What if, 'Ultron' - Sep 29

Obligatory disclaimer: real life is tricky; it is autumn in Ontario, Canada now, and all of the American toads and garter snakes and the rest of the cold-blooded animals are beginning to go to their winter hibernation sites; whereas the local songbirds – i.e., the American robin and the like – are flying down south, to the U.S., and beyond. Winter is only coming, it is not yet here, but the wildlife is getting the heck out of dodge already. As such, I often genuinely wonder as to how the world of ASOIAF would function – 10 years summer, 10 years winter and the such like? The local animals would find it to be murder, hence why GM never cared about them in his novels, dragons and dire wolves aside – but we digress.

This week, Marvel’s ‘What if?’ S1 has reached its’ penultimate episode, which has Ultron killing everyone, except for Natasha ‘Black Widow’ Romanoff and Armin Zola. Seriously, that is a character worth saving? Bloody Zola? Yes, obviously, the concept of ‘what if’ does imply from the start that here be unknown people with known names, but still? Zola?

…Zola aside, we got what? Further confirmation that the Thanos from ‘the sacred timeline’ was either especially tough, or especially lucky, or its’ Avengers were an especially measly bunch instead. Way back when, it took them two movies to actually defeat the grape goliath, and here in ‘What if?’, in the other timelines, various characters defeat him hither and yon. Puts a different perspective on all of those Infinity Stones found in the TVA, you know!

As for the episode itself, well… Yes, it is bad that Ultron won and killed everyone, to put it lightly, but we have already seen a variant of that, back in the episode 1x04, when that version of Dr. Strange did pretty much the same thing – and now he is back, as the Watcher has contacted him for help.

It should be noted that the Watcher had not shown initiative here; instead, it was the Ultron-Vision who attacked the Watcher, causing him to flee and start to assemble his own team, (though, notably, he has not contacted Zola or Romanoff yet), in order to save the multiverse and himself. Guess the TVA is going to be replaced after all, by the new mega-avengers, or else Ultron is going to kill the Marvel multiverse instead. This has happened before, actually, albeit by Deadpool rather than Ultron, but as we have seen, ‘What if?’ presents only the Avengers-associated characters so far, and Deadpool isn’t one of them; if you’re going to argue that the GotG aren’t exactly Avengers’ themselves, well, ‘What if?’ has them associated with T’Challa instead, and that hero began to be associated with the Avengers since the CA: CW film… unlike Shang-Chi, who never was, and so this movie of his is his first true appearance in the MCU, period. Where were we?

Ah yes, the Marvel comic arc called appropriately ‘Ultron Forever’, in which the titular character took over Earth, Asgard, and the rest, and only the brave yet ruthless Doombot stood in his way, so he assembled a team of Avengers from several time periods in Marvel history, and together the team defeated ‘the All-Father Ultron’ and brokered peace between the Doombot and the new free world… Where were we?

Oh yeah, ‘What if?’ aimed to shock and awe as much as anything, but the problem is that just as with many other TV series, (MCU or not), the shock and awe wear off quite quickly, and we’re left… with a TV show in this case, one whose S1 is coming to an end next week anyhow, and whose final expression – so far – is more positive than negative. Yay, really!

…However, for now, this is it. See you all soon!

What if, 'Thor' - Sep 22

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life, sometimes, can be… weird: earlier this week I have encountered a real life rat in the broad daylight, and it was a big one: about the size of a small groundhog, (aka a woodchuck), and just as massive. Some sources of mine claim that it was a male rat, (a Norway rat, for classification’s sake), since the females of the species are smaller and slimmer than the males are, but that is redundant; the point is that I saw a real live rat, in broad daylight, and that isn’t something that has happened to me before, not ever, and probably won’t happen to me again either, (not in a long while, anyhow), and this sort of thing makes life rather tolerable to live, at least some of the times… Where were we?

My rat-related rant aside, this week’s episode of ‘What if?’ was the comedy episode; in it, we got to meet Thor who did not grow up alongside Loki, as the latter was returned to Laufey in this particular universe. Fair enough, an AU is an AU, and it does not have to be relatable to the main timeline either, but where does it leave us?

