Continuing my MCU rewatch

[Fletch]

Back on the Fwoosh, I'd started posting some thoughts as I started my way back through the Infinity Saga movies. I wasn't sure if I was going to pick that up again here, but as I've kept plodding thru them, I've had smore more opinions that I wanted to share with whoever was listening.

I last left off with Iron Man 2, but I still have my notes for Thor. Here are the highlights:

1. I instantly disapprove of any movie that starts with a flashback showing us foundational info. You really have to convince me that it's necessary, and not just something that can be explained through dialog later. And here they did it twice. Like, just start us with a scene of Jane & Co. looking up at the night sky, talking about what they hope to discover, and then a breathtaking transition to Asgard and Thor's coronation showing us that they really have no idea what they're about to find.
   
   
2. The cast is great. Hemsworth and Hiddleston were such great finds for these rolls. They were both able to spout of the semi-archaic dialog and make it sound so natural. Portman, Skarsgard and Denning had a really great 3-way dynamic that made their exposition scenes way more watchable than if it'd just been any two of them talking. The Asgardians, however, never really got above "they're fine" for me. Sif and the Warriors Three each had their appropriate personality trait that they stuck to. Hopkins and Elba are both looming screen presences and command every scene they're in, even if they're also kind of one-dimensional.
   
   
3. I confess I was initially kind of surprised at how multi-ethnic Asgard was. Black Asgardians, Asian Asgardians... it's not what I was expecting based on my comic book reading, but I don't actually know the racial demographics of a mythical space realm, so can't complain.
   
   
4. It's way to dark on Jotunheim. I really have little idea of what's going on. I know for fact it didn't register to me at first watch that Loki's skin turns ice-giant blue at one point.
   
   
5. The best thing I can say about Chris Hemsworth as a person is that I was wholly unconvinced by his performances as a spoiled prince. He just didn't seem that capable of playing "douchebag." It's not until he starts acting the shit out of the banishment scene that you realize he's a capable actor, just not a dick.
   
   
6. Something that bugged me from first viewing: how does the Viking mythology on Earth know that Loki is an adopted frost giant but Loki himself doesn't? Did someone tell the Vikings but somehow keep it secret from Loki? Is this a version of Earth where that part isn't included in the mythology? It still feels so strange that a fundamental part of the mythology is just now being discovered by the people involved.
   
   
7. In later movies, Loki becomes almost a parody of himself, but here, Hiddleston really delivers on a 3-dimensional character. His face alone spoke volumes during Thor's banishment scene, and his "why didn't you tell me!" rage against his dad should be on every actor's list of audition monologues. And then Odin just kind of lays down and goes to sleep. Kind of a weak ending for the scene, but Hiddleston does such a great shift from anger to concern that you don't really notice.
   
   
8. Hnh. I never noticed before, but Thor sees the rune on the side of Mjolnir when he fails to pick it up. I wonder if he knew what it meant and realized that he was officially unworthy. Sidenote here, I wish the hammer were more just resting on the ground and not partially encased in stone. It doesn't look so much like it can't be lifted as it just looks stuck in the rock.
   
   
9. I can't quite put my finger on it, but the resolution feels rushed here. Like, he's humbled by his inability to pick up the hammer, makes everybody breakfast, then all his friends show up and fight a giant robot. I think what I wanted is more Thor involvement in the robot fight. Like, maybe just Sif comes down to Earth so it's more her and Thor trying to fight it rather than having the Warriors Three fight his battle for him. I also would've liked to have seen more powered-up Thor fighting the Destroyer rather than just going straight to tornado. Give the people of Earth a real show.
   
   
10. I broadly like that Thor had to destroy his only way back to Earth in order to save a planet of his enemies, but I'm not sure the situation was earned. Heimdall does say early on that he can't leave the bridge open or it'll destroy Jotunheim, but it was kind of a throwaway line and not exactly a Chekhov's Bridge. I certainly would've added a lesson from Odin or someone about how Bifrost was a great weapon until they learned to use it as a tool. Sort of a swords-to-plowshares lesson for his young princes. Then when Loki uses it as a weapon, he's proving his ill worth for the throne by ignoring that lesson. That's what I would've done, at least.
    
    
11. That post-credit scene confused the heck out of me. Like, is Selvig possessed by Loki?

All-told, this was the weakest of the origin movies for the core Avengers (including Incredible Hulk). I'd had high hopes for it because I like Kenneth Branagh and thought his Shakespearean interpretation of the story would play to his strengths. I think it comes across feeling a little predictable, with just the great performances getting us through each scene without a lot of anticipation about what comes next. The worst thing I can say about it is that I have never gone to Youtube to rewatch any of the action scenes in this movie like I've done with, say, Iron Man in Gulmira or Captain America's invasion of the Red Skull's bunker.

