Is the over reliance on humour a problem in the MCU

[Oscorp]

Yeah I totally agree with you guys! What makes Iron Man, The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy top all the other MCU films in my opinion is mainly due to how genuine they feel in the whole spectrum of emotions (both happy and sad). The attempts at comedy, while sometimes funny, feel more like "Hey look at how goofy this is!" kind of comedy, which I found charming at first but am starting to feel kind of sick of now. And the sad scenes don't get to be more than a minute long before they're interrupted by another attempt at comedy. It's as if the scripts are written with obligatory "put X amount of jokes in every Y minute" instead of the light hearted moments coming naturally like Raimi's films for example (which are also great films due to how genuine they feel).

I feel that both Iron Man 3 and Avengers: Age of Ultron would have been SO much better with the tone they had in their trailers. Those trailers were more epic than the films themselves.

Regarding Civil War: while the airport battle is really cool in that we get to see many of our favourite heroes duking it out at each other, something we wouldn't image happen 10 year ago, I just couldn't enjoy it the second time around. There's no tension at all. Zero. While they obviously don't want to kill each other, there was absolutely no sense of danger until the very last part. They just spit jokes and one liners at each other constantly. The final battle is soooo much better! I can count a lot of comic book action battles that are a lot better than the airport one in Civil War, visually impressive as it is.

With Thanos as the big bad in the coming Avengers sequels, I hope they dare to go with a darker and more serious tone.

Heck, having just rewatched Batman v Superman, I found it refreshing to see a serious comic book movie, and I look forward to Logan for this same reason.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Yeah I totally agree with you guys! What makes Iron Man, The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy top all the other MCU films in my opinion is mainly due to how genuine they feel in the whole spectrum of emotions (both happy and sad). The attempts at comedy, while sometimes funny, feel more like "Hey look at how goofy this is!" kind of comedy, which I found charming at first but am starting to feel kind of sick of now. And the sad scenes don't get to be more than a minute long before they're interrupted by another attempt at comedy. It's as if the scripts are written with obligatory "put X amount of jokes in every Y minute" instead of the light hearted moments coming naturally like Raimi's films for example (which are also great films due to how genuine they feel).

I feel that both Iron Man 3 and Avengers: Age of Ultron would have been SO much better with the tone they had in their trailers. Those trailers were more epic than the films themselves.

Regarding Civil War: while the airport battle is really cool in that we get to see many of our favourite heroes duking it out at each other, something we wouldn't image happen 10 year ago, I just couldn't enjoy it the second time around. There's no tension at all. Zero. While they obviously don't want to kill each other, there was absolutely no sense of danger until the very last part. They just spit jokes and one liners at each other constantly. The final battle is soooo much better! I can count a lot of comic book action battles that are a lot better than the airport one in Civil War, visually impressive as it is.

With Thanos as the big bad in the coming Avengers sequels, I hope they dare to go with a darker and more serious tone.

Heck, having just rewatched Batman v Superman, I found it refreshing to see a serious comic book movie, and I look forward to Logan for this same reason.

Literally couldn't agree more with all of this.

 

[NotNickFury]

You know, Oscorp, you saying that makes me think back and...yeah, Iron Man 3 really did tonally feel different in the trailers than what we got, mostly with the attack at Stark's home.

I think one of the things that makes humor work with Cap in particular isn't just the writing, it's that he's a literal fish out of water. Things like his pad of things to check out since he was frozen, his tiny buggie in Civil War, comments like 'I understood that reference' or 'If they're shooting at you, they're bad' are funny not just because they're...well, funny, but that's just Steve's character.

We're not laughing at him, but how his old school sensibilities often just don't clash well with the modern world.

 

[kguillou]

Yes yes YES. I am with you guys. Why was Marvel so blatantly dishonest with the tone of IM3 and AoU? The trailers were dark and serious and the actual films were far from it. Thats what frustrated me about those movies. You watch the trailers for IM 1 amd 2, for example, and they are very honest about what the movie is, the tone reflects the movies, what you see is what you get. Also, you would think after the wild success of The Avengers that they would openly promote the humor and fun of the films and not try to hide it. They were honest with GoTG, they were honest with Antman, I dont get the misdirection with those films those.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Yes yes YES. I am with you guys. Why was Marvel so blatantly dishonest with the tone of IM3 and AoU? The trailers were dark and serious and the actual films were far from it. Thats what frustrated me about those movies. You watch the trailers for IM 1 amd 2, for example, and they are very honest about what the movie is, the tone reflects the movies, what you see is what you get. Also, you would think after the wild success of The Avengers that they would openly promote the humor and fun of the films and not try to hide it. They were honest with GoTG, they were honest with Antman, I dont get the misdirection with those films those.