…Well, with variant Ultrons up the proverbial wazoos, if you want to be literal, but also – in the finishing stretch; let me elaborate. So far, ‘What if?’ was a rather restrained show for a cartoon: it took a single premise and ran with it – sometimes wildly, sometimes not so much, but always within the framework laid down by the mainline Disney/MCU, meaning that this season of ‘What if?’ is about the Avengers and no one else, though, admittedly, this ‘limited’ cast was big enough for the episodes – so far – each to have a different set of main characters; secondary characters are a different story, but they’re secondary for a reason… what else?

…A crossover episode, or rather episodes, as the odds of ‘What if?’ S1 ending on a double-episode finale are good, plus it would give the showrunners of ‘What if?’ to show the audiences how the MCU multiverse can handle this sort of an emergency without the TVA, (cough, ‘Loki’, cough), fixing it prematurely, but now we may have multidimensional Avengers assembling, so yay, here we go! What is left?

Nothing, I must admit. ‘What if?’ has begun on a mixed note: a tame job that pretends to be wild, and it remains as such; there are no Agents, (because AoS evolved into a hot mess), no InHumans, (because that show was insipidly bad so now its’ core concept was probably reworked in the ‘Eternals’ movie, cough), no Defends or X-Men or Fantastic Four because of copyright issues, no outsiders period. Fair enough and so far ‘What if?’ does deliver what it has intended to deliver – an entertaining pageant and a spectacle. That is not bad, but by now, seven episodes into the S1 – we are almost at a season’s finale, people! – the aforementioned people are getting rather tired of ‘What if?’, especially with such new gems as ‘Hawkeye’ and ‘Hit-Monkey’ are appearing on the horizon, to say nothing of the Eternals and what not. People are getting tired of ‘What if?’ for the moment, the show is losing steam, and I, for one, was, and am, and will be, more interested in the wild/feral Norway rat that I’ve encountered earlier this week than about the show, (at the moment), but that’s just me. I have been known to be weird after all.

Therefore, for now, this is it. See you all soon, instead!

What if, 'Killmonger' - Sep 15

Disclaimer: real life sucks, so let’s talk about one of its’ aspects first, instead, before returning to MCU. Where are we?

Ah yes, the YouTube. On this occasion, I watched a video called ‘Black Mamba vs. Viper’, where the victory was awarded to the black mamba, and I have to say that I disagree with it.

What is wrong with this match? For a start, the term ‘viper’ is an umbrella term: it covers the ‘true’ vipers, (such as the adder of Europe and the gaboon viper of Africa), the pit vipers, and also their immediate relatives – but that is unimportant, actually.

What is important is that the black mamba is an elaphid snake: its’ fangs are short and fixed, immobile – and its venom is a neurotoxin, it attacks the nervous system first. The fangs of the vipers – all of them – are much longer and fold when the snake closes its’ mouth – and their venom is a hemotoxin, it attacks the blood vessels first. Again, that is not important, but…

…But what is important is that snakes are scaly, rather than furry or feathery, unlike how birds and mammals are. As a result, when two snakes fight each other, they need to pierce scales, rather than fur or feathers, and scales can be tougher to pierce. The king cobra, which hunts and eats other snakes – hey, it is a living – is a cousin of the black mamba, (though do not ask me how close – apparently, the king cobra is not a ‘true’ cobra, whatever that implies beyond scientific classification), meaning that its’ fangs are relatively short and fixed and its’ venom is a neurotoxin… see above. However, it isn’t just much bigger and stronger than a black mamba – the king cobra is the biggest modern venomous snake, period, according to the official science – but it also has extra thick scales, in case its’ prey tries to counterattack with its’ own venomous bite… Put otherwise, the king cobra is a snake-hunting specialist and the black mamba isn’t, and when fighting a viper – any viper – it has to deal with an opponent whose scales might be thicker and tougher than its’ own, and whose fangs are certainly longer and sharper than the black mamba’s own… I am not saying that the black mamba cannot win this fight; I am just saying that the odds are stacked against it, that is all. Now onto the MCU?

