Tag: comics

Daredevil is so good it basically kills all other Marvel content

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Like many people, I began to get Marvel fatigue after Avengers: Endgame.  I did my best to stay abreast on the next phase of Marvel content, and I was a fan of how they pivoted into producing television instead of everything having to be all these movies.  I enjoyed WandaVision, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and even Hawkeye in spite my skepticism that he could be the focal point of his own episodic series.

Ms. Marvel was fun, but by the time Moon Knight released, I was getting to a point where they were just generating so much stuff so quickly, it was beginning to get overwhelming.  Loki was a little reprieve and She-Hulk was light-heartedly refreshing, but it was becoming apparent of what properties were Marvel’s A-tier, and what properties were well, not.

I never saw Shang-Chi, the Marvels, the Eternals or any of the other films that they produced around this time, because the ideas of full-length films and their single-sitting stories seemed antiquated to me, and Black Widow showed just how unnecessary some of the films could be, even with the Marvel production tag slapped on them.

Having kids, life in general and the general evaporation of free time led to me ultimately stop watching Marvel stuff outright, along with a long list of things that would just be added to a queue that I had no idea of when I would ever have the chance to tackle.  However, over the last few months, I’ve made a conceited effort to close the gap a little bit, and have managed to catch back up, having finished Loki, Echo and Agatha All Along.

And it’s a good thing that Echo was a part of this recent catch-up, because events in the show had direct correlation to the one series that I was actually looking tremendously forward to, and the subject of this entire post – Daredevil (:Born Again).

I’ve made it clear that Daredevil is basically the crème of the crop as far as Marvel television goes, and it must chap Disney folks a little bit that Netflix gets to take credit for Daredevil and all adjacent properties that spun from it (Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, Punisher, the Defenders), but that’s what they get for not releasing Disney+ sooner.  The writing is strong, the performing, the atmosphere, the grittiness and just sheer execution of all the Netflix shows were all at a bar that no other Disney+ era television shows could touch, and one of the most agonizing periods in time for the company must have been the mandated several year gap in between when Netflix had to forfeit the shows and where Disney+ couldn’t air them, because out of sight, out of mind, and there was always the inherent risk of producing more content, with actors again, growing and conflicting projects.

***[Spoilers Ahead, if you’re somehow less caught up than me]***

However, Disney money runs deep, and the stars seemed to align, one way or the other, and we’ve been blessed with the continuation of the Daredevil-universe.  It was smart of Disney to start making the connection of worlds in Hawkeye, bringing the Kingpin, and sprinkling Charlie Cox into other things to reprise the Daredevil role, in She-Hulk and Spider-Man, and it seemed to time right when they were allowed to drop all the Netflix shows on Disney+ so that anyone who hadn’t gotten to see this brilliant array of shows, while Born Again was being produced.

And now we’re back to the present and Born Again is released, and after the first episode, I’m blown away and taken back to 2016, when I first started watching Daredevil on Netflix.  I had concerns that the show was going to be kind of a reboot from the Netflix series, citing some convoluted continuity issues that writers were too lazy and uncreative to solve, but I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it more or less picks up from the Netflix age, with some time injected into it, as it should.

Events from Echo have impact on a key character to create immediate tie-in to the greater MCU, but by and large, the show is a continuation of the Netflix series, which is absolutely nothing but a positive in my opinion.  It starts off with a bang, and then it’s basically just kind of picking up from where Netflix left off, but in the same, intense, gritty and strong-written manner.

And all I could think of while watching just the first episode of Born Again, is just how much of a different level this show feels, in comparison to the years of in-comparison mediocre swill that’s been fed to us.  The acting, the writing, the mood and just sheer execution of everything is so good in just a first episode that it basically invalidates just about everything that was been parading around like imposter quality prior to it.  Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio have incredible chemistry, and although Kingpin has been long revived as early as Hawkeye, there’s something about seeing him reunite with Matt Murdock, whom most comic readers know is truly on his Rushmore of opponents.

Going back to the observation of how there’s a clear distinction between Marvel shows that are A-tier and those that aren’t, it really boils down to the point of why a show exists.  If the show is being used to advance some major story points in a grand manner, then it’s probably an A-tier show, like Falcon and the Winter Soldier, WandaVision and Loki.  However, if the show is being used to introduce a critical concept or character that could potentially be used later, then I would say that they’re not an A-tier show; like how Hawkeye was used to introduce Kate Archer and advance Yelena, Agatha All Along was basically used as a vehicle to bring Billy Maximoff into existence, and Echo was used solely for its plot device on a key Daredevil character.

