I cannot even fathom how anyone could watch this movie without having seen everything that came before it. I saw everything that came before it in the last 6 months and I was still lost at points. Where are all the Infinity Stones? Who's going where? Who's teamed up with whom? It was a lot to keep track of
Related to that, and due to the nature of the movie, some subplots were better than others
I generally liked the new team-ups we had here, especially when there were some heads being butted. The prickliness of Tony and Doctor Strange was a lot of fun, as was Peter Quill being so put off by Thor. I also liked the team of Thor, Rocket and Groot, although that whole subplot was pretty bland
The Guardians-styled segments were my favourites; in some ways I liked them even better than the actual Guardians movies. Quill and Drax had some good bits, and while Teenage Groot was really just one joke, they stuck with that one joke and it was a good running gag throughout the movie. Rubberband Man was also a fantastic choice for the Guardians' entrance
I also liked the aforementioned team of Tony and Strange, as well as Spider-Man. Strange's powers are still pretty cool and unique, though I wish they had leaned a little more heavily into them, perhaps more inspired by the visuals of the Doctor Strange movie. Spidey's new suit was also pretty neat
Everyone else got pretty under-served. Captain American has a beard and Black Widow is blonde now, and those were my main takeaways from the screen time given to those two. Oh, and Bruce Banner has performance anxiety
Thanos. Complex motivation for a villain, certainly the most powerful foe our heroes have ever fought, and I don't really care about him as a character. Considering how deep we are into the franchise, not to mention how the movie ends (which we'll get to in a minute), the most important thing about Thanos was that he had to feel like an actual threat to this multitude of incredibly powerful superheroes; the good news is he does, right from the start. But he doesn't have the charisma of the best MCU villains - Killmonger, Loki, and so on. Perhaps this was by design to make him all the more intimidating. Perhaps this was due to there not being much humanity behind his performance, by Josh Brolin, an actor I like. But even the parts intended to give him depth, like his relationship with Gamora, did nothing for me. His henchmen will have left my memory within the week if they haven't already. Parting word about Thanos for now: he has a surprisingly cute lil button nose compared to the lump of flesh that is his face
One has to respect a movie in which the bad guy wins. The subversion of our expectations is honestly shocking. However, the risk they ran was that it ended up making the first two hours of the movie feel somewhat hollow. Nothing the Avengers did before fighting Thanos actually made any difference. Thor's axe didn't save them. The battle in Wakanda didn't save them. Even sacrificing Vision didn't save them. This does add to the bleakness of the conclusion, but at the same time it diminished my appreciation for the movie as a whole story
It feels incredibly stupid and very 2019 to say this, but I knew a lot of details about this movie's ending thanks to memes. I tried to avoid spoilers, but it was to no avail. Spider-Man not feeling so good, people turning to dust, even the knowledge that Thanos was wiping out half the population of the universe. These were all things I knew. And with that said, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the ending to this movie still hit me hard. It was extremely well done. The emotions, the characters we've gotten to know, the ramifications, those are all going to stick with me. But if only I'd been a Marvel moviegoer when this movie came out, I'm sure seeing this ending in a theatre would have been next-level feels-hitting
Second time seeing it. We watched it when it was nominated for best picture
I admire this movie for the things that are unique about it. The African setting and the diversity of the cast and characters provide a welcome non-white, non-American focus. The movie is also full of strong, independent, plot-important women. These qualities do make it stand out from the crowd
Having said that, do I think this movie transcends the Marvel formula? No, not really. I was surprised it was nominated for best picture the first time I saw it, and it still doesn't blow me away after having seen everything that came before
The action is fine. There are some cool hand-to-hand fights, especially the waterfall scenes. The setting is interesting. Not a whole lot of memorably funny parts. Most of this movie kind of just slips away after seeing it
