Marvel Cinematic Universe Movie Thread

[St. Dubb]

Black Widow thoughts:

 

Spoiler

I went in with pretty low expectations and felt the movie exceeded it. I mean it's not top 10 MCU film but it's in the top half to me. I also appreciated the spy feel and the fact that it was more grounded than most MCU movies. 

The whole "there's no stakes" because we know her fate as an argument against the movie drives me crazy because you can say that about probably every MCU solo movie. Does anyone walk into a Captain America or Iron Man or Thor moving thinking there's a realistic chance Cap, Stark, or Thor is going to die in it? There's usually an upcoming Avengers movie we know is coming. Hell, we knew there was a Spider-Man sequel coming out so when Peter gets dusted in Infinity war, we knew he was coming back. So to dock points from this movie because we know Natasha isn't going to die or something seems silly to me. 

I knew Val was showing up again in this movie (or was supposed to make her first appearance technically) and figured it would involve recruiting Yelena but was surprised to find out she was already working for her. Crazy to see an end credit setting up a TV show. But I am definitely excited about where this probable Thunderbolts story is going.

 

[Chris2K]

Credits scene

Spoiler

I wonder if they did some editing/re-shooting of the Val scenes we've seen so far, because there's  no indication given of who she is in Black Widow, whilst in F&WS she got the full name introduction. It would make sense once it became apparent that the scenes were going to be "aired" the other way around to the original plan. 

 

[gunnar hendershow]

I enjoyed it.

Spoiler

Some parts I was seriously into and others kind of made me zone out. The character-focused moments and the overall spy-influenced elements were better than the climactic battle since I knew both Natasha and Yelena were going to make it out unscathed. It was nice to have them try to film the classic "descent to Earth" scene though. I love those.

Weaknesses were that it just felt in an odd place. Start of Phase 4, lots of motion going on with introducing new characters, here's a movie about one of the original Avengers but we're going to use this to introduce her Phase 4 replacement of sorts. Made it a little harder to be invested I felt. That and Taskmaster was just kind of dull. As GoGo said, making Taskmaster the emotionless killer and Ultron the Joss Whedon nightmare is an unfortunate thing that happened and can't really be reversed.

 

[Hellraiser]

I was a decent movie, just not really the Black Widow movie I had hoped for.

Spoiler

I had hoped for a spy movie similar in tone to Captain America 2 where she is the center of attention and gets to be a bad ass. Instead the main purpose of the movie seems to be to set up the new Black Widows and Natasha is constantly outshone by her. I like the new Black Widow, but it kinda pisses me off that in her own movie that is also he last big appearance in the MCU she has been neutered and plays the the 2nd fiddle to he successor. 

Also what is up with Red Guardian and Captain America? When he brags to the other prisoners about having fought Captain America in the 80s I though he was just telling tall tales as the MCU Cap wasn't defrosted until 2011. But later he asks Natasha if Cap ever talked about him to her. Why would talk to Natasha about a person he never met? Was there another Captain America? Or is the Red Guardian so delusional that he believes himself to be such a big deal that Cap must have heard of him and be in awe of him?

 

[MalaCloudy Black]

2 hours ago, Hellraiser said:

I was a decent movie, just not really the Black Widow movie I had hoped for.

  Reveal hidden contents

I had hoped for a spy movie similar in tone to Captain America 2 where she is the center of attention and gets to be a bad ass. Instead the main purpose of the movie seems to be to set up the new Black Widows and Natasha is constantly outshone by her. I like the new Black Widow, but it kinda pisses me off that in her own movie that is also he last big appearance in the MCU she has been neutered and plays the the 2nd fiddle to he successor. 

Also what is up with Red Guardian and Captain America? When he brags to the other prisoners about having fought Captain America in the 80s I though he was just telling tall tales as the MCU Cap wasn't defrosted until 2011. But later he asks Natasha if Cap ever talked about him to her. Why would talk to Natasha about a person he never met? Was there another Captain America? Or is the Red Guardian so delusional that he believes himself to be such a big deal that Cap must have heard of him and be in awe of him?