 

[Ru1977]

just start us with a scene of Jane & Co

So glad you're back on this! Also, I always thought it would have been interesting if they'd told the first two acts from Jane's point of view, so the audience isn't really sure if he IS Thor or just thinks he is. Then I hopes maybe a Hercules movie could take that approach, but guess not heh.

It's way to dark on Jotunheim

Agreed. That was the trend though for a while, night is too dark to see what the hell is happening.

The best thing I can say about Chris Hemsworth as a person is that I was wholly unconvinced by his performances as a spoiled prince.

That is an awesome comment

It's not until he starts acting the shit out of the banishment scene that you realize he's a capable actor, just not a dick.

Agreed. His fight in the compound is cool, Hawkeye cameo is neat, but the emotion he puts into the devastation is amazing.

In later movies, Loki becomes almost a parody of himself, but here, Hiddleston really delivers on a 3-dimensional

True, though I think he brought it for the Loki show.

he's humbled by his inability to pick up the hammer, makes everybody breakfast, then all his friends show up and fight a giant robot. I think what I wanted is more Thor involvement in the robot fight.

Maybe another beat of him trying to be a normal human? I dunno... The last act definitely has no fat.

That post-credit scene confused the heck out of me. Like, is Selvig possessed by Loki?

I don't even think THEY know, since Whedon directed that..you can't even blame it on two different directors not communicating.

I think it comes across feeling a little predictable, with just the great performances getting us through each scene without a lot of anticipation about what comes next.

Yeah, I can see that. It's pretty by the numbers, but I enjoyed the mythological nods and interpretations. It also scratched my Masters of the Universe itch a little with the muscly hero and his friends combatting neat monsters.

Anyway, thanks for bringing this back.

 

[PanchaMaestro]

Is it me or is Natalie Portman's acting just a momentum killer?

 

[Fletch]

Agreed. His fight in the compound is cool, Hawkeye cameo is neat, but the emotion he puts into the devastation is amazing.

Heck yeah. His defeat and remorse when he learns of Odin's death from Loki was pretty great. I was actually referring to the scene where Odin banished him. Between Thor's rage and Loki's "I think I've gone too far this time" expression, it felt like Anthony Hopkins was the worst actor in the room.

The last act definitely has no fat.

That's a really great way of describing it.

Is it me or is Natalie Portman's acting just a momentum killer?

I don't think so personally, but I can't argue with anyone who might think that. Unless we're talking about her "romance" scenes. My shriveled old-man heart has problems with how quickly people fall in love in movies.

Especially when it's a 2,000-year-old Thor. How does he meet someone and over, what, .00041% of his lifespan fall in love? I guess we just have to chalk it up to her being the one nearby while he went thru these life-altering moments. He just associates her with his new outlook and that's what he's in love with.

 

[Ru1977]

Heck yeah. His defeat and remorse when he learns of Odin's death from Loki was pretty great.

You're right.

I was actually referring to the scene where Odin banished him. Between Thor's rage and Loki's "I think I've gone too far this time" expression, it felt like Anthony Hopkins was the worst actor in the room.

Heh, I was pretty sure I was thinking of the wrong part. but yeah, that's an amazing point.

That's a really great way of describing it.

Thank you.

My shriveled old-man heart has problems with how quickly people fall in love in movies.

Ha! I get that though. They only have two hours, so there's always some truncating, but yeah.

Especially when it's a 2,000-year-old Thor. How does he meet someone and over, what, .00041% of his lifespan fall in love?

Christ, right!

I guess we just have to chalk it up to her being the one nearby while he went thru these life-altering moments. He just associates her with his new outlook and that's what he's in love with.

Also a good point. And, well, they were always doomed. And that's okay.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

Personally, I'd fall in love with Natalie Portman very quickly.

 

[Ru1977]

I still see Mathilda when I look at her.

 

[Fletch]

Captain America: The First Avenger

I watched this between forums so didn't keep running notes. I just have some thoughts from the memory of watching it.

1. I wasn't crazy about Chris Evans being cast. I still have an aversion to re-using actors from other Marvel projects, and back then he was the Human Torch. Boy was I wrong.
   
   
2. The tiny-Steve effect is flawless. I remember it felt kind of weird that he still had his deep, big-boy voice. Modern me is also kind of thrown by how much time we spend with Steve before he's Captain America. Same with Iron Man, really. As origin stories have really fallen out of style, it feels alien that we'd collectively agree to spend a third of the movie without the hero we came to see.
   
   
3. You've all probably seen the Easter egg of the android Human Torch in the bottle during the Stark Expo or whatever. With Black Panther 2 revealing that Namor was born pre-Spanish conquest, that mean's there's a very real window where Captain America, Namor and an eventually functional Human Torch were active at the same time. Do it, Marvel!
   
