My thoughts on Loki Season 2 and The Marvels

I finished Loki, season 2 a few weeks ago. It appears that this is the end of that character. I can't really see Tom Hiddleston reprising Loki in any other way than in the way they sent him off at the end of this season (this version of Loki). Before I go into more detail, here is your obligatory "Spoiler Warning."

So, the finale was pretty good. If you managed to watch it, you know that Loki took his place kind of at the center of the new multiverse and that they made it look similar to Yggdrasil: the World Tree. Loki also repeats what he told Odin in the first Thor movie: "For you, for all of us." If we do get more Loki, it will be through the use of variants. One thought is that a version of kid Loki might show up and hang with the Young Avengers.

Hiddleston did mange to play his version of Loki gloriously well. I don't know who was a more important character at this point: Thor or his brother Loki. Both of them got large amounts of screen time, and Loki by and large due to the series exceeded the amount of time that Thor got in the MCU. So maybe Loki was the most important Asgardian? I wouldn't have said this at the end of the first Thor film, but the dynamic between those two characters is super important for the stories in these comic books movies.

As far as the show goes, I liked the great characters and acting. Owen Wilson once again confirmed that he's one of the most solid supporting actors out there (I don't really see him as a main actor kind of guy). In a supporting role, he really goes a long way to make the drama of anything he's in be that much better. I also liked the truly wonderful retro art direction and the design of Miss Minutes and the TVA and so on, but you can't keep a thing fresh and surprising forever. So, maybe it was a good time to just move on. Loki was probably too cosmic by the end of this series too that it would be difficult to have him interact with mortals. He's kind of on the level of those gods that are above the Celestials in the MCU hierarchy of powers.

I also didn't understand how Loki acquired his time powers or how the whole time-slipping thing happened in the first place. My theory is that He Who Remains held Loki frozen in time when Sylvie pushed him through the portal at the end of season one. We know he can freeze and control individuals. So, Loki got frozen in-between dimensions until Kang died, at which point he was unfrozen and dropped back into the TVA. But because he was not present when the loom went into failsafe mode, it doesn't know where to put him so it tries based on the user input. And that's what causes all of the time slipping. Eh...it's kind of a mess. But so is the entirety of phase five, which saw their biggest box office bomb in "The Marvels" and the dismissal of Jonathan Majors for being an abuser of women. It seems kinda rudderless at the moment.

All of this reminds me of a comment I received on this very blog years ago when I was wondering what could possibly follow-up Avengers: End Game and someone replied, "We're at peak Marvel. It will just be downhill from here." Ouch...years later, that dude was right.

So yeah...switching gears a bit...I did go and see The Marvels in theaters. I think I was just really underwhelmed by the villain. But then someone pointed out to me that I might be too harsh with my criticism, because it was still on the level of Ant Man: Quantumania. Once I started talking about that film, I realized that they were 100% correct. The Quantumania movie and The Marvels are not better than each other at all, yet The Marvels is the worst bomb. I wonder if a lot of that just has to do with Brie Larsen, who (for some reason) people love to hate. I predict that Captain Marvel will be recast soon just to get rid of that baggage and see if the online trolls can be somewhat appeased. Who knows what will happen though with any of that. I want to believe that Marvel movies can rekindle the magic of the Thanos cycle, but I keep getting disappointed.

As far as my feelings toward The Marvels goes...while I was watching it, I thought it was light, fast, and fun. The action flowed nicely and we got really cool dynamics between the three Marvels. I loved Monica confronting Carol about her abandonment, and it was refreshing that they didn't let their issues distract them from the fight. I liked how Monica was the responsible adult and became the voice of reason.

Things I didn't like were small. The villain (obviously) was weak sauce. She just wanted to restore her planet that was ecologically devastated due to a dying sun. However, the entire movie, Carol Danvers had the power to just recharge the sun and she does that at the end. Why didn't she just do it at the beginning? Because then we wouldn't have had a movie. Also, the Kamala Khan powers are neat but the way they look on screen really strike me as "video game" and always jerk me out of the moment for some reason. It's probably just me. Also, I kind of liked seeing Carol demonstrate that she had the power to affect a star, reinvigorating it with her light blasts. The reason? The Dark Phoenix saga in the comic books. I collected these back in the eighties, and one of the things that the Dark Phoenix does in those comic books is absorb entire suns to fuel her power. I was wondering how that was going to look, and now I have an idea of how it will look because of seeing Captain Marvel reinvigorating the alien sun. Honestly, I think that Dark Phoenix would make an incredible cosmic villain for an Avengers type team up, requiring everyone to fight her. That would be awesome, and I think it would be a lot more compelling than what I'm getting from watching them lurch toward Avengers: The Kang Dynasty that's supposed to happen in a few years.