Ms. Marvel and She-Hulk, as much as I did enjoy watching them, I’d say they’re still glorified vehicles to introduce their titular characters into the MCU, so I’d say that they’re like a B+ tier, more purposeful than Hawkeye, Agatha and Echo, but still kind of fluffy and generally expendable if we’re getting down to business.

And then we have shit like Moon Knight which I have no idea how they’re going to tie into the rest of the MCU.  And Secret Invasion kind of just serves as this conveniently placed retcon device if the MCU ever needs it, and doesn’t actually add much to what was already established in the established existence of the MCU Multiverse or TVA or inevitable Dr. Doom fucking around.

But Daredevil, this is entirely a show and series that can stand alone.  Since it started on Netflix, it was established that it was loosely associated to the MCU, but really never needed to ever touch it again.  The show was set in its own little world in Hell’s Kitchen and thrived as a standalone series, generously bringing a few other properties into the fold.  And the magic is still there with Born Again, and as I’ve said, the general vibe and feeling I get while watching it is that it’s just on such a different level from the rest of Marvel, and I fucking love it.

I could have watched both debut episodes upon release, but with Daylight savings approaching, I opted to not, because additionally, I want to savor the show, because just watching the first episode was a reminder of how long it’s been since the Netflix age, and I don’t to just binge and blow through something that I’d been hoping and waiting to see again for a really long time.  I didn’t realize how much I missed Daredevil until Born Again dropped, and I’m stoked that it’s back, and I hope that it continues on the successes of the Netflix era.

Catching up on Marvel shows long after the fact

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

With the weather being as shitty as it sometimes gets in the peak winter months, I’ve been resorting to getting my cardio in via the treadmill as opposed to going outside to run and walk.  That being said, treadmill time opens the door for me to catch up on watching shows from the seemingly endless queue of titles that are added more frequently than they are crossed off.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve actually managed to cross two titles off of the list, them being Marvel’s season 2 of Loki, and the presumably standalone season of Echo.  In the past, I used to rush Marvel properties to the top of the list and watch them as soon as humanly possible, because the internet and social media are terrible things that have a tendency to spoil things.  But over the last few years, life, time, apathy, the algorithm, and a ridiculous oversaturation of content has shied me away from keeping up with the Marvels, and they’ve just instead sat in the queue to when I had the time, and shits to bring myself to start watching them again.

It’s actually kind of interesting to watch certain shows once a significant passage of time has occurred, because a lot of things can happen in the course of a year or two.  Like watching Loki S2, where Jonathan Majors’ Kang is so very much a major player in not just this show, but at the time, the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it was almost a shame to watch a show filmed at a time when he was still this guy knocking on the door of cinematic stardom, because I think he really is a talented performer, not just as Kang, but I also enjoyed him tremendously in Lovecraft Country, and now in spite of his role in the MCU, is basically for all intents and purposes, cancelled.

Echo, was short and sweet, being just five episodes, but again, when the show dropped, there was no news that the, for lack of a better term, the Daredevil/Kingpin universe was going to be reset, although I suspect that such was probably brewing in the background considering the direction they went with the Kingpin himself.  I did appreciate that Charlie Cox had a part in Echo, naturally doing one of his ridiculous one-take extended fight scenes, and good on Alaqua Cox for having the skill and stamina to keep up with it.  But again, it was another show watched long after its drop date, and a lot of things in the background have changed, and kind of alters the perspective on the show as a whole.

Staying on Echo though, I have to say that of many of the Marvel television shows, I would put Echo up among the top of the rankings when it comes to music selection.  All throughout the MCU television universe, there have been some real banger soundtracks, and Echo’s is right up near the top as far as my auditory preferences are, along with Luke Cage and Punisher.  The song, Burning by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs was one that I liked tremendously, and I rarely skipped the opening credits

Here’s the thing though, among the changes that have occurred within Marvel itself, are the changes to the world as a whole that really make watching “older” things like Loki and Echo and presumably any other Marvel property that lets 2-3 months surpass kind of are, and yes unfortunately I am referring to things that are occurring on account of the shitty political wasteland ‘Merica continues to slide down, mainly the unfortunate mass abolishment of DEI policies.

