THE MARVELS starring Brie Larson, Iman Vellani and Teyonna Parris (2023) 9 9

[Bosco685]

John Campea seemed to ejoy it somewhat. And again - someone saying this felt like a Disney+ show made into a movie.

 

[VintageComics]

On 11/11/2023 at 5:29 PM, D84 said:

In before the next lock!

Seriously, can we have one ing Marvel movie thread that doesn't break into a debate like on a political round table. I've taken a step back from here because I'm sick of it.

If you didn't like or aren't interested in this movie doesn't make someone sexist and liking it doesn't make you virtuous. 

It's just a movie!

There is zero politics. It's all opinions and discussions around business decisions. 

Everyone has something they don't like. I hate it when one forum is dominated by endless posts and memes about movie revenue but I don't gripe about it even though that's all this forum is sometimes. 

So which is better? 10,000 posts of single memes or 10 posts with 1000 words? The end result is the same amount of volume. 

It's just a matter of personal preference. 

There's a large group of people who actually are enjoying the longform discussion and I just focus on what I like and ignore the rest. That's probably best for everyone. You guys really don't want me griping about posters here, do you? That could get VERY long winded.

 

Edited November 11, 2023 by VintageComics

[mr_highgrade]

Just finish watching the movie with only one of my four sons. One is away in college, the other two heard the movie sucked and weren't interested in going.  There were some cringey moments that I can do without. You'll know when you see it. One word, "Bollywood".  Overall, my son and I enjoyed it. 

[Ken Aldred]

On 11/11/2023 at 11:33 AM, jimjum12 said:

It's either that, or this place is a Mecca for people who are unable to like anything. GOD BLESS...

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Wait for the reviews to come in, let the opinions settle, wait a few months for it to come down in price on Blu-ray and, at the end of all that, consider buying it if it seems to be a good film I’d watch repeatedly.

Common sense, patience and restraint, rather than nihilism.

[ymisbatg]

Just saw it.  It was fun, and yes, it had some silly scenes, but it didn't take itself too seriously.  The Marvels does not have a very heavy, serious tone, and I kinda enjoy that right now. 

 In my very personal rating system, it ranks above GOTG vol3 and below Thor: The Dark World.  Solidly in the middle tier of all the MCU movies.  The team fighting scenes were pretty good, and the plot was understandable (for a superhero movie).  

I was entertained and not bored during the movie.  It is not my favorite MCU film, but I enjoyed it much more than...

Spoiler

Thor: Love and Thunder

[paqart]

On 11/11/2023 at 11:33 PM, ymisbatg said:

Just saw it.  It was fun, and yes, it had some silly scenes, but it didn't take itself too seriously.  The Marvels does not have a very heavy, serious tone, and I kinda enjoy that right now. 

 In my very personal rating system, it ranks above GOTG vol3 and below Thor: The Dark World.  Solidly in the middle tier of all the MCU movies.  The team fighting scenes were pretty good, and the plot was understandable (for a superhero movie).  

I was entertained and not bored during the movie.  It is not my favorite MCU film, but I enjoyed it much more than...

  Hide contents

Thor: Love and Thunder

That's like saying you liked it better than Plan 9 from outer space.

[Cat]

On 11/12/2023 at 4:16 AM, paqart said:

A problem with doing this now is that "Marvel's best creatives" aren't the same people they were fifteen years ago. If they could go back to the mid-eighties, about as far as they can go with living creatives, you'd get a better result than what they have now. That, or work with people who've gone independent or left comics.

That's an opinion, far from fact. You're still stuck in the 80's, and that's fine, but you can't authoratatively say that things were better in the 80's. They were in your rose-coloured glasses' world. For me it was the 90's, and 2000's. That was my era, which happily does coincide with the start of these types of films. But it doesn't mean I'm right either. It just means my opinion is different. 

The best time for comics is.... whenever you enjoyed them most, probably when you were younger and freshly introduced to them. 

We need to be careful not to misstep and put across our opinions as fact. That way leads to danger and closed minds, and wrong ways of thinking. 

