Couldn't agree more. Honestly, with the exception of the new spider man film, I'm not as excited for the upcoming phase 4 films as much as I was for the films in the Infinity Saga. I honestly wanted the MCU to end with Endgame because it managed to deliver a solid ending to a decade's worth of world building and character development. How could you possibly top that?
Marvel should just focus on the individual heroes from the MCU going forward. The new Spider-Man project sounds like a lot of fun. And the Black Panther, Thor and Guardians of the Galaxy sequels could well turn out to be satisfying follow-ups. Trying to do another Endgame-type build-up scenario is the wrong approach.
Exactly. For me, Infinity War was the peak of the MCU, and everything after just has a less-than quality to them. I enjoyed WandaVision and Loki and am looking forward to Moon Knight and feel that format may be where Marvel's strengths are now.
The problem I find these days is that fandom is completely out of control and I think the internet has partly played a roll in this. A large portion of mcu fans care more about their favourite thing being successful and therefore will say it's amazing no matter how bad it is and will support it no matter what.
There will always be a portion of any fan base that loves it no matter what. Even if they don’t think it’s as good as others from that series. Also on the other end of the spectrum there are those who review bomb rotten tomatoes and IMDb in order to try and control the perception of how ‘objectively’ bad something is.
I am admittedly a huge Marvel fan and thought the movie was fine. It wasn't as good as some Marvel movies, it wasn't as bad as others. I hope people enjoy it.
Exactly lol, I like some mcu films but I’m ready to admit when a lot of their stuff is terrible, especially recently.. a lot of fans just blindly defend marvel with their lives
Here's how I see it; Marvel movies are burgers. Some of these burgers are amazing, most good, a few bad but they are ALL burgers. If you're force fed burgers long enough then it doesn't matter how good or bad it is. You're still sick of them.
100%. Shang Chi was one of the most boring movies I've ever seen. The big CGI fight at the climax is getting SO repetitive. It's so obvious that Shang Chi should have ended with a fight where his Dad doesn't have the Rings and it's just a pure grounded martial arts fight not some big CGI nonsense.
lol none of the burgers are amazing. Maybe three of them are really well directed and genuinely good films that will stand the test of time, and three is being generous.
@@burner9481 Yeah, if Shang Chi would have been more grounded it would've been a lot better. The whole family dinamic subplot was one of the most interesting narrative choices in the MCU but it was sadly wasted by the whole CGI fest. First half is very fun to be honest, second half is awful. I went in expecting something bad as usual and it almost won me over, but Marvel just can't chill for once, it's always the fate of the world and universe at stake or nothing.
I think part of the problem is the escalation of superhero power they are falling into. It all started with characters like Ironman and Cap. Real people with issues and vulnerabilities that we could relate to. Now they are all over powered invincible space beings. The reason why batman is so popular of late compared to superman.
I agree with this. If characters are too powerful wheres the real conflict? Interpersonal conflict is what makes people watch movies, especially multiple times...
That’s a very good point, and part of the reason why they had to sideline Captain Marvel for most of Endgame. You _can_ write interesting stories that revolve around ultra-powerful characters such as Superman, but the problems arise when they have to inhabit the same universe as a hundred other characters and you end up with a massive power imbalance that you’ve got to write around.
Agreed. The trailer didn't sell the movie at all. Turns out there was nothing to sell and the movie is just boring pointless green-screen cape nonsense.
They should have taken a 5 year hiatus after Endgame. The timing ended up being perfect too with the whole Covid debacle. I liked Shang Chi, but that one didn't connect to the other movies really. Could have taken place at any time.
Here is the issue... we all... most of us... want diverse, inclusive casts as we go forward But if that is pushed as a selling point and attached to mediocre to poor scripts or stories, then the cause of diversity and inclusion suffers by association we need good storied that everyone can enjoy, with diverse cast and crew
Well said! And its not just about studios putting diversity in front of the screen. inclusive groups need to be in the writing room developing scripts and making key decisions too!
Marvel is trying to reestablish a whole new phase and it’s just a bit rushed. This film literally rushes through thousands of years of content, we don’t care about these characters or their critical role in the MCU because we’ve only just met them. I really agree that a tv series would have been a better path for this franchise
Yeah seemed to me that they made a film that DC tried and failed with justice league and suicide squad. Haven't seen either so i'm saying from an outside view
When the films first started coming out, they were refreshing to consume over the comics because the comics had gone on for so long, become so bloated, and have all this continuity baggage that you would get scared off from jumping in. That on top of the stakes having been flattened by Galactus/whoever killing everyone only for them to come back anyway 100 times by then. The films have run on so long that that's where we're at now too. I think the smarter thing to do is just forget continuity, get creative with the genres, and allow more freedom to take characters places without this long shadow of Thanos and Iron Man and the previous 20 films hanging over them.
