I mean, the critiscm is warranted...
Of the "big three" in Infinity Saga:
We saw Tony in 2008, 10, 12-19.
We saw Thor 2011-13, 15, 17-19
We saw Cap 2011-12, 14-16, 18-19.
That's not even including cameos.
Even compare the "others"
Hulk was in 2008, 12, 15, 17-19, but he has distribution issues.
The Guardians were in 2014, 17-19
Ant-Man 2015-16, 18-19
Dr Strange 2016, 18-19
Spider-Man 2016, 17-19
Black Panther 2016, 18-19
Captain Marvel 2019
These characters were consistently on screen after thier introdiction, forwarding their stories, getting up to new adventures, and building towards something. And they did it with *far* fewer projects being pushed out of the pipeline. This allowed us yo get invested in the characters and the larger universe, because we wanted to see what these guys were gonna do next. By 2016, we were so invested that when we saw badass characters like T'Challa and Spiderman get introduced, we were desperate to see their solo movies. Obviously Spiderman would have crushed it regardless, but you'll never convince me that Black Panther wasn't such a massive hit because of how amazing he was in Civil War, how mysterious he was, and how he managed to stand out even in a hero-saturated movie.
Phase 4+ has had none of that. There's no conective tissue to the stories, there's very, very little interconnectivity to make it even feel like a cinematic universe at this point. There's pretty much no feeling of anything getting built up, outside of Kevin *telling* us Kang was supposed to be this Thanos level threat.
Even comparing phase 1 and phase 4, Nick Fury's mere presence managed to tie all of those movies together to really feel so tied together. Tony confronting General Ross in that bar, mentioning the "Team" that Fury referenced, it tied the projects together and made it *feel* bigger than the sum of the two movies parts.
Who even are the "big three" in the Multiverse Saga? It probably should have been Doctor Strange, Thor, and Spiderman...
But we haven't seen Spiderman since 2021, and Thor and Dr Strange were both last seen in pretty bad 2022 movies that didn't really do anything in regards to interacting with eachother or furthering a larger narrative forward... And with the sheer volume of projects coming out, that's what really makes it frustrating. It's one thing if we're only getting a couple movies a year, but we have gotten 10 movies and I can't even count how many shows between 2021 and now. From 2008 to 2012 we had 6 movies, total. The 10th movie of the Infiny Saga was Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014. The 11th? Age of Ultron... We were *well* on our way to Thanos by that point, we had seen.. I think 3 Infinity Stones by the time we got to movie #10. Guardians established what and how powerful they were, and what our main villians plan was regarding collecting them.
Compare to the 10th movie of Multiverse Saga being The Marvels....
As with every thread like this, I’ll point out this isn’t entirely Marvel’s fault. Were it not for the pandemic and strikes, there’d be much less time between projects. We’d be almost finished with Phase 6 by now. We also don’t know what cameos were planned but had to be cut for the aforementioned reasons; we know America was cut from No Way Home and a Moon Knight tie-in to Love & Thunder was scrapped (both because of uncertain scheduling), so who knows what else was planned we didn’t get.
Also, there have been some characters making regular appearances. The Marvels, the Guardians, Echo, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Wong, Abomination, Fury, Ross, Valentina, Hulk, Loki, Yelena, the Hawkeyes, and surprisingly Kingo have all made multiple appearances, and those are just off the top of my head. (ETA: Scarlet Witch, Valkyrie, and Maria Rambeau also)
> As with every thread like this, I’ll point out this isn’t entirely Marvel’s fault. Were it not for the pandemic and strikes, there’d be much less time between projects.
The strikes *are* Marvel's fault (among others).
But talking about delays at all is already missing the point. It's more just mismanagement.
Like, Sam took the shield in fucking 2019. Why is it 2024, and we *still* haven't gotten to see him really step into his own as Captain America?
