Spectacle and Spandex on the Silver Screen

So, who's excited for Infinity War this week?!

Yes, yes, I know, it's a bit gauche to buy into Disney's unstoppable hype juggernaut (not Star Wars, the other one), but I'm actually really looking forward to the overstuffed, inevitably messy culmination of the Marvel Cinematic Universe despite my attempts at staying aloof.

(I blame Chris Evans' beard.)

It's been a bumpy road, in places, but it's still kind of impressive that Feige et al have managed any sort of narrative cohesion across twenty different films over the last decade, especially as every other studio's attempt to do the same has crumbled almost immediately. Shared cinematic universes went from "that'll never work!" to "how do we do that?" in the space of a couple of years, and somehow Marvel's still the only one to pull it off with any success.

It can't just be because they were first, surely? DC's stable of characters is arguably more recognisable than Marvel's (certainly than it was at the beginning of this experiment), but WB made a severe miscalculation when they decided they wanted Zak Snyder to set the tone. Other Shared Cinematic Universes were just doomed to begin with - the Dark Universe of classic movie monsters never stood a chance.

But they keep trying! There's talk of an expanded Fast & Furious universe, Transformers and GI Joe crossing over into a Hasbro Cinematic Universe, and they've already started laying the groundwork for a Godzilla/Kong shared universe - though arguably there's already a template for that in the Toho Godzilla catalogue, and they're taking it slower than some of the other already-failed attempts.

Back to Infinity War, though - I've seen a couple of "first reactions!" headlines, presumably from the premiere, but I'm going to do everything in my power to go into the cinema without reading a review or seeing a Metacritic average. We're not seeing it 'til Friday afternoon, so midnight screening junkies will make Twitter a no-go from Thursday.

Anybody else got tickets booked, or are you all too burned-out on comic book movies to care?

I’m still working my way through the movies, one a week, so I’m not quite going to be there in time for release. Did Captain America: Civil War and Doctor Strange over the last two weekends. In general they just keep getting better (and I came into this with limited patience for superheroes, at best) so yes I’m definitely on board for this. Hope it’s as good as everyone hopes.

Changed the title of the thread to be less MCU-specific because there's a proper trailer out for Venom, starring Tom Hardy, and it's… it's a thing.

Full disclosure: I kinda love the mashup of the gritty aesthetic and the totally goofy stuff that kicks in as soon as the sim-bi-ote makes a proper appearance. There's no way to make this movie and not have it be silly, but it looks to me like they've gone with just the right level of seriousness in the periphery to pull it off.

What’s Venom then? That’s not MCU I take it?

That's actually a complicated question, now that Spider-Man is in the MCU.

Venom is a character in the Spider-Man comics. Short version: it's an alien symbiont that merged temporarily with Peter Parker, but it was too violent so he rejected it and it ended up bonding with Eddie Brock, a rival of Parker's at the Daily Bugle. (Luscan can probably fill you in on the rest.)

It made an appearance in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3 (jazz hands), but with the Amazing films and now the MCU reboot of Spider-Man, this is effectively another origin story for the character.

It's unclear whether this is set in the same universe as the MCU Spidey, or if it's off in its own thing. Honestly it'd be weird not to tie it into the MCU with a couple of references to Stark Industries, but I don't expect Tom Hardy to be in Avengers 4 or anything. I think Eddie Brock and Peter Parker were pretty close in age in the comics, but obviously there are a few years between Hardy and Tom Holland, so there might be some other departures from the comics.

Hmmm. Same deal with Deadpool I guess? Kind of related but not? I saw that was on Netflix the other night and was torn as to whether to watch it or not.

Deadpool is fun enough, but I have a feeling it's going to age terribly - if you're going to watch it, the sooner the better.

I probably will then.

Just want to make sure I don’t accidentally end up watching anything with Ben Affleck in it.

I assumed I was way behind on these, and would need to watch dozens of films to catch up, but I've actually only missed Thor 3 and Black Panther. God knows how I managed that.

I've hit spandex overload to be honest, but I'll still go watch this, just because everyone else is and I'm a sucker.

I have faith that Infinty War will be a lot of fun the first time at least. I went to see Black Panther in the cinema last week and really enjoyed that, and I re-watched Civil War just last night and found it better on a second viewing. Still haven't seen Dr Strange though.

I thought Doctor Strange was very enjoyable but a bit inconsequential: it didn’t have much of a plot, it was just Benedict Cumberbatch being charismatic for two hours.