Yeah me neither, and most disappointingly, the Uktron in the trailers was 100 times more scary than the full movie version, which carried barely any threat at all in the end.

 

[harryoscop]

Ultron was a disappointment all around. Wasn't menacing at all.

 

[MbJ]

Yes yes YES. I am with you guys. Why was Marvel so blatantly dishonest with the tone of IM3 and AoU?

Misdirect was the entire point of Iron Man 3. The running through line in the movie is about toying with perceptions and expectations (hence the infamous reveal that the evil villain is just a boozy British actor who farts and watches soccer).

Ultron has no excuse, though. That's just Joss Whedon's worst qualities sabotaging what could have been a great story.

 

[BatsDC]

The biggest thing I don't like in Ultron is the fact that a large chunk of the plot is basically built around misdirecting the viewer into thinking Hawkeye will die, only so they can be surprised when Quicksilver dies. So the whole middle section with the farm is utterly pointless, and takes up valuable time that could have been used elsewhere. It makes repeat viewings less enjoyable, because you know half of Hawkeye's screentime isn't meant to build his character up, but instead to make you think he'll die. That's just bad filmmaking, IMO. And then the payoff isn't great either, because we don't get to know Quicksilver enough, and it comes across as a waste of a character. I've got no idea why Whedon thought it was such a good idea to build so much of the movie around that.

 

[kguillou]

The biggest thing I don't like in Ultron is the fact that a large chunk of the plot is basically built around misdirecting the viewer into thinking Hawkeye will die, only so they can be surprised when Quicksilver dies. So the whole middle section with the farm is utterly pointless, and takes up valuable time that could have been used elsewhere. It makes repeat viewings less enjoyable, because you know half of Hawkeye's screentime isn't meant to build his character up, but instead to make you think he'll die. That's just bad filmmaking, IMO. And then the payoff isn't great either, because we don't get to know Quicksilver enough, and it comes across as a waste of a character. I've got no idea why Whedon thought it was such a good idea to build so much of the movie around that.

I can understand that perspective. To me, that didn't bother me because they're playing with movie tropes which Whedon does a lot. BUT, it is a problem that we don't know or care enough about Quicksilver when he dies. I audibly went "Oh s***!" when Coulson died in A1, Quicksilver's death was like "eh, oh well."

I just feel Marvel was trying to have their cake and it eat it too by promoting AoU in the trailers as "the darker, higher stakes sequel. Look how menacing this evil robot is" and the actual movie was "LOL jk! Look how quippy James Spader is as this cuddly robot!" I'm being hyperbolic, but you guys get my drift. lol

 

[BatsDC]

Yeah, I get the playing with tropes part. Whedon was right in thinking that everyone would think Hawkeye would die, because everybody thinks Hawkeye's going to die in everything.

But he relentlessly beats you over the head with it. He has a wife now! And kids! And he's going on one last mission! He promises to come back! He talks about future plans! He has to do one final heroic act! etc etc. It just takes up so much time in a movie that desperately needed more time elsewhere. They could have lessened all the misdirection stuff and up used that time to develop Quicksilver; that way Whedon can still avert Hawkeye's death, and it'd have had a greater impact too.

 

[TeeKay]

That's clsssic Whedon though. He loves to subvert expectations. You just mad coz you didn't see that coming.

 

[BatsDC]

That's clsssic Whedon though. He loves to subvert expectations. You just mad coz you didn't see that coming.

He certainly subverted my expectations... I was expecting it to be good

All jokes aside, I do like Age of Ultron; I liked it a ton after my first viewing.

