#// except stane and whiplash and hammer

[shellheadtmarc]

honestly i’m still angry the mcu actually blatantly pointed to the fact that the actual mandarin - you know, the guy with the literal ten alien tech rings and tony stark’s greatest nemesis - exists within the mcu and yet have done exactly fuck all with that reveal.

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Marvel Cinematic Universe review

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is one of the biggest and most ambitious franchises ever made. While not the first franchise ever to attempt a shared universe, it is definitely the one that codified how to pull them off in the modern day, and it has proven to be an incredible, unbelievable success. I mean, as good as Iron Man was, no one ever truly expected the little Nick Fury cameo at the end to ever be anything more than a neat little mythology gag. And yet, here we are, nearly a decade later, with it being the highest grossing franchise in cinematic history and with it containing some of the very best superhero films ever made.

Of course, there being fifteen movies so far, and with more on the way, it would be an enormous task to review them all individually… so, to celebrate the impending release of Spider-Man: Homecoming, I will be doing a similar thing as I did to the View Askiewniverse and touching upon each of the Marvel films thus far released. However, for the Guardians of the Galaxy films, Civil War, and Doctor Strange, I will keep things brief, as my reviews of them are still new enough to accurately reflect my opinions (Age of Ultron is not so lucky here).

There is no better place to start than the start, so let’s lok at the film that began it all: Iron Man. It is the tale of egotistical millionaire Tony Stark and how, after a brush with death that had him kidnapped by terrorists and crippled, he decided to change for the better and don a robot suit so he could protect the world from devastation. One of his big goals is to clean up the mess his company has made in the world, which not everyone likes, particularly Obadiah Stane.

This movie is probably most well known for resurrecting the career of Robert Downey, Jr. after he struggled for years with addiction and had a downward spiral. This is a truly triumphant return, and his negative experiences definitely helped him out with this role of a self-destructive playboy who realizes he should dedicate himself to a better cause. RDJ truly captures what his character is and what he should be, and thanks to his performance, he not only saved his career, he saved the character as well, who had not exactly been popular due to the recent Civil War event in the comics and his unnecessarily extreme actions therein. It’s a twofold saving, and boy is it a blast!

One part of the film that is not often talked about is the villain, Obadiah Stane, who is played by Jeff “The Dude” Bridges. As the very first Marvel supervillain, he does leave a bit of an impression with his  exclamation of how Tony built his first Iron Man suit IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS! He eventually suits up in a gigantic mech suit, and becomes the typical “Evil version of the hero” that we’ve all come to know and love… but, to be fair to him, he was the first one. As far as “Evil version of the hero”-type villains go, Obadiah Stane is enjoyable and memorable. He was originally planned to have a “never found the body” situation going on at the end of the film, hinting he could eventually return, but as it’s not in the final cut, we kinda have to assume that this was part of the annoying “kill the cool villain” trend the movies would follow for years.

This movie has a reputation as being one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, and it really isn’t undeserved. This film has kickass action, great characters, intriguing foreshadowing that actually payed off, and yet it still works easily as a standalone. This right here is how superhero films should be made, but the fact that so many later superhero films, including later MCU films and the DCEU films prior to Wonder Woman, decided to focus on cramming in so much crap that requires you to watch previous and later films to understand them, it seems not many got the memo. Franchise building isn’t always bad guys, but take notes; work on being good on your own first.

The Incredible Hulk is next up on the list, and this is one of the most obscure films in the MCU. NOBODY talks about this movie. I’d understand if people thought Mark Ruffalo was the first Hulk in the MCU; this movie is hardly ever referenced even in later films, all its plot threads seem to have been dropped, and it took until Civil War for one of its characters to reappear. For the life of me, I’ll never understand why; this movie is a fantastic example of worldbuilding while still remaining a solid standalone film. The plot is relatively simple: Bruce Banner wants to be left alone so he can cure himself, but after accidentally poisoning a man with his blood after it got into some soda (you read that right), General Ross and Emil Blonsky are on his trail; for those not in the know, Blonsky becomes one of Hulk’s most famous foes, Abomination.

