General

bonham2 wrote:

I'm just gonna choose to believe your initial assessment, if only to feel better about my own chunky ass.

New Ant-Man trailer!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WfTEZJnv_8

I was thinking Kang would totally off Scott Lang, but now I feel like this trailer is telegraphing it too much. I imagine Pym bites the dust instead, maybe even both Hank AND Janet.

It's wild that the Ant Man movie is going to be the one that sets the MCU off into its huge new direction. After Ant Man and the Wasp, I was worried he'd always be B-tier.

theJaw wrote:

Same here. I thought it was almost guaranteed, now I think it's unlikely lol


I'm loving it. Ant-Man/Paul Rudd is awesome. I liked Ant-Man and the Wasp more than most people, but Quantumania is definitely going to be on a whole other level.

@Scott Ant-Man and the Wasp is one of my buddy's favorite MCU movies, I just don't see it haha. I mean it's a good movie for sure but a FAVORITE? I dunno, I liked the first Ant-Man a lot more. But yah, Quantumania seems like it's going to be friggin wild.

Is that MODOK in the trailer? If so, is he still gonna be voiced by Patton Oswalt?

@theJaw I wouldn't quite call it a favorite, but it's #13 in my ranking, close to the top of my 2nd tier. I wish it had a better villain, but the movie is just so much fun anyway.

That is indeed MODOK in the trailer, and he appears to be played by

based on the trailer. Most people probably didn't catch that (I didn't, saw it in Reddit comments) so I guess I'll put in a spoiler tag just in case it would ruin somebody's life.

Awwww phooey. But also that's pretty neat haha.

Ant Man is up next. If anyone had told me 10 years ago that we would be about to get Ant Man 3, I would have called them batsh*t crazy.

Yeah, I like how back when Ant-Man was first announced everybody took it as a joke, and in reality he has been involved with a lot of pivotal stuff in the MCU.

Black Panther will be on Disney Plus on Feb 1. Looking forward to seeing that.

I look forward to re-watching it with the lady because my theater-going experience was pretty awful for that movie. Folks who are 6'6 should NOT be crammed into tiny theater seats for 3 hours, I can tell ya that. Hoping that being able to sprawl out on the couch will help me enjoy it a bit more.

I'm so pumped for Quantumania, I hope it delivers as well as it seems it's going to from the trailers!

We've still been working through our re-watch. We finished up Endgame over the weekend. We're skipping Far From Home because we re-watched that one just before No Way Home, so next up is Black Widow and we'll officially be in Phase 4! I'm glad we'll be completely caught up in time for Quantumania. Also, I'm really excited to watch all of the Phase 4 movies again. Other than No Way Home, we've only seen each of them once, and we haven't seen Wakanda Forever at all.

I wonder what everybody's take is on Phase 4 as a whole. Some people seem to hate it and think the MCU is doomed. Others think they're just setting stuff up.

I'm somewhere in the middle. I think MOST of the shows have been unnecessary, although I absolutely loved WandaVision. Loki was really good too, and I liked Hawkeye for what it was. I feel like everything has just been wildly inconsistent. Dr. Strange and Spiderman felt like MCU of old. Thor and She Hulk were goofy. Eternals and Shang Chi just felt out of place. Werewolf By Night felt REALLY out of place. I want to believe they have some grand plan to pull this all together like Endgame, but I don't think they do.

Shang Chi felt out of place? Huuuh? It felt like the only straight-forward MCU movie of the bunch to me. Eternals, I agree. That movie wasn't good, and seemed like it was from a different universe. It felt like an old mid-2000s X-Men sequel. That said, I still think it'll lead to SOMEthing... they can't just ignore the celestial head popping out of the ocean.

I liked Phase 4 for the most part. There were like 2 or 3 projects that I didn't like... Eternals, Moon Knight, and Hawkeye introduced potential halfway through and then fumbled it entirely. But that's been the case for all the phases, imo. I thought Iron Man 2 was bad, I thought Iron Man 3 and Age of Ultron were disappointing, didn't love Civil War, etc etc. Par the course. There were just so many projects in Phase 4, and the pandemic definitely had an effect, so it was definitely a little unbalanced compared to other phases.

I honestly think some folks just got SO attached to the MCU for finally adapting this great source material correctly to film, and I totally understand that. I'm right there too. But I also feel like those same folks gave a little too much credit to the MCU overall to the point that anything "new" or off the beaten path will be considered a disappointment. Other than Shang Chi, Multiverse of Madness was my favorite of the bunch, and that didn't even hit 80% on RT. Love and Thunder was NOT as bad as some folks pretend it was. Ms Marvel ruled, She Hulk was fun, etc. It's just that they all took different routes than the normal MCU blueprint. They let filmmakers have a bit more control, and I feel that was a good thing, but it seems the majority of MCU fans have rubbed up against it in a negative way. Oh well... it'll be another Star Wars situation where we're gonna be stuck with the status quo and either decide to get over that and put up with it or stop watching. I'll obv put up with it because that status quo is fun, but I also appreciated this little experimental phase.