On Monday, I'm going to talk about Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. On Wednesday, I'm going to talk about the Apple+ show Invasion. I recently finished season 1, and I have thoughts about it I want to share.

I'm sharing my thoughts about Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Please share yours.

I saw Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania this weekend. It was an exciting and fun-filled adventure, and I think I enjoyed it as much if not more than the other Ant-Man films. I also need to remind myself not to overthink the show too much. That usually happens with any story that messes with time, and if I find myself following the different threads to suss out how everything relates to everything else, then I butt my head against paradoxes and things that cannot happen. That being said, I do want to discuss it. So here is a minor spoiler alert to anyone who has not seen it but may be planning to do so in the future.

The first thing that this movie seems to pull into focus (more than it was when it was a "stand-alone" product) is the series Loki. In that show, we ended up seeing that 1) other multiverses do indeed exist, and 2) that they exist in the timeline controlled by He Who Remains (who is a variant of Kang), and 3) that they all have to follow the basic beats in order to not deviate from "The Sacred Timeline." So, the Time Variance Authority where Owen Wilson's character worked and where they enforced the Sacred Timeline appears to be just a timeline that is allowed to exist as long as it doesn't pose a threat to whatever the Kangs are doing. So, as long as other multiverses are the kind that don't rock the boat in a way that bothers the Kangs, they're allowed to go on existing. Is that right?

So, when Sylvie (the Loki variant) killed He Who Remains, it re-set the multiverse. Before that point, there really was only the Sacred timeline. However, since He Who Remains was eliminated outside of time, it made it like there were always infinite multiverses forever. Although the Sacred timeline still played out the same way, it's as though the other universes were never pruned, and they all played out on their own simultaneously. Hence, the return of a ton of Kangs that we see in the post-credit scene in Quantumania. Does any of that make sense? I'm actually not sure it makes sense to me, but that's what I'm thinking is going on.

Regarding a thing that doesn't require me to do mental gymnastics in trying to figure anything out, I enjoyed MODOK. I was not expecting Yellow Jacket (Daren) to make an appearance after he was the villain in the first Ant-Man movie. And he made a suitably creepy MODOK, which has always been a really weird creature in the comics. And MODOK is supposed to look ridiculous. There's no way not to make him look ridiculous, because he's a giant head with little arms and legs in a floating murder chair. 

Finally, Jonathan Majors as Kang is electrifying. Thanos was one kind of villain. He was bulky, strong, towering, and nearly always in control. He was like an irresistible force. However, going with another villain like that would have felt too much like a retread. So, I think that Marvel studios made a really good choice post-Thanos. This time around, Kang is much pettier, much more emotional, but also a brilliant scientist and warrior. He's someone who can manipulate the very fabric of time and space with his advanced technology. And all of his variants seem to be evil, with maybe "The Conqueror" being the worst of the bunch. He says, "Do I look like a liar?" But he is. He's a liar, a cheater, a megalomaniac, and a psychopath. It was exciting to see the ways in which Majors brings this character to life, and I look forward to more. And that pretty much sums up all my thoughts that I have on Quantumania. It felt like I was reading a comic book, and comic books too often leave me a little bit confused until I see the entire story laid out. 

Why do we need fourth wall breaks? Is this a fad that can please go away now?

Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame were the peak. It's been all downhill ever since. Although I've been entertained by what came after, the Marvel Cinematic Universe (by and large) is not really all that good anymore (look...I liked the Hellraiser movie on Hulu, and it was not good...like seriously...so I have a low bar). The multiverse introduction, all the different Spidermen, and the fourth-wall breaking that we always get in every She-Hulk episode is (I think) not all that exciting. I also do understand that breaking the fourth wall is something that happens a lot in She-Hulk comics. I don't read She-Hulk, so maybe I'm lacking that experience on seeing how cool it is. But I actually do like suspension of disbelief, and it's kinda impossible to hit that amazing escapism you can get from a movie if your character goes into the writer's room, which is what happened in She-Hulk's finale.

Like, in the episode, Jen argues to Marvel that She-Hulk is at first a lawyer comedy and a Marvel series second. And then she gets to make changes to her own narrative. I mean...she used the Disney+ menu to enter another show. Like, really? She argues with the very writers of her show, who are actually writing this scene anyways, from the first scene of the show to the last scene. For what it's worth, I don't like the "it was all a dream" trope that writers sometimes use either. I think it's just a matter of taste, and my taste leans that way.

