Op-Ed: The only thing that can defeat Marvel is Marvel

After the kickoff of Phase 5 with “Antman and the Wasp: Quantumania”, fans, including myself, are upset with how Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) projects have been on the decline. Chief among the complaints are the fears Marvel will continue to bring in new and exciting characters only to not do anything else with them, make movies with an immense amount of comedy, lack of any direction with the overall story, or with a decrease in CGI quality.

The MCU has been the most successful movie franchise of all time, bringing in, according to market and consumer data website Statista, 26.6 billion total dollars in total box office revenue worldwide, with Star Wars being a far second with 10.32 billion total dollars.   Marvel’s most successful movie, “Avengers: Endgame,” made 2.8 billion dollars. As of the date of this article’s release, this is the second largest amount of money grossed by a movie of all time behind “Avatar”, which brought in 2.9 billion dollars.

 Even with all of this financial success, Marvel is on the decline.

In the first phase, they introduced characters like Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, and Captain America, then they tied them all into one movie, “The Avengers.” In the second phase, they continued the stories of these characters, as well as introduced new characters like Ant Man and Wanda. Fans loved how all the films were part of a larger story. Now, But the newer phases haven’t really been following this trend, and it seems like Marvel is just making movies and Disney+ exclusives to rack in more money, rather than try to add to the overall narrative.  

Daredevil’s appearance in “She Hulk” is a great example of this.  Daredevil has his own show on Netflix, which was created by Marvel but didn’t connect to the overall storyline of the MCU. There is a “Daredevil” reboot coming to Disney+ in Spring of 2024, there is no new information that shows contexts as of this article’s release. Rather than spend money on introducing a new character that won’t be a huge part in the actual story, I think they should’ve used that to make their movies and other shows better looking.

I also dislike how Marvel brings in new characters from the comics to not really do much with them. “Moon Knight” is a perfect example of this. Moon Knight got his own one-season show in 2022, and Marvel has not shown any other interest in renewing it for a second season or incorporating him into other films they make.

Marvel uses a ton of CGI and other visual effects for their films. According to Industrial Light and Magic, a VFX company, “Avengers: Infinity War” only consisted of 80 shots that did not need any visual effect out of the around 2,700 total shots in the two and a half hours long movie. This means that only three percent of “Infinity War” did not require any visual effects. I believe this hurts the movies because companies like Industrial Light and Magic can’t keep up with the workload.

Personally, I am starting to dislike the amount of one liners in Marvel’s movies, especially when the antagonist is very serious and sinister. For example, Gorr the God Butcher from “Thor: Love and Thunder,” was one of Marvel’s serious villains, seeking revenge on all gods for the life he was given. Despite the dark tone of the villain, Thor was very comical and upbeat throughout a large chunk of the film. This made Gorr’s character and purpose seem less dangerous and hurt the overall feel of the movie.

The people at Disney and Marvel studios need to figure out what their overall aim is, or this decline in viewership and backing from a fanbase will lead to their downfall.