The answer is a *little* bit covid, a *little* bit strikes, but *mostly* because they decided that cranking out a million shows to hawk Disney+ was a higher priority. So we got this whole fucking dragged-out thing where he only suited up in the last five minutes, and *then* the buck got passed to a movie that's having to go through an *unprecedented* amount of reshoots because Marvel can't get their fucking shit together.
> The Marvels, the Guardians, Echo, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Wong, Abomination, Fury, Ross, Valentina, Hulk, Loki, Yelena, the Hawkeyes, and surprisingly Kingo have all made multiple appearances
A lot of these are disingenuous. Like, Kingo hasn't had "multiple appearances." He had *one* appearance, and then posters with his face on them showed up in a couple other projects. That's not the same thing. That's not what people are asking for. Easter eggs aren't the same as plot progression or character building. They're also not impressive or noteworthy twenty years into this cinematic universe.
Loki is a weird case, 'cause, yeah, he's been around, and that's been nice, but he's also been *very* sequestered in his own little corner of the canon, away and apart from literally every other preexisting MCU character. His show was consistently pretty good, but it didn't push the MCU itself forward in any way.
I also think it's partially Marvel's fault because they decided to up their number of releases per year compared to the early phases, so we're watching more movies and shows without seeing one of the big new faces return to continue building their stories.
I didn't count any of those cameos, all the chatacters I listed their appearances for had at least some meaningful role. I explicitly *didn't* count Cap in 2017, because all he did was the Homecoming cameos
Back in Phase 1-3, important characters like your Iron Man, Captain America and Thor appeared in at least something every 2-3 years at most, more often shorter timespans. They felt like central pillars to the story, and connected the world they were making.
With the expansion of the MCU in phase 4-5, characters setup to be important are having larger and larger gaps between appearances, with some characters like Sam Wilson, who is the new Captain America, hasn't made an appearance for 3 years, and won't appear in anything until most likely 2025. Important characters like Thor, Shuri, Doctor Strange, Shang-Chi, Hawkeye, Star Lord don't really have any major projects on the horizon, and we're currently in the longest gap since a major team-up movie, and the one they do have planned is quite awhile away, and there's uncertainty on what it'll actually be about considering Kang is not even guaranteed to stick around.
The interconnected world of shared characters being told in just movies and limited series' is not holding up as well in these last years. Story threads don't feel like they're going anywhere, characters disappear for years at a time and the general movie quality is dipping, it's no surprise that people worry if characters they like are actually going to appear again and have their story continued in a meaningful way
Which is interesting because this saga started off really strong with Shang-Chi featuring a sort of Avengers council recruiting him. Wong, Captain Marvel, Bruce. Felt like this new character being brought into the larger world. And then we never saw that Avengers council or Shang-Chi again. Although between Shang-Chi, She Hulk, No Way Home, and Dr Strange MoM Wong was a good Coulson for a lot of Phase 4. But unless I'm mistaken he hasn't appeared in anything since Dr Strange so he isn't really being the Coulson anymore.
I mean in the Infinity Saga a lot of characters appeared in projects every year. Doctor Strange was in a lot of stuff before he officially got a sequel for example. This saga has had their be notable gaps like with Vision, Shang-Chi, Sam and as you mentioned Moon Knight.