The real fun will come in finding out how they integrate him with the rest of the squad (assuming they haven’t already done that in any of the intervening movies): he’s so insanely powerful that he’s going to make most of the Avengers’ signature moves (punching people, oh look I’ve got some arrows) look a bit silly.

I rewatched Doctor Strange yesterday (boy, Mads Mikkelsen and Chiwetel Ejiofor are squandered) and it's actually much better than I initially gave it credit for.

The finale still kind of comes out of nowhere, because Spoiler - click to showthe abilities of the Eye of Agamotto are so vaguely-defined - it would have been good to establish the programmable-loop technique earlier in the film - and Strange's decision is played as an experimental excursion rather than as an acceptance of his greater responsibilities, and they could have done a better job communicating how much time Strange spent studying in Nepal (the phone call he takes at the start, just before crashing his car, includes a reference to the battle at the end of Civil War) - but the character work is much stronger than I remembered.

It's not a Civil War reference.

EDIT: can't find the exact line, but the director has confirmed that it's not Rhodey, and while Don Cheadle looks good for 51, I don't think Rhodey is 35.

Yeah, you're right - the exact line is "I've got a 35 year old Marine Colonel, crushed his lower spine in some kind of experimental armor", which also isn't the right branch of the military for Rhodes. Consensus seems to be that it's a reference to a guy in Hammer's armour from Iron Man 2, though there's apparently a 2016-dated trophy on the shelf when Strange is picking out a watch just before, so the timeline's screwy for that one, too.

I'm mega excited, it feels like every single film has been leading us to this, right back to Hulk. Like, even the first Avengers was amazing but still feels in the wider picture just a lead in to this and well done to all involved for making it work.

I'm seeing it a day early :O

I'm seeing it a day early :O

Yeah, you're right - the exact line is "I've got a 35 year old Marine Colonel, crushed his lower spine in some kind of experimental armor", which also isn't the right branch of the military for Rhodes. Consensus seems to be that it's a reference to a guy in Hammer's armour from Iron Man 2, though there's apparently a 2016-dated trophy on the shelf when Strange is picking out a watch just before, so the timeline's screwy for that one, too.

The MCU is all over the place, timeline-wise; Avengers Tower is in an establishing shot, too. I think Doctor Strange is supposed to take place over about a year, so starting in 2016 and ending in 2017. There's an "eight years later" card in Spider-Man Homecoming, too, that contradicts just about everything else.

There's definitely a reference to Stephen Strange in one of the earlier movies (Winter Soldier, maybe?) which suggests that pretty much all of the events of the Doctor Strange movie have already taken place by that point (otherwise how would they know about him?).

Separately we've been watching The Punisher on Netflix: we've enjoyed (to a greater or lesser degree) all the preceding Marvel series but this one's a bit of a stretch, it's essentially a grim study of traumatised military veterans with no spandex in sight whatsoever. It's OK I guess but honestly not the sort of thing I'd choose to watch without the very loose tie-in to the MCU.

I really wish we could have this Punisher vs this Captain America some day.

There's definitely a reference to Stephen Strange in one of the earlier movies (Winter Soldier, maybe?) which suggests that pretty much all of the events of the Doctor Strange movie have already taken place by that point (otherwise how would they know about him?).

Well, when that was written, Doctor Strange was just a "some day…" thing for Kevin Feige; the retcon now is that Strange was just a very arrogant, anti-authority rockstar super-surgeon, who was on Hydra's list because he could be a problem at some point in future, not because he's already the Sorcerer Supreme.

This could all have been avoided by Captain Marvel-ing Doctor Strange and setting it long before everything else, with Strange taking ten years to learn the music arts. But they didn't.

That's a silly retcon but I'm happy to give them a pass, given how impressive the continuity is generally. It really is incredibly impressive that ten years' worth of blockbuster movies, with hundreds of cast members, actually hang together, even when you watch them pretty much back-to-back.

The only really jarring issue is The Incredible Hulk, admittedly only the second movie in the cycle. It's not actually terrible in itself, but it's got a different guy playing The Hulk and overall it's just utterly irrelevant to the ongoing story: none of its events are ever referenced again and you can pick up everything you need to know about the character from his next appearance in The Avengers. It's pretty much the only film in the entire series that's completely skippable.

Bruce Banner's not the only character to change actor - Terrence Howard was replaced and never spoken of again.