Well yes, though given how Erik Killmonger – or N’Jadoka – has behaved in this week’s episode – we are not done with snakes. See, the way that the teaser trailer for this week’s episode was set up made us – well, me, for one – think that he might become a hero in this AU. Conversely, he became a villain, a manipulator and a blackguard, has killed quite a few people, some of whom were, or could’ve been, quite important to MCU, and have become king of Wakanda at the end, (though the episode ends with some optimism, more reminiscent of the ep 1x03 than the ep 1x04, for comparison). I am going with Shakespeare’s Richard III.

Let me elaborate. When it comes to ‘Black Panther’ the franchise and its’ corner of the Marvel universe(s), the themes of kings, kingdoms and kingships come up regularly, for all of the obvious reasons. The previous example was the 1x02 episode of ‘What if?’ which featured T’Challa as the Star-Lord, yes, but also as some sort of an outlaw king, a ‘white’ king, a fair and a just king and so on. Killmonger, conversely, is T’Challa’s direct opposite, something that this week’s episode of ‘What if?’ showed loud and clear, and that’s not a problem, but…

…But having already talked about the ‘Black Panther’ film recently in regards to the ‘Shang-Chi’ film, I got to re-digging some of my old files about the former film, and among them I found some articles that pointed out specifically that Killmonger was the villain of the movie, pure and simple, and not some conflicted anti-hero, cough. Now, this week – Sep 15, 2021 – we got a ‘What if?’ Killmonger episode, which confirms that no matter what the world, Killmonger is always a villain, and Tony Stark – for a different example – is not.

…Yes, this is a dig at the fact that there are plenty of people who are still sore at Tony, or at captain Rogers, in regards to MCU’s take on the Civil War plotline. There are also enough people who are still sore at Ward at the role he played in MCU’s AoS, especially the S1, when the effect was the strongest. Well, to put it bluntly, Killmonger was much more successful and ruthless than Ward ever was, period, so take that, critics!.. And also accept predeterminism, I guess.

No, seriously, the un- or intended other side of this week’s ‘What if?’ episode is that nature beats nurture, so to speak. Again, to use that particular contrast, but by befriended Stark, Killmonger got himself the opportunities that - anyone in S.H.I.E.L.D., ok, fine – would have dreamed about, (cough, the FitzSimmons, cough). And how does Killmonger repay Stark for all of those opportunities? With monstrous ingratitude, to put it lightly. Whereas T’Challa tries to think of everybody, and tries to make the world a better place for everyone, Killmonger cares only about himself, and the world can go screw itself for all that he cares. Fair enough, though the ‘Black Panther’ movie had that message rather muddled, and that version of Killmonger is dead anyhow, right?..

Is there anything left? Ah yes, the Hawkeye trailer that came out yesterday, (Sep 14, 2021). So far, it does a good job of capturing the Hawkeye spirit – I am talking about both Barton and Bishop – one that is serious, formidable, yet also a goofball on occasion, with some humor at least. (The Hawkeye version from the Ultimates comics lacked humor completely).  Here, we see the Avengers’ underdog finally getting his time to shine, and I’m not talking about ‘Rogers: the musical’ either. The bon mot here is that MCU is finally moving forwards from Thanos’ snap/Blip and its’ aftereffects for good… at least until Kang the Conqueror comes forth… conquering. Given that the current Avengers’ status is either ‘in transit’ or ‘undetermined’ I honestly hope that Kang will take his sweet time getting to MCU… and he probably will, as the ‘Loki’ S1 finale revealed that he has an entire multiverse for taking…and he already took over the TVA – but we digress. The point is that unlike the ‘Shang-Chi’ film, the ‘Hawkeye’ series fit well with the rest of the MCU Phase 4 – it is a transition story as Barton passes the moniker of Hawkeye from himself onto Kate Bishop.