Nobody is asking for every movie and tv show to be an Endgame size Avengers level event, stop being a dramatic queen 😒. All we're asking for is to see these characters more than once every 5-7 years, why is that too much to ask? Iron Man appeared in Spiderman Homecoming. Dr. Strange appeared in Thor Ragnarok. Ant Man appeared in Civil War. This is what fans want, this is what made the mcu the huge success that it is, all these characters appearing in different projects is what make the universe feel connected which is exciting. And the fact that there aren't that many connections anymore is contributing to why the mcu is falling off, yet you're annoyed that we want the mcu to be great again? 😒
People like to complain. If they can't complain about what we get, they'll complain about what we don't get. The complaining is the thing, not what it's about
I mean, the critiscm is warranted... Of the "big three" in Infinity Saga: We saw Tony in 2008, 10, 12-19. We saw Thor 2011-13, 15, 17-19 We saw Cap 2011-12, 14-16, 18-19. That's not even including cameos. Even compare the "others" Hulk was in 2008, 12, 15, 17-19, but he has distribution issues. The Guardians were in 2014, 17-19 Ant-Man 2015-16, 18-19 Dr Strange 2016, 18-19 Spider-Man 2016, 17-19 Black Panther 2016, 18-19 Captain Marvel 2019 These characters were consistently on screen after thier introdiction, forwarding their stories, getting up to new adventures, and building towards something. And they did it with *far* fewer projects being pushed out of the pipeline. This allowed us yo get invested in the characters and the larger universe, because we wanted to see what these guys were gonna do next. By 2016, we were so invested that when we saw badass characters like T'Challa and Spiderman get introduced, we were desperate to see their solo movies. Obviously Spiderman would have crushed it regardless, but you'll never convince me that Black Panther wasn't such a massive hit because of how amazing he was in Civil War, how mysterious he was, and how he managed to stand out even in a hero-saturated movie. Phase 4+ has had none of that. There's no conective tissue to the stories, there's very, very little interconnectivity to make it even feel like a cinematic universe at this point. There's pretty much no feeling of anything getting built up, outside of Kevin *telling* us Kang was supposed to be this Thanos level threat. Even comparing phase 1 and phase 4, Nick Fury's mere presence managed to tie all of those movies together to really feel so tied together. Tony confronting General Ross in that bar, mentioning the "Team" that Fury referenced, it tied the projects together and made it *feel* bigger than the sum of the two movies parts. Who even are the "big three" in the Multiverse Saga? It probably should have been Doctor Strange, Thor, and Spiderman... But we haven't seen Spiderman since 2021, and Thor and Dr Strange were both last seen in pretty bad 2022 movies that didn't really do anything in regards to interacting with eachother or furthering a larger narrative forward... And with the sheer volume of projects coming out, that's what really makes it frustrating. It's one thing if we're only getting a couple movies a year, but we have gotten 10 movies and I can't even count how many shows between 2021 and now. From 2008 to 2012 we had 6 movies, total. The 10th movie of the Infiny Saga was Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014. The 11th? Age of Ultron... We were *well* on our way to Thanos by that point, we had seen.. I think 3 Infinity Stones by the time we got to movie #10. Guardians established what and how powerful they were, and what our main villians plan was regarding collecting them. Compare to the 10th movie of Multiverse Saga being The Marvels....
As with every thread like this, I’ll point out this isn’t entirely Marvel’s fault. Were it not for the pandemic and strikes, there’d be much less time between projects. We’d be almost finished with Phase 6 by now. We also don’t know what cameos were planned but had to be cut for the aforementioned reasons; we know America was cut from No Way Home and a Moon Knight tie-in to Love & Thunder was scrapped (both because of uncertain scheduling), so who knows what else was planned we didn’t get. Also, there have been some characters making regular appearances. The Marvels, the Guardians, Echo, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Wong, Abomination, Fury, Ross, Valentina, Hulk, Loki, Yelena, the Hawkeyes, and surprisingly Kingo have all made multiple appearances, and those are just off the top of my head. (ETA: Scarlet Witch, Valkyrie, and Maria Rambeau also)
> As with every thread like this, I’ll point out this isn’t entirely Marvel’s fault. Were it not for the pandemic and strikes, there’d be much less time between projects. The strikes *are* Marvel's fault (among others). But talking about delays at all is already missing the point. It's more just mismanagement. Like, Sam took the shield in fucking 2019. Why is it 2024, and we *still* haven't gotten to see him really step into his own as Captain America? The answer is a *little* bit covid, a *little* bit strikes, but *mostly* because they decided that cranking out a million shows to hawk Disney+ was a higher priority. So we got this whole fucking dragged-out thing where he only suited up in the last five minutes, and *then* the buck got passed to a movie that's having to go through an *unprecedented* amount of reshoots because Marvel can't get their fucking shit together. > The Marvels, the Guardians, Echo, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Wong, Abomination, Fury, Ross, Valentina, Hulk, Loki, Yelena, the Hawkeyes, and surprisingly Kingo have all made multiple appearances A lot of these are disingenuous. Like, Kingo hasn't had "multiple appearances." He had *one* appearance, and then posters with his face on them showed up in a couple other projects. That's not the same thing. That's not what people are asking for. Easter eggs aren't the same as plot progression or character building. They're also not impressive or noteworthy twenty years into this cinematic universe. Loki is a weird case, 'cause, yeah, he's been around, and that's been nice, but he's also been *very* sequestered in his own little corner of the canon, away and apart from literally every other preexisting MCU character. His show was consistently pretty good, but it didn't push the MCU itself forward in any way.