Edward Norton wrote a version of the script and wanted to shoot that instead.

It was a fucking bonkers script.

Doesn’t Ruffalo’s Hulk mention breaking Harlem at some point? That’s a reference to the final showdown in The Incredible Hulk, I think.

I’m seeing it (hopefully without subtitles) in Oslo on Saturday, and will be being very careful about spoilers in the meantime. It’s been a largely thoroughly entertaining ride so far, and I still can’t quite believe they’ve taken this all the way from Iron Man*, which was out before Obama took office, and tied in that (and the post-credit sequence that started us down this road) through an ever-expanding universe to the point we find ourselves at now, where we’re about to see him fighting a giant purple alien alongside, amongst others, a talking raccoon, a tree, a demigod (or two), an OAP and a giant green rage monster. Oh, and bloody Spider-Man. The ten-year-old in me is ecstatic, and even this middle-aged version is pretty amazed at how well they’ve done, not least in making this all perfectly acceptable (and accessible) to mainstream audiences.

• The Incredible Hulk May have actually come out first, but I still consider Iron Man the first one, because there’s only about two weeks between them, and chronologically it works better that way.

The Incredible Hulk May have actually come out first

I'm pretty certain it didn't - the Tony Stark cameo at the end would have made zero sense to anybody if Iron Man hadn't already been released.

I've been putting MCU movies on in the background while I'm working for the last few days, focusing on the movies I've not already seen a dozen times.

Today was Guardians Vol. 2's turn, and I just couldn't finish it. I got as far as Ego's introduction, but the entire film up to that point is characters being mean to each other, arguing and sniping constantly. It's not fun - and while I understand how it fits with the arc of the movie as a whole, it feels almost like a deliberate effort to knock down all the goodwill these characters had built up over the course of their previous movie.

I hope they're not this spiteful in Infinity War.

It's worth sticking with Guardians 2 for its closing moments.

I'm yet to see (off the top of my head, may have missed some as there's so many) Black Panther and Doctor Strange.

Loved every minute of Thor: Ragnarok especially its use of Led Zeppelin's Immigrant Song

I’ve got Guardians 2 to watch this weekend, I didn’t even like the first one that much so I’m not going into this with the highest of expectations.

I’m actually disappointed that Black Panther isn’t out on blu-ray for another 8 weeks; I can’t catch up in time for Infinity War even if I wanted to.

The Incredible Hulk May have actually come out first

I'm pretty certain it didn't - the Tony Stark cameo at the end would have made zero sense to anybody if Iron Man hadn't already been released.

You're right. I had it in my head that they were released a couple of weeks apart, and that Iron Man might've cameoed in Hulk despite his film not being out yet, but maybe it was just the order I saw them in (and/or that they were released on DVD) that had me confused.

GotG2 is actually the Marvel film I have most trouble deciding my thoughts on - I really enjoyed the first, to the point where it was one of my favourite of the Marvel films for a time, but the second seems weirdly… obnoxious, maybe? Every character (bar possibly Gamora) just seems like a slightly worse version of themselves for much of it, to go along with the fact that they frequently now laugh uproariously at anything vaguely funny themselves.

It does mix that in with some really good stuff too (Rocket vs. the Reavers, for example), and largely pulls it together in the end anyway (besides having a bit too much going on in and around the credits, especially considering the film had ended very nicely without the padding), but it felt like it'd missed the mark a little bit to me, and I was a little disappointed even after the first viewing, despite still enjoying it.

The timeline is a bit odd there too, actually - GotG2 is supposed to be about three months after the first, I think, so the implication is that they're still getting used to each other, and that when Infinity War rolls around they'll have been together for years, but add in similar issues with Dr Strange (how long is the film set over, and how long ago?) and Captain America (is the montage in the middle supposed to represent two weeks or two years) and it does seem like Marvel have had a few issues with this kind of thing at times.

I’m actually disappointed that Black Panther isn’t out on blu-ray for another 8 weeks; I can’t catch up in time for Infinity War even if I wanted to.

If it's any consolation, Black Panther deals pretty much exclusively with Wakandan internal politics; it's a great movie, but it's probably the most skippable in terms of meta plot since… probably Iron Man 3?

It's kinda hard to say how much the events of Black Panther will matter to Infinity War considering nobody's seen it yet, but given the limited screen time and a cast of like forty thousand characters I wouldn't expect anybody to get a whole lot of focus. Wakanda is the scene of a major battle, but references are likely to be limited to cameos.