As for everything else… oh brother. Apparently, the main villains of ‘Hawkeye’ – so far – are the tracksuit mafia, some sort of a Russian mafia variant. Oh, good Lord – now is so the time to annoy the Russians further. Not. As the U.S. has demonstrated to the rest of the world, it isn’t the shining nation on the hill that it claimed to be, and while RF’s president Putin is a staunchly anti-American man, it is just as true that for years – maybe even a couple of decades – the U.S. could’ve forced the RF to replace him with anyone else, really, like Mikhail Khodorkovsky but not necessarily, who would’ve kept the RF pro-American. Instead, the U.S. seemed to be perfectly content with Putin until 2014, when it all ended, and now they are trying to put the genie back into the bottle, only not. Biden agreed that Putin is a murderer – and then he promptly had official talks with him later the same year, (2021). Seriously, people make up your mind – either Putin is a killer and his regime is a direct affront to the American democracy, in which case any friendly discussion with him is impossible, or he isn’t, and his regime isn’t, and in that case, calling him a ‘killer’ or anything is just rude and wrong and pointless.

…As a matter of fact, MCU – and by MCU, I mean AoS – tried to do something about Russia before the ‘Black Widow’ film did. To wit, seasons 3 through 5 featured a yahoo called Anton Ivanov, who was a pitiful imitation of Ward, and who never amounted to anything because AoS just couldn’t figure out what to do with him – the man died forgotten and unlamented for, a Watchdog Alpha or not – and now MCU is returning once more to mother Russia in the characters of the Russian mafia. Sigh. Odds of them being as generic as Dreykov was in the ‘Black Widow’ movie ae quite high, hence why I am going to finish my rant for the moment, but I am not impressed, though that, of course, is irrelevant…

For now, though this is it. See you all soon!

What If, 'Zombies' - Sep 8

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about MCU once again. This time, we are back with the ‘What if?’ series, and now we got zombies.

Pause. To be more specific, zombies have a long and established career slash history in the Marvel world by now; there’s a separate comic world inhabited by the zombiefied Marvel heroes and villains, but, again, this is a separate world from the mainstream comic one – and the same can be said about the MCU take on it. Uatu the Watcher shows us different worlds from the main MCU one, and this one just happens to be infected with zombies. Fun.

Again, pre-‘Loki’, the TVA would’ve appeared in such a world and tried to fix it, at least, lest things get as bad as they did in this week’s episode when the world got nearly overrun by zombies – or maybe it actually did.

To elaborate, again, the zombies in Marvel™ are much more than just shuffling mindless corpses: at the very least, they have bestial cunning as well as reflexes, and at worst, they’re as intelligent as they were in life – and much more ruthless, usually. …In D&D, there is a monster called a ghoul or a ghast, which is based on a monster from the Arabic mythology, a ghoul or a ghul, which is something intermediate between a basic zombie and a basic vampire: it has intelligence, just as the latter does, and is much quicker and tougher than a zombie is, but otherwise? It looks more like an animated corpse, or a zombie, than a vampire, who often comes across as suave and sophisticated… at least at first. Once the fangs are out, it is all different, but still… Where were we?

Right, this week’s episode of ‘What if?’. It obviously draws upon the previous Marvel Zombies’ incarnations, though it also tries to be original by making its’ cast go all over the places and phases; there’s a non-evil (supposedly) Sharon Carter in the mix, for example, but, again, all of this mix and match comes from the Avengers’ corner of the Marvel universe; there’s no sign of mutants or of the Defenders, off the top of one’s head. There are no agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. either; Coulson’s appearance in the episode 1x03 was more of a cameo than of anything more specific; what next?

A shout-out back to ‘Shang-Chi’ in regards to mix and match in regards to the racial question: Disney/MCU appears to try to have their cake and to eat it too: in AoS, they played around with interracial relationships, (Coulson and May as the most obvious example), but somehow nothing corporeal came out of it; the best was WASP and WASP, (think the FitzSimmons), and POC and POC, (Mack and Yo-Yo). In the ‘Defenders’ franchise, there were almost no interracial relationships: WASP Jessica was with the WASP Murdoch, while Mack – who was a POC – was with a different one: progressive indeed! Is this early 21^st century or the 20^th? …Of course, the ‘Defenders’ franchise also had the ‘Iron Fist’, whose main relationship was an interracial one, but it was done very clumsily, and out of the entire Defenders’ crew, the ‘Iron Fist’ went down first – but we digressed.