But it's full of bizarre ideas, wasted potential and shoddy execution. There's a great movie in there somewhere

 

[kguillou]

AoU isn't a bad movie but it has diminishing returns for me every time I rewatch. Its become one of those movies that I watch scenes from instead of sitting down and watching the whole thing. And it largely has to do with Ultron. I love Whedon banter and dialogue as much as the next guy but I wish, WISH he had the resilience to turn it off for Ultron. That was one character who didn't need to be quippy.

 

[MbJ]

That's clsssic Whedon though. He loves to subvert expectations.

Yes, but something being a shocking twist doesn't necessarily mean it's good. That's how M. Night ended up in a multi-year rut that he only just recently pulled himself out of.

 

[TeeKay]

He certainly subverted my expectations... I was expecting it to be good

All jokes aside, I do like Age of Ultron; I liked it a ton after my first viewing.

But it's full of bizarre ideas, wasted potential and shoddy execution. There's a great movie in there somewhere

I actually like AoU better than the the first Avengers film. Though I agree, AoU burned Whedon. There's a great film in there but I feel it gets a lot of undeserved flak.

Yes, but something being a shocking twist doesn't necessarily mean it's good. That's how M. Night ended up in a multi-year rut that he only just recently pulled himself out of.

Fair enough.

 

[CaptainWagner]

The biggest flaw in AOU for me was, even more so than Ultron quipping, was Whedon just doing whatever the heck he wanted with the characters.

You thought Tony Stark had a life-altering experience and was recommitting to Pepper? Well, Pepper gets written out of the franchise and not only is that change in philosophy never mentioned, his leap into creating robot peacekeepers is a direct contradiction of the lessons he learned in IM3.

You thought Thor chose to leave his place in Asgard to be with the woman he loved? Nope, here Jane barely gets mentioned, they've gone their separate ways, and in the end he returns to Asgard like nothing ever happened.

You thought that TWS would have massive impacts on the Avengers, forcing them to work on their own without SHIELD or Fury as backup? Well, not only are the ramifications of ALL OF SHIELD'S SECRETS BEING RELEASED never addressed, they immediately jump straight to being bankrolled by Stark and, just when things are at their worst, Nick Fury and a bunch of totally-not-SHIELD agents show up in a Helicarrier to save the day. Oh, and the Widow/Captain partnership isn't continued, rather giving her a random romance with Hulk.

And then there's Hawkeye. Who Whedon decided to "make interesting" by warping him into a character completely different from the comics and essentially neutering so much of what makes Clint great, not to mention eternally hindering any future usage of the character.

With all that, the disservice to Ultron and Quicksilver is just unpleasently flavored ice cream on an eternally frustrating cake.

 

[Web-Head]

The biggest thing I don't like in Ultron is the fact that a large chunk of the plot is basically built around misdirecting the viewer into thinking Hawkeye will die, only so they can be surprised when Quicksilver dies. So the whole middle section with the farm is utterly pointless, and takes up valuable time that could have been used elsewhere. It makes repeat viewings less enjoyable, because you know half of Hawkeye's screentime isn't meant to build his character up, but instead to make you think he'll die. That's just bad filmmaking, IMO. And then the payoff isn't great either, because we don't get to know Quicksilver enough, and it comes across as a waste of a character. I've got no idea why Whedon thought it was such a good idea to build so much of the movie around that.

What you said about the farm makes sense. It easily could've been used to develop Ultron more or even Quicksilver, so his death could've been more emotional.

Whedon was given too much Lee way in AoU though. Giving Hawkeye a lot of the focus was a bit weird.

 

[Lantern Venom]

Civil War came close to this, but the weakness of the MCU, it's need to lower the stakes while appearing to have high stakes becomes really apparent at Rhodey's "death" which is supposed to be incredibly somber and painful, to give weight to the conflict that we've just seen in the same way Bill Foster's death did in the comic (Killing Black sidekicks for the win?), but the film is not allowed to make this as painful as possible, it's got to assure us he's alive and give us a darkly comic beat with IM dropping Falcon.

.

I didn't find that comedic, even in the darkest sense. I remember the theater audience gasping because Iron Man was so distraught that he did something that heroes usually don't do: take a cheap shot. It was, in many ways, one of the most real moments in the MCU.

