The MCU Formula

What the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been doing well that most people seem to think others haven't been for the last 2-5 years or so.  Is the ability to provide over the top Escapist Popcorn movie fun, while also having Heart and Thematic resonance.  Other films seem to be trying to pull off what Marvel is but failing.

I can't entirely disagree, but my takes on these movies are more complicated.

Some people want to say Star Wars is being handled the same way the MCU films are because of both being Disney.  Yet ironically my overall reactions to the Disney Star Wars films so far (I won't be seeing Solo theatrically) have been the same as for the last three DC films.  Very high praise upon first leaving the theater, but the more I think about it the more what's disappointing about it sinks in.

I'm starting to feel like 2008 was an important transitional year in Cinema.  But do you know what 2008 movie anticipated the MCU formula in advance?  It's not the actual MCU films made that year, it took awhile for the MCU to find it's footing and Josh Whedon was important to how it did so.  Iron Man I did the and still do think of as Batman Begins light.

It was Speed Racer, yes that film that mostly flopped at the time but has a lot of loyal fans now.  It anticipated the MCU formula by being more like a Comic Book then the Comic Book movies of that year.  And guess what, Speed Racer is how it is because it's an Anime adapted by fans of Anime.

That's the thing, in American Cinema it may be only the MCU that's been pulling this off recently. But Anime has always been good at it. Like the Nanoha franchise, the first two seasons are like MCU films but double the length.  I feel like maybe Reflection has succeeded at being similar, but due to the language barrier I may need to watch it a few more times to know for sure.  As well as seeing Detonation which I probably won't be able to till a year from now.

But even getting into something more controversial to speak highly of.  Sword Art Online: Ordinal Scale is basically an MCU film, in both formula and execution.  And I see it as purely hypocrisy to think that movie is trash but the MCU films deserve their success.

I've been enjoying the MCU films.  However they aren't the formula I want all films or Anime to have.  And so I enjoyed Jurassic World far more.  And now that I've seen Batman V Superman a third time I think I can firmly say my overall opinion of it is a positive one, I think in time it'll be vindicated by History.

Now Avengers Infinity War has broken from the standard MCU formula a bit.  And that factors into why I like it the best so far.  And there is Anime I could easily compare it too, Thanos motivation makes him like a lot of Anime Anti-Villains.

About the ending of Infinity War.




Spoiler Alert.



Maybe now the Meme that Empire Strikes Back qualifies as a movie where the Bad Guys won can finally die.

I did a post back in 2016 called The Night is Darkest Just Before The Dawn, which argued a Happy Ending can feel more rewarding if it was a dark and difficult journey to get there.  Infinity War is perhaps the counter part to that.  A downer ending to a film that seemed like it was building up to the usual MCU triumphant ending.  And as such made a much bigger impact then the many bleak movies that have a bleak ending after being bleak for two hours.