Rolling Marvel Cinematic Universe thread (+ a poll: Classic or Dud?)

Buzz Lightyear and Han Solo coming to the MCU.

TEN new movies coming out over a two year span. Suck it, haters.

Oh, maybe that's ten projects being announced including the Disney+ shows.Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings announced thus far. Live blog on I09, where they're fucking up the spelling of most character names. Lots of juicy tidbits getting dropped, though. Adult Monica Rambeau will be in WandaVision!

I don't care if I'm the only person excited about this here. I just don't care.

did you see the poll results

Sounds like Dr. Strange sequel (Multiverse of Madness) is gonna be a horror flick.

Hawkeye show is basically gonna be the Fraction/Aja book, costarring Kate Bishop.

On board for Loki 4

Watiti directing a female Thor sounds exciting until you realize who's returning to the fold...

Well, well. Mahershela Ali cast as Blade, also FF confirmed(!!!) but a TBA release date somewhere down the line, probably after the scheduled flicks.

So, plot and cast news aside, not really anything that hasn't already been semi-officially announced or strongly hinted at. Black Widow, Eternals, Dr. Strange 2, Thor 4, and Shang-Chi all given firm release dates through 2021, and Black Panther 2, Captain Marvel 2, GOTG 3, FF, and Blade all confirmed to be on the way at some point.

I’m legit excited for Kate Bishop, I hope they do a good job!

wow this reveal that cottonmouth was really blade all along is gonna make the luke cage show integral to the mcu

wait, tony leung is in the shang-chi movie? hell yes

I was thinking "but which Tony Leung?", unsurprisingly the more famous one. I thought the less famous one has more martial arts skills but I haven't seen enough of their films.

Tony Leung will be portraying the actual, non-Kingsley Mandarin (and presumably Shang-Chi's pop-pop).

I saw the movie list on slate and thought it was a joke. WandaVision, really?

It's one of their streaming shows- along with Falcon/Winter Soldier, Loki, & Hawkeye

I know this is par for the course (and a "O Rly" observation); but as a Marvel Comics reader but a barely-into-the-MCU guy, it's interesting to have conversations w/big MCU fans who don't know the comics at all. Like this morning, a colleague at work -- "Is there even a female Thor in the comics? Ugh, I hope Natalie Portman doesn't replace Hemsworth," etc.

this happens to me all the time

usually in regards to someone commenting on some thing as being totally crazy, unpredictable, weird etc. and then asking me "is that a real thing?" (by which they mean "does that have some actual basis in published comics?")

tbh I always find this baffling, how someone can find a subject so engaging in one medium, but beneath contempt (or not worth doing the most cursory investigation necessary) in another medium

like people that were really excited about Watchmen but didn't have any interest in reading the book

I find it hilarious that people think that movies would introduce wackier elements than comic books

most recent example: Peter Porker

er xp

^^^

Say what you will about the recent DC movies, none of them were on "I Am Curious (Black)!"-level

would probably be an improvement tbh

not in 2019 it wouldn't

ok well what if they threw in Bat-Mite

http://img.fireden.net/co/image/1510/64/1510648240983.jpg

it's kinda funny after all the mammoth effort of the MCU, Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse ended up being the best comic movie

tbh I always find this baffling, how someone can find a subject so engaging in one medium, but beneath contempt (or not worth doing the most cursory investigation necessary) in another medium

lol

lol x 2

LOL how many of these shitty MCU movies do I have to sit thru before I’m allowed to call them shitty? One more? Two? Ten?

I think at this point the amount of time you've spent reiterating the shittiness of the Marvel movies has safely exceeded the amount of time you've spent watching shitty Marvel movies.

(Which, tbf, is precisely where I'm at wrt shitty DC movies, so you're in good company.)

I was born in 1974 and comic books never clicked for me. I never really found the art compelling, didn't have a regular place to buy them in my small town, and if I encountered them I was jumping into a story that might have been going on since the 1940s and I might never see the next issue so what was the point?

I watched Super Friends and Spiderman and His Amazing Friends on Saturday mornings, saw Supermans 1-3 in the theater, and was 15 when Batman came out and thought it looked lame so never saw any of those. I saw a few random Raimi and Nolan and MCU films in the way that you go to a big summer blockbuster (but I had no idea why Ghostface called himself Tony Stark until I saw the first Iron Man). I've got an almost 5 year old now and this such a dominant force in pop culture that it's hard to avoid. For some reason I watched Infinity War on a plane ride at a particular place in my life where I dug it enough to watch most of the ones I've missed on dvd from the library over the last 9 months in time to see Endgame in the theater. Me and the kid absolutely loved Spiderverse and have watched it or parts of it several times now since it's been on Netflix.