Edward Norton is Bruce Banner here, and you can tell he really is a fan of the comics, because he does an excellent job; he apparently did a lot of uncredited rewriting and even directed some of his own scenes. William Hurt as Ross is also perfect, which of course is helped by the fact that Hurt is a big fan of Hulk. Then of course there’s Liv Tyler as Betty Ross, and she’s actually one of the better love interests in the MCU, to the point where it’s honestly offensive she hasn’t reappeared and instead has been replaced with Black Widow of all people as Bruce’s love interest.

The movie has solid action and a solid final fight, with Abomination being a pretty good “Evil version of the hero” villain. He’s not spectacular or anything, but he’s definitely threatening and pretty cool. So how then did this become such an obscure film in one of the biggest franchises? I imagine part of the problem is being screwed over by Universal, who owns the distribution rights for Hulk solo films. This movie just couldn’t be followed up, and so Hulk is relegated to ensemble casts. This leaves a lot of the characters in limbo, which includes Abomination and Leader (who had his origin shown in the film). And this is a real shame, because like I said, there’s some great worldbuilding here; the super-soldier serum is mentioned, there’s Stark weaponry, and in an alternate opening with the Hulk running through the arctic we get a glimpse of the frozen Captain America. Honestly, I think aside from the issue with the film rights, the fact that this movie can mostly be described as “Solid” is the reason why it has faded from the public consciousness; it lacks the OOMPH so many of the later films and even Iron Man before it had, and nowadays aside from looking for all the foreshadowing it’s hard to watch and care about these characters who will never show up again. It’s a damn good movie in my eyes, but I can see why it is relegated to a footnote in the MCU.

Next up is Iron Man 2. Fuck this movie. I fucking hate this movie with every fiber of my being. It is an awful, bloated, unfocused, cluttered, and disrespectful mess of the film. This film is a fucking travesty in every single regard, except perhaps casting Don Cheadle as James Rhodes. The plot deals with the fallout of Tony outing himself in the last movie, with industrialist Justin Hammer breathing down his neck as congressional hearings try and force him to share his tech. There’s also a pissed off Russian named  Ivan Vanko who wants to get vengeance on him, oh yeah and Black Widow is also unceremoniously stuffed into the film alongside Nick Fury so this can basically act as a trailer for the upcoming movie about the Avengers. This was due to executive meddling, to the point where jon Favreau didn’t direct the third Iron Man. Marvel had bad problems with executive meddling in their early days.

This movie fucking offends me. First off, they waste Mickey Rourke as the villain Whiplash; Mickey Rourke was pissed with the execs making his character into a cartoonish villain when he was trying to play him as a human, an anti-villain… and so he proceeded to spew vitriol at everyone involved, meaning even if Whiplash survived it’s unlikely he’ll be back. So we wasted the one interesting villain, and who are we left with? Justin fucking Hammer, one of the most unfunny, annoying cunts in comic book movie history. He is easily one of the worst superhero movie villains ever made; he’s annoying, he’s cloying, and he sucks away screentime that could have been devoted to Whiplash. He’s an absolute waste of a villain.

Then we have Tony’s “Demon in a Bottle” arc, the arc where his rampant alcoholism threatens to ruin his life. This is a tragic part of the character, and the film was going to delve deeper into it. And hey, this would have been great! RDJ could add a lot to such an emotional arc due to his own experiences! Guess what they do instead?

They play Tony’s alcoholism for laughs. Have I mentioned I fucking hate this movie?

This movie sucks ass. It’s fucking awful and feels like a shitty trailer for better movies, which is exacerbated by how shoehorned in Black Widow and Fury are. The movie is a bloated, disgusting mess, crushed by bad decisions and executive meddling. It is easily the worst movie in the entire MCU, but believe me it has some competition… which I’ll get to soon enough.

After that travesty, we have Thor. Thor I can best describe as being a precursor to Wonder Woman in a lot of ways, which is reflected in the story to an extent: it’s about a god – er, or an ALIEN – who is banished by his father after being a disobedient shit. He gets sent on down to Earth, while his half-brother Loki plots and schemes back on Asgard. Okay, so it’s not entirely like Wonder Woman, but still, there are similarities.

