers can write their own stories. Second, prequel everything. Give us an accurate picture after Endgame of how every single character got to the Endgame point. Give every single character a "Thor Ragnarok" of sorts. Patch up every other character's story and just tell us where they were before and after Infinity War. Then do post-endgame content during phase 5. Finally, use everything that came before to inform and strictly guideline any writer that comes onto the project. If they're going to make a Marvel project, then they need to acknowledge the existence of the previous films and respect their writers, directors, artists, and everyone else who came before. They should still be encouraged to get as creative with their characters, but you must inform them of the original character's origins that they will be working with and then ask them what they want to do with the character, give them some time, let's say half of a month, to develop a cheap and low budget proof of concept, and then we can talk fullblown film. If the character they create ends up being too different and can be filled in with another Marvel character, give them that character and then let them roll with their concept. They need to decide whether or not it is appropriate to stay faithful to the character or to go as far away from the source material as possible, and then they need to be approved by a consensus that this idea would bring the character into Marvel's spotlight. Unfortunately, it seems as though they kind of just let their hired people run wild with little to no supervision and hoped that they knew what was best for the franchise, and some did, some didn't and most actively harmed it in ways that they both knew and understood and in ways that they couldn't possibly fathom the repercussions of their actions and had to live with them up until the final scenes. It's sad, but ey, at least it seems like they're slowly picking themselves back up, it'll just take a really, really long while for them to reach back up the original Endgame.
I love how you completely forgot about Captain Marvel. Because I certainly have.
Surprise villains can be fine, but in my opinion, the pay off with them is never the surprise, but having a moment where everything "clicks". Where a lot of things make sense in hindsight, or the satisfaction of recognizing the build up and seeing your observations recognized with a correct guess
Anyone else getting MCU burnout?
@@johnfulcher8448 I'm not sure if we should call it "MCU burnout" or "MCU crash!" Everything was building up to the finale, the Endgame, where everything was heading and the hype was real! Suddenly we're in a situation where everyone is following their own story, and whenever something big happens we wonder "Where is everyone else?" We had they high, here's the crash!
@@xendordawnburst9969 that's it, at this point every movie they make has to basically be a avengers movie or else it just dosnt seem to make much sense
Unfortunately, pulling a Kaizer Soze takes some great acting chops and writing. The current writers just aren't that good. Indeed, most Hollywood script writers seem to be just plain bad. The ones who are good, I don't think are being brought on board the Big Budget projects, except for a few. Interestingly, the DC movies are getting better, which is a genuine shocker.
I think my favourite version of this is Littlefinger being revealed to have killed Jon Arryn in Game of Thrones. He's already a villain at this point, but you just think he's a backstabbing opportunist. It's only in that scene when you realise he is so, so much worse. And there were already signs of that which make the reveal make sense.
The MCU has been special to me for a long time. It seems like in a lot of ways it's state mirrored my own life. Endgame came out my senior year of high school and it was both the MCU and my high point. Then corona comes along and nothing is the same, everything is directionless, monotonous, just bland and uncertain and it leaves you yearning for what came before.
Same for me bro. Exactly the same.
Think about it though. Was phase 4 that bad? Sure it suffered but I think a big part of that is the pandemic. Now everyone wants what come before. Why? Because life was simpler. That’s my take anyway
Oh, most likely we are the same age lol
Na dude, that’s just adulthood 😂
People getting old dont realize theyre also getting "boring". When its not a super devisive, black-supremacist film, im fine with some of the more lighthearted, dumb entertainment. Just ignore the people telling you everything is going to shot.
Watching this after the release of the second season of Loki is so interesting because I think that season tied so much of the overarching world together, but I agree it just needs to end. There’s too much going on with not enough connection and the constant attempt to keep old marvel relevant and renewed without the characters they need. They have made some great stories in phase 4 but that’s really all they are.
This is a fantastically well made video! You just earned a new subscriber.
i feel like 30% of the shows and movies have been good in phase 4 but as you said, they really don't have good endings or cohesion leaving us feel empty when they end, i feel like most people enjoyed wandavision, loki, moon knight when they came out and episodes were being dicussed but when they ended most people forgot about them. Shang Chi and No Way Home were especially good as well.
Wandavision was really frustrating for me because I thought the show was great, quite original and prepared for something even better. But what we got (Multiverse of madness) was really disappointing with a serial killer Wanda that doesn't stitch well with the ending of wandavision and a totally absent white Vision. I couldn't get into Loki because I thought that, well, Loki was just dumb. He is despicted as a master of lies, a manipulator, but during the whole show he is just stupid. At first I thought he figured it all out and had a plan for everything, but no, not at all. It's a miracle the dude is still alive. Overall I think his character is badly written. Female loki isn't better.