 

[Aristotelian]

Don't do that. Don't reduce people's observations to something generic so that you can dismiss them when they are in fact very specific. Here is the thing that prevents the MCU from true greatness for me:



Telling jokes, having light moments is lots of fun, but where in the dramatic arc you put them is very very important. For a movie like Indiana Jones, the comedy comes as the dramatic tension is getting into gear, to pull us into a character's sense of humor about his impending death and thus make the action and drama heavier. He is placated by his humor, but the audience is not. Even the famous scene where dramatic tension is cut for comedy (he shoots the guy instead of a sword fight) is a singular event, an improvisation, not a constant theme across a dozen films.

This is why The Winter Soldier elevated the universe and is the far and away best film of Phase II, because his humor was for himself. There are no jokes after Nick Fury's shooting or death, there are no outs from the brutality of the initial boat invasion. The jokes there never make it okay to laugh at the action.

Civil War came close to this, but the weakness of the MCU, it's need to lower the stakes while appearing to have high stakes becomes really apparent at Rhodey's "death" which is supposed to be incredibly somber and painful, to give weight to the conflict that we've just seen in the same way Bill Foster's death did in the comic (Killing Black sidekicks for the win?), but the film is not allowed to make this as painful as possible, it's got to assure us he's alive and give us a darkly comic beat with IM dropping Falcon.

Phase III is seeming to try and get into the CATWS weight, but the success of Phase II and it's success and crowd-pleasing in consistently cutting tension with comedy keeps drawing it in that direction. In a way, most of the films in the MCU are Avengers-again, bouncing characters off of each other, having a ton of fun with it, but pretty much a celebration of how awesome the MCU is. And it works, because the MCU is awesome.

The problem with this approach is that the MCU keeps having to imply stakes and loss without actually delivering that, and once you've seen that, it's really hard to unsee. This doesn't make the films any less fun, but it does make them feel like well crafted cartoons that are trying to trick you into thinking they're meaningful films. Even the comparison with Pixar is a bit embarassing. The MCU, despite the fact that we've spent more time with these characters has no chance of pulling the tears that a movie like UP, or Toy Story 3. Because that depth of emotion and meaning requires sadness, and the MCU isn't really allowed to be profoundly sad, that's not what it's for. Which is fine, except when it makes an attempt at being profoundly sad, then that weakness becomes more and more apparent.

And this is not a DCEU vs MCU thing, because DCEU isn't going to pull those tears either and definitely not going to create the good vibes that MCU and Pixar films do so often.

But it's not really 'weird' to want a roller coaster with high highs and low lows, because so many films, action and otherwise, many by the same creative teams behind the MCU but aren't beholded to continuing a half dozen franchises, manage to do so so well.

MCU films make people really happy, that's their goal, and that's their success. The problem is that great films make you feel a range of emotions, as is evidenced by the best Pixar films, and why they stay in the high 90s-100 range instead of the 80s-low 90s range. I mean, when was the last time an MCU film made us really sad? Did we cry at Peggy's Funeral, a character who we've spent far more time with than Ellie from Up? Were we devastated to hear Tony and Pepper, a relationship that was so much fun to see, were on a break? Did we feel hopeless when the Ancient One died? Did we feel Loki's rage when Frigga died? Wanda's when Quicksilver died?

Why not? Why are the MCU's dark moments less impactful than those from the best children's films?

So, hardly a KILLER problem, I mean, I'll take consistent low 90s any day, but when you realize that the MCU could be making truly GREAT films by simply letting some moments breathe, it does seem like a bit of a shame.

Exactly. The humour is too overt for us to take the more dramatic moments seriously. If they took TWS as their template, we'd have some seriously great, emotionally powerful movies that took up residence in the memory.

Note that in TA, Coulson's "death" was handled extremely well emotionally. That's what we need more of.

 

[Aristotelian]

With Thanos as the big bad in the coming Avengers sequels, I hope they dare to go with a darker and more serious tone.

I certainly hope so too - if not, I may just check out of the whole MCU. Why? Because this is the grand story that the whole series has been (up to now) building towards, and if they simply make yet another fun family movie, for this most cataclysmic and serious event, they will have failed utterly. I must have substance in the movies I watch, which is why I regard the Captain America trilogy, The Avengers and Iron Man as the best of the MCU; humour and fun is there, but the dramatic substantial stuff is also there too, and I have that to return to again and again on rewatches. Apart from regarding all humour to be as such superficial, I tend to find the Marvel films in particular are funny because the lines we hear come unexpectedly, not because of how or when they are delivered. It is why "What do you say to your other nickname, Merchant of Death?" the response from RDJ "That's not bad" always gets a chuckle out of me; it is how he says it that amuses me, which makes it repeatable. Guardians and others are less funny every time, at least for me, due to this problem.