@@anthonymartensen3164 yeah but they were interconnected for ten years weaving a storyline that culminatted in endgame. and that was a hell of a satisfying end to it all. mcu could end there and people would be satisfied. everything so far has felt aimless, they are teasing stuff, but its all vague and ultimately it fails to create hype. there is no direction. remember iron man 1 started all this with a huge tease, avengers, and after that it kept building on that and it kept momentum. after endgame things came to a halt, and marvel seems to struggle to start the engine again, despite continuing delivering entertaining shows and movies.
@@anthonymartensen3164 Yeah I think best thing to do is have then all interconnected but also have separate little storylines so it doesn't become overwhelming and saving the hugely connected stuff for the avengers movies. Which is what they're doing.
I mean, yeah, the smarter thing from an artistic standpoint would be to admit now that the grand overarching master plan was always about 10 films too long and stop producing increasingly uninspired bilge, but I'm confident they'll squeeze every last penny out of this thing.
This is a great point I hadn't considered. The interconnectedness is great when it all adds to one big epic story, but at a certain point it just becomes bloat. The most interesting part of these films is never the stuff that makes them the same and connected, but the stuff that makes them different. The interesting part of Thor is the norse mythology stuff. The interesting part of Hulk is all the cold war nuclear weapons analogy. Instead of another shared universe wise cracking Thor movie, why not make a trilogy of wagnerian norse mythology movies that is it's own thing? It's the same thing with Eternals - they should have had a smaller group of characters and focused on the Highlander / Interview With Vampire esque idea of immortal beings living through history, and ignored the generic comic book stuff.
@@budigunawan5624 nope. Dune is stunning. Eternals is a boring mess. Should have started out as a Disney plus series culminating into a film. They made the DC mistake of trying to stuff too much in one movie. At the end, I didn’t care at all. Finally Eternals have ALWAYS had this problem - even the comics for the most part don’t care about the eternals.
Should have been a one-off 4 to 6 episode D+ Ltd Series that led into a future movie (like WandaVision) especially as the writers/director have confirmed they initially had 12 Eternals in the first draft let alone the villains & the world-building to develop! The very end credit scene should have made it more explicit who the 'cameo' was! Hope the very mixed reviews don't put off Feige/MCU taking future big swings - just hope they choose the right medium to tell those stories effectively!
or you know maybe it could just have not been anything? every c list marvel character of the silver and bronze age doesn't need a live media adaption, controversial opinion now days I know.
But this is a really epic tale that the film basically says that created modern days' mythology. I think it is more fitting to have a feature film. None of the D+ shows so far had the feel of a film.
I completely agree, that's exactly what I had been thinking too. Every episode could have featured an Eternal and had that epi revolve around their story, starting with Sersei and the penultimate epi being about Ikarus (and revealing the twist that he had killed Ajak). Obviously not every Eternal would get a feature, but it would have given more room for context, world building, and character development (which I found was quite rushed what with them going around the world and back and forth through time). The last episode is the final face off between characters we actually care about and the Celestial being born.
Just been to see this and I’m a massive marvel/sci fi fan. I rushed to see it, so I wouldn’t hear any reviews. But I was disappointed. It doesn’t help that I have been to see Dune twice and loved it. What Dune got right, this got wrong. You had wide sweeping shots, but they weren’t epic. The plot, well, I was think ‘what’ to myself a few times, some things just didn’t seem to work. Maybe a Disney plus show over 6 episodes might have helped.
I am curious to know what makes Dune different from this, I loved the hella out of Dune. Watched it twice in cinemas just because it was that good but what makes Eternals meh? Is it too much exposition? Cause Dune had exposition but on the second rewatch you realize how minimal that actually is and most of the run time is just seeing the scenery that Denis put into the world
@@2slowpoke929 IMO Dune is more interesting, both visually and story-wise. Eternals has a lot of typical MCU tropes despite being somewhat fresh in some aspects. There are also too many main characters of equal importance in this one, so 2.30 hours is just not enough to flesh out everything. In Dune, sure we have to learn about plenty of characters, but we really have to care about a few to make the plot work. I also felt that the pacing in Dune was more consistent.
I just watched it and I didn't get a 'what' feeling. Instead, I saw the MCU doing something different. I don't compare it to other movies but rather why so many people are going to see it, the movies before. And it was new and different than the other MCU movies. Idk, I don't go out to see movies anymore. This was different when the MCU started getting formulaic. Not incredibly different, but much slower than any other MCU I can think of.