And to be clear, I'm all for watching something fun and goofy. Not everything has to fit neatly into the MCU puzzle. I'm also not clear on what Emil's whole purpose was in this show. Is he just doing self-help seminars now? I do get that he's part of the Thunderbolts, but the whole way of getting him there seems a bit sloppy with his character arc in She-Hulk.

It's got to be hard to follow up a huge story arc that ended with Thanos, a snap that removed half the life in the universe, and time travel that was necessary to reverse all of that wherein we still lost two great heroes. So, I appreciate that they are throwing so much at the wall to see what sticks. I really liked the show as a whole, but this ending fell flat for me. I guess maybe my expectations were out of wonk. Or something. I feel like I should be saying to Marvel, "It's not you, it's me." And leave it at that. Honestly...why do we need fourth wall breaks? Is this a fad that can please go away now?

I suppose that the next thing I need to watch is Werewolf by Night. I hope that ends up being more satisfying.

Let's talk about a particular kind of body count I've been noticing in MCU movies for some time now.

I went and saw Thor: Love and Thunder this weekend. I did enjoy the movie, and I want to talk about something that is a spoiler for those who haven't seen it. So here is your SPOILER WARNING.

Got that?

3...

2...

1...

Captain Marvel and The Wasp should watch their backs. Seriously. I think other than Pepper Potts, she's the only major female superhero lead who hasn't sacrificed herself and died so that a male superhero can go on to save everyone. Let's look at the female body count thus far in these MCU movies.

1) Black Widow. She sacrificed herself/died so that the Avengers can get the soulstone.

2) Gamora. She was killed by Thanos so that he could get the soulstone.

3) Jane Foster. She was killed by cancer. A wish could have brought her back, but it was used on the bad guy's daughter (to bring them back).

4) Scarlett Witch. She was killed when a mountain fell on her and crushed her to death.

5) Peggy Carter. She died of old age, but she's still dead.

6) The Ancient One. She was killed by Kaecilius and his murderous zealots, but not before setting Doctor Strange on the right path.

7) May Parker. She was killed by the Goblin Glider. It's arguable that she sacrificed herself for Peter Parker, and put him on the path that he is on today.

Lots of women making the ultimate sacrifice so that the boys can shine. I don't know what's up with the writers in the MCU, but this shit is glaring. Like seriously...it is. Do you think it is sexism? Or is it coincidence? Please weigh in if I'm making "too much of a mountain out of this molehill."

The What If Infinity Ultron episode on Disney+ was a lot of fun to watch and left me with a lot of thoughts.

Spoilers ahead for Infinity Ultron and the What If series on Disney +

So, I'm still a little behind on the What If series on Disney +. However, I did finish watching the penultimate episode wherein Ultron gets a hold of the Infinity Stones and then proceeds to expand his power into other universes and then beats up the Watcher (who's been telling the What if stories in the first place). As entertaining as it was (and it was fun in the comic book sense of watching powerful characters slug it out), I was left with questions and observations that will probably never be answered. Here are some of them.

1) Ultron is able to use the Infinity Stones once he goes to another universe. This doesn't make sense to me having finished watching the Loki series wherein the Infinity Stones were used as paperweights in clerk drawers in the Time Variance Authority building (which is outside the known universe). They established in that series that the Infinity Stones have power only within the universe with which they originate. Even in the comic books, this is a thing. For example, in a JLA and Avengers crossover, Darkseid briefly gets a hold of the Infinity Stones, and then realizes that they are useless because they are not a part of his universe (Darkseid is a huge DC villain similar to Thanos).

2) Ultron in the episode got the stones way too easily. I mean...he just used the mind stone to cut Thanos in half. For some reason, I think Thanos would have put up more of a fight than that. But it's all what the writers want, right?

3) Was Clint's arm and cloak some Wakanda Tech? It seemed like it was, given that the Winter Soldier's arm came from there.

4) I'm actually not sure how powerful the Watcher is within the canon of the Marvel comic books. Is he up there with the Living Tribunal? I'm just not sure. I do know that the Living Tribunal can just turn Infinity Stones off, like flicking a switch. He did that in some of the Infinity Stones plotlines before placing them beyond anyone's ability to abuse.

5) I loved seeing Captain Marvel's true power unleashed when she attacked Ultron. That's impressive, even if she was ultimately defeated by the robot with all the stones. Still...we've never seen that kind of power flex from that character.