 

To answer your question,

Spoiler

David Harbour's been asked about this and the way I understand his answer, yeah, Red Guardian is lying. But he believes it's true.

 

[Lint]

I take it as

Spoiler

he believes he fought Captain America, but he actually fought a random soldier dressed as Cap for propaganda purposes. He thinks it was the real deal though

 

[Lint]

If you really think about Red Guardian

Spoiler

He was really just another failed Super Soldier project.  He was probably put on that deep cover mission, then thrown in the gulag, to make the public forget about him

 

[theshadow]

18 hours ago, Lint said:

I take it as

  Reveal hidden contents

he believes he fought Captain America, but he actually fought a random soldier dressed as Cap for propaganda purposes. He thinks it was the real deal though

 

Spoiler

Perhaps Isaiah Bradley isn't the only secret super soldier. Maybe we have another secret Captain America we don't know about yet.

 

[Daniel Bryan]

Just watched Black Widow. Florence Pugh stole the show, unsurprisingly, and actually managed to lend some emotional weight to otherwise hollow scenes - she's very good. But overall it was weightless.

I get that it's a Marvel movie and they're all trying to do the quippy thing - and it struck a nice balance for the first 40 minutes or so - but once David Harbour came in, the jokey dialogue started to make me uneasy, especially when it's about forced hysterectomies or all the people Natasha must have murdered, and

Spoiler

the whole "quirky family" concept felt really off too, because Rachel Weisz is, when they meet her, still actively working for these people, kidnapping and torturing girls and designing them so they can be forced to stop breathing, and it's all treated as a joke, or like it doesn't even matter compared to hurt feelings and family drama. She also turns on them way too easy and it's never really explored or explained why.

The retconning of Natasha's backstory and general vagueness of the villain bugged me:

Spoiler

Natasha's backstory has never really been explicit, but you have to assume she's a few years older than Scarlett Johannsson, and was KGB as a child. It's implied in Avengers that at one point she was a mercenary, presumably after the collapse of the Soviet Union ("I have a very specific skillset. I didn't care who I used it for, or on." ), but here she isn't taken to the Red Room until after the Cold War ended, and goes straight from working for Russia(?) to SHIELD. It makes her a little less interesting, as does "Drakov's daughter" turning out to be just a bit of collateral damage she feels particularly guilty about, rather than, along with the hospital fire and whatever happened in Sao Paolo, something specifically bad that she did.

Which brings up another thing, who is Draykov working for? Is it Russia? Is he just out doing this on his own? How? To what end? Has he just been sitting up in his sky fortress mwahaha-ing to himself this whole time? The whole Widows thing struck me as them just copy and pasting the Winter Soldiers concept from Civil War so they'd have a plot without having to put too much thought into it.

On the whole it seemed like they weren't really interested in exploring Natasha's character or doing anything with her - just wanted to put her name on the poster and get a "Black Widow movie" out there. It started promising, and those first 30/40 minutes where they're basically doing The Americans and then the bit where it's just Natasha and Yelena are solid, but then it just became your bog-standard Marvel movie. Not disappointing, because you know what you're getting into, but still feels like a missed opportunity to do something interesting.

Edited July 25, 2021 by Daniel Bryan

[Ruki]

 

 

No more movies on D+ day one?

[gunnar hendershow]

I mean I get some of her frustration as the box office was dramatically lower than it normally would've been (and I'm sure it affected her overall compensation), but like if they just released straight to theaters w/o D+ I doubt there'd have been that many more people braving theaters to see it.

[JasonM]

27 minutes ago, damshow said:

I mean I get some of her frustration as the box office was dramatically lower than it normally would've been (and I'm sure it affected her overall compensation), but like if they just released straight to theaters w/o D+ I doubt there'd have been that many more people braving theaters to see it.

Possibly, but on the other hand. The Prelim figures say something like 90M (viewers) in the box office, and 60M on Disney+.

