GotG holiday special - Nov 25

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk… about the GotG: holiday special? Yeah, no.

Here is the thing: this piece is a variant of the ‘Green Mary-Sue: Legal Eagle’ that we have been subjected earlier in 2022 – a ‘comedy’ piece that actually degrades MCU…but because it is a 45 minute long special, it works, as there is nothing to actually degrade. Instead, we mostly get Drax and Mantis traipsing around the world of MCU, channelling their old married couple vibe, while Kevin Bacon… is just Kevin Bacon, just as Megan Thee Stallion was Megan Thee Stallion in the J.W. show. These celebrities do not add anything to MCU; they just add gravity to the void of content in ‘She-Hulk’ and now – the GotG special. What is there to discuss? Nothing!

However, what else is there left? ‘Strange World’, a Disney original special movie. Whereas MCU took 4 phases to arrive in that particular place, ‘Strange World’ was there, and stayed there throughout its’ run, (i.e. 102 minutes long). Supposedly about living in homeostasis with nature, (i.e. the ‘Frozen 2’ film), ‘Strange World’-2022 does a half-assed job of it; rather, for most of the movie’s duration the show’s characters are running around their ‘strange world’, (which is rather reminiscent of a human body, cough), doing… nothing of substance. Yes, I know that this is a journey of discovery, with the discovery being the truth about the Pando plant and the rest of the world, but due to the speed of the movie, both the discovery itself and the process of discovering it, are downgraded and vanish in all of the rush and the special effects. Yuppie, only not, as we are the ones paying for this piece and get to watch the shenanigans of the Clade family for over an hour. ‘Strange World’ indeed! Anything else?

Sadly, no. The American Thanksgiving has come and gone, the Black Friday is upon us, and the winter of 2022-3 is upon in a matter of days. This is very disheartening… and I did say that the real life sucks, didn’t I? So I did, and rather than to drag it out, I am ending this rant for now. See you all soon instead!

Zootopia+ - Nov 16

Obligatory disclaimer – real life sucks, so let us talk about the ‘Zootopia+’ mini-series: is it any improvement? I confess that I have no idea, so let us proceed.

On the literal level, ‘Zootopia+’ is a straightforward idea: it is a November-2022 released mini-series, (6 episodes), dealing with friends, family and acquaintances of Nick Wilde and Judy Hopps. Herein lies the issue: why and what for?

‘Zootopia’ itself was a successful 2016 Disney film, featuring a world of anthropomorphic animals, (primarily mammals too), with the focus on the aforementioned Nick and Judy, who have to solve a mystery of the night howlers and co. (Spoilers: the sheep did it). As such, it was a fast paced, exciting and dramatic mystery and adventure animated movie. The aforementioned ‘Zootopia+’, conversely, is a 6 episode mini-series, focused on the various animals (mammals) that Nick and Judy have encountered in their mystery quest, and who’ve helped them, (rather than hindered, cough, sheep). The issue remains unchanged, however: what for, and why?

Disney is already implementing this ‘fill-in-the-gaps’ strategy – in its’ SW franchise. After their initial (overly) bold take on the SW-universe, which resulted in a fractured SW-fanbase and an increasingly certain possibility of the remaining SW-fans turning against Disney/SW and turning SW from a profit for Disney into a clear-cut loss – and so Disney/SW went in another direction: they stopped talking about the future after the SW9 film and instead began to increasingly hover around the world of the ‘first six’ films, going into the increasingly smaller holes and gaps to flesh-out the SW-world. The SW-world did this already to itself, if you ever read any of the SW: Legends material, but because it was not Disney-certified or approved, Disney/SW tends to ignore it instead – at least officially. Unofficially, it is more of a relationship that Disney has with Mr. Riordan: while not acknowledging this aloud, Disney is using Mr. Riordan’s material in MCU – first in the ‘Moon Knight’ franchise, and now in BP – and the same goes for the SW: Legends, as Disney/SW uses them to flesh itself out now – but how does that relate to ‘Zootopia’?

It does not and herein lies the issue: ‘Zootopia’ is a ‘Disney original’ film, and any information delivered in it is ‘Disney original’, one that has nothing in common with any other Disney material. However, while the original ‘Zootopia’ quickly enough became admired… that is pretty much the extent of its’ influence: these days it is more obscure than popular, hence the issue: why did Disney think that ‘Zootopia+’ would work? Given how it has hardly made a ripple even in the actual ‘Zootopia’ fan base… I would say that it had not – but Disney tried, money was issued (and/or assigned), product was released…and no one cared. Obviously, success is measured by other means other than online popularity, and the Internet is full of critiques that fall flat, (but gods keep me away from the ‘Lyle-Crocodile’ film), yet I find myself honestly confused: just what Disney intended to achieve with the release of ‘Zootopia+’? The closest I can come-up with is that Disney is gaging-up, or stirring-up, the interest in the franchise, before going out with the next movie installment of this ‘verse’, because otherwise there is no reason to this rhyme, to butcher a popular statement. Still, it is what it is, and I just had to share my opinions on ‘Zootopia+’, because why not?.. The PAW Patrol franchise has done/is doing/etc., etc. a much better job of world building, to the point when they have become a victim of their own success – but that is another story.

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

BP2 - Nov 12

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the latest BP film instead.

What can be said about it? Firstly, the queen-mother Ramonda is dead. I was completely unsurprised, (just very, very emotional), for this fits perfectly into the theme of MCU’s Phase 4 – out with the old, in with the new. The wheel of time moves, and the generations replace each other: T’Challa took over when his – their – father died, and Shuri did the same once her mother was no more. Shuri is now the queen of Wakanda, and until her nephew comes of age, she is the last of that line.

…Of course, she could always marry someone else and have children, but for the moment, she has enough on her plate without worrying about continuing the family line literally. Given that she’s probably some sort of an emotional mess now, that is good. What next?

First, an obligatory shout-out to Killmonger… well, to his ghost on the ancestral plane (or plain, or whatever). This was a nice tie-up of a plot line – he is at peace now, as is T’Challa, and Shuri… she is getting there. She has not killed Namor… given how much MCU has invested into him, it isn’t surprising – he isn’t going to be killed-off after a single film… but still, having a villain redemption, (more or less), story than a killing-off tale, is a pleasant surprise. War and peace, (sorry, Leo Tolstoy), are an important part of the BP portion of MCU, so here BP2 had delivered fully again.

Now, on the topic of villains, we got the countess Val. Apparently, she’s also in charge of CIA, because of course she is, and she’s also the ex-wife of agent Ross, (who appeared in the ‘Civil War’ and BP1 MCU films). Wonderful. It is up for grabs if she is a human or an alien, so maybe we should focus on America’s role in BP2? I am not talking about senorita Chavez here either – the fact is that CIA/America had set-off the conflict between Wakanda and Talocan (Atlantis), but…

…But RL matters, and right now the U.S. is in a fix, as no one in there knows as to where the States are to go. The relations between the Democrats and the Republicans remain very bad, and no one has any idea as to what will happen in the U.S. in 2024, who will win, etc., etc. Since Disney, in all of its’ current incarnations, hates risks, especially ones that can cause it to lose money, so far it has downplayed the role of the U.S. in MCU…and may actually be remaking the up and coming MCU components on the sly. That said, there’s no U.S. in BP2-

-But there is an America in this movie: Talocan is America, Mesoamerica to be more precise. If the CIA director Val Ross (cough-cough), stands for a Republican, WASP-ish America, then MCU’s Namor/Kukulcan and his cohorts stand for a Democratic America/Mesoamerica/America of P.O.C.s – and because of CIA’s machinations it confronts the Afro-Futuristic Wakanda, which – as we have discussed in the first BP film – is a Western utopia of Africa, (so go and look at that review, would you?). Because Disney/MCU has its’ own agenda, and it is more pro-Democrat than pro-Republican, everything, of course, is resolved at the end, and there’s a happy end for everyone, except for the queen-mother Ramonda, who is dead now, and for Shuri, who now has lost everyone…except maybe her new nephew… are we done with the U.S.?

…In the BP2 film? – yeah, pretty much, for it should be noted that Bucky Barnes the White Wolf of Wakanda hadn’t been mentioned at all here; in fact, the Avengers may as well not exist (at the moment). Riri ‘Ironheart’ Williams is an American, of course, but that fact is downplayed as much as it can be so yay! …Or not, given how the U.S. is still the top dog, (especially since R.F. is experiencing increasingly many and new problems of its’ own), so Disney/MCU’s downplaying of U.S. in its’… products may bite it in the arse yet.