The biggest similarity is probably Chris Hemsworth as Thor, who exudes a childlike, boyish charm as Thor when he is down on Earth among the mortals. It’s not the same charm Diana has in Wonder Woman, but it’s not wholly dissimilar. Their origins too, as mighty gods who go to live among mortals and fight alongside them, is likewise similar. Of course, there are big differences too: the biggest one is while Wonder Woman surrounds herself with a cool human supporting cast, Thor surrounds himself with one of the worst fucking supporting casts I’ve ever seen. Special mention must go to the cliically unfunny Kat Dennings, who sucks the joy out of every scene she’s in with her relentlessly awful attempts at humor. Natalie Portman is a bland, flat love interest who has almost no chemistry with Thor, a nd the old scientist guy is so generic I forgot his name. This is a damn shame, because his supporting cast on Asgard was fantastic, with Heimdall getting special mention for being an utter badass guardian played by Idris Elba. I’d much rather watch the cosmic adventures of Thor and his Asgardian buddies than him pal around with boring humans, but ah well.

Still, at least we have a cool villain this time around. Loki is pretty interesting, and Tom Hiddleston does an excellent job with him. He would only get better and more entertaining in later films, but this was solid groundwork to establish him. Hilariously, Roger Ebert hated this film and had this to say in his review: “The standards for comic book superhero movies have been established by Superman, The Dark Knight, Spider-Man 2 and Iron Man. In that company Thor is pitiful. Consider even the comparable villains (Lex Luthor, the Joker, Doc Ock and Obadiah Stane). Memories of all four come instantly to mind. Will you be thinking of Loki six minutes after this movie is over?" This is just one of the most hilariously ironic reviews I’ve ever seen, as Loki has come to be one of the best and most memorable Marvel villains (mostly due to the fact he doesn’t die).

Overall, I feel like this movie suffers from the same thing The Incredible Hulk did; it’s a darn good movie with a lot of value that also works as a standalone film, but it’s easy to see it as exceedingly average due to its faults. At least this movie got followed up… though… eh. We’ll get there soon enough. As it stands, Thor is a good if not great film that establishes Thor well enough.

Next up is one of my personal favorites, Captain America: The First Avenger. I love me some pulpy 1940s style two-fisted tales, and this delivers that fun in spades. Sometimes you just wanna see a handsome blonde man punch Nazis in the face, and boy does this film deliver. The story tells the tale of how wimpy but strong-hearted Steve Rogers goes from a scrawny little man into the gorgeous beefcake American hero that is Captain America, and how he fought against Red Skull and HYDRA.

This movie has a lot of silly Golden Age elements to it that would not work in any other context other than the most patriotic superhero’s first big movie. The biggest, of course, being Cap himself. He’s a character that is really hard to pull off… and yet, Chris Evans did it, and perfectly so. I’ll let this excerpt from TVTropes’s YMMV page for the movie speak for itself:

“It's always an issue to adapt Captain America to any medium, because a character who is actually living up to his own principles of righteousness can far too easily come off as straight-out Narm, and by all rights that's exactly what this film should be. But somehow it comes out as a genuine, heartwarming, awesome, tear-jerking, triumphal ode to true patriotism and human goodness instead, a feat that should have been impossible outside the Golden Age of Hollywood. The writers, director, and Chris Evans deserve a lot of credit for striking the right tone with Cap: The Herois a trope that's almost never played straight anymore, without veering into self-parody or coming off as self-righteous.”

I really could not have summed it up better myself.

Now, let us talk about the villain, Red Skull, who is played by a deliciously hammy Hugo Weaving. Hugo Weaving is an actor I love in nearly everything, because he always brings exactly what is needed, and boy does he do that here. He’s sick, depraved, truly evil, and just oh so delightfully hammy. The man is basically if M. Bison as played by Raul Julia was in a Marvel film, and that I think is the highest compliment you can give a hammy villain. The best part: While he is defeated in the end, his use of the Cosmic Cube seems to imply he could survive, leaving him open to return. The bad news: he hasn’t appeared since, and for years after, Hugo Weaving took a very negative attitude to the role, implying he only did it for money… until a 2016 interview showed he had softened considerably, and thought the role was awesome. Please Marvel. Bring this man back. We need more of his evil Nazi hamminess, especially since you fucking wasted Baron Strucker (we’ll get to that soon enough).