   
4. Every scene in this movie (except one, bear with me) has so much heart. Almost no secondary character is wasted. Erskine, of course, is Tucci-levels of charming. Tommy Lee Jones' Gen. Phillips somehow manages to stay the gruff commander even when displaying compassion. Even Red Skull's scenes with Arnim Zolo showed a level of respect and friendship. Nobody was just "in a scene," they all told stories.
   
   
5. The one exception was that forced conflict bit where Margaery Tyrell kisses Steve and he's all "hOw dO I KnOw YoU anD StARk aRen'T FoNduE-inG?" An honestly terrible, forced moment in an otherwise very sincere movie.
   
   
6. Smart choice to have Hydra be an offshoot of the Nazi Party and the main antagonist. That lets Cap and the gang have win after win without throwing any shade on the actual Allied troops of WWII. It meant they could go up against fantastical, sci-fi weaponry without recoloring the conflict in the trenches.
   
   
7. Neal McDonough was so perfect as Dum-Dum Dugan. I'm going to go out on a limb and say I think I would've preferred a Disney+ Howling Commandoes series more than a second season of Agent Carter.
   
   
8. Still not a fan of the WWII costume. It seems too bulky and strappy. Maybe it draws inspiration from an actual period suit, but I find it just confusing. Especially since we already had seen an Army-fatigues-as-costume look done for the Ultimate Comics Captain America. Sure the character was written as a dick, but that period costume was really sharp.
   
   
9. Oh, and as great as Chris Evans is, someone needed to tell him to close his damned mouth. He's just gaping all the time and looks constantly confused.
   
   
10. What a let-down having the showdown with Skull end with Schmidt just sort of disintegrating himself. What an unforced error. He just chooses to pick it up. It wasn't even falling or Cap didn't toss it to him as a trick. It's like his OCD just kicked in and he couldn't handle it being out of place.
    
    
11. I still don't get why Cap had to put the plane in the water. Did I miss something about how the plane itself was a bomb? What would happen if it did arrive at New York? There weren't any Hydra agents left to fly the buzz bombs. I just wasn't convinced of the threat the plane posed that required Steve to sacrifice himself.
    

A pretty solid movie that suffers a bit from a "wha-?" ending for Red Skull and Cap. It's weird in that it doesn't give a character arc for Steve. Like, he starts out as right and noble and just stays that way throughout. Everybody else had to change to meet his expectations. Dude was even willing to sacrifice himself at training camp. But somehow it works.

 

[Damien]

I instantly disapprove of any movie that starts with a flashback showing us foundational info. You really have to convince me that it's necessary, and not just something that can be explained through dialog later. And here they did it twice. Like, just start us with a scene of Jane & Co. looking up at the night sky, talking about what they hope to discover, and then a breathtaking transition to Asgard and Thor's coronation showing us that they really have no idea what they're about to find.

Generally agree. It's a crutch for writers to just try to dump out a block of exposition right at the start. It's actually what turned me WAY off to Brandon Sanderson (besides like.. a whole bunch of other stuff).

It's way to dark on Jotunheim. I really have little idea of what's going on. I know for fact it didn't register to me at first watch that Loki's skin turns ice-giant blue at one point.

Yes, but I could also levy this complaint about almost every goddamn movie and TV show made in the last five years. I swear, sometimes I wonder if I'm getting old and my eyes are failing because I can't fucking see -anything- anymore.

Something that bugged me from first viewing: how does the Viking mythology on Earth know that Loki is an adopted frost giant but Loki himself doesn't? Did someone tell the Vikings but somehow keep it secret from Loki? Is this a version of Earth where that part isn't included in the mythology? It still feels so strange that a fundamental part of the mythology is just now being discovered by the people involved.

It's not a fundamental part of the mythology. Loki is not adopted by or related to Odin. He's the son of a giant/jotunn with a name I can never remember and Laufey (a female Aesir or Vanir goddess), and just hangs out with the gods of the sagas. He's never adopted by Odin and does not seem to consider himself 'brother' to any of Odin's children (he is very close with Thor in some stories and I believe there's mention of them being made blood-brothers, which is a different thing entirely).
There are other half-giants in the original myths, also. It's not considered a strange thing or unique to Loki. Hel, Thor, and Odin are also half-giant.
And just as a REALLY pedantic correction; it's not 'Viking' mythology. It's Norse mythology. 'Viking' is a profession (suffice to say).