Overall the BP2 film works, however. Both the cast and the crew delivered to the max, and the script is tight and good and enjoyable – what more do you need? Since BP2 is a glorious spectacle for one’s soul – nothing else. I have certainly enjoyed watching it, and still heartily recommend it for everyone else to go and see it too, (if you are able).

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

Black Adam - Nov 2

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us briefly talk about ‘Black Adam’, before MCU’s ‘BP2’ steals the spotlight.

‘Black Adam’ works. It is not the most powerful or poignant installment in the DCEU series, it is not necessarily even ‘the most’, period, but it works. The villains are villains, (with the final Big Bad being an actual devil of all things), while the good guys… Pause.

The titular character is an anti-hero, right? Yeah, no, it does not work like that. When anti-heroes first entered the fray, the cultural landscape was still dominated by heroes and villains; an anti-hero was a sinner who had found redemption; the grey area was located between light and dark; people could dwell there, spiritually speaking, but sooner or later they would have to make a choice between the aforementioned light and dark… or else they were NPC characters who had no role in the piece of fiction at all. Now, though, this dichotomy is over, grey morality is a thing, and people like Black Adam are just heroes who aren’t afraid of getting their hands dirty… unlike the Justice Society league, for example.

Here is…not so much another pause, as an admittance of a sticky issue: why was Amanda Waller bossing Justice Society league around? In the DC canon, she runs only the Suicide Squad, (which was absent in ‘Black Adam’), nothing else. True, the status of the Justice Society itself is suspect – these days it is more apocrypha than canon in the DC comics at worst, and a second tier to the JL at best…but we still got the JL in the DCEU, right? Henry Cavill is returning from the witcher-verse, and Gal Gadot has never left, correct? Somehow, the JL never gets a mention in ‘Black Adam’, and while the entire film never feels like a reboot, somehow it does not feel like a part of the already-established DC-verse.

…Yes, I am quite aware that DCEU - and the rest – are being overhauled by their superiors in real life, (re: the Batgirl film), but that is not a problem of ‘Black Adam’ cast and crew: they set out to make a movie, (and not, say, a pet project of The Rock), and they delivered. What else?

‘Black Adam’ is an entertaining movie. Well, naturally – it is a comic-book film, is not supposed to be informative or educational. The good people are good, the bad are bad, and Black Adam and his Kahndaq are not about to bow to the U.S. any time soon, Superman or not. Can the latter defeat the titular character is another issue, but it was not explored in the movie canon – and then there is Shazam. More precisely, Black Adam is a Shazam villain, (or at least a nemesis), so you would think that DCEU’s Shazam would appear in the movie under one pretext or another, but no, nothing. Is there some problem with Shazam’s actor in real life, I know not. Moving on?

Hard to say. Lately the Internet is being bombarded with the ‘BP2’ movie info, but I am holding out – lately MCU was more disappointing than not. ‘Ms. Marvel’ was pointedly downplayed for RL reasons… and she was flat-out lackluster, while ‘She-Hulk’ was a Mary-Sue story, period, with Titania getting the short end of the stick, here. See, a Mary-Sue cannot stand female characters that are equal with her, (and the same goes for the male characters in a Marty-Stu story), and does her best to get rid of them, or at least – seriously diminish them. This is exactly what happens to Titania: at the end of the ‘She-Hulk’ S1, the ‘Hulk-King’ and the Abomination are arrested, and Titania just… vanishes – clearly, the titular character’s deal with K.E.V.I.N. included getting rid of her for good – or something. In any case, the end of ‘She-Hulk’ S1 is all about the titular character and her new and updated family – though with her cousin the Hulk introducing his own son, the situation may begin to change – but what does this have to do with ‘BP2’?

Nothing, sadly. All I wanted to point out is that MCU’s Namor has at least some things in common with MCU’s Killmonger, (now deceased… probably). MCU’s Namor has strong Mesoamerican overtones, and some of his promo images show him wearing a jaguar-head helmet/headpiece/headdress… you get the idea. Plus, there’s his moniker Kukulkan, who was, or is, a Mesoamerican serpent deity in RL – and on the other…paw we have MCU’s Killmonger, who went with the moniker of the ‘Golden Jaguar’ in the first BP film. There are no wild jaguars in the Old World, (which includes Africa); they are an American-only species – and now we get a Namor with strong Mesoamerican connotations. Again, nothing is new under the sun, we already had a half-Japanese Namor, (located on Earth-13410, one Namor Miyamoto), so why not a Mesoamerican one?.. At this point, I am more annoyed with the endless barrage of pro-BP2 promotions, but that is another story.

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

She-Hulk, Story - Oct 13

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the ‘She-Hulk’ S1 finale instead.

…Actually, the ‘She-Hulk’ S1 finale – ‘Whose Story?’ – is not that much an improvement, either. Instead of returning ‘She-Hulk’ to the series’ MCU roots, the storywriters took the series in a weird direction. Pause.

Let us try again. With ‘She-Hulk’, the MCU tried to do something different from its’ previous installments – a rom-com TV series, just as the ‘Werewolf by Night’ special was supposed to take MCU into the horror genre area. This is not a bad concept, but the thing is that MCU, such as it is, does not fall into the ‘fit one, fit all’ area. Marvel comics are, well, action comics, and action-driven comics, and without that action drive, they… stagnate. Or, at least, they do not go anywhere – hence, the ‘She-Hulk’ series, (so far, but I am not being optimistic by now), which almost didn’t do anything to promote the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe further. Almost, because at the end of this episode the Marvel Cinematic Universe does go further – the actual Hulk returns, Titania seems to be a halfway decent individual after all, Blonsky is morally ambiguous instead of being a straightforward good guy, and so on.

Actually, about Blonsky – Wong does take him back to Kamar-Taj after all; given how neither of them were this season’s ‘Big Bad’, this does raise an interesting question: now what? What will this unlikely male duo do next? In addition, where does Madisynn fit into this?

Another pause. Here is the thing. The ‘She-Hulk’ S1 finale almost redeems itself; almost, because the middle five episodes of S1 had not much to do with either the first two or the last two episodes. These four eps actually have some of the ‘mainstream’ Marvel feel, and they work – more or less. The middle five – not so much. So what?

That is the tough one. On one hand, Disney/MCU can do whatever they want to do at this point – unlike the SW aspect of this juggernaut, the majority of their fans will swallow anything; on the other extremity – Disney/MCU has announced that they’re delaying a lot of their releases not too long after their official proclamation of the schedule, so, clearly, something isn’t going according to the grand plan. Consequently, Disney/MCU can diminish ‘She-Hulk’ to a nearly stationary rom-com; on the other, they may not be able to afford this, as when you think about it, any TV series, (or a movie, or a book, a magazine, etc.), is just a product that its’ maker must sell – to their audience.

…Here is not quite a pause, but more of an admittance: the above statement applies to fiction. In case of non-fiction, the situation is slightly different, as fiction applies to the audience in general, while non-fiction has a more specific, a more defined audience. However, since ‘She-Hulk’ is fiction, it is supposed to be sold to everyone, who cares about MCU…and maybe a few other folks. Instead, it appeared to have become not as successful as ‘Werewolf by Night’ was, implying that Disney/MCU is not as good at playing the market, as it would like to pretend.

This brings us back to ‘She-Hulk’. As an MCU rom-com, it was something of an experiment, here, and as such, it was expected to bring in success if it were to continue. So far, it did not do as well as Disney/MCU expected it to, and the more successful parts were the more old-fashioned and less experimental ones. Consequently, it is anyone’s guess as to where the future will take ‘She-Hulk’, and the rest of MCU, given that there already are delays and what else have you.

(Oh, wait, there is the ‘Wakanda Forever’ film coming in November 2022, but I am not holding my breath about it either, but let us wait for it to come out before we make any judgements).

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

She-Hulk, Ribbit - Oct 7

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about this week’s ‘She-Hulk’ episode, ‘Ribbit’, since it is the penultimate one in ‘She-Hulk’ S1.

What is there to say? Let us talk about the ‘Devil’ in the room – a while back, MCU and its’ related/connected press services proclaimed that this will not be a sequel/direct continuation of the Netflix’s ‘Daredevil’ series, but rather a straightforward restart – and so it is. Somehow, Murdoch made his way from the East Coast, (Tom Holland’s third Spider-Man movie, remember?), to the West Coast, (‘She-Hulk’ takes place in MCU’s L.A.), in order to have a relationship with the She-Hulk, apparently… Pause.