There's at least a suggestion that they will, as the Russos have said that they're most interested in genre subversion, an idea that is evident in all their movies, not just the Marvel ones. We may get a serious compelling villain and actual character deaths this time around. Hope they handle the monumental task ahead of them and deliver us a (at the moment) finale we've been eagerly anticipating for so long!

 

[Infinight888]

You thought Tony Stark had a life-altering experience and was recommitting to Pepper? Well, Pepper gets written out of the franchise and not only is that change in philosophy never mentioned, his leap into creating robot peacekeepers is a direct contradiction of the lessons he learned in IM3.

I would argue that creating Ultron was the direct result of the events of Iron Man 3. Tony seemed reluctant to be fighting with the Avengers. He did so because Hydra was a threat that needed stopped, but he was looking for a way out. Ultron was essentially his retirement plan.

You thought Thor chose to leave his place in Asgard to be with the woman he loved? Nope, here Jane barely gets mentioned, they've gone their separate ways, and in the end he returns to Asgard like nothing ever happened.

While I agree with this, IIRC, Natalie Portman wasn't too hip on returning to her role after TDW. It's easy to understand why she was written out.

Personally, I never took it as the two being separated. (Well, aside from distance.) Thor had to work with the Avengers to retrieve Loki's scepter from Hydra's hands, and Jane had her own life to live while he was away. Thor only leaves after seeing visions of Asgard being destroyed.

Well, not only are the ramifications of ALL OF SHIELD'S SECRETS BEING RELEASED never addressed

Isn't this what Agents of SHIELD is for?

they immediately jump straight to being bankrolled by Stark

Well, yeah. Of course they would be bankrolled by Stark. He's an Avenger and he's rich. Also, the team is already together at this point, and have been for months.

just when things are at their worst, Nick Fury and a bunch of totally-not-SHIELD agents show up in a Helicarrier to save the day.

I'll give you this one, it was lazy. It is made somewhat better if you watch Agents of SHIELD, though.

giving her a random romance with Hulk.

I liked this, actually. It's nice to see that characters evolve outside of the two hours a year we're watching them. It seemed obvious by their dynamic that the two had been flirting back and forth for a while. Her lullaby to the Hulk was routine at this point.

And then there's Hawkeye. Who Whedon decided to "make interesting" by warping him into a character completely different from the comics and essentially neutering so much of what makes Clint great, not to mention eternally hindering any future usage of the character.

If you say so. I don't know the comic Hawkeye very well, but I like the MCU version. Making him into a family man, someone who actually has something to lose, makes him unique among the team.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

The biggest flaw in AOU for me was, even more so than Ultron quipping, was Whedon just doing whatever the heck he wanted with the characters.

You thought Tony Stark had a life-altering experience and was recommitting to Pepper? Well, Pepper gets written out of the franchise and not only is that change in philosophy never mentioned, his leap into creating robot peacekeepers is a direct contradiction of the lessons he learned in IM3.

You thought Thor chose to leave his place in Asgard to be with the woman he loved? Nope, here Jane barely gets mentioned, they've gone their separate ways, and in the end he returns to Asgard like nothing ever happened.

You thought that TWS would have massive impacts on the Avengers, forcing them to work on their own without SHIELD or Fury as backup? Well, not only are the ramifications of ALL OF SHIELD'S SECRETS BEING RELEASED never addressed, they immediately jump straight to being bankrolled by Stark and, just when things are at their worst, Nick Fury and a bunch of totally-not-SHIELD agents show up in a Helicarrier to save the day. Oh, and the Widow/Captain partnership isn't continued, rather giving her a random romance with Hulk.

And then there's Hawkeye. Who Whedon decided to "make interesting" by warping him into a character completely different from the comics and essentially neutering so much of what makes Clint great, not to mention eternally hindering any future usage of the character.