…On the other hand, ‘Zombies’ does work hard to keep us focused; for an episode that is all about zombies and excitement, it feels like the biggest letdown yet: it may be an ‘Apocalypse’-based episode, but somehow the tone is all over the place, and the shout-out to ‘WandaVision’ didn’t help either, though an evil zombie Wanda was a good villain. That said, I left feeling the episode not shaken or awed, but almost bored, since it is obvious by now how the story will end: the good guys always win, even if a horde of Thanos’ zombies will arrive from space as a final twist. Sigh. When Ward was revealed as a Hydra agent back in AoS’ S1, that was a twist. This was something else, and nowhere as good, leaving the audience wish either for the blank despair of 1x04, or for the cautious optimism of 1x03. 1x05 constantly careens between the two, and leaves the audience with dissatisfaction instead. Sad, but that is real life for you. It sucks.

For now though, this is it. See you all soon!

 

Shang-Chi - Sep 7

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of 10 Rings’ movie instead. Where does it stand, exactly?

Why, at Marvel™, of course, sharing team Marvel’s™ standard brand of excellence! …Unfortunately, given that we are at Marvel’s Phase 4 by now, that is not enough, on its’ own – but let us elaborate.

Until ‘Shang-Chi’ rolled in, so far, all of Marvel’s Phase 4 was all about transition: Wanda and Vision have drifted apart, (putting it lightly), Bucky and Sam have become a duo, Loki has become a duo with Sylvie, and has become a proper hero rather than a selfish berk, and the title of Black Widow passed from Natasha to Yelena. Anything else? Oh yes, PP and Dr. SS, (different one from the ‘What If?’ episode 1x04, I believe), are about to embark on a magical journey of self-discovery, or at least PP does; I am not so sure about the good doctor… So, where does it leave Shang-Chi?

Kind of shoehorned into the same mould, technically speaking. Throughout the bigger part of the film, Shang-Chi travelled both literally and spiritually, both through the external world and inside of his own mind, trying to figure out as to who he really was, until he succeeded, (at least, by the movie’s conclusion). That’s not bad, but the problem is that the movie itself wasn’t a transition per se, as the ‘Black Widow’ film was, (and even that had problems…aside from ScarJo fighting Disney/MCU afterwards, cough), but rather it’s an introductory movie, not unlike the initial ‘Black Panther’ film, (another one is coming out soon enough). The ‘Black Panther’ movie had introduced Africa, (and Afro-Americans), to MCU. Now, ‘Shang-Chi’ is doing the same thing with Far East Asia, (and also its’ native people). Again, not a bad idea, but…

…But even ‘Black Panther’ had problems with its’ message, as we’ve discussed it way back when. ‘Shang-Chi’ has the same problem, and if you’ll say that its’ cast and crew went extra distance to avoid the clichés, I’ll respond that they’re inevitable, because Shang-Chi himself was a cliché – an Asian, or an Asian-American martial artist, who is trying to become ‘A Good Guy™’ person and escape his father’s shadow. The issue of Fu Manchu was mentioned repeatedly as ‘Shang-Chi’ was coming to the silver screens, so let’s not chew on it too much, but, again, Fu Manchu’s villainy worked because he was a cliché, by the Western standards anyhow – an alien, a foreigner, who isn’t, mmm, Caucasian, but who is intelligent, and rich, and formidable all the same. ‘Shang-Chi’ the movie tries to avoid that cliché by taking place – in a large part – outside of a real world altogether, but rather in the magical place of To-La…or inside Shang-Chi’s mind…or on a different plane of existence altogether…you get the drift. Not such a bad idea, but unfortunately a large part of Disney/MCU’s strength is its’ realism; the latter often tried to reference real life events and people, (especially in the first phases), and once ‘Shang-Chi’ moved away from that state of affairs, it floundered. ‘Black Panther’ didn’t go in that direction, BTW – indeed, the movie was about Wakanda ending its’ isolation, and instead becoming a part of the greater MCU world, ‘thanks’ to Killmonger and his actions – there’s nothing like that in ‘Shang-Chi’; rather, Wu Xenxu’s crime organization remains a world apart from the rest of MCU, and so’s the village of To La. ‘Black Panther’ destroyed, (well, started the process of), isolation; ‘Shang-Chi’ did none of that.