If I’m gonna criticize anything here, it’s gonna be the Howling Commandos. As a point of comparison, let us bring up Wonder Woman again; she too assembled a multi-national ragtag group of misfits, and all of them had plenty of character and development, and to top it off, it’s pretty obvious they were meant to be a substitute for the Commandos. But despite they, they’re actually BETTER, as the Howling Commandos barely have any presence at all in this film. I couldn’t tell you a single thing they did. They’re dull wastes of character space, and it’s a shame.

Still, overall, the movie is fantastic pulpy fun, and it ends on the biggest tearjerker of Phase 1. It’s a pretty simple film, and at times it can seem corny and silly, but like I said in Wonder Woman, it’s all part of the charm of these optimistic superhero films that harken back to the Golden Age. And hey, I find it hard to give a movie that subtly implies Indiana Jones is canon in the Marvel universe anything but two thumbs up.

Finally, after all the buildup, we come to the big conclusion of Phase 1: The Avengers. And after all the buildup, all the development, was it worth the wait? HELL FUCKING YES IT WAS WORTH THE WAIT! This movie kicks a whole lot of ass, and is one of the biggest, best, and flashiest superhero films ever made. This is the film where Thor, Cap, Iron Man, Hulk, Hawkeye, and Black Widow all unite to take down Loki and his alien army before they destroy the world; how much cooler does it get?

The movie’s greatest strength is just the sheer spectacle of it all; this kind of film was unheard of. Who would have thought a movie like this would exist when Iron Man first came out? Seeing all these huge actors as heroes onscreen together, fighting against Loki… it’s just amazing. The writing and humor here is actually really on point, which can be jarring after seeing the much denser and wackier dialogue of Age of Ultron; it makes one wonder if the execs forced Joss Whedon to add more humor to that film. All these pieces are in place, and it is just a joy to see them come together.

Even better, it’s not totally required to watch every movie before to understand all of the characters; the film does a pretty good job of establishing everyone. Sure, it HELPS, but you can get a feel for each one of the heroes just from this film. It especially helps with Bruce, since it’s Mark Ruffalo now in the role and no one really remembered Hulk’s one MCU solo outing anyway. Speaking of which, Mark Ruffalo is a highlight of the film; he’s the best Bruce Banner yet by far, and his Hulk is the best yet scene in film.

If there are any criticisms to go around, it’s that Cap doesn’t get to do as much, and a lot of the badass normal heroes kind of get shafted. Sure Cap, Widow, and Hawkeye do some cool shit, but it’s Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man who pull of the big, flashy, exciting moments in the big final fight. I get that you gotta make Hulk cool considering his lackluster past films, but do ya gotta steal Cap’s thunder to do it?

Overall though, The Avengers still holds up as a great, exciting superhero extravaganza and one of the best crossover films ever made, and it’s definitely one of the best MCU offerings. It has its flaws, but the sheer excitement and comic book joy of the film shine through, making it a must-see experience.

Phase 1 ended on such a high note… how do we kick off Phase 3? With another shitty Iron Man sequel, of course! To be totally fair, this movie is a hell of a lot better than Iron Man 2… but a lot of things are better than that, so it isn’t saying much. This time Tony Stark has the bright idea of antagonizing a terrorist organization known as the Ten Rings and their leader, the Mandarin. This backfires, and soon Tony is uncovering evil plots and shit.

This movie fucks up badly, especially in the villain department. Most of the enemy mooks are people injected with Extremis, a drug that gives them powers… the problem is, most of these mooks are disabled military vets who are now willingly and gleefully acting out terrorist attacks on their fellow Americans, up to and including a plot to assassinate the president. Look, I get sometimes it’s dumb to read into things in movies too much, but there’s really no way I can read this that isn’t pretty fucked.

As if that isn’t bad enough, we come to the issue with the Mandarin… and shockingly, it’s not about race or the “Yellow peril” origins of the character. For most of the movie, we are led to believe the Mandarin is played by Ben Kingsley, and he does an absolutely excellent job at making the Mandarin menacing, chilling, hammy, and intimidating all at once. He’s the perfect modern update of the villain… and sadly, he is not actually the Mandarin. He is an actor named Trevor Slattery. Slattery still manages to be one of the bright spots of the movie… something that does not extend to the true villain Killian, played by Guy Pearce. He’s an extremely boring, generic, and forgettable foe, and his claims that he is in fact the real Mandarin opened so many plotholes it’s no wonder they had in development a short where the real Mandarin sends out pissed off enforcers to call bullshit on his and Trevor’s schemes.