I loved Phase 4. I prefer it over Phases 1 & 2 for sure, and it's really close to Phase 3. The main reason I would give Phase 3 the slight edge is Infinity War/Endgame. But, those movies were the culmination of 10 years of buildup, so of course they were extremely impactful. I know most won't admit it, but I firmly believe that most people's expectations have been too high after those movies, so now anytime Marvel puts out something that's just good, it's viewed as bad because it's so much less than IW/EG. On top of that, once hate starts to roll in for a thing, there are always people that like to join the bandwagon by hating on that thing too! The anti "anything I perceive as remotely woke" crowd isn't helping matters either.

For me, the only disappointing thing about Phase 4 was that it didn't have an Avengers film like each other phase before it, but that's ok. It did seem a bit "all over the place" with them introducing so many new characters. But, it was clear to me from the start that they were already beginning to set up for the next big thing, and this was confirmed when they announced Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars, so I'm 100% on board with what they're doing. I also love that they've been trying new and different things. This is keeping the MCU fresh IMO. I'm a little more mixed on the shows. I only loved WandaVision, Loki, and Moon Knight, but I still enjoyed all of the others except for Ms Marvel. The shows is where they've done the most experimenting with different styles and whatnot, and I'm down with that. For the movies, I'd say Shang-Chi, No Way Home, Multiverse of Madness, and Love and Thunder were all great, and Black Widow and Eternals were just ok (still haven't seen Wakanda Forever).

I think the MCU is in a great place right now. I'm so excited to see how things continue to unfold as they keep building toward Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars. Maybe they'll even top Infinity War and Endgame, who knows? I try to just ignore the haters these days and hope that they'll get tired and go away so that the rest of us can enjoy all of the awesome Marvel content we're getting!

I'm a MCU mark at this point, so I obviously loved Phase 4. I might be the only person that seemed to think The Eternals was a top 10 MCU movie and I'm really looking forward to a continuation of that story and those characters. I've enjoyed all the shows, but it does feel like they have been setting up Phase 5 for so long I have kind of forgot some of the details (especially Wandavision which I loved). My top 5 from Phase 4 are
5. Shang Chi
4. The Eternals
3. Loki
2. Wandavision
1. Spider Man No Way Home

I don't really consider Werewolf to be a full part of the MCU, but I didn't think What If was either and it has actually played into other stories a bit. I can't explain how much I loved Spider Man No Way Home. If we lose Tom Holland as SM it will be a shame, he has embodied that role so well. It also made me realize I would have enjoyed Toby Maguire more as SM had he played a more mature version of him (I hated the 00 SM movies). It also offered a great redemption for Andrew Garfields SM who I thought was underrated.

Of the upcoming movie and tv series in Phase 5 the only one I'm not really looking forward to is Agatha. It feels like that wasn't a planned series but sprung from the viral hit of the character (which was great, but I don't know how you are going to make a series on it).

I loved Werewolf By Night. One of my favorite aspects of Phase 4. It totally is 100% a part of the MCU, there was something that connected… I can’t remember at the moment, but yah it WAS presented differently a lot differently so I feel ya.

theJaw wrote:

I need to go back and watch it again, I was half paying attention when I watched it and probably missed that.

beavis wrote:

I did like Eternals, much more than most people seemed to, but it's still on the bottom end of my ranking.


I do acknowledge that Werewolf by Night is part of the MCU, but it felt very separate from everything else. The fact that they labeled it as a "special presentation" made it seem like it was more of a side project, not something that was an important part of the core MCU. I loved it though. I don't remember a specific thing that connected it to the MCU, but it's been a few months since I watched it.


Same. My hype for that movie was insane, up there with Infinity War and Endgame. To prepare for it, me and my family went back and re-watched all of the Spider-Man movies. Even my kids who don't generally get "hyped" for something were extremely excited to see it. We went on opening night, and had a really good crowd cheering at all the big moments and everything. It's one of my best memories.


I loved Tobey as Spiderman, but I did enjoy the more mature version of him that we got in NWH. I also loved Andrew Garfield getting to come back and have some big moments. I always loved his Spider-Man and hated that his movies didn't do as well.