Now, again, I have no problem with the two of them being in a relationship. First, Cox and Maslany really manifest chemistry between their characters… plus they have the entire red/green contrast thing going.

Second, Marvel has already done this thing with the relationships – I am talking about Matt’s relationship with Jessica Jones back when they were featured on Netflix series instead. The fact that there was no mention of her, or any other ‘Defenders’ made on ‘She-Hulk’ (so far), doesn’t matter – it only means that their fates are up in the air for Disney/MCU to decide upon, that’s all. As for Matt and Jennifer, I am reminded of the Marvel comics’ Avengers: at first, they were going to set-up Robbie Reyes, (one of the Ghost Riders), with Carol ‘Captain Marvel’ Danvers. (Yes, that one).

…And then, abruptly, Robbie/Carol ship disappeared; now, Danvers seems to be mending fences with Tony, (who isn’t dead in the comics, BTW), while Robbie is hanging around Echo, who is now the host of the Phoenix force in the comics and is about to get her own show in the MCU. (Hint-hint). What’s more, Keanu Reeves is openly hinting that he is open to becoming MCU’s next Ghost Rider. Pause.

Now, MCU already has a Ghost Rider – Robbie Reyes, played by Gabriel Luna, who appeared in AoS’ S4, and who was supposed to have his own TV show, but that failed, and he vanished from MCU after AoS’ S4 finale. That said, there was another Ghost Rider – one who turned Robbie into a Ghost Rider in his backstory, so there is room for John Wick to enter MCU. In addition, yes, there were several Ghost Rider films in the past that featured Johnny Blaze, but they are not part of MCU, so no problem from this part either. Back to the ‘She-Hulk’?

…There isn’t much left to say, actually – somehow MCU tried to turn ‘She-Hulk’ around at the 11^th hour, by having the Intelligentsia, (yet another super-secret super-villain cabal, sigh), attack her when she was receiving some sort of an award, causing her to freak out, and allowing the Damage Control people to step in, suggesting that the show might be stepping away from its’ previous rom-com incarnation. Since ‘She-Hulk’ S1 has only one last episode left, I’m not feeling too overwhelmed here, not to mention that as far as power groups go, Damage Control is just a surrogate S.H.I.E.L.D. – and we’ve discussed both it and S.W.O.R.D. in the current MCU before, so, uh, excuse me if I’m underwhelmed; the fact that the titular character here is one of the least sympathetic and popular MCU super-heroes so far doesn’t help either, (no offence to Ms. Maslany intended). As such, I won’t be holding my breath to wait and see as to how J.W. gets out of this one, as both she and Damage Control people are flat-out lackluster, and we have to wait and see as to how the new Daredevil version fares. Is that it?

Well, no, there is also the ‘Werewolf by Night’ TV special, but first – a shout-out to the upcoming ‘Wakanda Forever’ movie for its’ line that Namor is ‘Kukulcan, the earth-shaker god’. Whoever came up with that line is a moron, because Kukulcan was a different name for Quetzalcoatl – the god, the pterosaur is called Quetzalcoatlus instead – and regardless of the name, he was not a sea or an underground deity, no, he was a sky deity instead. Earthshaker is a moniker that is, or was, associated with Poseidon/Neptune instead, a much more appropriate deity to Namor, what with the trident and all, but because he is Old World and all, the movie’s scriptwriters pulled Kukulcan out of their… orifices instead.

Keep in mind, that Disney is associated with Kukulcan already – via Mr. Riordan and a certain Ms. Cervantes, who’s YA novels deal precisely with this mythology. First ‘The Moon Knight’, and now this. No wonder that Mr. Riordan appears to become done with this universe and is writing straight-out YA novels instead that have nothing to do with myths or with Disney. Well, kudos for him, ‘because his PJ is going to be a Disney+ TV series soon, it seems.

However, what about ‘Werewolf by Night’? Succinctly, it works because, firstly, it was short, compact, and precise, and Disney/MCU did not stuff it full of their Easter eggs and co. as they tend to do. (In addition, such approach works best in MCU – just look at the AC TV series). Second, it works because it is only barely connected to Marvel – it might be just your typical horror mini-movie for all that it is so no problems there. Third, the same can be said about characters – they may be from Marvel originally, but so far there’s no indication that they’re a part – that their world is a part – of the greater MCU universe, and given how MCU has been playing with the concept of the multiverse, this might be the start of something new entirely – we’ll just have to wait and see.

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

Hocus Pocus 2 - Oct 3

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ film. Why? ‘Cause I have actually enjoyed watching it, unlike the ‘She-Hulk’ series.

Now, some of you have taken objections regarding her latest episode, ‘The Retreat’ and claim that J.W. is not a Mary-Sue here. To which, I reply: she is an only woman in an episode, surrounded by a bevy of men. Of course, she is a Mary-Sue; this is one of the telling marks of a M.-S. Character in fiction, (regardless of gender), but…

…But the men in ‘The Retreat’ were underwhelming, meaning that J.W. isn’t a ‘typical’ M.-S., but more of a ‘pathetic’, ‘underwhelming’ one; I never thought that a M.-S. Character could have such adjectives, but MCU managed to achieve that regardless – congrats to them! Not, and what about ‘Hocus Pocus 2’?

‘Hocus Pocus 2’ is something different, less like MCU, and more like ‘Frozen 2’. Why?

Because almost like the ‘Frozen 2’ film, ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ lacks a ‘typical’ antagonist; the Sanderson sisters – in the first film – certainly were that: unabashedly evil. The main protagonists of the first film – several plucky kids and one special cat – had to go unbelievable lengths to defeat them, (which they did). More importantly, while the Sanderson sisters had magical powers, (and some serious singing skills, let us be honest), the children – or the cat – did not.

In ‘Hocus Pocus 2’, the situation is different: practically everybody is a witch here, save for a certain cranky zombie, cough. Now the playing field is much more level, everyone can relate to each other better, and the secondary conflicts between the new children characters feel rather forced and, well, secondary.

Yes, aside from the Sanderson sisters, none of the characters from the first film appear; instead, we get a brand-new cast. This also connects ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ to ‘Frozen 2’, where the franchise had a complete remake and went in a completely new direction from where the first film (we’re talking ‘Frozen’ here) had gone. That said, the films in both ‘Frozen’ and ‘Hocus Pocus’ franchises were excellently made and fun to watch, plus…

…Plus whereas ‘Frozen 2’ went in the ‘green energy’ direction, (and we will talk about it at another time), ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ – not so much. Here, the issue was with the concept of witchcraft – no duh: from the old stereotype that we had during the release of the first film, now the witchcraft became a part of U.S.’ cultural history, and must be dealt with differently – which ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ did. Quite successfully too, given the movie’s reviews: it worked.

Why, again? Because it did not go too deep into various RL issues, but instead sought to entertain its’ audiences, which was a children’s/YA’s movie is supposed to do. Both the children and the Sanderson sisters were zany and fun to watch…and nothing else, actually: somehow, the stakes in this film feel lower than how they were in ‘Hocus Pocus 1’, but that’s ok: this franchise is just small enough, and compact enough, to endure this without much ado… and so they had. MCU, conversely, is much larger and more overblown than this, and so it is not doing as well: ‘She-Hulk’ is not bad, it is just flawed – but we have talked about this show before.

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

She-Hulk, Retreat - Sep 29

 

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and you can always count on your family to make it worse – especially for you. I am almost done with everything and everyone, and that thought is scary as fuck – I do not want to go, but I do not want to stay either…

On a more cheery note – the latest ‘She-Hulk’ episode, ‘The Retreat’, is out, and… how is this more cheery, exactly? Let us elaborate.

If last week our titular character tangled with Titania, this week the Abomination is back, and he is getting therapy? Therapy for super-villains (and others?) is a thing now? Then where it was in AoS – both Grant and Daisy could have used it, (even if for different reasons…

Why am I returning to AoS this time? ‘Cause ‘She-Hulk’ is showing us the Abomination going through his redemption, apparently… In the Marvel comics, the Abomination is a monstrous, twisted mirror of the Hulk, while the rest of the characters that’d appeared at the titular location are nowhere near as powerful, but here, in MCU, he’s one of the gang, and-

-And the show is about J.W., because she is the titular character instead – in this episode, she learns to let go and deal with rejection thanks to one therapy session. Of course she does. Did the showrunners and co. think that that would make their titular character slightly less Mary-Suish, maybe? If so, then congrats – they went down the other way and made her the ‘pathetic forerunner to a Mary-Sue’ cliché: J.W. genuinely does not do anything on the episode, she just is! This has rather happened already, in the episode 1x05, but there we had Molly Book and co. to carry the day, (metaphorically), here – not even that.