There’s no sugarcoating it; Marvel has been doing a pretty good job of organically adhering to the inclusion of diversity throughout the years.  Loki excels at having a diverse cast, and I was tickled to see Ke Huy Quan show up as a key character in S2, and I love how Data is becoming a commodity in Hollywood in general.  Echo was basically a DEI jackpot, with the titular character Maya Lopez, being of indigenous descent, who also happens to be hearing impaired, and oh yeah has a prosthetic leg.

It was still a great show that definitely highlights indigenous culture, but I can’t help but wonder if shows like this will actually see the light of day in the rapidly devolving ‘Merican ecosystem, and if Disney themselves will fall into the ranks of other notable companies, and eventually scrap their DEI initiatives, and gradually we the viewers start to see less and less diversity in future projects.

All the same, maybe I’m just thinking too much about it, or perhaps the state of the world is permeating into my headspace, no matter how much conscious effort I put into avoiding the news.  Both of these shows were still enjoyable, and at least while they were produced prior to the last election, I can still look forward to Agatha All Along and any other rando series and films that I might’ve missed before I eventually expend the effort to catch the new Captain America flick.

LoL: Arcane, season 2 – so unprecedently good

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

What a week for Netflix-dropping both Cobra Kai S6.2 and Arcane S2 on the same week!  Much to the dismay of mythical wife, I went with Cobra Kai first, primarily on the fact that because the episodes are so short and generally way more digestible, despite my guilty-pleasure love for the show, I really wanted to clear it from the queue so that I could really savor and enjoy Arcane S2, which I knew was going to be the way heavier show.  I regret nothing, and the fact that I’m writing about Arcane and not another post about Cobra Kai says what left a stronger impression in the end.

To cut to the chase, I would go as far as to state without any hesitation or real need to think about it, that Arcane is probably the greatest video game-to-on-screen adaptation, like ever.  The bar of such a category wasn’t really that high to begin with, but I would say that it was previously set at like, a generic office building height of like 16 stories, but then Arcane came along and pushed the bar to the height of like that one gigantic ass building in Qatar or Abu Dhabi that’s considered the tallest building on the planet.

Like, despite my heavy criticism for Riot Games as far as business practices and bad behavior goes, and how critical I am of the League of Legends community, mostly being a nuclear toxic wasteland of the worst human beings in existence, Arcane combatted and overcame these handicaps and still put out an absolutely legendary banger of a program that I’m hard pressed to say anything negative about, because it was just so wonderfully executed from top to bottom.

The art style is breathtaking, the voice acting top-notch, and the writing and storytelling was A+ from start to finish.  There are plenty of easter eggs and references to satiate fans of the game, while not at all being difficult for those who didn’t play to watch without failing to understand what’s going on.

As I said from the first season, it’s all so good, it almost makes me want to start playing the game, and if not for the fact that I’m a parent who never has any time on his hands and can’t fathom the amount of time I sunk into playing League in the past, I would consider re-downloading the game and looking around at the virtual arenas that I dumped a solid 5-6 years of my life into.

Honestly, I don’t even know where to begin on how to praise how good this show is.  They do a bang up job of utilizing existing characters, and the ones they invented for the show meld so seamlessly with them that doesn’t feel forced, feels organic and feels cohesive.  Ambessa and Mel feel like they belong in the original game’s canon all along, and their general arcs and development feed well into the overall storytelling of the show.

Viewers like me become emotionally vested in the characters, and despite the fact that as a player, Jinx was one of my mains, but just in general, I’ve grown tired of the Harley Quinn-type of mentally unstable girl that seems chaotic and unkillable while also happening to be harboring genius level intelligence hidden behind a façade of psycho, by utilizing her history and life as Powder, she’s still a character to get behind, and not tire of her antics when she’s Jinx.  Even though it’s not simple to deconstruct a Harley Quinn-type, Arcane does such in a way that is realistic and allows for actual growth and development instead of plateauing with more of the same psychotic behavior.