[Cat]

On 11/12/2023 at 2:06 AM, fantastic_four said:

So fire the only guy who's ever done what he's done.  The guy Warner Brothers has been searching for their own version of for almost two decades without success.  I had high hopes that Geoff Johns would be that guy, but I was skeptical from the start--with good reason, it turned out.  Creative types like him usually get frustrated with the business aspect of films after a while when they're relatively young like he was, so I wasn't at all surprised when he stepped down.  They never fully gave him control anyway, so I'm still not sure who to blame that on.

So, fire a one of one dude in Feige and replace him with...who?    Ideally it will be a superfan without writing or art creds like Feige has always been.  There was never any danger that Feige would go back to writing or drawing because he didn't have skill at that to even fall back on it like a Geoff Johns did.  That's Kathleen Kennedy's problem--she's a stellar producer, but she is NOT a content curator, nor does she appear to have much of an instinct for how to curate content and Star Wars has suffered for it.  I'm guessing Kennedy has never known who Figrin D'an is, and that's who they need curating their content--a superfan.  Pablo Hidalgo and Dave Filoni are superfans, but both are also writers so they're not ideal candidates.  They're still both the best candidates to have creative control over that content, but neither has really been given that control to date so who knows how they'd do.  

Whatever happened to Leland Chee? He was the chronicler of Star Wars, it's resident continuity expert. If you needed info on a character, someone's history, or to see if a scene made sense canonically, it went through him. Is he still there at Lucas film in his role? 

[Larryw7]

We need to hear from Silvermane He said Captain.Marvel was going.to be the new leader of The Avengers and that Marvel movies will be incredibly popular until the end of time, Silvermane, please advise.

[ganni]

 Maybe "Warner" will make their own "The Marvels" movie... I'm still in my dreams I guess   

Edited November 12, 2023 by ganni

[godzilla43]

I am happy that this movie tanks in box office. I started recently watch The Boys from Amazon because I had Amazon Prime. Did not know anything about it but I find it much more enjoyable than most of Marvel shows. Why? Because something happens in every episode. Like in Loki there was episodes were nothing happened but we got a feeling that there is some big evil out there. Then in final episode you see a version of Kang (He who remains). That's it. Like for a better story Kang should have appeared in  third episode and Loki would battle him but no because Marvel is jeopardizing the story in sake of holding its characters for always something. Well in this case Kang for big screens Ant-man 3.. and we all know what happened.

I bet that 2-3 years ago Marvel was thinking that this decade would the decade for these B-list "Avengers" and Kang. Then 2030 would be FF and 2040 would be X-men..

Edited November 12, 2023 by godzilla43

[Bosco685]

The Japanese are so polite when posting a neutral to negative review.

Hideo Kojima (Japanese video game designer regarded as an auteur of video games who created the Metal Gear series).

Compared to his recent post about The Killer.

[1950's war comics]

On 11/11/2023 at 11:25 AM, paqart said:

Just to pile on a bit here: Forcing anything invites resistance.

In Endgame, when Captain Marvel grabs Thor's hammer, he says, "I like this one." I have always interpreted that line as an attempt by the producers to tell the audience that they are supposed to like Captain Marvel. It reminded me of those occasions when, as a child, certain adults would try to make me be friends with someone I didn't want to be friends with. It wouldn't surprise me if the kid on the other end of those introductions felt the same way.

This isn't much different from when my wife tries to make me take vitamins or when religious family members force their kids to go to church. There isn't anything wrong with (most) vitamins or churches, but people don't like being told what to do. The latest incarnation of the MCU appears to have decided that it knows better than the audience. They know what we should like, and is giving us that, a steady diet of the movie version of liver. They think we'll go along with it because we have given them the authority to decide what is best for us by supporting their earlier movies. I have nothing against the idea of other people eating nothing but liver, but I'm not interested.