My public library has a huge section of graphic novels and trade paperbacks (a phrase I learned only recently) and I want to check them out but again, how does one find an entry point? I've read Civil War and The Killing Joke and Watchmen, but there are so many others - just shelves and shelves of them - that it's hard to focus. And if am interested in some character and start reading wikipedia suddenly I'm looking at a 10,000 word entry on Doc Ock and the versions of him that exist in like twenty different versions and story lines or the dozens of people who have hosted the Venom symbiote. It's overwhelming, but picking something at random feels so haphazard.

Yeah, it's unwieldy and intimidating even for the initiated (I read pretty much all the Marvel stuff but I'm like 1.5 years behind at the moment, during which time hundreds of issues have been published). A sense of what you like the most and what you're looking for would help with tailor-made recommendations.

Good post, joygoat. I second Old Lunch — are there particular characters/vibes you’re interested in?

The last few years of this thread has some great recs (including from Yours Truly!), if you have the patience to scroll thru it: Marvel Comics blabbery

Excelsior!

I've read Civil War and The Killing Joke and Watchmen, but there are so many others - just shelves and shelves of them - that it's hard to focus.

it's worth noting that you've read three things that are, more or less, the product of a single authorial voice. If you want to read more stuff that is set in the Marvel universe, that also reads as the product of a person (or collaborative team) executing an idea, the pickings are going to be slim. If you just want to read superhero comics that read like that (as your choices so far indicate), the options are wider.

If you're interested in reading comics generally, and want them to be as coherently a single story executed by good storytellers (like Killing Joke and Watchmen), there are hundreds of thousands of recommendations we can make, depending on styles or genres you like in other media.

Still waiting for the Cinematic Jodoverse tbf

I read Watchmen years ago when the movie hype was building, Killing Joke because I recognized the cover and knew it was a self-contained origin story, and Civil War because it seemed like as good an intro as any because I had a film as a reference.

Basically in terms of structure, I'm looking for something that feels somewhat discrete, like a standalone graphic novel or some story arc that's collected or demarcated in some way, preferably within the Marvel universe because I find them more interesting than DC ones who feel a lot more one dimensional. Focus on a particular villain or that villain's origin or motivation is good, like I find it interesting when someone finds a way give a character who seems like a gimmick from 1967 a sense of gravitas.

Characters I'm interested in: I loved Spiderverse so any Miles/Stacy/modern-day Peter Parker/ future whatever Spiderman. I feel like I should read Frank Miller's Dark Knight but that's perpetually checked out. Someone was talking to my son about doc ock and spiderman swapping bodies (Superior Spiderman, I believe?), and when he told a waitress how much he loves Venom (just for being so scary looking) she told him about Carnage which I know nothing about. I've also heard about Doctor Doom for my entire life but know nothing about his origin or powers etc.

Thanks for any suggestions, I'll probably lurk on the marvel thread as well.

Gwen Stacy that is.

Jonathan Hickman's Avengers run leading up to Secret Wars a couple of years ago was good, he has a pretty strong voice as a comics writer. It's got a ton of characters, though, all the trad Avengers, Fantastic Four, Doctor Doom.

https://www.comicbookherald.com/jonathan-hickman-marvel-universe-reading-order-2008-to-2016/

the run that starts w/ V here

I've never read it but Grant Morrison's Batman Incorporated but it's quite popular and I don't think you need to read other Batman books to get any of it.

good self-contained DC GNs - Red Son (Soviet Superman), All-Star Superman

Are you looking for things that your kid can read too, or mainly just yourself?

I've also heard about Doctor Doom for my entire life but know nothing about his origin or powers etc

These can be different every few years depending on who's writing or which editor's in charge or whatnot - part of why DC or Marvel own-brand superhero comics are terrible potentially challenging for casual readers.

The initial few years of Spider-Man, written and drawn by Steve Ditko with dialogue added by Stan Lee, would probably be a really good grounding tbh, but the dialogue is very dated.

(and was a 40-year-old's made-up idea of how hip teens talked at the time, and often hasn't actually read the story closely so contradicts what's meant to be going on, or forgets what he wrote previously etc.)

The closest thing to Spider-Verse that's accessible to a new reader (although just with a white male Spider-Man) might be collections of the Spider-Man's Tangled Web series from the early '00s: these were 1, 2 or 3 issue self-contained stories where individual cartoonists or teams were given a little more free reign to bring their style to Spidey. So you'd get a little of the flavour of the many illustrative and tonal styles that Spider-Verse rolled together so well.

I wouldn't give a pre-teen Venom comics at all btw - not only are they designed to be SCARIiIiIIeeEEr than the stuff the kids have read for years already, they're very lamely gross and violent in a way that's aimed at 14-15 year olds who want to feel transgressive but without actually taking in new ideas.

Carnage is Venom, but for 16 year olds who've burnt out on the transgressiveness of Venom.

Tom King's VISION 12-issue miniseries is wonderful. I have no interest in the character or any real knowledge of his history, but this was clever and sad and great.