I'm kind of an anomaly when it comes to fans of the Age of Ultron movie (the second Avengers movie). I actually liked it. However, I do get that Ultron was a Thanos-level villain who could easily serve as the big bad of several MCU films, and he didn't even survive one movie. I get that...and I get why online bros are pissed about it. However, the team at Marvel already had a story-arc mapped out. They didn't need another big bad for this arc. Instead they used Ultron like a strong chess piece. For example, in my opinion Ultron is what creates the fissure between Cap and Iron Man. It's what decimates S.H.I.E.L.D. And, it arguably is what allows Thanos to win the first time.

Anyway...those are my thoughts about the episode. Anyone else watch What if? If so, what do you think of it thus far?

I will be taking Monday off from blogging to celebrate Indigenous People's Day (Columbus Day). So, I shall see you on Wednesday. Until then, take care.

Loki was a baffling chaotic hot mess of a series that is a clarion call of things to come.

He Who Remains in the middle of his villainous monologue

Spoiler Alert: We are talking about Loki today. Proceed at your own peril.

Loki season 1 (there will be a season 2 according to the stinger embedded after the credits sequence of the season finale) ended by introducing us to a character called "He Who Remains." Played by Jonathan Majors from HBO's now canceled Lovecraft Country, he was a monologuing villain. However, his monologue wasn't boring, as he spoke to both Loki and Sylvie in the house at the end of time.

Who "He Who Remains" actually is...has yet to be revealed. But most sources who have read comic books say that this is Nathaniel Richards. They also say that Kang the Conqueror is one of many versions of Richards, which echoes a sentiment shared by He Who Remains when he referred to one of his variants as a "conqueror." This particular version of Kang was just a nerd who became a tyrant kind of accidentally. Not because he actually wanted to rule, but because he thought he knew what was best and had the means to achieve it.

As a villain, I found this character of He Who Remains to be affably evil with his pseudo arguments of, "What would you do in my place? All of your lives were necessary collateral damage...a sacrifice to keep the timeline pure. If you think you can do better, then you should and just take over." I also liked the line, "We're all villains here." It seemed appropriate given the circumstance that Sylvie and Loki had somehow managed to achieve the high ground of morality despite their storied history of death and destruction. The difference then seemed to be in the growth of the Loki character played by Hiddleston, who learnt to consider what if he is wrong and how that can affect others. This was unique, as Sylvie (to the very bitter end) was consumed by revenge for the wrongs that had been done to her.

In watching these six episodes of the first season, I've got to say that none of this went in the direction that I thought it would. Loki was singularly the most baffling of the Disney + series that include WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. It was also the most revealing into the MCU's future, by giving us a glimpse of all the time travel quackery that is going to consume the multiverse. I wonder how the writers are even going to keep track of all the timelines that are going to explode, and all the various iterations of the characters we know and how they will face the threat of Kang the Conqueror. I worry that it will become confusing in the same way that Dark on Netflix got really confusing and not at all enjoyable. I also wonder if Kang will fall short of the impressiveness of Thanos. I don't really know much about him, so I'm excited to learn. I definitely think that Marvel is trying to go in a different direction, and try out a completely polar opposite of Thanos by recognizing that you can't capture lightning in a bottle more than once.

And I had a parting thought I wanted to share sparked by the Loki mini-series. Maybe the common thread of the future movies is going to be the TVA (Time Variance Authority), and how everyone is going to try for a better version of the TVA. In other words, stopping Kangs from warring across multiverses seems necessary, but not if the cost is free will and the destruction of so many other lives. I also wonder if the timelines diverging means that there are now multiple instances of the TVA. Loki landed in a very different version--one with Kang's statues and no one remembering him. So what exactly does that mean if the TVA itself has been rewritten other than to send the basic message that nothing that has happened thus far in the Marvel Cinematic Universe accounts for anything. It seems like a weird place to go with these stories, but maybe a great reset is what they needed to break away from the comic book peak that they reached with the Infinity Gauntlet story.

Do any of you have any thoughts or considerations regarding the Loki mini-series? 

Disney Studios does a great job in rotating major characters out of their Marvel properties. Black Widow is the latest example of this.

A bunch of people around the world watched Black Widow this past weekend. I was one of them. By the time it was over, I had thought yet again on why Marvel (when run by Disney) seems to keep hitting things out of the park. Every film has a freshness to it that you don't get with new Batman and Superman movies where they have recast the old character with whatever the new hotness is in Hollywood. It occurred to me that one of the things that Disney really has going for it is its willingness to just let things go and move on.