The one character I probably had the most feelings about after watching S2 was probably Ekko; I never played him in the game, and I always dreaded seeing an Ekko on the opposite team, but his treatment in the show was done to perfection.  In spite of the fact that he wasn’t nearly as focused on in the first season, he was a major, major player in S2, and despite my general ambivalence for his character based on my history as a player, he was easily someone I was definitely vested in during the show.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that scene in the show with Caitlyn and Vi; like I’m surprised that it happened, and happened so graphically, and there’s a multitude of feelings of surprised that the show and Netflix let it happen, but at the same time, I applaud the acceptance, the portrayal and the acknowledgement of all of the above, and I can sum it up in a singular word of “bold” and much like how I feel about the rest of the show, I think it was done appropriately, and not even from a sophomoric standpoint as much as it’s commendable that it was done in a manner that doesn’t hide from it, feels emotional and real, and probably gave long-time fans who felt similarly a moment to pump their fists in what feels like a metaphorical win.

Oh and the music of the season, my god.  I don’t seek out and look for new music these days, I’m usually content to occasionally stumble across an artist when it’s spoon-fed through me on Pandora or Sirius, but the soundtrack from S2 was out of this world.  I especially love the fact that it was pulling from all sorts of songs of other languages, and I felt like it was a little deliberate nod by Rito to do such, due to the global reach of the game itself, and if there was a soundtrack of it on iTunes, I’d be compelled to actually spend money on it.

As I’ve said countless times in my life when thinking about shows, films, books and any forms of storytelling, endings are the hardest thing in the world to come up with, and big props to Arcane for also not fumbling that aspect of the show.  Seldom are stories ever truly wrapped up in neat little bows, and Arcane is no exception, but at the same time it’s probably for the best, because to my understanding, Arcane may be over, but Rito definitely isn’t going to not want to tap the wells of numerous other League worlds to source future media from, so it’s best to keep things open ended for the sake of future shows or movies.

Overall, I can’t say anything bad about Arcane.  I really can’t.  I would give the show a solid 10/10 and not one of those bullshit reviews where internet reviewers give it a 9.8 or 9.9 out of 10 because people who review shit are hipsters who are convinced that shit isn’t supposed to be perfection, but as far as I’m concerned, I have no justifiable critiques about Arcane.  Art style, direction, voice over work, storytelling, music, plot, absolutely everything was good.  Not even mad that it was just two seasons, because if they dragged it out, it would inevitably open the door for flaws, this was just A++ show execution from top to bottom, and I’d recommend most everyone to watch this show, because it doesn’t take a history of playing League to enjoy it, and it’s just straight up excellent televison.

I’m so envious of Earth-1610 Aunt May’s Spider Cave

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

In my most recent episode of I don’t have any fucking space for myself, I began to fantasize about how great it would be if I could just have a underground bunker like Spider-Man (E-1610) had in the backyard of Aunt May’s house, perfectly hidden by a nondescript and dilapidated looking toolshed, as shown in Into the Spider-Verse (amazing film, btw).

And not just because it was full of all sorts of shit that’s right up my alley, like the gym full of free weights, the spacious computer area, as well as a generous amount of space allocated to workshopping, but just because of the sheer space that existed, available to use.

I have no personal space of my own.  Like literally, I don’t have any designated space that is mine and mine alone, and my blets are in storage, all my personal effects are in storage, and I have like a shelf, a desk, and a Ron Swanson poster in the corner of my master bedroom that’s the closest thing I have to personal space, and that’s when mythical wife isn’t taking a nap.

The rest of my house is absolutely overflowing to the gills full of kids things, and every now and then when my mind can grasp how ridiculously full my home is, I feel despair and hopelessness about how things will never improve.  When I bought my home, it was two adults in a four-bedroom home where one bedroom hardly saw any use, one was a guest room, and I had a room designated to be my office where I could store and display all of my personal effects.

Now it’s three adults, two kids, no spare bedrooms, no office, and me having angst about having no personal space, whenever I have the time to have angst, and writing about how I fantasize about a fictional underground bunker that ignores the existence of infrastructure, code and architectural integrity which is the least unbelievable thing about this specific world which has teenagers flinging themselves all around New York on spider webs, and travel between alternate realities.

But yeah back to the point, I’m so envious of the Spider Cave underneath Aunt May’s house, and if I had something remotely close to having an underground bunker of my own, without any hesitation, it would be the go-to place to store all the shit that’s taking up space in the house proper, and maybe allocating half of it to becoming my personal private office space.  Because don’t I deserve a place to get some peace and quiet too??