Problem is the MCU has rushed through so much material from the comics that they've lost a lot of interesting story arcs and development. There's a constant reaching to go more epic to the point it's now completely overblown and disjointed. The threat level is manifested in a way that seems safe and predictable to the point it's become meaningless and boring.
They gave every big character pretty much their own film before they brought them together for the first Avengers film, back then they didn't rush into it.
The biggest issue for me was the 2 “leads” Gemma Chan and Richard Madden were the dullest leads in a marvel film yet. Both actors were given nothing to do for 2.5hrs and have zero charisma or chemistry on screen.
To reprise my comment on another UA-cam review of Eternals: It sounds like Eternals has the same problem as the comics on which it's based. The "ancient aliens"/"ancient astronauts" stuff with the Celestials and Eternals is a potentially fun idea for a visually inventive sci-fantasy comic or movie, but when you put that kind of story into an existing "superhero universe" with tons of other superbeings, ancient god-like creatures etc., it's much harder to make it work, partly just because making the ancient wise demigods wear brightly coloured pleather armour and spandex jumpsuits potentially devalues the concept, but also because it feels weird to have such a weighty concept be just another facet of an already crowded universe. The Eternals' role in human history suggests that they should either be the most important "superhero team" on Earth, or antagonists to the upstart young modern "superheroes" with their own ideas about how things should be, or mentor figures or similar. Having them be just kind of adjacent doing their own thing and rarely if ever interacting with all the other world-shaking stuff going on makes them feel like an afterthought. More briefly - If you want the human-shaped demigod servants of a race of space-gods, who've lived among humans for thousands of years and shaped human history, to come across as an epic awe-inspiring concept, then maybe don't drop them into a universe which already has an ancient order of dimension-hopping sorcerers, Norse gods jumping through wormholes, technology which eats known physics for lunch, and a Malthusian lunatic who killed half the population of the universe with a cosmic space bling glove and nearly destroyed it totally.
Seems they were made far too human. If they had been wise, even inscrutable intelligences, maybe like variations of Dr. Manhattan, really re-imagined deeply as ancient cosmic beings, it might have been an interesting movie.
I feel that the Celestials and Eternals stuff is so weighty as you say that’s it almost has undercut everything else that’s occurred in the MCU. The movie and characters didn’t earn that level of importance with the audience or story. The film feels so detached from the MCU whilst simultaneously now being a huge huge part of it. Just felt forced and rushed. Worst thing was the characters and plot just felt like they were saying they were above everything else in the MCU and that everything is secondary to them and the celestials now.
The trailer for this film was very clever. The trailer was so bad, it lowered my expectations to such an extent that i came out of the film thinking, "well that was better than i expected".
Is it possible that the ticking of all the boxes is one of the problems. It seems that film makers are getting lazier, in that once all the boxes are ticked they feel that's job done and relax so the rest of the movie suffers as a consequence.
Oh they will. Just wait till they bring in the X-Men. I can wait, but for all the movies that already exist about them, many fans are so impatient to see the future MCU version.
I'm tired of a lot of the MCU myself, but to be fair, they are doing that with Spider-Man: No Way Home. People are losing their minds over that. Otherwise this year though, Eternals and Black Widow were mediocre. Haven't seen Shang-Chi but that's supposed to be solid. I think people will be invested in Thor: Love and Thunder, Guardians Of The Galaxy 3, Doctor Strange 2 and Black Panther 2.
@@nick1635 I agree that Fox ran X-Men into the ground. I hope Marvel takes their sweet time to introduce them. Like I said *I* can wait. Others are way too eager to start it all over again. I think Feige is smart enough to play the long game. Marvel Studios can only make movies or shows based on their comics so they *have* to make each project as distinct as possible without oversaturating us. It seems they already passed that point with Kermode but definitely not with millions of others.
@@idakev I'm tired of Spider-man. By the end of this year Holland will have appeared in 6 movies within 6 years. Add that to the other versions with Maguire and Garfield and we've had 11 movies in 21 years. Approximately every 2 years another Spider-man appearance. I am tired. However based on the internet hype plenty of people are living for the next movie.