Unfortunately for Disney, this attempt to force their taste on everyone else is backfiring. Not just because they don't like the fare, but because it is repellent. That is why they don't get to keep the existing audience as they add to it. Sticking to the food analogy, let's say you have a string of popular steak houses and decide to add a vegan menu to appeal to vegans. That might work, because non-vegans aren't repulsed by vegan food. They just want meat in their diet also. If you have a string of popular vegan restaurants who decide to add small amounts of meat to their dishes to appeal to non-vegans and expand their customer list, they're going to lose all the vegans. This is because vegans are repulsed by the meat added to their food, which is no longer vegan.

Many things can be forgiven in a film as long as it retains the essence of what makes it interesting in the first place. In my case, a time travel movie has to be really bad for me to not like it because I'll forgive almost anything in a time travel movie. Oddly enough, this is not true of superhero movies. I thought it was true, because I kept going to every MCU movie as if every fault was invisible, for the same reasons I ignored flaws in time travel movies. Looking back on it, I see now that this wasn't the reason.

Up until Iron Man, I didn't like superhero movies. After Civil War, I became suspicious of superhero movies. I haven't enjoyed more than half of the releases since then. What happened? Why did I start liking them, and why did I stop? It had nothing to do with superheroes or an interest in the genre.

Prior to Iron Man, every superhero movie I'd seen, including movies I worked on (Spider-Man, X-Men 2, and Daredevil) had very little going for them beyond the superhero license. I didn't like them for the same reason I didn't like movie adaptations in comic book or book firm. In those cases, as with Star Wars, the movie was the original, and everything else was a pale imitation. Iron Man changed that. For the first time in my experience, the licensed material was more than the original. Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man had standalone cinematic merit.

I continued watching MCU movies, hoping they would continue making films that stood on their own, apart from and in many ways richer than the comics. They succeeded over and over again. This is why those movies were so popular. They were good movies. The characters, situations, and themes were interesting independent of the source material. This is why they appealed to an audience that was much larger than the number of active comic book buyers. 

And then, Disney happened. Disney made two mistakes (mistakes they also made with Pixar, and to a lesser extent with Star Wars). They went back to treating MCU movies as a stable of licensed characters, as opposed to a universe filled with interesting people, and they decided to slip a little iodine into the brew, in the form of their pet causes. Marvel characters are not enough to make a popular movie. That much was proven with all the pre-MCU movies. Thinking the licensed properties alone will keep the fans in the theaters is like assuming that a tree painted by Van Gogh will inspire every other artist in the same way, to keep museums packed with visitors who want to see images of that tree. Guess what? They don't care about the tree. They want to see how Van Gogh painted it.

This is analogous to assistant editor's month at Marvel, or fill-in issues. With rare exceptions, these are both reasons to groan because we accidentally bought something we didn't want and know we won't enjoy. Not only that, the value of those issues in the price guides is always lower than everything on either side of the issue range.

Let's not forget the iodine. Some things can be tossed into a movie without noticeably affecting quality. For instance, brand placement. Sometimes it stands out as ridiculous, like the Apple computer used to defeat the aliens in Independence Day. More often, we don't notice it. Sometimes, it adds to the film, like the fancy cars driven by James Bond or Tony Stark. Product placement does exist in MCU films, and it is no better or worse than in any other film. They also have ideology placement, and this is the poison that kills the ride for me.

When I go to a film, one of the things I am hoping to accomplish is to leave the real world behind for a couple of hours. Even if it is a true story about the real world, like Marie, Erin Brockovich, or Schindler's List, it isn't my real world. In my real world, I am thinking about whether I had my vitamins, whether I'll get my latest project done on time, and whether I want to cancel my next dentist appointment. That's the stuff I want to leave behind. As part of that, there are real world irritants that I don't want to think about unless the irritant is somehow chastised. For instance, a bully who pesters every kid on the block has a spaceship land on him. That would be fine. If instead, he is the hero of the film because of his bullying, and he is never upbraided for his bad manners, then I will not enjoy the film no matter its other qualities.