For me, the only movie I'm not looking forward to is Blade, simply because I never saw the original. I plan to catch up on that one soon, but I don't know how well it's going to hold up so many years later. I'm torn on New World Order. I want to be thrilled about another Captain America movie, but TF&TWS just didn't convince me he's going to be a good Cap. Most of it is the lack of a super soldier serum, honestly. I wish he had ended up getting that in the show. Also, I feel like Sam was great as a side/backup character, but I don't think he can carry the lead. I'll definitely give it a chance though, and hope to love it. I'm super excited for Quantumania, GotG3, and Thunderbolts, plus The Marvels should be pretty fun. As for the shows, I'm a little more mixed on them. I'm definitely excited for Loki S2. I had almost no interest in Secret Invasion until the trailer dropped, then suddenly I was very excited. I loved Agatha so I'm looking forward to that one as well. I'm only mildly interested in Ironheart and Echo. I want to be excited for Daredevil, I liked him in She-Hulk. But, I still need to watch his original show to get up to speed on the character.

The original Blade Trilogy is fun, but the visuals are VERY rough. Some of it would be difficult to pull off even today.

The Netflix shows were a mixed bag, but Daredevil Seasons 1 & 3 were great. I disliked 2 due to the.Punished and Karen Page story, but it's still a decent season. Jessica Jones Season 1 was great. The rest was ok. I really wish The Defenders was better. I think we need a street level Avengers where the universe isn't always at stake, and The Defenders would have been a good place for that. Maybe it can still happen on the shows. Daredevil, Spiderman, Kingpin, She Hulk, Hawkeye, and Kate Bishop hands all interacted in some way together, so there is hope.

theJaw wrote:

I liked Shang Chi. I just thought the ending was a little far fetched. I was 100% on board until a giant flying dragon came out of the mountain. Other than that, I'll agree that it wasn't that out of place.

I think they had such an impossible task after Endgame. That was 10 years in the making, and they are basically starting over again. I wasn't a huge fan of Phase 1 until later on when I could go back and appreciate it all. Hopefully, I'll feel the same way about Phase 4 once it all starts coming together in the next few Avengers movies.

Lol oh man, the giant dragon fight may have been my favorite thing the MCU has put out… maybe just ever. I remember having legit tears in my eyes by the end of that movie because of the sheer awesomeness placed in front of me haha

We've been trying to finish up our MCU re-watch before Quantumania drops. We recently watched Black Widow, Eternals, Shang-Chi, and Multiverse of Madness. Had to make several changes to my ranking:

41. I Am Groot!
40. The Incredible Hulk
39. Ms. Marvel
38. Eternals
37. Iron Man 3
36. Iron Man 2
35. Iron Man
34. Thor
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33. Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special
32. Thor: The Dark World
31. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
30. What If…?
29. Werewolf by Night
28. She-Hulk: Attorney at Law
27. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
26. Doctor Strange
25. Guardians of the Galaxy
24. Captain America: The First Avenger
23. Black Widow
22. Hawkeye
21. Black Panther
-----------------------------------------------------------------
20. Ant-Man
19. Spider-Man: Homecoming
18. Captain Marvel
17. Moon Knight
16. Loki
15. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
14. Spider-Man: Far From Home
13. Ant-Man and the Wasp
12. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
11. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
-----------------------------------------------------------------
10. The Avengers
9. Avengers: Age of Ultron
8. Thor: Love and Thunder
7. Captain America: Civil War
6. WandaVision
5. Spider-Man: No Way Home
4. Avengers: Endgame
3. Avengers: Infinity War
2. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
1. Thor: Ragnarok

Notable changes:
-Dropped Eternals from the bottom of my 3rd tier to almost the very bottom of the list. It's not bad, but it doesn't do anything particularly well either, and I have no interest in ever watching it again.
-Added GotG holiday special. Wasn't going to, but changed my mind.
-Dropped Black Panther a couple more spots. I like the movie, but it's very overrated IMO.
-Dropped Multiverse of Madness a few spots. I enjoyed it, but not as much as the first time. I still think this movie needed to show off more of the multiverse and/or have a bigger impact on the multiverse moving forward.
-Moved Shang-Chi up a few spots. I wish it could be higher because I really love this movie, but it's getting harder and harder to break into my top tier.
-Dropped Ms Marvel even further. Not sure why I had it above the Iron Man movies, that was dumb.

Just watched Black Panther Wakanda Forever. Liked how they handles the Bostwick stuff. Really liked Angela Bassett, especially her calling them all out. Liked Namor, glad to see them keep around an antihero. Obviously they never predicted Bostwick dying but I think the biggest flaw in the Marvel movies so far is killing off Killmonger. Not only was the character insanely cool and Jordan killed it, his story could have easily flipped him to being the BP in the second movie. I felt that Shuri becoming BP was rushed.