However, the one thing that stuck, both the first time and this time, was Killmonger. Considering I've complained about boring villains in the past, the villain in this one definitely elevates the whole movie beyond some of the others. Michael B. Jordan is super entertaining to watch, and his character's motivation has a lot of depth and nuance. Best part of the movie by a fair margin
I've started taking notes while watching these things, and my notes for Black Panther included me saying, "Same old climax. People just flying all over the place." And it's true! The CGI, weightless, generic climax is something that has plagued a lot of the Marvel movies. I've even started wondering if I'm placing too much weight on the climaxes, and perhaps I should start to judge these movies more on whatever comes before. But is it too much to ask for an engaging, original action movie climax!? What is it about the way they make these movies that the big, final, super important action set-piece, the culmination of the whole movie, is so incredibly forgettable? I can think of only a handful of Marvel movies with memorable climaxes that stand out from the others: Avengers 1 and 2, Thor: The Dark World (I know, I'm surprised it stands out, too), Ant-Man, Civil War, Doctor Strange, and Guardians 2 if I'm being generous. Am I missing something here? Does anyone out there have an argument for the Marvel climaxes being good? Or did I miss any individual movies that should get recognition? I'm open to discussion
The Marvel movies always get a boost in quality when you can sense the director's unique style, and that's the case here. Taika Waititi's dry sense of humour permeates to the core of this movie. I haven't seen all of his movies, but I liked What We Do In the Shadows, and he wrote and directed for Flight of the Conchords, one of my favourites. Everyone knows this is one of the funniest Marvel movies, and it sure is, but I really did love how distinctively funny it is through the writing and the performances
For that reason, I was surprised to find Waititi isn't actually a credited writer on this movie. Honestly, I'm assuming he put his spin on the script quite a lot, but if more praise is due to the credited writers, consider it given!
Running trend in the Thor movies: Asgard scenes are boring and self-serious, Thor out of his element scenes are funny and entertaining. Setting so much of the action on Sakaar was the best choice. There's an immediate shift in tone in this movie compared to the previous ones, almost jarringly so, but still not enough to make the Asgard scenes all that memorable. Although I did like the Matt Damon cameo and Anthony Hopkins was funny playing Loki/Odin
The whole climax of the movie was pretty forgettable. I liked Cate Blanchett as Hela, though. She was fun as a straight-up, no subtleties, villain. I also liked their tactic for defeating her. Karl Urban did nothing for me, considering how much screen time his character got
So with that in mind, back to Sakaar!
Mark Ruffalo is charming, Tessa Thompson is badass, Tom Hiddleston is mischievous. I liked them all
Jeff Goldblum! What I loved about him in this movie is that there was JUST the right amount. He made the most of every minute of time he was on the screen and it never got old. Same with Korg (voiced by Waititi, as most of you know). It takes restraint to use these characters sparingly, as I'm sure they knew how much the audience would love them
I've always liked Hemsworth in these movies, and I think he's a really funny actor. It's also always more interesting to see Thor in a vulnerable position, considering he's a God. But more importantly, THOR GOT A HAIRCUT
Ashley's reaction to said haircut: "OH MY DADDY DADDY. I'm going to flood this fucking couch!"
The joke was on her, dear reader. It was I who flooded the fucking couch. Hemsworth looked goooooood
And now, a little tangent for some Mark and Ashley lore. Way back in April 2017, the trailer for Ragnarok was released. You remember it. It featured Immigrant Song pretty heavily. Ashley and I were seeing a movie, no idea what it was, and this trailer pops up. Ashley decided to refer to Immigrant Song as "that song from Shrek 3!" Now, at first I just gently mocked Ashley for associating that song with Shrek, and not with, say, Led Zeppelin, by suggesting that Shrek 3 was her favourite movie of all time. And BOY has that initial mockery morphed. It has now become a running joke that Ashley is obsessed with the Shrek franchise, but also that she is sexually aroused by it and him. She affectionately refers to herself as a Shrek Slut. So! If ever you've heard us joke about Shrek and Ashley's fetishization of everyone's favourite ogre, well, this is why. Thanks, Thor: Ragnarok trailer, for inspiring this stupid thing we've been saying for over two years!