All that is to say - it almost works in the film's favor that they based the Marvel mythology on a deep misunderstanding of the original Poetic Edda and Prose Edda (probably, actually, on some shitty 'Norse Mythology for Dummies' that misunderstood the former). Because, this way, the 'real' super-alien Loki's story is actually quite different from what a human would have found in the myths, without actually being completely in conflict (i.e. it can all be explained as the Poetic and Prose Eddas being snippets of remainders of stories that don't really have all the necessary information and have filled in the blanks).

I broadly like that Thor had to destroy his only way back to Earth in order to save a planet of his enemies, but I'm not sure the situation was earned. Heimdall does say early on that he can't leave the bridge open or it'll destroy Jotunheim, but it was kind of a throwaway line and not exactly a Chekhov's Bridge. I certainly would've added a lesson from Odin or someone about how Bifrost was a great weapon until they learned to use it as a tool. Sort of a swords-to-plowshares lesson for his young princes. Then when Loki uses it as a weapon, he's proving his ill worth for the throne by ignoring that lesson. That's what I would've done, at least.

I hate pretty much every aspect of how they handled the Bifrost - even down to how they pronounce it. Infuriating.

 

[Fletch]

Loki is not adopted by or related to Odin. He's the son of a giant/jotunn with a name I can never remember and Laufey (a female Aesir or Vanir goddess), and just hangs out with the gods of the sagas.

I did not know that. I thought I'd read some mythology, but I guess I just read Thor comics because I've always thought they were brothers.

Technically my complaint still holds up because, if anything, Loki is even more famously a frost giant, but I guess it shows how pop culture can replace actual culture when we're not paying attention.

 

[SDcomics]

Captain America: The First Avenger

You've all probably seen the Easter egg of the android Human Torch in the bottle during the Stark Expo or whatever. With Black Panther 2 revealing that Namor was born pre-Spanish conquest, that mean's there's a very real window where Captain America, Namor and an eventually functional Human Torch were active at the same time. Do it, Marvel!

Neal McDonough was so perfect as Dum-Dum Dugan. I'm going to go out on a limb and say I think I would've preferred a Disney+ Howling Commandoes series more than a second season of Agent Carter.

That is a great post, sir. I agreed with just about everything, especially the two points I highlighted. I would love, love, love a Disney + series that delves into the MCU's Golden Age. Phineas Horton, Captain Leonard McKenzie, Peggy Carter, the Howling Commandos, a very young Howard Stark, a very old Matt Hawk and Blaine Colt, Namor, Jim Hammond, Kathy Garver, Robert Frank, Nathaniel Richards ... and maybe (If she has a mind to) Scarlett Johansson as The Blonde Phantom.

And that would just be scratching the surface, really.

I can only dream.

 

[Damien]

I did not know that. I thought I'd read some mythology, but I guess I just read Thor comics because I've always thought they were brothers.

Technically my complaint still holds up because, if anything, Loki is even more famously a frost giant, but I guess it shows how pop culture can replace actual culture when we're not paying attention.

Possibly more than any other mythology (Greek fans are going to get so mad at me), Norse mythology is a fucking mess in pop culture. You could have read seven different Norse myth books and still have come away completely wrong-headed. I do not have the education to explain or speculate on how this all happened, but there just happens to be a LOT of really bad Norse Myth re-tellings out there. Probably also doesn't help that white supremacists have co-opted the mythology and re-told it for their own ends as well, more than they've done with any other mythology.

But yeah, dude - if you do like this stuff, read the Prose and Poetic Eddas. Those are practically our only actual sources for this stuff. If someone is telling you Norse myths and it's not in one of the Eddas, there's a good chance (but not a certainty) that they're just lying to you/making stuff up.

And yeah, Loki is famously half-giant, and famously a liar and a trickster. That being said, one could make the argument that the 'real' gods just think it's funny that simpleton humans can't even get basic facts straight and don't give it much more thought than that.

 

[yojoebro82]

1. Neal McDonough was so perfect as Dum-Dum Dugan. I'm going to go out on a limb and say I think I would've preferred a Disney+ Howling Commandoes series more than a second season of Agent Carter.
   
   
2. Still not a fan of the WWII costume. It seems too bulky and strappy.

How about a compromise: Agent Carter and the Howling Commandos! The wife and I got into Agent Carter because she seemed interested. I was apprehensive because I knew it got canceled mid-story. I liked it, and of course, Atwell is easy on the eyes. Yeah she was done really dirty in Dr. Strange, but I have a feeling she'll be back in one of the upcoming multiversal cluster f Avengers movies.

One of my favorite MCU figures is the WWII Cap with the brown leather jacket with just a hint of the USO costume peeing out the top, blue GI helmet with the A, triangular shield and a gun. If that was his costume for the whole movie, I'd have been fine.

 

[Ru1977]

peeing out the top

 

[Justice]

Every time now I see this movie post Endgame I want to yell at the other kids to stop him now while he is young and weak.