Is It Time To Let The MCU Just Die?
On November 1, 2023, Variety printed an article wherein a Marvel insider — careful to keep their name hidden — noted that Marvel Studios was "truly ****ed" when it came to the character of Kang (Jonathan Majors). Kang, some Marvel fans might be able to tell you, is an interdimensional, time-traveling supervillain who is in league with myriad duplicates of himself from across the multiverse. Kang is hyper-intelligent and aims to erase whole timelines from the multiverse until he is essentially the only sentient being left standing. Or something. His motivation isn't wholly interesting. An upcoming film, as Disney announced in 2022, will be called "Avengers: The Kang Dynasty," so it seems clear that the company wants to arrange their next major team-up event — a la "Avengers: Endgame" — around Kang. The insider quoted in Variety has revealed that Kang is underwhelming. This, in addition to the slew of bad press surrounding Majors and his assault trial.
This crisis, the Variety article points out, came at the end of a long downward slide for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Once peerless in box office receipts and endlessly capable of sucking the air out of the room when it came to any serious discussion about the cinematic medium, the MCU is now experiencing a dramatic contraction. Several of its more recent films haven't been as well-received or as successful as their predecessors, and stories have been coming out more and more about the studio's sloppy VFX handling and last-minute, over-moneyed changes.
Perhaps this isn't merely superhero fatigue. Perhaps we're looking at something that's been on life support for too long. Perhaps the time has come to just let this mishegoss end.
The incredible glut
Pundits who still love the MCU, or those who still hold out hope that it can spring back to life, frequently delve into why the MCU is contracting and have many ideas as to how to fix it. Some say that "Avengers: Endgame," one of the biggest movies of all time, was so effective a climax that continuing with the series without a years-long breather was foolhardy. Others rightly point out that COVID-related theater closures and production delays derailed the carefully timed marketing train that the MCU always rode on.
Others still handily point out that there is simply now far too much of the MCU to handle. The first three "phases" in the MCU film series — 2008's "Iron Man" through 2019's "Avengers: Endgame" — ran a total of 49 hours and 56 minutes over the course of 11 years. That's a lot. Phase 4 unto itself, however — that's "WandaVision" through "The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special" — racked up 50 hours and 21 minutes of screen time from January 2021 to November 2022. Words like "overexposure" and "oversaturation" come to mind.
And, frustratingly, Phase 4 didn't climax in a major "event" crossover film the way the previous three phases did. This was two solid years of time and more than two straight days of filmed entertainment that amounted to little more than wheel-spinning.
Yes, some of the films and/or shows have been good. I was fond of the heady sci-fi conceits of "Eternals," and James Gunn's "Holiday Special" assuredly has its fans. But it's possible to admire the individual chapters in a film series while still tiring of the machine that's making it.
Loosening the death grip
Also mixed up in the MCU's overexposure/contraction was Scarlett Johansson's lawsuit against Disney over the company's movement of her film from theaters to streaming. The suit didn't necessarily deal a massive financial blow to the MCU, but it was a sign that the series' most visible and famous actors weren't willing to hold the series in a glittering, untouchable esteem.
The MCU has taken up all the air in the room for the better part of the last 15 years. There is an entire fungus-like industrial ecosystem online that thrived in its shadow, from superhero websites to trailer reaction videos, from cosplayers to fan wikis. Some of those websites may finally be facing the fact that commenting on the MCU's runoff was not an eternally sustainable business model. For too long, the MCU was seen as above criticism, the central, peerless standard by which all blockbusters must be measured. Journalists asked Martin Scorsese repeatedly about the MCU for goodness' sake. It sometimes felt that the only movies worth discussing were the ones with Avengers in them.
Perhaps, I posit, it's time to let the building come crashing down and find other aspects of the cinematic landscape to focus on. The recent success of tiny-budget horror movies like "Terrifier 2" and "Skinamarink" prove that the 2010s' age of ultra-blockbusters is drawing to a close.
Will the world miss it? Perhaps. Throughout the reign of the MCU, each one of their releases, no matter the obscurity of the character, felt like an event. These were must-see pictures, crucial to understanding the modern pop landscape. Those who enjoy thrill-ride-like movies full of cheer moments, special effects, and clear-cut good guys and bad guys may be wistful about their departure.
But some of us are ready to move on.
But what does the MCU mean?
The most significant aspect of the MCU's contraction, however, might have a lot to do with why the series became popular in the first place. Note that the series is not about crime preventers but, as Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.) once pointed out in dialogue, about crime avengers. They get back at villains who have already enacted an evil plan. This is a clear metaphor for post-9/11 malaise. The Avengers represented a freelance military force whose morals were unshakably good and whose powers were impressive enough to stop attacks from mysterious outsiders. Many audience members emotionally latched onto the Avengers because they lived in a clean, parallel universe where superpowered beings could stop wanton acts of violent terrorism.
In the decade after 9/11, audiences were gloomy, surrounded by wars, and watching gritty military dramas that were still dizzy from the real-life violence in New York. By 2012, audiences were ready to see heroes clean up the mess.
By 2023, however, another generation has passed, and the wound of 9/11 is as healed as it will ever be. At the very least, America no longer requires the fantastical cinematic bandage that the Avengers provided. In short, the Avengers have outlived their cultural usefulness.
Without anything notably thematic to add to the cultural landscape, a wild over-glut of content, a thrown COVID-related release schedule, scandals surrounding budgets and VFX, a lawsuit, and a major star being taken to court, it's no wonder audiences are finally — finally — losing interest. There will be no repeat of "Endgame."
It's not too late to cut and run. There's no law saying that the MCU has to continue indefinitely.