@@jonathaningram8157 ye u have summed up how i feel about those shows aswell. Wanadavision was good overall but the ending was a generic fight and multiverse of madness did nothing to help her character, they didnt bring back white vision or do anything with that storyline indeed. And loki had an interesting story in my opinion but you are right in that he was dumbed down so that the female loki could stand out more
_what we got (Multiverse of madness) was really disappointing with a serial killer Wanda that doesn't stitch well with the ending of wandavision_ It's just shitty writing and directing. People don't understand what happened. - Scott Derrickson who did Doctor Strange 1 was supposed to direct. - Nightmare was the main villain. It was going to be a twisted surreal horror film. - Wanda was to start out as a genuine ally of Strange but fall down a dark path by the film's end. - America Chavez was going to be introduced as a multiverse jumping character. - The multiverse was going to come unraveled in this film. - No Way Home would come *after* this film, and so would not need the stupid plot about getting into college and Strange casting the cartoon forget spell. [which makes no 'magical' sense and is just one of the dumbest uses of magic - ever] - There were actual story boards showing Chavez opening the portals to rescue Strange in No Way Home. - Both films - potentially - would have actually made sense. - This was tricky and took time to develop. But Disney was impatient and greedy and told Scott to hurry up or step off. - Scott got fired. - And then Covid 19 happened. - This completely made a joke of Disney's hurry up demand because it shut down the whole film industry - Scott would have had plenty of time to write MOM as it turned out - but...too late now - he went on to make the Black Phone (a much better horror film) instead. - Enter Sony: Now they refused to wait for Multiverse Of Madness and just rewrote NWH with one of the *stupidest* plots in the history of writing. lol. [Sony and Disney basically f'ed both films into the ground] - Meanwhile Feige in desperation turned to burnt-out Sam Raimi to direct MoM, and minimum wage writer Michael Waldron to do the multiverse writing (cuz he did cartoon multiverse for Rick and Morty) - The result is a complete cluster fk. Multiverse of Madness retcons the entire Infinity Saga so that it makes *no sense* and turns a complex character Wanda Maximov - into a cartoon horror movie witch from an evil dead movie. What a mess.
_Wandavision was good overall but the ending was a generic fight_ There was more to it than that - that was *not* generic but many people didn't get it. The two androids had a battle of logic. The two witches had a psychological war. There's a great scene where Wanda using Runes - sneaks up on Agatha and attempts to westview her [mind control]. But Agatha is counting on this - and she traps Wanda in *her* mind where the other witches all turn on Wanda, because they know she is the foretold Scarlett Witch. Almost no one got this scene though - they think it's just generic something-something fighting. Should have been better executed but it's still better than almost anything else in all of phase 4. The dumb fkry that went on in multiverse of madness does not even bear examining. Wanda is too stupid to even understand how a woman can actually 'have babies' with the power of 'female' and would not need to go on insane killing spree.... [which Raimi's laughable 'horror' movie needs and just uses Wanda to make it happen] Raimi and Waldron don't get this, and don't get how the character they've created has no credibility from a female perspective.
90% of everything Endgame and after has been absolute GARBAGE. Shang Chi was not bad but not great, No Way Home was a colossal waste of time because much like Wandavision and the new Dr Strange, Marvel Disney has no clue how a multiverse works.
I feel like with every new release, they have to keep upping the stakes, and eventually it feels overwhelming to have stakes that high in a solo movie.
Ah yes “the goku effect”
That's the thing. Once Endgame ended they needed to dial everything back, or else the world would be facing "end of the world" type events with every movie. For example - Shang-Chi had the potential to just tell a story about a family conflict, but had to throw in a creature that would destroy the world at the end. They could have just moved that to a different movie, and made it a team-up thing. Or even just left it for a Shang-Chi 2 that went into what the rings were.
Reminds me of how ridiculous the Fast & Furious franchise got
@@SRFAA absolutely. Shang-Chi, Eternals, Dr Strange 2, so many of these movies have had world- or even dimension-ending stakes. Black Widow even had the Red Room manipulating the whole world for that to be set up and resolved in one movie.
This is what I call the supernatural effect. Season 5 was a good ending. Endgame was a good ending. I'd be satisfied never watching a marvel movie again after endgame (except for anything directed by waititi)
Really enjoyed this vid, but the surprise at the end of Loki was an example of that trope done really well IMO. He Who Remains isn't the same character as Kang and thus it felt like it landed the triple axel with what they resolved in the Loki story and set up what is to come for the future of the MCU, where as most everything else had big misses much earlier in their runs from oddly transparent rewrites and maybe the impatience you mentioned. It's gotten to the point of painfully low expectations though with all the output from Disney + save from Andor and to a lesser extent Ms. Marvel (it's sins seem far more forgivable somehow?). Even at the movie theater, where for some reason I think we're pretty forgiving, the House of Mouse is slipping and I am hoping that there is a real trickle down effect with their swap back to better days in the CEO territory. Cheers!
Not only infinity stone, there are thing like shield and vibranium which glued every story together.
I reckon there should’ve been a 1-2 year break after endgame. To give time for everyone to settle and for rumours and hype to begin. Marvel could’ve taken their time to make the films/series and eventually after that year or two they would announce the new saga and the films that would begin it.
