The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU): Thriving? Dying? Or already dead. It first began in 2008 with the one and only Iron Man. From then on, they have released banger after banger or they used to. Based on a intsgram poll on @BVNNews, out of 121 people, 75% of students at BVN believe Marvel died after Avengers: Endgame. Disney hasn’t done the best with the MCU, but is the franchise really over? Well, yes, but also no.
The MCU is currently divided into six phases. One through three is the “Infinity Saga,” and four to six is the “Multiverse Saga”. The Multiverse Saga is where people believe Marvel went wrong. This phase is kicked off with WandaVision. A series that received a 92% on Rotten Tomatoes by critics and 88% by the average watcher. Pretty high and very much deserving. However, other series like She Hulk got 80% from critics…the average user, though,…. 32%. To be fair, the series did suck.
I think one huge issue I had with this new phase was the introduction of the characters that were never seen again. For example, my beloved Moon Knight is one of them. This series was amazing, Oscar Isaac (the actor who plays Moon Knight) was incredible, the cinematography was great and the plot was intriguing. Yet, not only is the character never mentioned in any other movie or show, but the series itself was canceled. What. Are. We. Doing Marvel.
Now comes one of the best series Disney has produced, but also their downfall: Loki. As a Loki fanatic, it pains me to say that Loki might be the reason why Marvel died. The series itself is amazing; however, the whole series was supposed to set up the next big bad villain: Kang, the Conqueror of Worlds. And it did a great job doing that, but they had to scratch the idea due to the legal conviction of actor Jonathan Majors, who plays Kang. Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania was also setting up for Kang. Genuinely, what do you do to get yourself out of this situation? Bring back Robert Downey Jr. as the next villain seemed to be the answer Disney found.
I think the next huge and last problem with the current MCU is the fact that they kind of assigned “homework”. Let me explain: the new Spider-Man movie trailer came out recently, and I got confused when I saw Bruce Banner as a human. From where I left off, in Endgame, he was Smart Hulk (a mix between Dr. Banner and the Hulk). I later found out that if I had continued She-Hulk, I would have seen that he turned back into a human. Now I’m wondering if I missed something vital from the Marvel movies and series I didn’t watch. I know some people who haven’t seen any of the MCU’s phase four to six productions because they believed Marvel had died. However, those same people still want to see Avengers: Doomsday in hopes of a revival. Hate to break it to them, but they have a lot of catching up to do if they want to understand the upcoming movie.
In the end, did Marvel die? Pains me to say it, but yes. I’m still excited to see the newest movies, but it’s not like how it used to be. My standards have lowered, and right now, the only hope I see for the MCU is to make this Dr. Doom thing work. If they can do that, then they can hopefully gain back the fans they lost.