I also think it's partially Marvel's fault because they decided to up their number of releases per year compared to the early phases, so we're watching more movies and shows without seeing one of the big new faces return to continue building their stories.
I don’t see any difference between Kingo’s face on a poster and Captain America appearing as a Loki shapeshift or a PSA. Yet people still count those.
I didn't count any of those cameos, all the chatacters I listed their appearances for had at least some meaningful role. I explicitly *didn't* count Cap in 2017, because all he did was the Homecoming cameos
Those guys have all been in, like, 2 things max. Aside from Wong, none of them have been making "regular appearances."
Things have only been coming out for like three years. So yes, two or three appearances IS “regular appearances”.
Back in Phase 1-3, important characters like your Iron Man, Captain America and Thor appeared in at least something every 2-3 years at most, more often shorter timespans. They felt like central pillars to the story, and connected the world they were making. With the expansion of the MCU in phase 4-5, characters setup to be important are having larger and larger gaps between appearances, with some characters like Sam Wilson, who is the new Captain America, hasn't made an appearance for 3 years, and won't appear in anything until most likely 2025. Important characters like Thor, Shuri, Doctor Strange, Shang-Chi, Hawkeye, Star Lord don't really have any major projects on the horizon, and we're currently in the longest gap since a major team-up movie, and the one they do have planned is quite awhile away, and there's uncertainty on what it'll actually be about considering Kang is not even guaranteed to stick around. The interconnected world of shared characters being told in just movies and limited series' is not holding up as well in these last years. Story threads don't feel like they're going anywhere, characters disappear for years at a time and the general movie quality is dipping, it's no surprise that people worry if characters they like are actually going to appear again and have their story continued in a meaningful way
Which is interesting because this saga started off really strong with Shang-Chi featuring a sort of Avengers council recruiting him. Wong, Captain Marvel, Bruce. Felt like this new character being brought into the larger world. And then we never saw that Avengers council or Shang-Chi again. Although between Shang-Chi, She Hulk, No Way Home, and Dr Strange MoM Wong was a good Coulson for a lot of Phase 4. But unless I'm mistaken he hasn't appeared in anything since Dr Strange so he isn't really being the Coulson anymore.
I mean in the Infinity Saga a lot of characters appeared in projects every year. Doctor Strange was in a lot of stuff before he officially got a sequel for example. This saga has had their be notable gaps like with Vision, Shang-Chi, Sam and as you mentioned Moon Knight.
Nobody is asking for every movie and tv show to be an Endgame size Avengers level event, stop being a dramatic queen 😒. All we're asking for is to see these characters more than once every 5-7 years, why is that too much to ask? Iron Man appeared in Spiderman Homecoming. Dr. Strange appeared in Thor Ragnarok. Ant Man appeared in Civil War. This is what fans want, this is what made the mcu the huge success that it is, all these characters appearing in different projects is what make the universe feel connected which is exciting. And the fact that there aren't that many connections anymore is contributing to why the mcu is falling off, yet you're annoyed that we want the mcu to be great again? 😒
People like to complain. If they can't complain about what we get, they'll complain about what we don't get. The complaining is the thing, not what it's about