..... There was. Maybe not in terms of announcements but COVID kept Marvel from releasing stuff for a while
Yeah, I don't know how they could fail so badly after Endgame, when they succeeded before. I mean, they wrote the handbook. Introduce new generation of superheroes, focus on 3-4 main heroes driving a core narrative. Get a climatic movie with these main heroes. Slowly introduce another 4-6 side heroes alongside, intro'd via TV shows or as part of the main narrative. Build towards another event film. Rinse and repeat.
thats literally a cardboard cut out of what they did i doubt theyd wanna be that shallow
@@headshot531 lol if anything their current approach is far more shallow, a retread would've been better
This is literally what they're doing right now. Like, to a T. People just wan't everything. If they didn't kill off characters and introduce others, people would still complain that "Theyre just doing the same." There's no winning.
Simple, that the entire MCU was building up to Endgame. Thanos was being teased since 2012, since the first Avengers movie. And now... That's it. it's over. Endgame was just too much of an ending. Not that i'm complaining, I rather things end on a high note and be done with it, but now they are just trying to do something the MCU wasn't meant to do.
@@davidstinger1134 it has to reset and build to something else (kang/secret wars) which it is. People are being dumb
I really like this dissection and I couldn’t agree more. I also really appreciate that you acknowledge that most of these films are not bad on their own as many have (somewhat hyperbolically so) said that this phase is shockingly poor. Truthfully, it just feels like a kitchen with too many cooks. Each ingredient decent on its own, but together, they just become conflicting and over saturated in their flavors, so to speak.
it would have been interesting to see how they all link together by now. At least a common motif of the big threat, perhaps the TVA or the celestials but as this video said, there is just is no clear links beween each of the character stories
There was a time and a place for Marvel MCU films. They won’t be around forever, and it reflects on what people wanted at the time. There will be another movement in media that will define future decades to come. The problem with many stories is that they don’t know when to say: “The End”, and “They all lived happily ever after”; having a conclusion that stays concluded is a powerful message.
I think a hurdle Marvel Studio will have to figure out is the escalation problem. More powerful heroes, bigger conflicts, in shorter lengths of time.
Great video. Last line cracked me up because i literally just watched that before this.
I feel like people are overlooking how it took them three phases to build up to endgame. We’re in the first phase of the multiverse saga. I can agree that phase 4 didn’t have it’s own “it all came together” moment but I think it’s silly to assume they aren’t all building towards another endgame. It feels disjointed now because we haven’t seen the end yet. Or at least I hope that’s the case.
I'd say losing SHIELD as a way to tie the world's together has hurt too. Wong can only do so much
Yeah, which is weird because they were teased to be returning back in Age of Ultron. Then they didn't even involve them in Civil War. They definitely need a SHIELD to have things come together. Especially with all these characters popping up all over the place. Perfect for recruiting a new team.
While I agree that the connections are important the biggest issue for me is the over dependence on humor and lack of stakes. Allow moments to be serious and the consequences to be devastating. If there are no consequences then there are no risks, GoT was so wonderful during it's prime because you were unsure who would live and who would die. If Marvel adopts this mentality after phase 4 they might succeed more. Allow certain characters, to lose some serious fights and allow the world to feel the effects. Then you can bring characters together to battle this issue and it will feel genuine. For Example in Doctor Strange MoM: Can you imagine how much better it would have been if Strange had lost to evil Strange? America Chavez is killed not by Wanda, but by the evil Strange who had beaten our Strange and made a deal with Mephisto or Dormammu sending our Strange to be a prisoner? Where in another story Wanda has to team up with the Midnight sons to save him? Real stakes make the story immersive without them they are bland.
The only opinion not coming from hate.
Well if you think about marvel character comic books, they have entire arcs and stories that have no connection to other characters, marvel movies need to remain independent whilst having specific movies dedicated to linking the dots eg teamup movies ect
Not a problem. Just get another Strange, that's the exact same as our Strange from the multiverse (after all, this nonsense can be used to fix anything, the multiverse is 'infinite'). Or better yet, that's not even a stake, because Wanda can do anything. She can make the evil Strange into spaghetti and meatballs. Done. The problem isn't the 'stakes'. The problem is the nonsense of 'multiverse', where no character is truly dead, the nonsense of woke genius girl boss op characters like 'Wanda', where she can apparently do anything and so on.
They do actually have a plan with Phase 4, as everything has led to one of a few things they’re trying to set up: 1st, the New set of Avengers, with Spider-Man, Captain America (Falcon), and others. 2nd, they are setting up this whole Kang plot line, as they seem to be trying to get to the Time War mentioned in Loki Season 1, and 3rd, tying into the Kang plot line, their setting up the Young Avengers, with Quantumania, Hawkeye, and others, and will probably complete the team with Iron Lad, like in the comics, also because he is the past version of Kang in the comics, which will probably tie into their introduction.
I hope faze 5 will have more compelling and we'll put together stories/films. As long as they work well with each other in the same universe, and they give time and effort to push the boundaries of film, it should be great