The plot of Infinity War isn't going to hinge on any one previous entry in the franchise.

It's worth sticking with Guardians 2 for its closing moments.

Oh, I saw it at the cinema. Wasn't the biggest fan at the time, but after Doctor Strange and Age of Ultron were better than I'd remembered I was hoping Guardians would also go up in my estimations.

I still haven't rewatched Guardians 2, and this conversation isn't hastening me back to it any.

I'm also going to have to go dark on the internet generally, I suspect, as we aren't going to see Infinity way until Sunday. 😭

Infinity War blew me the fuck away.

I feel like I'm amongst the most easily impressed by everything on here, but can't fucking believe they made a film with that many superheroes and not have it feel bloated to me…which is exactly how I felt about the first Avengers and this film has even more! Thanos lived up to my expectations, I see why he is so feared now and it's actually really fun to see him just batter things if anything, much better than Ultros was imo.

Yeah it's- it's a hell of a film.

Well.

Spoiler - click to showIt's kind of a fucking miracle. It pretty much has no business working at all; for it to not only hang together but have several actually great moments into the bargain is pretty astonishing.

We are thinking of going to see it tomorrow but I am unsure about taking Robin who is only six and a half. Does any of the following happen:

1 Vision gets his head ripped open.
2 Gamora/Black Widow/Baby Groot get killed and everyone is very sad.
3 Massive graphic violence.

For reference Avengers Assemble is fine, Guardians of the Galaxy was over the line a bit with violence and sad "We are Groot" bit.

This is the most violent MCU yet, and isn't really shy about it. I didn't consider how younger viewers might react while we were watching it, but it's pretty brutal in places.

If Guardians was too much, stay clear of Infinity War.

I'll DM you specific answers to your questions.

Ok, cheers.

Now who wants to babysit a six year old distraught that she can't go and see what is surely the best film ever?

So, Guardians of the Galaxy 2 last night: I think I enjoyed it more than the first one. It was just nice to be back with this particular bunch of characters without having to spend the first hour on scene-setting. (It still had a rubbish villain, and could have done with losing ten minutes of CGI kicking the crap out of itself in the final act, but they’re criticisms you could level at almost every one of these Marvel films). Still, it was funny and entertaining and the plot was interesting and everyone got plenty to do. Job done.

Didn’t seem very relevant (at all) to the ongoing Avengers plot, though, which feels like an unfair criticism but is still, at this stage, a slight disappointment.

Just home from Infinity War. Holy shit.

Thoughts, in no particular order:
Spoiler - click to showWhere the hell do they go from here? Well, they're going to undo a bunch of it, obviously - more than a few of these characters have confirmed sequels coming up - but still, it's a real gut-punch downer of an ending. They balanced everyone really well, though, and everyone had clear objectives throughout, so it didn't get confusing. Rocket/Bucky was a fun exchange. Sad that Immigrant Song didn't start blasting when Thor showed up in Wakanda. Peter Dinklage still hasn't learned how to do an English accent. When they inevitably undo the character deaths, will that include all the non-gauntlet deaths, or are Loki, Heimdall, and Gamora all gone gone? Where was Valkyrie?

Go see it, if you haven't. It's a remarkable achievement. I still can't quite believe they pulled it off.

Spoiler - click to showPeter Dinklage still hasn't learned how to do an English accent

Spoiler - click to showOr how to act.

Spoiler - click to showWhen they inevitably undo the character deaths, will that include all the non-gauntlet deaths, or are Loki, Heimdall, and Gamora all gone gone?

Spoiler - click to showDepends how they undo it, I suppose. If it's a proper, full-on time paradox intervention, then it might "make sense" for them to totally undo everything that happened in this one.

Spoiler - click to showWhere was Valkyrie?

Spoiler - click to show According to Tessa Thompson, "at the bar".

I still can't quite believe they pulled it off.

Spoiler - click to showI can't quite get rid of the gnawing sense that I didn't like the film as much as I just respected the audacity of it and was impressed by the fact that it didn't just completely and immediately implode under its own weight. I feel like we're still far too close to the thing to really judge it objectively, especially as the next one is bound to redefine or just outright erase a lot of these events.

Spoiler - click to showPlus, y'know, it fails pretty hard at standing on its own merits as a piece of narrative art - does (and should) the fact that that's by design matter?