We re-watched Love and Thunder and I still don't understand why this movie got so much hate. I still loved it the second time around. The only valid criticism (IMO) is that we really should have gotten more of Gorr. In particular, we should have gotten to see some of him doing his god-butchering thing early in the movie. That said, he had more screen time than I remembered, and considering the whole movie was right around 2 hours (on the shorter end for the MCU), I think the amount of time he got wasn't too bad. I loved the humor, and didn't think it was too much or too goofy. The only attempt at humor that really didn't land for me was Korg being reduced to just a face. I thought that was really dumb and awkward. I kind of want to do a comparison between L&T and Ragnarok some day and count the number of jokes, because I really don't think this one was heavier on the humor, even when it undercuts more serious moments, but most people loved the humor in Ragnarok. One of my favorite scenes the first time I saw the movie was when he gives all of the kids the power of Thor. I still liked it, but it wasn't nearly as epic as the first time seeing it, in the theater. The Shadow Realm was definitely my favorite this time, I wish the battle there had lasted even longer.

Also, we finally watched Wakanda Forever. It was good. Better than I expected without T'Challa. There were a lot of great scenes/moments throughout the film, but the movie as a whole wasn't amazing, just good.

With that, we've officially completed our re-watch and are ready for Quantumania! Unfortunately, it currently has a 52% critic score on RT. This isn't going to stop me from seeing it, I'm still hyped for the movie. But, given how Phase 4 went, this likely spells doom for the movie. Anything sub-80 pretty much sets a negative tone for how the overall public is going to perceive and talk about the movie. I honestly hate that the critic scores can have such a huge effect on how well the movies do, especially when they're released ahead of time. I'd rather the critic scores stay hidden until the movie is available to the public. I think a lot of critics are pretty burnt out on superhero movies at this point. The only movies that are going to get a good score from them from now on are those that do something truly unique (and do it very well), or those that represent marginalized groups, progressive ideals, social justice issues, etc. I'm not against the inclusion of those sorts of things per say, but I don't think films should be rated more highly just because of them. Either way, just being a solid superhero movie will no longer cut it, it seems.

I updated my ranking a couple posts up instead of posting it again. I moved L&T down two spots, and added WF to the ranking.

I’m happy to hear Quantumania is a straight up sci fi movie through and through, but yah it is getting absolutely clobbered by reviewers. I’ll obviously still see it but I’m getting a bit worried now.

Of course I also feel like some folks have been blowing the MCU out of proportion since Endgame released, and was sort of expecting the reception to get worse before it got better. Not sure if the RT score is just hyperbole or not.

I really thought Quantumania was going to be the movie that would start to turn things around in this regard, but now I feel like this is just how it's going to be.

It seems like the public is really starting to get tired of superhero movies in general. It is to be expected after the Infinity saga being a 22-23 movie epic. After Endgame, it's hard to keep people interested. Add into that the saturation of shows on top of the movies. I feel the same way a little. I still haven't completed a few of the shows, and I have no desire to see Black Panther. I WOULD like to see DC get their act together and fix the DCEU. I am dying for a good Superman movie.

I'm not tired of super hero movies with the big guns like Cap, Iron Man, Thor, GotG, Spidey, Strange, etc, but I am tired of hearing about the upcoming slate of movies with B heroes being thrown at us like we're supposed to take it and like it. I don't care about a lineup with headliners like Agatha, Echo, Ms Marvel, Iron Heart and Thunderbolts. I don't mind them being mixed in but I'm not going to get excited and spend money to see them. I get that actors run their course and move on from roles, but treat it like James Bond, plug in a new actor and keep it rolling.

@back4more to be fair, GotG absolutely were not "big guns" when that movie was announced, or even when it was released. Hell, they're still not big guns anywhere besides the MCU. So that sort of thing is required to an extent. There is no forward progression if they don't start introducing new characters and attempting to build them toward a "big gun" position like they did with GotG. And in a huge, sprawling, connected universe, it's a little harder to just recast the characters. It's just like when they cast Kilmer after Keaton dropped out of Batman, there's just no way to pretend that's the same Bruce Wayne. You can't recast Iron Man unless you reboot the entire thing.

