When did we all decide to hate Marvel now? Like, did everyone just wake up one day and say… “Hey, hating the most iconic and most popular franchise is cool now”? Did I fall asleep and wake up in an alternate universe again? When did we just say “Marvel sucks now”? The reception towards phase 4 by the fans (and I really have to wonder if these are actual fans who actually read or understand the source material at all) has been incredibly hostile. Why? What is so wrong with phase 4 that garnered this unnecessary and not needed hatred? People have been saying that it’s because of female representation and diversity in this phase, but all I have to say about that is Where were you the last 14 years?! This franchise has ALWAYS featured stronger female characters in central roles and diverse people in central roles as well that were just being the tokens. Pepper Potts and James Rhodes were the ones who helped Iron Man take down Iron Monger, Whiplash, and Aldrich Killian! Betty Ross was helping Bruce Banner try to control the hulk within him! Jane Foster was the one who helped Thor find his humanity! Peggy Carter was the one who helped Captain America take down hydra! Maria Hill was Nick Fury’s eyes and ears! Why is adding female characters in strong, competent roles suddenly a bad thing? Because yeah, a good female character is someone who keeps screwing up, screwing up, screwing up, and screwing up to the point where she is too stupid to live and can’t hold her own weight and needs someone to hold her hand. And since when did adding more diverse voices into the mix ever harm or damaged a franchise? It didn’t. Name one franchise that was hurt by this. I dare you. And here’s the thing about the people who are saying that “Marvel has gone woke.” Marvel has ALWAYS been woke, from the very beginning! Iron Man was a commentary on the military industrial complex and corporate power, The Hulk was a commentary on the military and it’s unethical practices! Why is everyone acting like this is a huge deal for the franchise 14 years in?! And here’s the thing, once upon a time, perhaps a different life time ago, yeah it was funny to bash and shit on a movie, it was cool to hear someone’s anger filled arguments about something as stupid and minuscule as a movie or tv show… if the movie or show deserved it. But like any existing trend or fad, it just dies out and people tend to move on to other things. And it also goes to show how hypocritical people are, like how would people react if they made a whole movie about a bunch of straight, white men being heroes with the females being constant damsels in distress and the diverse people being token or background characters that don’t add anything to the plot? Oh wait, they already did that with the Bryan Singer/Brett Ratner X Men movies and everyone hated them for that and yet for some reason people tend to like them now. And here’s the thing, not liking something is one thing, but attacking people who made the products and who dare like it/dislike it is crossing the line! And if the reception that the current phase is getting is any indication, the fandom clearly had extremely unrealistic expectations going into this/were going to hate this regardless of the outcome. And to not only add misogyny, bigotry, homophobia, and now Islamaphobia, we are now adding hypocrisy to the fandom, pretty much like the Star Wars fanbase. For example:
Peter Parker in Spider Man 3 acts like a dickhead and does a cringeworthy tap dance sequence to humiliate Mary Jane that is totally out of character and out of place in the film: No one bats and eyelash.
She Hulk does a stupid dance for three seconds that doesn’t destroy her character in anyway considering that this is a comedic based show and this would be something to expect from a comedic based show: Everyone at Marvel must die.
And to be perfectly honest, this wouldn’t be too bad, if this wasn’t coming from people who are supposed fans of this franchise! People have also been saying that “The MCU would have been better off ending at Endgame or Far from Home”. Because yeah, ending your most highly successful and acclaimed franchises of all time on a cliffhanger and leaving hundreds of thousands of questions left unanswered and several characters and storylines left underutilized and underdeveloped would have been GREAT optics. Why bother continuing on with the franchise when you can just give it a shitty reboot that NO ONE would have wanted or liked.
Sigh… it’s really a shame too. Just when I thought I finally found a fanbase that was starting to be incredibly grateful for what they have, they go down the easy route and act like the Star Wars fanbase, except probably even worse. And considering that this is coming from anti SJW’s (which may I remind you, are regular SJW’s with even worse intentions.) it’s hard to take them seriously. And every time I hear them complain, I don’t just hear the equivalent of a toddler throwing a tantrum. All I’m hearing is:
“Screw your themes, Screw your messages, Screw whatever your trying to get across, Screw your deep and symbolic purposes, Screw the human element of these characters, and Screw expanding upon your world building and character development, we just want mindless action for the sake of mindless action and fan service even if it doesn’t make sense. It’s just a superhero franchise, not some Oscar material, so stop trying to act like it’s adult or deep or something.”
And as long as the fandom keeps this up, the content of the franchise will get better while the fandom will just get worse.