I very much enjoyed the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies when they came out, including Spider-Man 3, as I remember. It has also been quite some time since I watched them. Those movies benefited greatly from being unique and novel, and earlier examples of how to do blockbuster superhero movies. They were light, and fun, and funny, while still having some good action scenes and special effects. If I watched them now, I'm sure they'd feel very similar to the *counts on fingers* SIXTEEN Marvel movies I've watched in the past half a year
Side note, I didn't see either of the Andrew Garfield movies
This is a long way of saying that Spider-Man: Homecoming was a very, very fun Spider-Man movie, while not really doing a whole lot better than the Tobey Maguire ones, in my opinion. But let's talk about the actual movie at hand, now
Loved Tom Holland in Civil War, and loved his interactions with Robert Downey Jr., so it was pretty disappointing there wasn't more of that. Instead we got Happy Hogan...Thanks?
Tom Holland was a lot of fun in this one, too, and definitely skewed younger than Tobey, feeling more like a high schooler. And speaking of which...
JESUS CHRIST, TOM HOLLAND. When I saw him without his shirt on I immediately looked up how old he was when they filmed this because I felt like a pervert. The good news is he's 23 now, so he was about 20 when they filmed it. The bad news is that Peter's supposed to be 15 in the movie, so I still kind of feel like a pervert
I liked Tom Holland's performance so much that it was even more of a bummer that his face was covered in so many scenes. Comes with the superhero territory, I suppose, but I think it affects Spider-Man more than most
Michael Keaton - kind of boring as a kind of boring villain, but great as a protective, vaguely menacing father. Combining these two aspects made the later villain stuff more interesting. At some point that character twist was spoiled for me, and I wish it had been more of a surprise, but it was still pretty effective
The action was serviceable, if not memorable
I really liked this movie's sense of humour and comic timing. All the way up to the last second of the movie, with Aunt May's "WHAT THE FU--," I laughed a lot at this one. The funny Marvel movies sit high on the list for me; I'm still holding Iron Man 3 as one of my favourites. For this reason, if you've been following along, you probably know why I'm excited for the next one in the franchise
I still feel a little bad for how hard I was on the first Guardians with my rewatch. I went into this one with an open mind, and again with the memory of enjoying it the first time I saw it
Some of the things I liked about the first Guardians are even better in this one, while some of the faults are still present. Overall, I enjoyed watching it again, though
From beginning to end, I adore how colourful and vibrant this movie is
Once again, Rocket is a lot of fun, you can tell how much Bradley Cooper likes voicing him. For me, though, and surely for a lot of people, Baby Groot is the MVP of this movie, and the source of the best gags
Another great, tone-setting opening credits sequence
I loved the first movie's soundtrack. I loved this one even more. So many of my favourite scenes are enhanced by the song choices, and quite a few of the songs are ones I'd heard before in my life but didn't give much thought to. Thanks to this movie, I developed a new appreciation for most of these songs
My favourite sequence is the scene where Rocket, Baby Groot and Yondu escape from the Ravagers' ship. Come a Little Bit Closer is a fantastic song choice, and Yondu's whistley arrow thing is super cool every time it's on screen, especially with the neon tail effect
As a villain, I thought Ego was a really cool concept, executed well. I always like seeing Kurt Russell. The climax was fine, but I really liked the little humourous touches like Baby Groot and the bomb, and Quill flying around off-screen asking if anyone had any tape
The space battles left me kind of cold
I think I laughed more at this movie than the first one, but again, I ended up wishing it was just a little funnier than what we got. Like I said above, I love Rocket and Groot. But splitting up the team for a big chunk of the movie wasn't a great choice, and I never found Drax's shtick all that amusing
The ending funeral scene didn't hit me in the feels like it did for some people, but I appreciated closing the movie with one last visually vibrant scene
LOVED the special effects. Visually incredible. Just like with Ant-Man, the effects were used to show us scenes and settings that would have been otherwise impossible. I wish I had gone to see it on the big screen