With all that, the disservice to Ultron and Quicksilver is just unpleasently flavored ice cream on an eternally frustrating cake.

It pains me to do this as a big Whedon fan, but I agree with all of this, the movie just made too many mistakes in not only ignoring what had come before, but not doing anything interesting with the in their place either. AOU just lacked any real stakes also, the 3rd act is the worst from me and has been since my first viewing, there is no danger to the heroes and nothing interesting enough going on. Whedon Tries to add some dramatic impact with Quicksilvers death, but it just falls totally flat, especially when there are jokes being made 2 mins later. Ultron himself doesn't help, he is no threat himself never mind his paper mache drones. He loses every battle he has in the movie.

Ultron is the biggest flaw in the movie for me, but it has plenty of others as well. The darker movie that trailers promised would have been so much more satisfying. It's even more annoying when you consider Serenity was quite jokey also, but had some brilliant dark and serious moments, and a totally bad ass and threatening villain. So we know Whedon could have pulled a much better AOU off.

 

[BatsDC]

The problem with the third act is Ultron never feels like the threat. The main goal only ever feels like its to evacuate all the people, not stop Ultron, which wouldn't be a problem if he wasn't portrayed as a mere minor annoyance for 90% of the sequence. He pops up every few minutes, only to get smacked away somewhere else, and then rinse and repeat.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

The problem with the third act is Ultron never feels like the threat. The main goal only ever feels like its to evacuate all the people, not stop Ultron, which wouldn't be a problem if he wasn't portrayed as a mere minor annoyance for 90% of the sequence. He pops up every few minutes, only to get smacked away somewhere else, and then rinse and repeat.

he is more like an annoying fly than what he should be, the seemigly unstoppable main threat who is trying to destroy the world.

 

[Consona]

I actually like AoU better than the the first Avengers film.

I liked AoU much better then TA. To me it was much more interesting film, character-wise, story-wise, dialogue-wise, well, in like every aspect, basically. And in AoU there was a MCU moment I genuinely loved, that conversation between Vision and Ultron at the end. I'm a tv series Star Trek guy who loves characters just sitting around a table debating stuff. So Vision and Ultron speaking about human race was one the of highlights of MCU so far for me. t: I'd love if there were more moments like that in MCU. Ultron was great overall, IMO. Quirky, peculair, talkative, to me, he was the best MCU villain so far. Kaecilius had a potential to be the best but they totally botched that up.

Regarding Civil War: while the airport battle is really cool in that we get to see many of our favourite heroes duking it out at each other, something we wouldn't image happen 10 year ago, I just couldn't enjoy it the second time around. There's no tension at all. Zero. While they obviously don't want to kill each other, there was absolutely no sense of danger until the very last part. They just spit jokes and one liners at each other constantly. The final battle is soooo much better! I can count a lot of comic book action battles that are a lot better than the airport one in Civil War, visually impressive as it is.

With Thanos as the big bad in the coming Avengers sequels, I hope they dare to go with a darker and more serious tone.

Heck, having just rewatched Batman v Superman, I found it refreshing to see a serious comic book movie, and I look forward to Logan for this same reason.

The final Steve and Bucky vs Tony fight was another level compared to air port brawl, yes. But air port fight was great for what it was, which is like a prolonged sequence from some cartoon for kids brought to perfection*. Not something too fateful and fatal or tragic, but terrific action with quipping and characters being cool, the choreography and camera work, etc. were fantastic.

Likewise Trinity vs Doomsday in BvS UE is a comic book boss fight brought to perfection*. I rewatched it yesterday, it's absolutely fantastic. The portrayal of all the combatans, the action, the emotions, just great.

So I think action-wise BvS and CA:CW are actually some of the best in the genre. But to me, the best CBM action sequences are still in MoS.

I'm really curious about Infinity War since the theme is something really different from Russo's Cap films, it's supposed to be like a pompous space opera event if I'm not mistaken. But the thing is even with 14 films they did not introduce the Thanos' cosmic threat like... at all. And they still need to address the break-up of Avengers, actually, so there are a lot of things that needs to be done for Infinity War.

And I cannot wait for Justice League, man, so many exciting films ahead.

____________
* or near perfection since nothing is perfect, but you know what I mean.