I would take all of the holiday shit in the attic and it’s going into the Spider Cave.  All of mythical wife’s teacher shit that sits in a number of crates in the garage; all that shit’s going into the Spider Cave.  The large tubs that are accumulating with kids clothes, artwork and toys that they don’t play with – Spider Cave.  Tubs of DVDs and BluRay discs?  Spider Cave.  The lawnmower I haven’t used in three years?  Spider Cave.

The irony is that all this offloading into a Spider Cave wouldn’t actually free up enough space within my house proper to where I could actually have some private space again.  Objectively speaking, the more efficient thing would be to leave everything where it is, and use the Spider Cave solely for my own personal space and use, since it would hypothetically fulfill my desire to have even just a little bit of space for myself.

But the knee-jerk reaction to a fantasy fulfilled of having a Spider Cave was churning reallocation of crap from one place into another place, where it could be better out of sight and out of mind.

All the same though, having a magical bonus 250-350 sq ft. of usable space really is a fucking fantasy.  And it would be truly incredible to have my very own Spider Cave; I don’t even need or want any of the Spider Tech, because I don’t want to have the great responsibilities that would come with inheriting such great powers, I just want a place where I can hang my blets, display all of the crap that I’ve accumulated that’s worth displaying, and having a space to myself that’s just, me.

DC’s Absolute Universe logos absolutely suck

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I don’t dislike DC Comics, but I’m definitely one of those fans that feels like no matter what they do, no matter what they try, it always seems like it falls flat, and when they’re inevitably compared to Marvel, they’re always this extraordinary distant second place.  I love Batman, and I have no qualms with really any other DC property, but in my opinion, I just feel like DC in particular has fallen a little too victim to the changing of the times and ideals of the world, and have been way too quick to pull the plug on long-term storytelling, and retconned things so rapidly and so frequently that it’s hard to even tell what’s canon versus what’s just some blow-off one-off.

It’s like the comic industry is truly no different than the rest of the working world in that nobody stays put long enough to see through any chances at some good long-term storytelling or even just a year’s worth of comics these days, and the industry as a whole is full of convoluted, clunky crap that I have little interest in reading on the monthly, and prefer to read about it later on Wikipedia synopses, so that I can then go, what the fuck?

Anyway, in yet another reconning of the universe, DC Comics is apparently going in the route called the Absolute universe, which I’m guessing is a lot like when Marvel launched the Ultimate universe, but the fact of the matter is that it’s still a hard reset of all the flagship properties, with hopes of boosting sales, engaging the newer, even more ADD generation, and that it’s easier to start over from scratch versus even attempting to pick up the pieces from the latest wave of employee turnover.

And part of the entire reconning of the company, for some reason, they saw fit to redesign a bunch of logos of notable properties.  And if there’s one thing I’ve learned throughout my career as a creative, fewer things (attempt to) mask mediocrity than the changing of logos of a notable brand(s), or making them in the first place, for inconsequential purposes.  I mean, the City of Atlanta probably burns $10M a year on making logos and branding stupid bullshit while half of that is probably skimmed into the pockets of corrupt bureaucrats to begin with.

But most noteworthy among the rebrandings were the new logomarks for three of their most flagship properties: Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman.  And as the title of this post clearly states, they all absolutely suck.

Batman’s new logo silhouette has been transformed into a multi cutter tool’s blade, seeing as how it’s a very lightly serrated rectangle now.  It seriously looks like if I were to trace this as a stencil onto a piece of sheet metal, cut it out and jerry-rig it into my Ryobi, I could probably use it to fairly efficiently cut through plastics or foams, if I were still at the stage of my life where I would make costumes for Dragon*Con.

Wonder Woman’s logo now isn’t too far from its old iteration, but much like many things that are feminine in nature and display now, it’s been widened, fattened and made to look all thicc, because it’s okay if not all women don’t look like Jim Lee interpretations of females, especially in comics.  But in doing so, it’s almost as if they’ve been successfully bullied out of their own original identity by the growing Whataburger company, who didn’t really do a good job with their own branding to not act like they weren’t completely lifting the original Wonder Woman emblem in the first place.

So let the record show that the regional fast food burger company has successfully bullied the vaunted Wonder Woman out of using her own fucking identity.  Poor form, DC.