Spoiler - click to showPlus, y'know, it fails pretty hard at standing on its own merits as a piece of narrative art - does (and should) the fact that that's by design matter?

Spoiler - click to showDoes The Empire Strikes Back get docked points?

Then again, imaging walking into that film like- totally dry. Thinking 'I want to see a summer blockbuster movi- wait- what is even any of this'

@aniki: Spoiler - click to showDepends how they undo it, I suppose. If it's a proper, full-on time paradox intervention, then it might "make sense" for them to totally undo everything that happened in this one.

Spoiler - click to showI really hope they don't. There needs to be some consequence.

@aniki Spoiler - click to showI can't quite get rid of the gnawing sense that I didn't like the film as much as I just respected the audacity of it and was impressed by the fact that it didn't just completely and immediately implode under its own weight. I feel like we're still far too close to the thing to really judge it objectively, especially as the next one is bound to redefine or just outright erase a lot of these events.

Spoiler - click to showNo, I think it is genuinely good. In large part, that's down to just how well they've put Thanos across; for a genocidal lunatic, he's astonishingly underplayed, with a real sense of capital-D Destiny to him. I'm reminded of the Operative in Serenity: "What I do is evil, but it must be done." He genuinely believes he's doing the mathematically correct thing here, and his own qualms or morality are irrelevant. It's a phenomenal performance.

Spoiler - click to showPlus, y'know, it fails pretty hard at standing on its own merits as a piece of narrative art - does (and should) the fact that that's by design matter?

Spoiler - click to showI think at this point, they've earned it; after a decade of these things, they're allowed to throw themselves an inside baseball fireworks display.

So there's a New Yorker review doing the rounds on Twitter at the moment, with the "complaint" that Infinity War doesn't do enough (read: any) introductions to its characters, and they exist only in the framework already established by their previous appearances. @luscan and @aniki both brought that up above, too.

So, is that actually a problem? I mean, this thing's been running ten years, and it's nobody's first rodeo; I think Spider-Man has has the least screentime of anyone here, and he's already been in two of these things; it seems a bit like tuning in to Game of Thrones for the first time for the Red Wedding and complaining you don't know who anyone is.

Is it not well-enough established in the popular culture consciousness that these things are ongoing and interconnected? Is there a larger-than-single-digit percentage of people going to see this as their first Marvel movie?

Hmmm, I dunno really. Most of these films are, if not exactly standalone, pretty straightforward to watch in isolation. It's only really Winter Soldier, Age of Ultron and Civil War (and now, apparently, this) that really demand a bit of background knowledge; and I reckon you could wing the first two of those without too much trouble. So it's not all as serialised as people like to claim, or at least it's not a barrier to entry for most folk.

They should probably have called it Avengers 3 and avoided the problem altogether.

So there's a New Yorker review doing the rounds on Twitter at the moment, with the "complaint" that Infinity War doesn't do enough (read: any) introductions to its characters, and they exist only in the framework already established by their previous appearances. @luscan and @aniki both brought that up above, too.

So, is that actually a problem? I mean, this thing's been running ten years, and it's nobody's first rodeo; I think Spider-Man has has the least screentime of anyone here, and he's already been in two of these things; it seems a bit like tuning in to Game of Thrones for the first time for the Red Wedding and complaining you don't know who anyone is.

Is it not well-enough established in the popular culture consciousness that these things are ongoing and interconnected? Is there a larger-than-single-digit percentage of people going to see this as their first Marvel movie?

Do you remember The Simpsons movie? Very little time was given to establishing characters in that and, at this point, I'd probably argue that Iron Man or Spider-man have a similarly sized cultural footprint to Homer and Bart.

If you came in at the end of Breaking Bad, for example, and wondered why that bald man and that scrawny looking guy were so mad at each other and wait, what's that blue stuff? I thought this show was about a naughty chemistry teacher and-

Kermode has a pretty good take on this.

Do you remember The Simpsons movie? Very little time was given to establishing characters in that and, at this point, I'd probably argue that Iron Man or Spider-man have a similarly sized cultural footprint to Homer and Bart.

By the time the Simpsons Movie came out, the TV show had been airing for eighteen years, and four hundred-odd episodes totalling nearly 150 hours had been broadcast, and that's not counting re-runs. Okay, the cultural impact of Marvel's comic output is not to be sniffed at, but I don't think it's as broadly mainstream as The Simpsons - and I don't know that hardcore comic readers are responsible for the increasingly ridiculous box-office takings of the MCU.