This brings us to the second big difference between ‘Black Panther’ and ‘Shang-Chi’ – the matter of ethnicity, or of race. ‘Black Panther’ was all about Africa; ‘Shang-Chi’ – about Asia, or more precisely, it is all about the Far East. Yes, it is a Western term, but since we are still living in a predominantly Western world, that is the term we are going to use. Therefore, what about it?

This is the latest attempt of the Western cinematography to break into the Far Eastern cinemas and etc. There were ‘Crazy Rich Asians’, ‘Mulan-2020’, ‘Raya and the Last Dragon’ to name a few, and now there is also ‘Shang-Chi’. The West does not care about the African mass media market and culture so much, in part, because the latter are so underdeveloped when compared to the U.S., but it cares about the Far Eastern version because of communism and the Far Eastern culture in general – neither of these factors are too friendly towards the West. ‘Mulan-2020’ in particular have brought those differences to the fore, and the West, embodies by Disney, folded first. Disney/MCU (+SW, etc.), may pretend to be fair, progressive, politically correct and so on, but the bottom line is all about the dollar. Given how much of the latter ‘Shang-Chi’ has brought to Disney/MCU, it obvious works, though maybe the heroic Black Widow ScarJo will do something about that with her lawsuit. Anything else?

…Just that even the ‘Black Panther’ film had some token characters of a different color, cough, that were actually important to the film; ‘Shang-Chi’ – not so much. As a result, the movie again suffers, becoming less of a movie and more of a propaganda piece…whose message is a lie, on top of everything else, and everyone is aware of it, more or less cognizantly. U.S. in general seems to have problems in this department; it seems to rely too heavily on its’ media to shape its’ own story, and it does not work. It didn’t work back in the elections-2016, and it doesn’t work now: no ‘FBI: International’ or ‘NCIS: Hawaii’ TV series will hide the fact that the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan with its’ tail between its’ legs, no so much an eagle or a lion, but rather whipped toy dog, but we digress.

No, no really. When ‘Black Panther’ was made and released, the U.S. still considered itself to be on top of the world, and most of the world played along, (cough, RF’s conquering of the Crimean peninsula in 2014, cough). Now, ‘Shang-Chi’ is playing in the world where the former statement is clearly false, and the rest of the world has to admit it. (Alternatively, it was the one doing the forced admitting). How will this affect ‘Shang-Chi’ and the rest of MCU? I have no idea, but out of the two movies, I have still enjoyed ‘Black Panther’ better.

…This is it for now; see you all soon!

What If, 'Dr. Strange' - Sep 1

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks: the U.S. and the rest of the West are officially done with Afghanistan, and the Taliban has taken over it just as officially. Hooray. Biden had no intention of continuing this ‘forever war’ – fine, but it doesn’t change the fact that during the last 20 years, USA completely failed to build a proper Western country in Afghanistan, so let’s talk about this week’s episode of ‘What if?’ instead.

Sadly, this week’s episode seems to be offering more of the same; in the last week’s episode, five out of six initial Avengers died, but the rest of the world moved on; this week, however, Dr. Strange destroyed everyone and everything in his grief instead, and-

Let us try to talk about this one character across. First, in AoS, Grant Douglas Ward lost John Garrett, and more importantly, Kara Palamas, just as Dr. Strange lost Christine Palmer in this week’s ‘What if?’ episode. Unlike Dr. Strange, Ward went to extract his revenge – well, first he went completely insane, in a sad, but dangerous way – by killing…well, mostly Ms. Price, Coulson’s girlfriend of the month, and also exposing Melinda’s (ex?) husband Andrew as an InHuman called Lash…but that is another story. The point is that as far as Ward was concerned, Coulson’s S.H.I.E.L.D. owed him a karmic debt, and he resolved it by flipping it over, by dying – and joining Palamas in the Underworld – and by tipping S.H.I.E.L.D.’s karmic cup over, and leaving them dealing with Hive, who almost executed Grant’s revenge on a far bigger scale than Grant ever could. Dr. Strange, on the other hand, did not work the system as Grant did, he did not join Palmer in the afterlife as Ward did with Kara, but rather he tried to resurrect her, which went against the flow of existence in this particular universe – but this brings us to Wanda.