Finally, we have Superman’s logo, which at least, manages to at least salvage their traditional five-sided pentagon shape, and is the one logo that seems to retain the closest to its original iteration.  But much like in the world of typography, the original serifs have been lopped off of the S, and for whatever reason, the top left part of the emblem looks really fucking weird to me, because there’s no break in the red from the S and the edge of the emblem and it all bleeds together looking sloppy.  I can interpret that the general thickness of the S probably wouldn’t accommodate for there needing to be any space near the edge of the emblem, but it just looks really off, like Capcom’s shitty logo for not putting any space in the second C and the O of their wordmark that bothers the shit out of me.

And if you were to focus on the yellow parts alone, it looks like a really erect dick about to really overshoot the toilet underneath it, and I hope that any of my zero readers were to read this observation, they would become unable to unsee it, and spread the opinion out to the rest of the world like an obnoxious virus.

So, in conclusion, DC Comics felt the need to reset their shitty universe once again, and for some reason decided to rebrand some of their most iconic properties in the process.  And in changing logos that never needed to be changed in the first place, we’re left with a saw blade, a fat version of the Whataburger logo, and a dick and toilet emblem in the end.

gg dc, wp.

Damn, the new Chick Fil-A looks like Avengers HQ

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

CFA: Chick Fil-A opens brand new, state-of-the-art restaurant in Bumfuck, Georgia that is two stories, drive-thru only, featuring multiple lanes, including several app-only lanes

My first thought when I saw this brand-new Chick Fil-A was exactly what the title of this post is: damn, this place looks like a baby Avengers HQ.  And frankly, it might as well be, considering the company’s hard reliance on drive-thru service when it comes to their bottom line, it makes sense for them to have a location that’s entirely drive-thru only, featuring the feature that I love best, the app-only lanes for the evolved class of human being that understands how easy, efficient and optimal using Chick Fil-A’s app is when it comes to food service.

What doesn’t really make much sense are CFA locations that have scrapped drive-thru outright, and I think there’s one up in North Druid Hills that does that, and I can’t imagine that their business is nearly as fruitful as those CFA locations that have efficient and reliable drive-thru service, like the ones near my own home that my household tends to go to, at least 2-3 times a month, but that’s neither here nor there for the purpose of this specific post.

However, the one drawback to this Baby Avengers HQ of a Chick Fil-A is that it’s located way the fuck outside of Atlanta, and barely even deserves to be considered metro area in the first place.  McDonough is one of those areas that’s literally like an hour outside of city proper, but because there are enough psychopaths that commute to the city from there, they get to be considered Metro enough to get the occasional nod in morning traffic reports because there’s usually some apocalyptic traffic coming out of I-75 in their location.  Frankly, that’s the only reason why I even know the name of the street it’s on, Jodeco Road.

Needless to say, I can’t see myself making a trip just to experience this location, because they’re not Tim Horton’s, they’re not Buc-ee’s, nor are they Wawa.  Even though I would probably take joy in the expedient manner in which an app-only line could be, it would be the same food that I could get at any of the CFAs that are within 1-2 miles from my own home.

All the same, I hope this location does gangbusters, so that the company can start replacing all the other CFAs throughout the city, as well as all over the country, with these mini Avenger HQs that can show the rest of the fast food world up, on how to optimally run the fast food business.

Let’s talk about Avengers: Doomsday

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

So over the weekend, it was unveiled that part of phase 57 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe would be the release of an eventual film, Avengers: Doomsday, where the MCU would be introducing Doctor Doom, presumably to be the next big bad in the series.  But the biggest bombshell to come out of the announcement would be that Doctor Doom would be played by none other than, Robert Downey, Jr.

Now I didn’t see any of the internet outcrying or rage to have come from this, as I don’t pay an iota of attention to anything that isn’t fed to me these days, but I did notice people talking about what people are talking about, so I suppose that in segments of the world, there are people who are salty and disappointed with the notion of RDJ returning to the MCU after publicly declaring his departure from it after Avengers: Endgame.

I mean, I couldn’t care any less about RDJ picking up a second role in the MCU, so many people are quick to forget that Chris Evans was Johnny Storm before he became Captain America, and I’m sure there are several other lesser knowns who have picked up second roles at some point during the 27 years of Marvel movies in existence.  And with the MCU having already established the existence of the Multiverse, Pandora’s Box is wide open for whatever recasting, retconning and changes on the fly as they want.  Earth 6XX is just a digit change away from being able to re-write whatever the fuck Marvel Studios wants to write that will keep the money printer operating.