Disney's introduction of their pet causes into the MCU has had the effect of polluting the films with noxious odors. Some might like these additions. I hate the smell of all things related to chickens. Other people love the smell of chickens and eggs. I won't eat if someone is eating either of those foods near me because the smell is so revolting to me. My reaction to chicken is not mainstream. It isn't even close. The sellers of chicken parts have nothing to worry about from me. However, what if I took over the biggest chicken processing plant in the country and turned it into an artificial chicken-like vegan "chicken" product? Would I get new customers? Probably. Would I lose more than I gained, probably. That is what Disney did.

The tragedy is that the MCU was really wonderful for awhile. If it hadn't been, the current malaise wouldn't be noticed because no one would care.

thank you for another brilliant post full of depth and insight !

this is the type of post that should go mainstream with 150 million views

[1950's war comics]

On 11/11/2023 at 3:54 PM, VintageComics said:

There is zero politics. It's all opinions and discussions around business decisions. 

Everyone has something they don't like. I hate it when one forum is dominated by endless posts and memes about movie revenue but I don't gripe about it even though that's all this forum is sometimes. 

So which is better? 10,000 posts of single memes or 10 posts with 1000 words? The end result is the same amount of volume. 

It's just a matter of personal preference. 

There's a large group of people who actually are enjoying the longform discussion and I just focus on what I like and ignore the rest. That's probably best for everyone. You guys really don't want me griping about posters here, do you? That could get VERY long winded.

 

thank you ! this is actually the best, most informative thread i have read here in at least a couple years

[1950's war comics]

i too hate being bashed over the head with messages when i go to a movie... that is why i stopped going to them some 3-4 years ago 

only war movies over the past decade or so were any good , like Dunkirk etc ...

[pemart1966]

On 11/12/2023 at 2:05 AM, Larryw7 said:

We need to hear from Silvermane He said Captain.Marvel was going.to be the new leader of The Avengers and that Marvel movies will be incredibly popular until the end of time, Silvermane, please advise.

Was just thinking the same thing yesterday...

[Cat]

On 11/12/2023 at 8:01 PM, Bosco685 said:

The Japanese are so polite when posting a neutral to negative review.

Hideo Kojima (Japanese video game designer regarded as an auteur of video games who created the Metal Gear series).

Compared to his recent post about The Killer.

Same thing he posted about the first film. We can discard him as a candidate for Silvermane's IRL identity. 

[Bosco685]

This is cute. I bet being a fairly young actor working with a star you admire must be intimidating.

 

[Bosco685]

Quote

The last-minute push for The Marvels with an appearance by star Brie Larson on Friday’s The Tonight Show and at a theater in NYC post-actors strike have not moved weekend grosses any higher for Marvel Studios‘ The Marvels.

 

The film is posting a weekend at the bottom of yesterday’s estimates with $47M, the lowest ever for Disney‘s Marvel Cinematic Universe. This after a $15M Saturday, -30% against previews/Friday of $21.5M. Worldwide, per Nancy who’ll have an update soon, is at $110M, which is also a bottom rung for the MCU and below the $140M we were forecasting.

 

Also, The Marvels gets one of several post-pandemic B CinemaScores from audiences after Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (B+), Thor Love & Thunder (B+), Eternals (B), and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (B). Comscore/Screen Engine PostTrak exits are worse at 3 1/2 stars and a 73% positive.

 

By all accounts and by all sources, it’s a disastrous result for a $200M Marvel Studios movie. But, wait, didn’t we declare Apple Original Studios’ and Paramount’s $200M Killers of the Flower Moon at $44M a success a few weeks ago? Just sit down, I’ll explain in a bit.

 

[VintageComics]

On 11/12/2023 at 5:01 AM, Bosco685 said:

The Japanese are so polite when posting a neutral to negative review.

Most people in the West can learn a lot from more the Japanese than the Japanese can learn from the West and I attribute it to the age and maturity of the culture. The mistakes the West are making now in all aspects, the Japanese were making 1000's of years ago. They've matured out of it. 

I've enjoyed learning about Japanese culture since Frank Miller introduced me to it circa 1982 and have tried to more or less incorporate a similar philosophy in my life since becoming an adult. 

Their greatest asset is self accountability and self editing, which is a lost art in the West. That's why they're respectful even to the things and people they dislike.