In addition, we got MCU’s Wrecker, from MCU’s Wrecking Crew, in the same place, also going for therapy. Does it mean that MCU’s Wrecking Crew is done and gone? In Marvel Comics, the Wrecking Crew was competent and powerful enough to fight the Avengers regularly enough; here, it is a joke, just as everything and everyone that becomes associated with MCU’s ‘She-Hulk’. El Aquila can’t be taken seriously because he is a swashbuckler? So’s the Swordsman, technically, but MCU’s ‘Hawkeye’ (the series) has given him some respect at least.

Actually, maybe ‘Hawkeye’ warrants some more mention here. The first MCU property that went into outright comedy territory had been… WV, actually, but that show quickly began to evolve past that in its’ fourth episode. ‘Hawkeye’, on the other hand, never took itself too seriously… almost. Once Yelena popped-up, then things began to sombre up, but the new Black Widow did only come and go… Pause.

Yeah, that ‘Secret Wars’ trailer – it starred Nick Fury and Maria Hill… and only them, really. You would think that some of the AoS characters, good or bad, would appear, but apparently not – clearly, Disney is done with that show.

…Yeah, I remember that ‘Hawkeye’ was also the show that brought back S.H.I.E.L.D. as Ms. Barton’s watch – but after the initial fandom’s excitement – clearly, they aren’t done with AoS, it all died down very fast, meaning that Disney/MCU have no intention of pulling SW – to wit, the latest installments in the SW franchise deal in the period set in the original trilogy, and not going into ‘the future’ anymore; they’re flat-out pretending that the sequel trilogy doesn’t exist, and also wait for the fandom to forget all about it, before going into the future once more. Barton’s watch might have been their attempt at doing the same thing with AoS, only it failed, so no more S.H.I.E.L.D in the MCU for real.

…Actually, the same might be said about S.W.O.R.D. as well – it’d been set-up in WV, true, but earlier in 2022 we had ‘Ms. Marvel’ and there was no sign of it either; instead, we had Damage Control, who did the same thing that S.H.I.E.L.D. and S.W.O.R.D. did, and there were no Skrulls either; given how the ‘Captain Marvel’ film was almost all about the Skrulls, this is just weird – but how does that connect to ‘She-Hulk’?

It does not, not really. There were some post-credit pics of J.W. working with folders that have the S.H.I.E.L.D. eagle logo on it, but nothing else. That is good, because everything and everyone associated with ‘She-Hulk’ becomes downgraded.

…Therefore, for now, let us wrap it up. MCU is having problems, and it had them for a while, probably because of RL issues. Did I mention that real life sucks and blows? Then I am repeating this, and I will see you all soon instead!

She-Hulk, Jen - Sep 22

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the latest ‘She-Hulk’ episode instead. Only… it is not doing so hot either – this week’s episode’s highlight, apparently, was when the titular character, wearing a sparkling pink dress, punched Titania – who was back for round three – in the mouth. Titania was wearing an equally sparkling pink power suit, BTW. So what?

So earlier this week I watched the latest HoD episode – you know, the one where Daemon T. kills his wife with little more than a big rock. Killer Croc from the DC-verse would have been so proud!.. But we are not Killer Croc, and I, for one, find it kind distasteful that team HBO and co. have needlessly vilified Daemon T. just for extra drama.

Again, in the book, Daemon is not a good man, but his wife dies pointedly from natural causes and he has nothing to do with it, Targaryen family powers or not. By making Daemon actually do the deed, team HBO and co. have made him something of a misogynist and have diminished him as a person and as a character. The fact that HoD’s main protagonist – you know, the ‘new and improved’ Dany – wants to elope with him does not help anyone either… but wait!

In this universe, actually being an evil asshole gets you ahead! Daemon and co. are doing the right thing by their standards! Well, yes, and don’t forget – the upcoming Dance of the Dragons thingy will be the start of the end for the Targaryen dynasty; odds are good that GM was going to revive their reign at the end of ASOIAF, but now that ASOIAF faded away, and GoT ended up with a Stark on the throne instead… yeah, this makes it hard to root for anyone on the show and I’m actually hoping that all of the Targaryens featured on the show so far will die – but there was one unexpected side-effect: I remembered MCU’s AoS.

…yes, I’ve been talking about it on and off for ever, but this time the death of Ms. Daemon reminded me of Fennec Shand from the SW-verse instead. Why?

In SW, Fennec is shot down, left to die, but with Boba’s help she recovers and becomes his assistant.

In MCU, Kara is shot down – not unlike Fennec – and is just killed-off by the show.

Put otherwise, Fennec is SW’s Kara, and the issue isn’t that that Ming-Na Wen, plays Fennec on SW, and played both the Cavalry and agent 33 on MCU, (in a manner of speaking, but still), and it isn’t that Disney properties recycle each other’s ideas, but how AoS has treated Kara. Agent 33 was an interesting character, and the showrunners could have pulled a Fennec and kept her alive, but they did not. Indeed, Kara did not have to be a regular character on the show at all – they just could have sent her off to her mother, (with or without her memories intact), or done something similar, (as they did to the characters of Lance and Bobbi in S5), and that would have been the end. Instead, they flat-out treated her as crap, and that is the final line.

…Not that HBO is treating its’ powerful women characters any better – Ms. Daemon was verbally abused by her asshole husband at first and then killed-off by him, while the surrogate Dany is coming off as Daemon’s female counterpart instead. Oh, and one of her (potential) minions just killed-off her new husband’s same-sex partner. Take that, modern socio-political values!

…In the ‘She-Hulk’ we do not go so far, but it is the same direction still. In the comics – and the cartoons – the character in question was, and is, one of the Hulk’s most powerful relatives and allies, and Titania is her adversary and arch-nemesis. On the show, the two appear to be little more than just two semi-toxic bitches that just cannot get along because that would be the reasonable and sensible thing, am I right, fellows? Oh, and the ‘Mr. Immortal’ subplot, cannot forget that – a Marvel character has faked his death 8 times, effectively becoming a bigamist! Ha-ha-ha! ‘Futurama’ actually did that plotline first, save that its’ bigamist did not fake his death, he just shapeshifted and packed-on more wives. Have to admire his stamina, if nothing else – but he still were taken down by all of his wives, just less legally and more violently than Mr. Immortal has been.

…There is also MCU’s Abomination, who was last seen on the show having a cult with multiple girlfriends – and he got set free. Aside from the moral issues, there’s the fact that he got diminished from being a monstrous reflection of the Hulk into a mere jerk too – but that is what ‘She-Hulk’ the show does, apparently – it diminishes all the Marvel characters that it touches, no wonder the original Hulk fled to Sakaar in the episode 1x02 before it was too late – or maybe it was, we’ll just have to wait and see.

...That said, my original point is this is what the American nation have come down to, after ‘MeToo’ and all of that? Between HoD’s handling of Ms. Daemon on one hand, and ‘She-Hulk’ making its’ titular character a mockery of the ‘powerful female character’ concept, I am really sore at real life. Did I mention that it sucks?

…Well, this is it for now, people – I will see you all soon.

She-Hulk, Jeans - Sep 15

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about ‘She-Hulk: the Legal Eagle’ instead.

…Oh, this isn’t how the show is actually called? My bad, and you are right – the show is barely legal either. Pause.

Let us try again. In this week’s episode, we learn that Titania has acquired the rights for the ‘She-Hulk’ brand, and is suing JW for the supposed copyright infringement. JW fights back on the court of law, and with the help of Ms. Book, she wins her right to remain the She-Hulk. That is fair enough, but…

However, the more I watch the ‘She-Hulk’ show, the more I feel that the characters are diminished because of this. In the comics and such cartoon shows as the ‘Agents of S.M.A.S.H.’ (now ended), She-Hulk was a lawyer, (or at least a legal councillor), but she was also a hero who smashed things, and, actually, in the comics? She still does that, while being an Avenger at the same time. Conversely, the show seems to be focusing on her being more of a lawyer, and that is ok, only… She-Hulk the titular character is not really a lawyer, she is a rom-com lawyer, and that makes her show not so much legal drama, but more of a parody of one.