There’s just not much to recommend here. The movie is just a dull slog with a few bright spots here and there, and even the ending is bullshit with Tony seeming like he’s giving up superheroics for good… and then by his next appearance he’s back to being a hero with a new set of armor even though all his suits were destroyed in this movie. This one just sucks, though not as bad as the second one; there’s at least a bit more to like here.

And now we go from bad to worse, for we land on Thor: The Dark World, which is an incredibly awful movie. The plot involves evil elves invading Asgard looking for a magic MacGuffin to do things and… look, the only reason anyone bothered with this fucking movie is because Loki is in it, and by god, the forty minutes he’s in it are just fantastic and funny. His interactions with Thor are nothing short of hilarious, and the fact he actually comes out on top in this movie is intriguing. Props to the film for that at least.

Too bad the film sucks in nearly every other conceivable way. The major focus on the human characters is the worst of all; Natalie Portman is given a disproportionately large amount of screentime and hogs the plot, and Kat Dennings is back and as relentlessly unfunny as ever. She is like a cancerous tumor on an already foul film. And as if the humans aren’t bad and obnoxious enough, we have the villain, Malekith the Accursed, a dark elf who has some of the most generic and boring motives ever despite looking absolutely cool. He is one of the worst comic book movie villains ever, hands down, and it’s such a shame because he’s played by the usually amazing Christopher Eccleston. To say that he was wasted here is a crass understatement.

There’s not much else to say here; this is an awful, shitty movie. The saving graces are Loki’s screentime and maybe the final battle, but even that is interjected with some unfunny humor, and the lack of a solid villain really drags the film down. This film is utter crap, but at least there’s a bit to recommend here, which is more than I can say for Iron Man 2.

Well we’ve got two strikes down, so this is Marvel’s last swing… can they save their asses? I mean, this is a sequel, to Captain America: The First Avenger of all things, this couldn’t possibly be that good, right?

WRONG.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is not only one of the very best films in the entire MCU, it is one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, and probably the greatest adaptation of Metal Gear Solid we’ll ever get. I’m not kidding, everything’s there: a genetically modified super soldier fighting against a shadowy conspiracy that wants to use a giant war machine to attack the world’s population, all the while fighting a crazy cyborg version of their best friend. Also there’s a fight in an elevator and an evil AI that has been manipulating the world from behind the scenes. If you can’t already tell, I fucking love this movie.

A big plus is that this is less straight-up superhero action for the most part, and more an action thriller. This lets Steve use his badass super soldier skills to their fullest extent against armies of armed mooks. Even more amazingly, this movie does a good job at making Black Widow likable and interesting, and she has very good chemistry with Steve. Best of all, though, is the introduction of Anthony Mackie as Falcon, Cap’s new best buddy and a badass hero in his own right who helps solve this big HYDRA conspiracy. And despite his limited screentime, Sebastian Stan makes an impression as the incredible, unstoppable, hardcore titular Winter Soldier, AKA Bucky Barnes, Cap’s long-lost friend.

This movie is the one all Marvel sequels would be judged by afterwards. Well, for a while at least; this movie’s own sequel managed to top it somehow. But yes, this movie is absolutely fucking fantastic, a modern classic of the superhero genre, and one of the best Marvel sequels ever made. Not bad, especially since unlike Iron Man or Thor the original movie is not the biggest or most critically acclaimed Marvel film (Though t still got a mostly positive reception). The fact it managed to produce a sequel superior to the first while Thor and Iron Man’s sequels ended up being shit is nothing short of impressive.

After this movie came Guardians of the Galaxy, which I reviewed recently on Michael After Midnight. Needless to say, it’s an amazing film, akin to a modern-day Star Wars, and I truly love it… though at this point, I fully admit its sequel is far superior. If you want a general idea of my thoughts on the film, just click the link there.

So how do you follow up two incredibly epic game-changing movies? With an Avengers sequel! Joss Whedon is back, the cast is all here, what could possibly go wrong?

A whole fucking lot.