In WV, Wanda did not accept Vision’s death all that well, and by using her powers, she took over a town in New Jersey (of all states), and through the power of her mind, (augmented and empowered in part by the Mind Stone of Thanos’, cough), she rewrote that corner of MCU, brought back Vision, and did plenty of other things – but they were obviously only temporary, and so Wanda had to let go of her past and move on – or else she would’ve gone insane, (or even died), and Vision would still be lost to her; at least, at the WV’s finale, Wanda is moving on… in some direction, and she might yet be able to recover their twins, and moreover – there’s a new Vision in the MCU, so who knows? Maybe the two of them will be able to work it out. Of course, the fact that the new Vision looks like a hybrid between GoT’s Night King and KKK’s mascot doesn’t help things, but that’s on Disney/MCU’s conscience, so where are we?

Yes, that unlike Wanda, this Steven did not release his grief, but rather let it use him to destroy his universe – MCU’s grief metaphor in reverse. I am impressed, really, but the fact that this universe’s Ancient One states that Christine’s Palmer’s death was destined to be rather rubs me wrong: it’s reminiscent of predeterminism – that some things are just meant to be, and no one can do anything about it… and that just goes against Protestantism and the rest of all things Western, you know?

Let us try again. In AoS, S.H.I.E.L.D. stood for democracy, just as Hydra stood for tyranny, so whereas in Hydra compliance was rewarded, in S.H.I.E.L.D. initiative and taking charge of one’s own life and future were – and they were shown to be superior to Hydra’s blind obedience. So far so good, but then the second half of S2 introduced the InHumans, whose life motto was ‘what will be, will be’ instead. It isn’t exactly Hydra’s ‘compliance will be rewarded’ motto, but there were enough similarities, superficial or not, for S.H.I.E.L.D. to become confused, and to start treating the InHumans incorrectly, (Skye’s inexperience in these matters didn’t help any), and the result was the bloodbath on the Iliad, (a S.H.I.E.L.D. battleship of the Navy sort), and things became even worse from then on, until the S3 finale – Ward almost didn’t make things worse, but when he did… see above. The point here is that Lincoln paid the ultimate price in AoS’ S3, but he did it because of predeterminism, among other things, and because of it, he never became fully at home in S.H.I.E.L.D.- pause.

Getting back to ‘What if?’, Dr. Strange gets into trouble and destroys everyone and everything because he actually refuses to bow down into inevitable, and tries everything he can to change his and Charlotte’s destinies, and as a result, the world ends. Maybe he should have moved on, true, but the way this episode have handled it? It is too reminiscent as to what has happened in RL Afghanistan, where instead of building a proper Western society, of meritocracy, of self-advancement, and self-worth, and what else have you, the Americans failed, and Afghanistan remained an Eastern country, where people are prepared to bow to inevitable and to die for their beliefs – whether it’s Islam, or democracy, or whatever – but not to kill for them. There’s a difference…and besides, a good deal of Afghanis would rather run away anyways and live a better life elsewhere, away from Afghanistan – what were the Americans and the Europeans doing over there, anyhow? Clearly not building a different nation with a new system of values as the Soviets tried in the 20^th century, or even subduing them in servitude, as the Brits did in the 19^th. But hey – Disney/MCU is trying to be educational here and now about the nature of grief, (seriously the laurels of ‘Inside Out’ success just cannot be let go here?), funded by the taxpayers’ dime, while inadvertently promoting the values of predeterminism here. How patriotic and clever! Do they want to replicate the ‘success’ of AoS in the ‘What if?’ If so, full speed to them to go ahead! Not.

…Well, this is it for now anyhow. ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the 10 Rings’ is officially coming out this Friday, so we’ll talk about it either this week or the next. See you all soon!