By contrast, something like ‘The Good Place’ has its’ humorous moments, true, but it has serious moments too, and the show feels – even in re-watches – much more well-balanced than ‘She-Hulk’ does. I would like to say that there is drama and stuff in ‘She-Hulk’, but I cannot. Somehow, the way that the show presents itself discredits any possibility of there being actual drama in ‘She-Hulk’, and as for Titania and her character…

In her past incarnations, Titania went from being an outright villain to more of an anti-hero, and from She-Hulk’s enemy to more of a frenemy slash eternal rival. Basically, the two ladies had the better chance of beating each other if and when they went toe to toe, than anyone else would. Here, on ‘She-Hulk’, Titania is not anything but an annoyance; JW does not learn anything, or get anything from their confrontations, and neither does Titania; you could have replaced Titania in this episode with some random character off the top of your head, and the story would’ve remained the same, with JW becoming more confident in being the She-Hulk in the end. Put otherwise, the titular character is not the only one being diminished on the show; everyone else is as well. Sad – and in case of Madisynn, (seriously, that is her name), outright annoying. True, ‘She-Hulk’ is rounding-out the story of Wong and Kamar-Taj in new, unexpected ways, but, again – somehow Wong is being transformed here from a formidable and serious magician into some sort of an irresponsible asshole – while the Abomination, (I’m quite certain that we haven’t seen the last of him yet), has transformed from a monstrous, distorted image of the original Hulk into some sort of a heterosexual cult leader and nothing more. That is… disappointing, if nothing else, but, again, that is what Marvel going for intentionally, so more power for them, I guess. Anything else?

…The funeral of Her Majesty Elizabeth II is proceeding apiece this week, but I frankly have no intent of discussing it, out of the respect for Her Majesty, if nothing else. An epoch did end with her passing and I really do not want to muck around in themes of such epic levels…

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

 

She-Hulk, Magic - Sep 8

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks – Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain has passed today, on Sep 8, 2022, at 96 years of age. May she rest in peace! The rest of the world will be in a worse place now that she’s gone, as her immediate heirs – her son Charles, and his sons, William and Harry, don’t get along, (and there are plenty of lesser scandals and fights in the family too), so it’s anyone’s guess as to what will happen in the British politics next. Given that the modern world is already a rocky place, this is not good. Shall we try to lose ourselves in the world of fiction instead?

…Yeah, that is tricky too – we got a partially live-action remake of ‘Pinocchio’ coming out today, (i.e. Sep 8, 2022), but, frankly, I am not the biggest fan or connoisseur of this franchise, so I politely pass over this. ‘She-Hulk’ is onto the 4^th episode (‘is this not real magic?’) of its’ franchise so far, and it seems to be finding its’ legs by now, and… it’s somewhat decent, as we get to meet some new and original characters, and get to see the titular character actually do something more aside from some rom-com lawyering – she isn’t Ally McBeal, after all!

…The problem with ‘She-Hulk’ is that by now it is unintentionally diminishing the Marvel characters that are featured in it – the Abomination, Wong, Titania, the Wrecking Crew, and even the titular character. Instead of being, well, characters, heroes and villains, as the characters of the Phase 1 through 3 were, the characters of ‘She-Hulk’ seem to be as relatable, realistic and sympathetic as the characters of any rom-com – say, ‘Friends’, had been. People just do not care about the adventures of J.W. and her Gal Friday, Nikki, (the duo are trying just a touch too hard to come across as straight), as they seem to meander from case to case, from episode to episode, (while looking sexy, because reasons). Oh, and Bruce/the original Hulk is gone from the show, having left for the vastness of space once more. Planet Hulk, here we come!

Back on Earth, the titular heroine is about to get sued by Titania, (whose RL is Mary) about who is the real She-Hulk. Hold on to your horses, you cannot stand the excitement! …The poor bloke from Michigan, who got mauled by a grizzly bear and her three cubs, is causing more excitement on the Internet than the ‘She-Hulk’ does. And finally, there is the entire issue with Amazon’s latest series: ‘LotR: RoP’ – people hate it.

Now, Amazon, is actually denying it, which is just dumb – either those negative numbers and reviews are a lie, in which case Amazon should just ignore them, or they’re the truth, in which case calling them a lie is a mistake. Disney was already in such a place with their SW franchise – the SW movie sequel trilogy, to be more precise. They tried to do something about such criticism, and their actions resulted in the SW fandom to be still split into several factions, and Disney/SW itself is trying to rebuild itself…, which includes ignoring that the sequel trilogy had ever taken place. I do not know as to how Amazon will handle their misadventure, but that will actually be interesting to see. Anything else?

Aside from the fact, that team Amazon had no open indication that anything LotR-related is guaranteed to be an immediate hit? I am afraid not. Gorbachev is gone, Her Majesty is also gone, and we are left with the live action Pinocchio-2022, which even IGN openly calls ‘mediocre’, which means that it is that bad. Therefore, for now, this is it. I will see you all soon instead.

She-Hulk, The People - Sep 1

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us continue talking about our jade-colored legal eagle instead.

Sadly, this week’s episode, ‘The People vs. Emil Blonsky’ is not exactly a break-mold episode that is needed by now; instead, we get an introductory episode.

However, whom does ‘The People’ (re)-introduce? First – Emil Blonsky/the Abomination, who seems to be one some path of redemption, (with Wong along for the ride, apparently). ‘The People’ show that he has also evolved, just as the original Hulk has, and is keeping his coherence whenever he digivolves, so no more mitigating circumstances; on the flip side, he is released, provided that he doesn’t go full supervillain once more. Pause. Yeah, looks as if the MCU Thunderbolts – still in the making – just got a new name onto their potential roster.

Second, we got the Wrecking Crew, and so far, they are quite underwhelming – just four mysterious people with Asgardian equipment, (cough). Given how Jen spent even less time with them than she did with Titania in the series’ premiere, I am not holding my breath out for them – Hell, Titania’s return would be more exciting after their debut.

Finally, we got the shape-shifting Light Elves, the better cousins of the Dark Elves (from the 2^nd Thor film), or at least the cousins with the better PR. Getting into the entire MTS situation down below, I am left wondering about the shape-shifting gig – isn’t it the Skrulls’ thing instead? Actually, we have not heard of the Skrulls since the WV ended – and the second ‘Dr. Strange’ film has seriously re-made that story, (and not necessarily for the better). I’ve heard rumors that team Disney is having some serious legal issues with the team Marvel comics, so I honestly wonder if this has any relations to this slight re-working that we’re getting in MCU lately?..

In addition, as for MTS herself… what kind of fee did she get for her appearances in the ‘Legal Eagle’ – I mean, ‘She-Hulk’? In addition, does this make her a legitimate part of MCU now, and Marvel comics can use her as a character, if she is paid? People want to know!

On a more serious topic, the entire celebrity cameo shtick had been used before in romantic comedies, (such as ‘The Nanny’), so does it mean that ‘She-Hulk’ is going full ‘Ally McBeal’ now? In that case, um, could we do a plot twist where this aspect of MCU is revealed a rebooted Westview with Wanda doing her old tricks in a new setting? Now that has potential, I have to say!

…Sadly, however, this is all I want to say about ‘She-Hulk’ at this point. See you all soon, instead!

She-Hulk, Law - August 25

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about ‘She-Hulk’ instead. In the show’s second episode, ‘Superhuman Law’, the titular character continues to evolve…along the expected lines of a Mary-Sue: her family sucks, they are a different aspect of the patriarchy, (and their indoctrinated female lackeys, of course), and they are keeping our plucky heroine down, until she embraces her different, outlier, destiny of being a lawyer for the outsiders, such as Emil Blonsky/the Abomination. Fair enough, and J.W. got her girl Friday Nikki to help her along, so yay! And who needs Titania anyhow? …Anything else?

…Yeah, in the B-story B.B. the original Hulk is back in space, probably to re-enact MCU’s version of the ‘Planet Hulk’ storyline. A different studio – Lionsgate or something similar – has already released an animated movie version of that story some time before, so MCU has to do something much more complex to avoid any copyright conflicts… but what is the point?

The point is that ‘She-Hulk’ is continuing the traditions, initiated the previous Phase 4+ installments, such as the Sam and Bucky show, or WV: the old heroes are leaving, new ones are arriving. Steve Rogers is out, Sam Wilson is in. Carol Danvers may be leaving, but Photon is entering, but…

…but I guess we’re re-saying once more: real life happened, and it sucks, and so the MM Disney+ series, instead of being feted as a breakthrough of the Pakistani-US relations, got downplayed to the max, and may even join AoS in being MCU’s apocrypha instead – but nothing like that is threatening the ‘She-Hulk’, no sir: there’re no contentious real-life racial issues or anything, just straightforward girl power, (with Wong and Blonsky being the titular character’s gay wingmen), and B.B. is heading back to the stars… What else?