If the contract simply states that she only gets paid through BO sales, that means Disney has pocketed a third of her income without her getting any slice of that pie, when if there had been an exclusive theatrical run you can make a good case a portion of home viewers would've ended up going to the cinema instead.

I'm sure Disney+ won't let this go to court and settle in some form or fashion, or potentially litigate it for eternity... Or potentially claim that their hands were tied due to COVID forcing their hands. But even then you can make a case that there WAS a theatrical run alongside, so Disney still broke terms.

[Chris2K]

I completely see her point, but it's also a bold move to target something that was done to allow people to watch the movie without risking their health by going to a cinema.

I think it's safe to say we can rule our Scarlett appearing in another MCU property at this point.

[Maxx]

She isn't targeting that.  She's targeting Disney for screwing around with the deal they had. 

[Jimmy]

Yeah, she's totally in the right here. If I've read it right, they broke contract - she attempted to renegotiate, they ignored her, so she's taken action. Good for her. Especially when the battle for equal pay between genders is such a huge issue in our industry, I've got no issue with a female star making sure they get paid what they're worth. Or, in this case, what they agreed to in the first place.

[DFF]

I have no idea how these contracts are worded, but I'm guessing there must be an element in there that states that the film would get a cinema release prior to other formats for this lawsuit to stand?  And that because D+ moved the goalposts that contract isn't as stipulated. 

Suspect that going forward it means agents will be more wary of stream-at-home releases and make sure there's wording in there to account for it in their clients' contracts moving forward (I don't think Premier Access is going anywhere). 

Agree with JasonM in the thought that Disney will likely just settle this one out of court, but Marvel/disney (whatever level the talent contracts reside at) may get bombarded with renegotiation demands. 

[Josh]

She’s 100% right to do it. There was even an email between her and a Disney exec earlier in the process (when the question of streaming due to COVID was rising) in which the exec said they still planned for a theatrical exclusive and that if plans were to change they would renegotiate first.

There’s also no reason for this to be the end of streaming premieres unless Disney alone makes that move. Warner Bros. has been renegotiating the contracts of stars in their movies this year in order to stream them without breach of contract. This is entirely a matter of a parent company not keeping their word. It’s important for the protection of all actors (not just stars) for Disney to be forced to pay her and cover the loss.

[tristy]

Weird that they renegotiated with Dwayne Johnson and the directors, etc. for the Jungle Cruise D+/theatrical simultaneous release, but it appears they didn't do it with Scarlett and company. And now it's rumored that Emma Stone is considering doing the same because of the Cruella movie, but she's apparently negotiating with Disney about a sequel so that one might get worked out. Gerard Butler has followed in Scarlett's footsteps for his Olympus Has Fallen movie, so it appears she might have opened the floodgates.

On the Marvel side - "insiders" say that Feige is furious with Disney about this, since he was always against the idea of a Disney+ release for Black Widow right from the very start. I don't think Feige will have the same type of relationship with Bob Chapek as he did with Iger.

[Jimmy]

6 hours ago, tristy said:

Weird that they renegotiated with Dwayne Johnson and the directors, etc. for the Jungle Cruise D+/theatrical simultaneous release, but it appears they didn't do it with Scarlett and company. And now it's rumored that Emma Stone is considering doing the same because of the Cruella movie, but she's apparently negotiating with Disney about a sequel so that one might get worked out. Gerard Butler has followed in Scarlett's footsteps for his Olympus Has Fallen movie, so it appears she might have opened the floodgates.

On the Marvel side - "insiders" say that Feige is furious with Disney about this, since he was always against the idea of a Disney+ release for Black Widow right from the very start. I don't think Feige will have the same type of relationship with Bob Chapek as he did with Iger.

Spot the difference between Dwayne and Scarlett. 

[angeluzcr]

18 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

Spot the difference between Dwayne and Scarlett. 

Besides this , from the wording, to me it seems the agreement of SJ was with Marvel and Disney made Marvel released it on D+, that may be the diference.Disney tried to skip the terms since is was Marvel problem.