This movie had tons of executive meddling, so much it drove Whedon nuts. But executive meddling can’t take all the blame for the shoddy script and the piss-poor mishandling of characters. One of my biggest regrets is saying this was one of the better MCU films in my review; it most definitely is not. But on the other hand, unlike the Iron Man sequels or Thor: The Dark World, there really is a lot of genuinely good stuff in this movie. Look at the plot: Tony, desperate to keep the world safe, creates an AI that ends up going rogue… that AI being Ultron. Now they gotta stop this AI before it wipes out humanity. There’s a lot of good potential in this story! But sadly, this potential is not fully realized.

Let me talk about the good stuff first. The big draw is the action setpieces, which are a bit more spectacular than before… or they would be the big draw, but since the story is so messy, it’s hard to care too much. At least there’s more action scenes. The REAL draw here is  this stretch of time where the Avengers are at Hawkeye’s cabin; this lets all of the characters interact with each other in a close space, and see how everyone plays off each other. It’s absolutely fantastic, and it’s a shame the whole movie isn’t as tightly written as these scenes. Hell, they manage to make Black Widow, who tends to be a dull and uninteresting character, more human with a bit of tragic backstory.

The new characters here are fascinating as well; Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, Ulysses Klaue, Vision… all of these characters are pretty interesting and cool. In concept, at least. While Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver get a solid amount of screentime since they’re working for Ultron for most of the film before switching sides, by the film’s end Quicksilver is killed. Vision only appears immediately before the final fight, Klaue is just a cameo (albeit a really good one) to set up Black Panther… none of these characters really feel organically added, they feel crammed in to set up future films, leading to Age of Ultron feeling like a trailer for better movies to come.

Look at the original Avengers movie; you could jump into that from just about anywhere in your Marvel viewing experience and get it, and they don’t throw too much new at you. Here, they’re flinging all sorts of new shit at you that you pretty much NEED to watch the other movies to really get this one. Hell, and even that doesn’t help too much, since there are still things like Thor’s weird, nonsensical vision and Bruce and Natasha’s out of nowhere romance.

Of course, the absolute worst part of this film is the absolutely horrendous script. It’s not entirely bad, but there are lines like “She’s weird and he runs fast” (describing Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, respectively) and Black Widow going “Beep beep” while she rides through a crowd and Tony’s infamous “prima noctis” joke… the movie is just so dense with garbage writing like this that it’s impossible to take seriously and it deflates the tension when it constantly happens in battles. Now, there are still some good and genuinely funny moments, like when Vision lifts the hammer or Klaue’s entire scene, but there’s plenty of cringe inducing stuff that proves when it comes to Whedon’s writing, lightning DOES strike twice… do you want to know what happens when Whedon’s writing is hit by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else.

Now, finally, let’s talk about the villains… oh, sorry, VILLAIN, they decide to anticlimactically kill Baron Strucker offscreen after the opening, so no point in discussing him! Ultron is the biggest saving grace of the film… as well as yet another example of Marvel getting rid of their most interesting villains. Ultron has solid motives, an interesting plan, and with more fleshing out could have served as an incredible reoccuring antagonist… so of course he is blown up by the end of the film, because his name isn’t Loki. HOWEVER, everything is ambiguous enough that he could realistically return; guy had to hide a backup somewhere, yeah? James Spader did such a good job at making Ultron both creepy and charismatic it would be a crime to not use his talents again, though since Marvel isn’t exactly begging Hugo Weaving to be Red Skull again at the moment, I won’t hold my breath. What makes this a bit more bitter is that, overall, Ultron was the best villain in all of Phase 2.

Age of Ultron is a film that can only be described as messy. Honestly? I’d say it’s a bit worse than Iron Man 3. That film may not be very good, but at least it was a bit more focused and the humor didn’t clog every single action scene and they didn’t try and cram fifty new characters to act as teasers for better movies into the plot. This film actually has a lot in common with Batman v Superman; the story is cluttered and unfocused and choked by the tone of the rest of the film, there are superfluous cameos and character insertions that are advertising better films to come, and obviously both are lukewarm superhero crossover films. Age of Ultron has a better villain, however, while Batman v Superman has much better fight scenes, and also Batman doesn’t make an awkward and forced rape joke so that’s good. In all honesty, I’d rather watch Batman v Superman over this; that movie may be dark and dour, but I can handle grim and gritty more than I can handle horribly painful and unfunny jokes ruining most every action scene. Age of Ultron is a seriously mediocre movie, and it’s just so depressing after how good the original Avengers film was… what a note to end Phase 2 on…

...Ha! Psyche! There’s still another movie, bitches! Here comes motherfucking Ant-Man to save the day! Whoever could have thought that Ant-Man of all characters would redeem Phase 2 by delivering a quirky, genuinely funny action-crime thriller? This story has Scott Lang, a former robber who is trying to go straight for the sake of his daughter, get roped in to becoming Ant-Man after breaking and entering into Hank Pym’s house. Ant-Man has to steal research from Pym’s former company before the new, corrupt owner Darren Cross abuses the research.