I genuinely do not care anymore, in fact. MM was flat-out disappointing, with its’ substitute InHumans and S.H.I.E.L.D., (aka Clan Destine and DoDC, respectively), and ‘She-Hulk’ is just trite and predictable, in a genre sort of way. Oh, and this week’s episode had a hidden reference to Wolverine apparently too. This makes it all better, no doubt. MCU has mishandled the InHumans about as badly as it had S.H.I.E.L.D., so now they are introducing the mutants, (and also other beings, such as the Clan Destine), to do something about that. Well, good luck to them!

As for us… right now, this is it. See you all soon, instead!                                                                                                                       

She-Hulk, series premiere - August 18

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, the electronics in my life and my home are going berserk, so let us talk about the ‘She-Hulk’ series premiere – and… it is a Mary Sue!

No, seriously, she is – she is better than her cousin BB is, (and he used to be a cosmic gladiator, remember?), she is better than Titania is, she’s better than everyone else, and it’s the patriarchy that is keeping her down, nothing else.

Yes, I am quite aware that this version of ‘She-Hulk’ is a direct descendant of the early 2000s’ comic version, where Ms. Walters got fired by her old legal firm ‘cause of her skin color, (cough), and who became a freelancer instead, battling even Dr. Doom, (hint-hint towards MCU), matching wits with the Daredevil in the court of law, (and look who is back, even in the trailers)… over the old Captain Rogers; (it resulted in Cap being acquitted rather than condemned, and in him punching Dr. Faustus in the face – in MCU, this role belonged to Dr. Whitehall, who seems to be dead after all); and she’d confronted Titania, who’d been… actually in employ of some minor villain-hero, who was revealed not to be so minor after all… and who had altered the Marvel universe somehow…and the She-Hulk had to team-up with the Shocker to fix things… yes, Marvel comics can be really confusing sometimes. What next?

Well, MCU’s Titania resembles a reject from the World Wrestling Federation, and, apparently, fights like one, so pardon me for not being impressed as to how Attorney at Law: She-Hulk kicked her ass. Any true Mary-Sue requires having other female characters around to be the villains for her to easily defeat, or maybe even redeem, but they are still inferior to her, because she is perfect, (and otherwise? She will bugger-off into the sunset, leaving the authors with a gaping plot hole, ‘cause she’s that sort of an a-hole instead). What next?

Well, the 355 film, (remember it?), failed despite trying to show this sort of a female protagonist, (or several, actually), and the same can be said about the DCEU, such as the “Harley Quinn’ films, which have also vanished by now with nary a mark left. We will see how ‘She-Hulk’ will fair next, and there is also a statement about MM.

MM, by contrast, is less of a Mary-Sue, and more of a propaganda piece, aimed at showing just how well, and how domestically, Muslim immigrants are living in the U.S. Sadly, RL being what it is, this happened soon after the Taliban vanquished the U.S. army and the democratic regime in the Afghanistan, completely and utterly, so the American elite’s take on MM was underwhelming, but what could be done? Admit that MM is a propaganda piece with a message that not even its’ makers believe in? Yeah, that’s not how they do it in America; they adhere to their beliefs – in a half-ass manner that satisfies neither side; the result here is that MM got buried between ‘Obi-Wan’ and ‘Thor 4’, and the world moved on…

Therefore, let us move on as well; so far, MM offered little, and ‘She-Hulk’ offers less; as such, I’ll see you all soon instead!

Ned Leeds is hungover (fiction) - Aug 2

 ...Will be attempting something different for August - I'll be posting fiction here as well! Here's one piece:

Ned Leeds woke-up after the S.H.I.E.L.D. New Year party. His brain hurt.

With a truly herculean effort, Ned Leeds tried to put his scattered thoughts – and brain cells – together. They still hurt, but now he vaguely remembered that he – and other people – had been battling a giant three-headed rat that got conjured… probably not by him, and what’d happened next?..

“You fainted from mental exhaustion – not that the rest of us were much better,” came the reply from a young woman of approximately Ned’s age from the next bunk over. “Hi, by the way – I’m Kora Johnson!”

“Johnson, Johnson – why does that sound familiar-?”

“Because Daisy Johnson – or Quake – is my sister?” Kora did not sound too happy in talking about her sibling.

“…Okay,” Ned thought some more. “You’re the girl in the top, thong, and sheer pants from the last night, right?”

“Absolutely!” Kora beamed very, very happily at him. “You remembered!”

“…Yes, yes I did,” Ned winced. “I mean, I do. I remember the rat-“

“That sneaked-up through a tear in reality after Wong and Coulson got into an argument over an old orgy in Las Vegas-“

Ned blinked and looked around. “Hangover?” asked an S.H.I.E.L.D. agent that Ned had never known before, while handing a glass of ‘hangover cure’ to him.

“Yes please,” Ned said gratefully, as he downed the entire glass in one swig, and things began to zoom back into focus almost straightaway; next to him, Ned could see Kora have the same experience.

“Hey, Daisy,” the younger Johnson sister said sourly; “did you take my sheer pants?”

“No, May did-“

“Ah, that’s ok then-“

“…I really hate you sometimes-“

“Did the three-headed rat bite you-?”

“No, we had to deal with the FitzSimmons’ and their time-travelling machine, as well as their counterparts from both the past and the future,” Daisy’s companion said cheerfully… before Daisy grabbed him by the collar and dragged him away.

“…What?” Ned just blinked.

“Oh, they’re just trying to figure out what their relationship is,” someone else replied from behind him and Kora. Ned turned around and blinked.

“Do I know you or do I not know you?” he asked the Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man, aka Peter Parker. 

“Eh, it’s hard to say, so I will just comment that while Dr. Strange’s heart is in the right place, he’s still an unreliable bastard,” Peter replied in the same tone of voice – MJ had shared her stash of weed with him, and it showed – literally, since MJ was sharing it with Ned and Kora now as well.

“No, I’m not!” the sorcerer in question snapped, as he briefly looked into the infirmary. “Also, Ned – nice work with Clea.”

“Who?” Ned blinked

“The extra-dimensional witch-queen who turned herself into a multiheaded rat-monster, only to be turned into a field of tulips by you,” Dr. Strange replied brightly.

“…I was going for begonias instead, but I was that stinking drunk by then,” Ned confessed.

“…I’ll be going now,” Dr. Strange spoke, after a pause that was just a bit too long, and that was exactly what he did, leaving the four young adults by themselves for a change.

“So, what do we do now?” Ned asked no one in particular, (while secretly wondering if he and Kora really did join forces to turn the treacherous Clea into a bunch of flowers, among other thoughts of his). 

“I don’t know – enjoy the next few weeks together?” Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, (see above), replied just as brightly, and this was what they did.

End

FH: Medjai - July 22

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks; sometimes it sucks so badly, that you cannot sleep at night, but just lie there and wonder – just what are you doing, and where are you going, and where, and when, are you going to stop and get out of the groove – and go on from there to where?.. On a more lighter side, the ‘For Honour’ (FH) game has introduced the new character – the Medjai.

…Oh yes, undoubtedly, the Medjai – or rather, the Medjay, were a real-life organization, actually: first, they were a tribal group from Nubia, (a region located alongside the Nile river), and later on – something of a police organization during the existence of Ancient Egypt – something that the second incarnation of the ‘Mummy’ franchise used quite a bit. Yay?

Well, maybe – the Anubis-based armor used by FH’s Medjai clearly comes from that franchise, (as opposed to the aborted Tom Cruise one, eh?), as does this warrior’s double-axe, (double battle-axe, maybe)? There’s nothing original about the new guy, put otherwise, and what’s more, whereas its’ predecessors were taken – at least – from the now-defunct ‘Deadliest Warrior’ (DW) franchise, the Medjai doesn’t even have that – this is fiction at its’ purest. Ouch!

Finally, we return to MM for one last time – somehow we forgot to comment that MCU’s version KK is a mutant instead. Fancy that! In the original comics, MM was an InHuman instead, so now we got a flat-out switcharoo! Yay! Just kidding, but this is also one of the factors as to why the MM finale was about as bad as AoS’ had been – it is just flat-out incompatible with the rest of the show, just as AoS’ had been. However, AoS’ problems aside, in MM, the finale has rubbed-out the rest of the season – pause.

