THE MARVELS, the thirty-third film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is set for theatrical release early next month. The film’s early box office projections suggest the movie won’t quite be the hit previous MCU titles have been. Combined with mostly negative reviews for the studio’s last couple of movies and production woes on the studio’s Disney+ television shows, it feels like there is real blood in the water surrounding the studio’s future. The knives are out and, if online discourse is to be believed, the general public is ready and waiting for the studio (and superhero films in general) to crash and burn.
Here’s the thing, though: Every Tweet I see from some FilmBro account that's low-key hyped to see the end of Marvel’s reign at the box office just makes me more and more loyal to the brand. Why, though? It’s not like Marvel is the underdog in this situation. The studio’s movies have made more money in the last fifteen years than the economy of some medium-sized nations. Why do I feel the need to stick up for the Marvel Cinematic Universe when it has been the dominant force in pop culture for almost two decades?
I started reading MCU: THE REIGN OF MARVEL STUDIOS by Joanna Robinson, Dave Gonzales and Gavin Edwards this past weekend. The book - a tell-all account of how Marvel launched their own film studio and found success despite the publisher facing bankruptcy ten years earlier - has been a great reminder of just how unlikely a world we live in where characters like Iron Man, the Guardians of the Galaxy or Black Panther are not just successful action movie heroes but truly recognizable pillars of culture.
I grew up during a time when comic books weren’t just unpopular, they were borderline uncool. Over the last few decades, I’ve gotten to see superhero movies go from embarrassing schlock made by slumming hacks, the storylines played for cheap laughs and fanboy-targeted eye candy, to Oscar-winning films directed by humorless auteurs.
Full circle, baby!
I’ve seen the rise of graphic novels carried in libraries and bookstores. I went from being a kid who had to make a homemade Venom costume for Halloween in 1995 to an adult who watches trick-or-treaters walking down the street dressed as Groot or Doctor Strange, the costumes plucked from department store racks full of once-obscure Marvel c-list characters. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.
Marvel Comics are popular now, and I’ve somehow managed to escape the fate normally held for lifelong geeks - I don’t resent the company’s popularity! I’ve seen too many fans spit on their fandom as soon as whatever they were into reached a certain level of cultural awareness. Not me, though. Not with Marvel, at least. I’ve loved the fact that Marvel Comics has found its moment to shine. I love the fact that people of all ages, races, genders and backgrounds have their individual favorite characters. It’s kind of crazy to consider that there is a hyper-loyal Scarlet Witch fanbase now, but I love the fact that it exists.
Do I enjoy every movie or show that Marvel puts out? No, not really. Some of them - *cough* ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA *cough* - exit my memory as soon as the credits begin to roll at the end of the movie. It’s OK, though. I also don’t remember and love every single comic book issue I read. At this point in the lifespan of Marvel Studios, each individual movie or television show has stopped being important. It’s all static that, when you take a step back, you realize forms a larger image.
Marvel Studios has grown so large that it’s become a true Universe, like the comic books it adapted. And I want to see that universe continue to live and thrive - even if there are some neighborhoods in that universe that I’m less interested in others. Does this make me uncool? Eh, I’m used to it. I survived the ‘90s, when I had to hide the fact I read comics from my classmates. I can survive the ‘20s, when apparently still rooting for Marvel makes you an enemy of Cinema™.
Everything must end, though. We are probably truly at the cusp of the Marvel bubble bursting. The studio has had a good run and hopefully, the general awareness of characters will translate to an interest in comics, books, video games and other stories that can be told with the characters.
This understanding of finality doesn’t mean I’ll be any less bummed when the last Marvel movie or television show comes out. I like stories that have an end but I also like stories that live on, long after my interest (or life!) ends. I like the idea of seeing but a single panel in a larger unknowable strip - my perception bound by my own limitations as a mortal human. The Marvel Cinematic Universe may not be Cinema™ to everybody, but it’s undeniably something big and important that will have lasting reverberations in our culture.
I’m glad I got to see the beginning of it. I hope I don’t have to witness the end of it.