I’m sure that RDJ will portray Doom with justice, even though Doom is all about dignity and his own code of honor, while RDJ is best when he’s playing kind of an asshole, like Tony Stark was, but I’m still confident that he’ll knock it out of the park when all is said and done, and all the keyboard warriors who are complaining now will be surreptitiously STFU’d and cautiously singing his praises, while worrying about tryhards who keep screen grabs and e-receipts of dumb shit they might be saying now.

However, this isn’t to say that I don’t reaction to the announcement of Avengers: Doomsday without any trepidation myself.  In fact, I actually had to stop and think for a few seconds when I saw the name of the film, because when I hear the phrase “Doomsday,” in the context of comic books, my mind immediately goes to the big ass gray Kryptonian gorilla that killed Superman, which is a DC Comics IP and not Marvel.

Dr. Doom isn’t that far behind at this point, but the fact of the matter is that whenever I think about Dr. Doom in the context of Marvel Comics, to me, he’s a villain that I associate first and foremost with the Fantastic Four, and not the Avengers.  This isn’t to say that there’s not numerous instances in comic history where Doom has scrapped with the Avengers, but comic enthusiasts like me tend to forever mark a guy with whatever property they appeared first in, which in the case of Dr. Doom was Fantastic Four #5 in 1962.

But at least to me, it’s never going to not feel like Dr. Doom is being forced into the Avengers, because to me, he’s not an Avengers villain.  He is, and always will be a Fantastic Four big bad, and for that reason alone, it will permanently temper my ceiling of how good Doomsday can possibly be.

Although I’m sure the writers at the MCU will spin up a storyline that makes it feel organic and will be portrayed, acted and executed marvelously, I just don’t think of Dr. Doom as an Avengers adversary.  He’s the yang to Reed Richards’ yin, but an intellectual equal all the same.  Although he does some pretty extreme things that often results in death and destruction, Doom still has a strong sense of justice and integrity, and has more than once throughout history flipped sides for the greater good, and is one of those bad guys with honor, like Magneto, or even the Joker whenever anyone tries to hurt Batman that isn’t him.

That being said, I personally think that we’re approaching a crossroads for the MCU with Avengers: Doomsday, because ever since Endgame wrapped up phase whatever #5, the MCU has been stretching itself thinner and thinner and risking dilution, overexposure and burning out fans with the rapid releasing of so many spinoffs and trying to produce television and films all while trying to keep them somewhat tangenally connected for the sake of creating the next Infinity War.

Some may disagree and think we’ve already passed this point long ago, and some might think I’m nuts and there’s nothing wrong with the amount of exploding comic media still to come, but speaking for myself, I’m at a point where I’m becoming increasingly unable to keep up with every Marvel production released, and of the things that I have been able to see, not everything has really felt like it’s been worth the time investment.

Moon Knight sucked, Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk  and surprisingly Hawkeye were pretty decent.  I haven’t seen Echo, nor have I finished What If?  I haven’t seen The Marvels or The Eternals, but I’ve heard little but negative about them, and Black Widow was still a film that I didn’t think even needed to exist, save for the end credits scene. 

Tom Holland’s Spider-Man films are still quality, as are the animated Spider-Verse films, but they’re obviously still Sony’s properties first, no matter how badly the MCU wishes they weren’t.  But it’s evident that the MCU is really stretching thin with properties that aren’t X-Men and the reality that contains mutants in them, because we all know they’re sitting on this for phase-616 where they can try to reignite the comics movie craze all over again in the future.

The point of this recollecting of more recent MCU productions is to illustrate the picture that the MCU is kind of treading water in quality since Endgame, and I feel like the journey to Doomsday is going to be a critical one that will either cement the MCU as one of the greatest collaborative collections of media in history, or having fans be wishing for a merciful end to all this fucking comics-based media.

The return of RDJ might be seen as a panic move, or maybe the man just wanted to take a break from comics and go enjoy his Oscar for Oppenheimer, or perhaps this was all part of the plan.  I’m not going to assume that this journey to Doomsday will be bad, and will remain optimistic that RDJ and the MCU A-team can carry the torch back to an entertaining high road again, but at the same time, I wouldn’t be surprise if it doesn’t come with a lot more speed bumps, hiccups and some rougher patches than it did in the earlier phases.