Let me start again. Throughout the first season of her show, KK was introduced and developed not as a mutant, or an InHuman, or some other Gifted, but as her own person, an independent and competent young woman, who has her own thing, and who does her own thing too. Great! She was also shown to have both her own allies and enemies, which is also wonderful – and then came the final scene, and all of this was flat-out removed, as not only Kamala was revealed to be ‘something else’ instead – i.e. a mutant, regardless whether a regular or an irregular one – but she has also found herself in an entirely different, non-connected situation from what she’d experienced so far…

…Something similar has happened to the Scarlet Witch too, in fact. Throughout WV, she has grown and changed as a character, and at the series’ finale, she actually began to return to her superhero roots – and then came the ‘Dr. Strange 2’ film, and all of that got thrown out of the window, with Wanda being reduced to someone not unlike the Wicked Queen from Disney’s original ‘Snow White’ animated movie. There is a reason as to why people are accusing Disney/MCU of mistreating their female characters, and this is a part of it. I do not know what will happen to Kamala next, has she just switched places with Carol Danvers, or if the two of them have switched their minds instead, but I really hope that she will get a better hand than the one that Wanda has received…

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

Avengers comics - July 20

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and MCU has taken a breather for 5 weeks – thanks God. Why?

Because MM, in particular, had been an uninspiring mess! MCU’s Phase 4 is about transitions and introductions…but it has stopped working in ‘Thor 4’, ‘cause Disney/MCU want to retain TW in their roster, and the latter didn’t want to work with the ‘Thor’ franchise unless CH remains Thor – so it was NP who got removed out of MCU for good instead. Well, not her, but her character – Dr. Jane ‘the mighty Thor’ Foster. Fun! However, never was it said that Disney/MCU would not step over their principles if they can achieve greater financial success! What next?

…So, in the absence of MCU, I tried to read some Marvel comics – especially the Avengers’ storyline, and it is the same old song, albeit done in different tune: initially, the Avengers had their own plotline, as they teamed-up with several other heroes to protect Earth from various beings, (who were being puppet-mastered by Mephisto). Eventually, that degraded into collections of one-shots, and cameos, and filler arcs, all of which clearly showed that Marvel themselves do not really know what to do with this version of the Avengers anymore, or why should it keep them.

Here, though, is an especial shout-out to the ghost rider, (the Robbie Reyes version). In the beginning, he became a ‘proper’ Avenger, (as opposed to a more vigilante type of crime fighter), with a burgeoning relationship with Captain Carol ‘Marvel’ Danvers. Why? Because he was about to get his own series in MCU, at that time. This did not happen, so by the time that the Moon Knight Story arc came along, Robbie got sidelined completely, and Carol teamed/coupled-up with Tony ‘Iron Man’ Stark instead, (complete with a fostered baby, who is more of a political statement, but that is another story).

Why the Moon Knight? Because he did get his own series at MCU, so his character did get some redesigning in the Marvel comics. Fun! However, this story arc had nothing to do with him anymore; rather it was all about the Phoenix.

…When the current Avenger incarnation began, Wolverine was the Phoenix, (do not ask, I do not know – or care about – the details). Then, abruptly, Wolverine was not the Phoenix anymore, and began to lead his own, ‘Savage’ Avengers, against a wizard named Kulan Gath (or something along those lines). Now there is no mention either of the Savage Avengers or of the wizard in question…and the Phoenix force resides in Maya ‘Echo’ Lopez instead.

Yes, that Maya, who starred in the ‘Hawkeye’ TV series, and who is about to get her own series, apparently. Therefore, now she is the new Phoenix in the comics, and Robbie is flirting with her, while Carol is with Stark, (see above). Frankly, the current Avengers should have their own soap opera by now, with Mephisto playing the main villain, which would be more appropriate for them… Where were we?

Ah yes, with the epiphany that while Disney/MCU have some idea of where they should go now that the Infinity Saga is over, but they are quite willing to diverge from it because of money, then Marvel comics don’t even have that, and just follow – vaguely – Disney/MCU’s lead. Yay for them, really. Sometimes, I authentically hate not only the real life, but everything else as well.

However, for the moment, this is it. See you all soon, instead!

 

 

Ms. Marvel, S1 finale

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the ‘Ms. Marvel’ finale. Unfortunately, it is not an improvement over reality either; I am honestly confused if this is a season finale or a series finale, and I am admitting aloud: for the first time since involving myself with MCU, I do not care!

Can I elaborate? It is tricky to say: on its’ own, ‘Ms. Marvel’ wasn’t bad; it was just lackluster – more like the ‘InHumans’ than the AoS, if we used comparisons.

What was specifically out of what in ‘Ms. Marvel’? I would say that it tried too hard to be a superhero origin story, and a coming of age tale at the same time; the fact that it also tried to give itself an ‘ethnic’ flavor didn’t help either, as Disney/MCU is notoriously politically correct – and not always in a good way.

Where had it gone wrong in the opinion of most critics? Precisely there – in the original ‘Ms. Marvel’ comics, KK has to struggle with at least some racism, as she is a POC in the US. In the Disney+ series, this aspect was seriously downplayed, leaving quite a few viewers and fans wondering – then what is the point of making MM a POC? For Disney/MCU to put another (metaphorical) notch into their feel-good belt? FOX’s last X-Men films tried something along those lines, and it really backfired upon them; Disney/MCU seems to be going in a similar direction…

True, Disney/MCU doesn’t have to do this sort of a story – i.e. one where a POC defeats WASP opposition, but for the modern Western culture this is one of its’ basics, and when it isn’t followed, then the modern Western culture wonders as to what that POC is doing on screen and shouldn’t we be watching something else instead? It can also be argued that just as with women-based movies, (such as the ‘355’ or the ‘365’ – does anyone even remember it?), the Western audiences are no longer satisfied with watching POCs ‘merely’ succeed over their WASP opposition, but in that case people may no longer be satisfied with what Disney/MCU is offering them to begin with… yes, it can get real ugly for Disney+ and its’ universes very quickly – but we got carried away.

On a less ‘deep’ level, MM suffers from the fact that it is shallow – the lead actress may be carrying the show, but there’s little to carry as the show’s villains, the Clan Destine and the Damage Control, appear to be substitutes for the InHumans and S.H.I.E.L.D., but lacking their histories within MCU for the audiences. People just don’t perceive them as threats or care about them, and so MM falls flat once KK goes to confront them: she kicks their ass? So what?!

…And as for her love life – do not go there. Can you imagine a male lead with three female love interests? Wouldn’t go down too well, (unless the lead was James Bond, but still, it is squeaky), so why should the gender-flipped situation work? Oh, right, because these days the fanworks are full of Mary Sues, especially of the female variety, and, yes, this version of KK is a Mary Sue.

No, really, there is some justification for my proclamation: KK is a female lead, she gets the lion’s shares of the romance, and the rest of the female characters are much more peripheral. Since MM was written by professional writers rather than amateurs, MM is able to get away with it, (the brevity of the show helped too), but still there are strong elements of Mary Sue in KK too. What is left?

Ah, yes, the finale, where KK and Captain Danvers switch places in the universe: KK is elsewhere, and Captain Danvers is in KK’s bedroom. I have not cringed so hard, and not just because this situation is reminiscent of Disney’s humor at its’ worst, but because this situation was flat-out shoehorned into the show. Throughout MM, Captain Danvers was referenced quite a bit, because of the obvious reasons, but nothing else; KK was built into a superhero/vigilante who stood on her own two feet and did her own thing, getting free of Captain Danvers’ shadow – and then along comes the final scene, and everything is up-ended once more; seriously, what does Disney/MCU want with KK? She is a first Muslim superhero – fine, but there has to be more than that to her, right?

…And then there is the fact that that scene was also reminiscent of the AoS’ series finale – one that had nothing in common with the rest of the series’ S7. Rather, it was more reminiscent of where the show’s characters were at the end of S3 – the beginning of S4, save that now the cast seemed to include Kora, (whose story arc made no sense), agent Piper, (a character that seemed to have no real purpose, and was just a plug), and the LMD of agent Davis, (an act of dubious morality even by MCU’s standards for reasons that were discussed else when). Here, again, the brevity of MM works in its’ favor, as its’ disastrous epilogue is much more restrained and contained than AoS’ had been. Yay? – I do not know and I honestly do not care. Anything else?

 Sadly, no. ‘Ms. Marvel’ had been one of the most lackluster Marvel shows that I have ever seen, which is something of an anti-record. Ah well, real life sucks, remember? In any case – see you all soon!