@theJaw you are correct GotG were not big guns then but they have been built up to that status now. Like you stated, things like that are required to an extent to forward progression, but you are moving on from the money makers that Marvel comics were built on. The comics don't move on from the big timers when new stuff come around, they work whats hot and in the end most of what they have are the tried and true heroes ..... Cap, Spidey, Thor, Iron Man, etc. I think the Batman movies of the 90'2 are a perfect example of how they can plug in new actors and keep rolling. If you have a new Cap movie every 3-4 years, and rotate the other big dogs similarly, sprinkle maybe a movie a year of something new and see how it grows, would that not be better than going from Phase 3 to what is lined up for Phase 5?

Batman from the 90s is an example of how NOT to do it, in my opinion. Batman Forever and Batman & Robin were so tonally different from the Burton films, and the series suffers as a result. I liked Batman Forever as a kid, but even then I felt it was weird that it looked like a cartoon city. As a result, we wound up getting countless reboots that never advance the plot beyond the origin and a few new bad guys. With Captain America and Iron Man (and Thor to a certain extent), they were able to have full character arcs. They told full stories over a dozen or so films that showed true character growth with an eventual ending. We don't need another series of Iron Man movies. His story is done. If they just continue on forever with new actors, it completely takes away from any drama or any meaningful growth.

I like that Falcon is now Captain America. Steve Rodgers is done. I think we need Iron Heart to move on from Iron Man. Thor might need a new actor...I mean, he's a god that lives for thousands of years.

Meh, MCU might lull for a few years but I think it will pick back up as Multiverse starts to come to a close. But it will be explode again when X-Men are introduced. I could never afford to buy comics as a kid so this is really my way of seeing a cool story play out with characters I was always interested in

bonham2 wrote:

I get it, but I don't feel that way at all. I love the amount of content we've been getting! I really like the shows breaking up the downtime between the big movies, especially when they use the shows to try new and unique things, and introduce new characters who could then show up in movies later (or give more screentime to characters who were in movies but weren't the main character, Yelena is a good example in Black Widow then Hawkeye). That said, I don't like the feeling that I HAVE to watch everything. There's some stuff coming up that I'm really not interested in, but I feel like I'll be missing out on a potentially big/important piece of the MCU if I don't watch it anyway.

Edit: I read something on Reddit recently, there was some comment Feige made in an interview about how they were going to slow down the stream of content soon. I think he was most referring to the shows, but I'm not sure.

back4more wrote:

I don't think most people view it that way. The vast majority of the audience did not read the comics (myself included), so most of the characters all the way back to Iron Man have been brand new to us. I knew Spider-Man from the 90s cartoon and the pre-MCU Spider-Man movies, and I knew Hulk from the old Incredible Hulk show and the pre-MCU Hulk movie, and that was pretty much it. I mean, I knew there was a Captain America in the comics, but didn't know anything about him. I didn't watch the original Captain America because one of the "big guns" was in it, I just wanted to watch a superhero movie. It was sad to lose a couple characters that became big guns to the mainstream audience, but I think we're still just as open as ever to meeting new characters. I know I am, at least. In Phase 4 alone, I love a lot of the new characters...Yelena, Shang-Chi, America Chavez, Namor, Monica Rambeau, Agatha, Mobius, Sylvie, Kang, Kate Bishop, Moon Knight, Ms. Marvel (didn't like the show but I liked her), She-Hulk. I'm down to see any of these characters again.

I'm surprised you put Thunderbolts on your list, that's one of the projects I'm most excited for right now! Bucky, Yelena, Red Guardian, US Agent, I think it's going to be great. I'm less excited about Taskmaster and Ghost, but this will give them a second chance to shine. I thought Zemo was supposed to be in it too but I'm not seeing any mention of him now, that's disappointing. Would love for him to show up too, or a Loki, maybe even Namor.

bonham2 wrote:

I agree I wouldn't mind if several years down the road, we get a new version of a past character, from another universe or something, but they definitely don't need to overdo it, or do it too quickly.

Just saw Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. I thought it was great! The critic score on RT is down to 48% now, which is ridiculous. I seriously don't know what their problem was with this movie. I had some minor nit-picks, but overall, it was really enjoyable, and definitely did not feel like just more of the same. The audience score on is 84% though, that's much more reasonable. Make sure you stick around for both credit scenes. The first one in particular is really good.

@Scott that’s great news. Does it really have a Star Wars feel to it?

@back4more I didn't get that feeling while I was watching it, but after seeing a few people mention it on Reddit, I guess I can kinda see the similarity in one scene.

Saw Ant-man, I agree with Scott. Aside from a couple of things that are too convenient just for the sake of moving the plot, I don't have any complaint. Ant-man delivers again, even with the movie style change.

Yeah, I feel like I undersold it, if anything. I wanted to say more, but didn't want to risk spoiling anything, even minor aspects of the film. Just ignore the critics and go see it for yourselves!