For example, Captain America, Iron Man, and Black Widow had run their course. So they let those characters go. There may be new ones that pop up in the future. Anthony Mackey is going to be a "Captain America." But he will never be "The Captain America," and I'm not bothered by that at all. That old "cap" is done as far as I'm concerned (and I really do love me some Chris Evans). The reel's been run out on that particular iteration of the character and what they wanted to do with their life. I gotta say though, that I'm a little in awe of Disney's bold moves to just toss aside old characters that have made them a ton of money. Lesser studios might have tried to woo the actor back with a salary increase or some other such nonsense, but not Disney.

Black Widow (of course) is the latest of the bunch that gets their swan song in a motion picture. When the character was first introduced, female members of "The Avengers" and female superheroes in general were kind of rare. However, we can't say that anymore (and it's only been ten or so years--that isn't that long, folks!). And as much as Natasha spent posing and doing the things that she does really well for the entirety of her run in the MCU, the film was also a highlight of Natasha's greatest hits, showing us one more time just why she was an Avenger in the first place (even though she had no actual super powers). The film also was an excellent springboard to introduce us to someone who is going to be "a Black Widow," even if she isn't the Black Widow. And that's actually exciting, because I love this new character (her name is Yelena Belova and is the younger sister of Natasha but not by blood). Progression and change is so much better than just rebooting characters and asking everyone to pretend that they don't know the origin story one more time.

In watching all of these comic book movies and television adaptations, I feel like studios (and Hollywood) too often keep reaching for the same bag of tricks to try and capture lightning in a bottle. The characters of Superman, the Batman, Spiderman, and the Joker have been done to death. As much as I love Tom Holland in the role of Spiderman, it's going to be fun to see what Disney does with the character next as Holland's contract is up. I read online that Holland is hoping that they will renew his contract, but I actually hope they don't. With the MCU providing a guiding hand to the property of Spiderman, I would assume that we are going to see an expansion of the character into the many alternate realms and earths, giving us all kinds of "Spider people." This hasn't ever been done before in live-action, and it's going to inject some badly needed freshness into a very stale franchise.

Change is a good thing. Capitalism doesn't agree with this statement of course. With regard to entertainment, what capitalism tends to do is to seize upon a successful thing...and then clone it with something that is only marginally different. The up and coming Windows 11 operating system reminds me of this, because Gizmodo's screen shots show that its interface will be almost identical to Mac OS. So, they are copying Apple to try and catch lightning in a bottle. Only Apple already caught the lightning in a bottle, so I don't think it will end up being any more successful than Windows 10 was (I'm actually a fan of Windows 10). And that's why what Disney does by tossing out these old characters in favor of trying out new ones is remarkable by any capitalist measuring stick.

Anyway, Black Widow was a great film that didn't feel stale, and it opened the doors to many other fun opportunities to explore within the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Anyone else see it this weekend? I'll look for your responses in the comments.

Because of WandaVision I have questions and thoughts about the Blip.

 

Years after Avengers: Endgame brought a finale to the story arc of the Infinity Stones and Thanos, I have questions. I maybe should have thought of them back then, but I didn't. What brought them to mind was WandaVision and seeing Monica Rambeau (who had appeared in WandaVision's sitcom reality as "Geraldine") reformed out of ashes.

So my first question is: If you got blipped while you were on a plane, would you get blipped back into the middle of the sky and then fall to your death? So, thinking on that horror show...I must conclude that this is not the case. Rather, the Hulk's "snap" put everyone back safely. So Monica showing back up in a chair makes sense even if the chair she originally fell asleep in 5 years ago had been moved.

So these are complicated questions, obviously. And I shall never get a satisfactory answer to them. I mean...what if you were blipped in the middle of complex surgery? That would have to suck to suddenly be back without being sewn back up or if they were in the middle of removing something. Yikes.

I did find one reference online that said that Bruce Banner wished everyone back safely. However, my brain at this point, still wonders about collateral damage of people disappearing and then reappearing five years later. The consequences have to be huge, and I wonder how many stories you could tell dealing with those consequences before they got old.

The directors and writers have said that the Avengers had a lot of time to work out what it is they wanted: all of the people who got dusted by Thanos to return safely. This may be the equivalent of a fifteen page plan (or something similar) that includes enough food for those people to eat, and that they don't unblip in the same space as a thing occupying a space. There are those speculating too that maybe Banner's snap was to "implement the plan" that had been worked on and the Infinity Stones took it from there. They are unquestionably more than just magic objects. They define reality itself, so perhaps they have a kind of sentience to them.

Looking back on the whole Infinity Stones story arc, I will give the MCU credit for sticking with their whole "everyone is gone for five years" catastrophe. I thought they were going to cheese out an ending with a complete time reset and everyone would be hunky dory. But, they decided not to go that route, and to embrace all the consequences of "The Blip," and I guess we are just getting started on how these things will play out.