So this film has great setup, and it’s a refreshing change of pace for the most part. The film is mainly about the training to become Ant-Man and the heist itself, leading to a bit of a different tone from the usual superhero film. Yes, of course there’s a big fight with a supervillain at the end, but it’s so quirky and hilarious that it still fits the tone of the rest of the film. That’s another great quality this film has; it’s quirky and humorous while not being obnoxiously so like the last film. A great addition is one of Scott Lang’s sidekicks, Luis, an incredibly enthusiastic criminal with quite bit of hidden depths and an impressive skill for telling stories.

But even more impressive than the quirkiness and the interesting change of pace from other superhero films is just how this movie takes things and makes you like them, things no one would ever expect to like. Hank Pym for example; Pym has long been a subject of ridicule among comic fans, mostly due to an infamous moment where he hit his wife Janet. After this movie and Michael Douglas’s powerful and moving performance in scenes such as when he talks about how his wife died… well, those “Wifebeater Hank Pym” jokes can go the way of most of the MCU’s villains. Douglas did an excellent job at making Hank a character with flaws who is still sympathetic. And if that’s not enough at how this movie makes you love things you’d never expect to, well, this film just may make you cry over the death of an ant. No, I’m not kidding.

Now, if there’s one thing I can really criticize here, it’s the villain. Darren Cross/Yellowjacket is not bad by any means, but like a lot of MCU villains he falls into the trap of having the same superpowers as the hero, which is frankly an overplayed concept. Look at the great villains of the MCU like Loki, Ultron, or Ego; all of them had powers that gave them an edge or were noticeably different from the heroes they fought. Cross shrinks just like Ant-Man does, just like Obadiah Stane had a giant robot suit, Abomination was a big roaring monster, and Kaecilius was a powerful wizard. None of these villains are really bad per se, but still. At least that final fight is incredible, with the concept of two men with shrinking powers played for all it c an be played for and so many great comedic moments coming from it.

Ant-Man totally makes up for how lackluster and unfunny Age of Ultron was. It’s genuinely funny without clogging every scene with jokes, the action is utilized excellently, the protagonists are all likable and enjoyable, and the film feels a lot more fun and fresh than anyone would expect. This is definitely one of the most shocking success stories of the MCU, but that success is nothing less than well-deserved.

And now we enter into Phase 3, and as I have reviewed all the films, I will link to their reviews.

First up is Civil War, the third Captain America film, and the movie that Age of Ultron should have been. It still does bring in some new blood, but they feel far less forced and more organically woven into the plot. The jokes and the action are all great, and the villain is actually interesting. Click here to see what I thought of it, and also what I thought of Batman v Superman (I may have to re-review that movie as well…).

Next up is Doctor Strange, which holds the distinction of perhaps being the most visually impressive superhero film ever made. The trippy visuals really help to make the film, and Benedict Cumberbatch puts in an excellent performance, as does Mads Mikkelson, who redeems what would otherwise be a flat villain. Click here for the full review of the movie.

Then we have the most recent of the bunch, my favorite film of all time, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. I won’t say anything here, just click the link for the full review.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is constantly growing and expanding, creating new and fascinating stories that their characters can inhabit. These films are some of the only modern superhero films that truly embrace their comic book roots and play them for all they’re worth. Coming up soon are films such as Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Ant-Man & The Wasp, Captain Marvel, and untitled Avengers, Doctor Strange, and Spider-Man sequels as well as volume three of the Guardians of the Galaxy story. We can only hope that, upon their release, I have wonderful things to say about them. But considering the high quality of most of the movies here, especially as time went on… I don’t think there’s any reason to be afraid. Marvel’s the king of superhero cinema right now, and I see no signs they’ll be giving up that crown any time soon.