Lots of comparisons to Inception, another movie that really impressed me. I definitely got some Matrix vibes too
Having said all that, by the time the climax rolled around, I had no fukken idea what was happening with the plot or the villains' motivations. It might be more clear on a rewatch. But the thing is, I didn't actually care that much. The stuff at the end was still so visually inventive, with the Dark Dimension and the time loop, that I was fully engaged right to the end
I saw a few episodes of Sherlock, but this was the first movie starring role I'd seen of Benny C. I liked his performance a lot, although that accent at times seemed a liiiiittle shaky. He really does have a sexy alien thing going for him
I liked Tilda Swinton. I think she brought a fun impishness to her character that was clever and subversive. However, I am going to come down on the anti-whitewashing side. I'm sure an Asian actor could have given a performance that was just as good, and I will always support more diversity in movies
Thanks for coming, Mads Mikkelsen, Michael Stuhlbarg, Rachel McAdams and Benjamin Bratt. You did very little to enhance this movie but it's probably not your fault
I actually thought this movie could have had fewer jokes. Not all of them landed for me, and I found a lot of the humourous beats tonally jarring. I didn't think this movie needed it, it had enough going on otherwise. I'm sorry, Marvel. I know I'm fickle and hard to predict. I know I've complained about the opposite in past movie write-ups. What can I say. I contain multitudes
This movie has a lot in common with Winter Soldier, which was also one of the best movies so far in the franchise. Makes perfect sense, considering the two movies share directors and screenwriters. When Civil War first came out I went for a very long time thinking it was an Avengers film, given the sprawling cast of characters. But considering the sensibility and tone of this movie, it does have more in common with the Captain America movies than the Avengers movies
Amazing action sequences. There's a wonderful sense of verticality to some of these scenes, for example Bucky's stairwell escape and the missile silo fight towards the end. Lots of practical effects, which we've established make a big difference for me. A fair number of plainclothes fight scenes, too, which are fun to see the actual actors kick ass. Also some great car stunts
In terms of tone, this one is also pretty serious. Again, it worked very well. But going into it I was expecting a lighter-style romp than what we got. It's funny to think that some of the Marvel movies that rely the least on humour were also directed by the Russos, who were well-known for their work on two of the funniest shows ever made, Arrested Development and Community
I knew all about the airport fight. In fact, I had watched the airport fight already. One of the best sequences yet in any Marvel movie, definitely lives up to its potential. What I didn't realize, though, was that the airport fight wasn't the actual climax of the movie. With 45 minutes left to go, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. But the ending, with Tony and Steve going mano a mano, was tremendous. I would call this the best climax in a Marvel movie so far, and if you lump it together with the airport fight and call them Climax 1 and Climax 2, well, there's really no contest. The Avengers movies are the only ones on the same level
The Howard Stark reveal totally got me. I reacted verbally. I also thought Robert Downey Jr. put in some excellent acting in this movie, something the Marvel films don't usually get attention for
Marvel villains, mostly, are dull. I've said this before, others have said this before. This villain was fine, but dull. However, the genius of this movie is in where the conflict is actually focused. Some of my favourite scenes have been when our heroes fight against each other. As I said in my Age of Ultron post, we care about these characters separately and love watching them work with and against each other. The central conflict, the action sequences, everything stemming from Tony going against Steve, worked incredibly well. The movie also did a great job of toying with our sympathies and making us straddle the line between rooting for one or the other
Great intros to Spider-Man and Black Panther. Peter's intro and his interactions with Tony were especially fun, and I can't wait to see Homecoming
Funniest scene was probably when Ant-Man showed up. I LOVE YOU, PAUL RUDD
So Chris Evans should just devote the rest of his career to restraining helicopters with his bare hands, right?