Thor 4 - July 12

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and ‘Ms. Marvel’ is barely better; the 1x05 episode has tried to rectify the show’s lackluster situation, but only some, and if you care about this, you should go and read Salman Rushdie’s novels, such as ‘Midnight’s Children’ (1981) and ‘Shame’ (1983), since they deal with the India-Pakistan partition in fiction to a much more professional degree than MM does – therefore, let’s talk about the ‘Thor 4’ movie instead.

No, seriously, what is the deal behind MM? Is it supposed to be undercut in favor of ‘Obi-Wan’ TV series and ‘Thor 4’ movie? The answer is simple: it got messed-up.

Let us start with the biggest issue of the film, (in my opinion, admittedly): lady Sif. She appeared in the first one - or two – ‘Thor’ movies, as well as in a couple of AoS’ episodes, (the first two seasons), and after which, she vanished… until she reappeared – in a manner of speaking – in ‘Loki’ S1. This isn’t too surprising, as Jaimie Alexander, who played her, with busy in ‘Blindspot’ until that show ended in 2020, so now the crew of MCU are carefully trying to reintroduce her MCU character after years of absence – with lackluster results, and this brings us to ‘Thor 4’.

At the end of the ‘Endgame’ film, Thor the character left with the surviving GotG characters – and ‘Thor 4’ sees them part way: remake number 1. Then Thor the character meets – well, re-meets, lady Sif, who warns him the Gorr the God-Butcher is coming thus setting-off the rest of the film.

What is my main gripe about the ‘Thor 4’ movie, again? That Sif’s character is completely unnecessary for it – hear me out. The bulk of the film is about Thor and Dr. Jane Foster, (aka the Mighty Thor, but we will just call her Dr. Jane Foster to avoid repetition), and about their relationship. Put otherwise, just as the ‘What if?’ episode 1x04 was felt influencing the second ‘Dr. Strange’ film, so does the ‘What if?’ episode 1x07 influences the fourth ‘Thor’ movie.

What was the ‘What if?’ episode 1x07 about? It was a comic relief episode, with Thor the character going down to Midgard, and throwing down a party that got so badly out of hand, that Captain Marvel, (the Carol Danvers one), had to step in and end it; I’m oversimplifying it here, but still…

…No, ‘Thor 4’ isn’t as comically goofy as ‘What if?’ episode 1x07 was, but there’s still a distinctly college frat party fill to it, including the entire romance angle. Again, we got Thor and Jane here; we also got Korg and the Valkyrie, so why do we do need Sif?

…Yes, I am oversimplifying things here probably again, but again, we got Thor. We got Jane, who was his primary love interest in the previous ‘Thor’ movies. We got the Valkyrie, with whom Thor began to have some sort of a relationship in the ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ film. We also got Korg, who was seen in the trailers helping around the New Asgard or wherever. What for do we need Sif for? To help the Valkyrie in the New Asgard – asexually? Korg could have done this just as well! (And given how Sif did not appear in any of the teasers and trailers, I am guessing that the MCU crew felt the same way).

As for Jane’s fate… I do not know. There were one Thor too many in the MCU throughout the film, and since TW declared, that he’ll make a ‘Thor 5’ film only if CH would be in it, the heads of MCU said – ok, the old fan favorite it is, then, and killed Jane off instead, albeit in a most heroic way. That is the only explanation I can come up with, because otherwise? The original Thor’s survival goes against Phase 4’s zeitgeist – transference.

Remember? Phase 4 was, and is, all about ‘out with the old, in with the new’, with the survivors of ‘Endgame’ going out, and the new blood coming in. Wanda Maximoff’s death in ‘Dr. Strange 2’… is not too final, actually, because multiverse – now that TVA is out of commission at the end of ‘Loki’ S1, we can have an infinite number of Wanda variants coming into the mainline MCU-

…Wait. Wasn’t Wanda proclaimed of being a ‘nexus being’ in one of WV episodes? Yes, but WV meshes with ‘Dr. Strange 2’ only partially, so all bets are off.

Back to ‘Thor 4’… The same thing can be said about Jane/the Mighty Thor, actually – now that TVA is down, a variant of her can appear from the multiverse whenever it will be convenient for MCU – end of story. What next?

Aside from Sif’s completely unnecessary reappearance, Jane being killed-off for good now, and Thor moving on with a new companion, (in a manner that is too reminiscent of Dr. Strange and America Chavez to be truly successful), there’s also the issue of Valhalla: in MCU it seems to be some sort of an Asgardian afterlife, while in RL it was an actual part of Asgard; MCU is tweaking RL Norse mythology once again… but if you want a more accurate version of the Norse mythical world, go and read Mr. Riordan’s ‘Magnus Chase’ series: this work might’ve been truncated, when compared to his other pieces, but it still depicts the Norse mythology and its’ nine worlds more accurately than MCU does.

…And, of course, MCU has used Mr. Riordan’s works before – remember the MK S1? Yeah, MCU has used Mr. Riordan’s novels there a lot – but we have talked about that before. Anything else?

Actually – no, not particularly. ‘Thor 4’ is a fun movie to watch once or twice, but nothing more, and the character of Sif doesn’t add (or subtract, admittedly), from that fact; with these parting words we part way; see you all soon!

 

Ms. Marvel, 'Seeing Red' - June 29

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks – just ask the Americans with their ‘Roe vs. Wade’ cancellation. I genuinely don’t know what they were thinking: if this is just the first step to cancel everything else, including interracial and same-sex marriage – it’s one thing, then we’ll have some sort of American Civil War take II, no problem. But if it is not, however – then it is just pointless aggravation of the American civilian society, one that the D.C. crowd probably does not need, not with all of the Jan 6 hysteria and all. What will come out of it, I do not know, though the fact that the American (Western?) mass media is beginning to downplay this, (sort of), may play some role…

The Ukrainians, of course, are hanged-out to dry, as the Americans still give them minimum aid while extracting maximum publicity out of this; and Finland & Sweden have joined NATO – and Putin does not appear to care about it very much. Erdogan, conversely, have acquired at least some political benefits for himself and his regime – but we are being sidetracked; let us talk about ‘Ms. Marvel’ instead.

Only not, as this week’s episode – ‘Seeing Red’ – is… wait. Let me try again. As people have pointed out to me since my last entry, Clan Destine aren’t InHumans, but are rather human-djinn hybrids with their own story, and Damage Control has its’ own missive as well. Fair enough, but my actual point was that story-wise, Destine is standing-in for the InHumans, and Damage Control – for either S.H.I.E.L.D. or S.W.O.R.D., take your pick, please. Here, in ‘Red’, we got more gifted people in-fighting, between Clan Destine, and the Red Daggers, (and Damage Control doing their wild card thing too, I suppose, in the bigger picture), and there’s mention of monsters, and world-changing plots, and government agencies, and-

-and we all have had it before, in AoS. I’m surprised to admit it, but I am rather tired of getting back to AoS in almost every single review of MM – but the truth is that AoS has had its’ initial plots recycled in every later season – and MM has the same problem; in addition-

In addition, lately I got a feeling that Disney/MCU is actually trying to downplay MM – first so that it would not compete with O-B-1, and now – with the upcoming ‘Thor’ film. That may be so, but there’s also the feeling that Disney/MCU is try to actually keep MM under the radar, because it isn’t sure just as to how well it does resonate with USA’s Islam community, (and especially the Pakistanis). The Red Daggers, especially, have a rather assassin-like feeling to them – and that RPG prestige class was based on RL Middle East characters – but we digress.

Here is thing. Disney/MCU is all about the money – it loves to make money, it hates to lose money, and it has figured out that a controversy is one of the best ways to lose money, and so it does its’ best to avoid controversy, as its’ settlement with ScarJo regarding the ‘Black Widow-2021’ shows: it probably could’ve won legally, but in PR terms this would’ve been a (controversial) disaster, and so Disney/MCU opted to settle out of court and give-in first.

So, how does that fit onto ‘Ms. Marvel’? Well, like it or not, but it is controversial – sort of – simply by existing: it is a show about an Islamic community that lives in the U.S., and given that U.S.’ relationship with the Islamic world has never been easy, and after the end of the Afghan cycle, (2001-2021), even more so – therefore, it isn’t too surprising that Disney/MCU has opted to downplay MM rather than vice versa: you never know as to who will get offended!.. Anything else?

No, not really – if Disney/MCU itself is trying to downplay MM, then who am I to upplay it instead? Therefore, let us end this for now – but I must warn you: real life being what it is, (see the opening paragraph), I will not be able to review MM episode 1x05 for RL reasons next week. Ah well, see you all soon all the same! Until then – cheers!