People who have been following the film's production have noted, since pretty much the beginning, the oddness of taking on board Chloe Zhao as a director for a project that seems to play to none of her creative strengths - dynamic action sequences, characters painted in broad brushstrokes, and big complicated sets and effects work are just not things you see on her resume. The "wokeness" isn't the problem - everyone working on this film has delivered compelling entertainment with the right material. It seems to be that the heads in charge of Marvel, not really having a clue as to how to approach a story this big in scope and existential import, decided to pick an auteur on the grounds that she'd invent the approach for them - regardless of whether or not she was the right fit for the project.
lol have you been asleep the last 12 years? The MCU's MO is to hire up and comers and boss them around so that every film feels the same despite having some genuinely talented directors on board. The only exceptions are GOTG 2 and maybe Ragnarok.
@@popculture70 Corporations, particularly ones that large, don't choose directors "just to be diverse". Yes it's a marketing boon, but on some level they calculated Zhao's intimate and sincere filmmaking style would benefit a family story like Eternals. Ryan Coogler also had no directorial experience with big-budget adventure films and Black Panther was wildly successful; Branagh has lots of experience directing actors in theatrically-styled performances of flowery language and Thor was a dud. Taika Waititi was an indie filmmaker and Thor: Ragnarok is widely beloved; the Russo brothers were known primarily for their comedic work before coming out with The Winter Soldier. The MCU has a long history of taking small gambles with their directors and the successes and failures don't always occur where you'd expect. Zhao was another gamble and the most plausible reason for it not working out is that the studio bit off more than they could chew, and the scope of the script outweighed Zhao's ability to rein in the difficult bits. Joss Whedon is arguably the director most responsible for the MCU's explosion of popularity and its current house style and even he fell victim to the exact same thing when the studio handed him an overstuffed brief for Age of Ultron.
Worse, it's the kind of film where you think other filmmaker would do a much better job. The problem is, that other filmmaker is Zack Snyder. Seriously.
marvel fans on Bonfire Night 2021: You don't know how long I've been waiting for this film. mark kermode fans on Bonfire Night 2021: You don't know how long I've been waiting for this review.
Just seen it and I'm glad I did, I went in with low expectations after the rather naff looking trailers and Mark's review. I disagree with Mark on this one, this is one of Marvel's better MCU movies and one I won't have forgotten about in a couple of days. Every other week the world is ending in the MCU but this looked and felt much grander. I really liked the flash backs through time, the entire cast some got to shine more than others that you wished had more screen time but it's understandable the movie is long enough. Cinematography was stunning, a pleasant surprise for me especially when Mark complained it was SFX on top of SFX I didn't feel like that at all. Marvel splashed out big on this movie and it didn't look like CGI teams ran out of time, everything was so well polished (I was particularly impressed how realistic the CGI was done in the forest night battle). Does Angelina Jolie age, she might actually be a vampire! BTW there are 2 post credit scenes!
"I was particularly impressed how realistic the CGI was done in the forest night battle" Not to take anything away from your enjoyment of the movie, but for me that's the problem with a lot of modern blockbusters (Superhero movies, Jurassic World etc). When I'm watching those I'm thinking "that's some well done cgi", rather than being absorbed into the world. Watching, say, Lord of the Rings I never once thought about the effects, I was so swept up in the story, so invested in the world. Now blockbusters feel more like effects demos rather than engaging stories. But maybe that's just me.
I enjoyed it too. But i think they could’ve done without the deviant at the end, he was kind of superfluous. The inner conflict among the Eternals was enough.
I have to say this is the first MCU film I've actively disliked. It managed to tick a lot of my NOPE boxes all at once, mainly the ancient aliens interfering/being responsible for human development thing. Thor managed it well by only implying the Asgardians visited and maybe battled on Midgard. Here, these goons are directly responsible not only for protecting people from these Deviants, but also for providing some technological advancements. I *loathe* those types of stories as I feel it diminishes our ancestors actual accomplishments. Now,it is possible to make such a story that will entertain me, but it has to have strong characters, and I found myself not caring about these people at all, even forgetting which ones were in certain scenes. It also begged the question of where Doctor Strange and co were. You mean the 10 Rings can get their attention, but a global earthquake and suddenly appearing island doesn't warrant a look? There were parts I liked, such a the inclusiveness. It was just there, and not made a preaching talking point. It trusted it's audience to grasp that. It just kind of had that huge hill to climb and ended up sliding down to the bottom.
Eternals could have worked. But they made the WB/DC mistake in trying to do too much in one film. In the end, you have 10 “heroes” that no one really cares about. What marvel SHOULD have done is started this out as a Disney Plus series culminating into a film called The Eternals. You have 10 heroes in the story. There is no way you can adequately tell the stories of all of these heroes and make you care about them. At the end of this mess of a film, I didn’t care about any of them.
Joss Whedon's Justice League also had too many characters, a clunky plot, boring CGI and a dull bad CGI villain. Eternals seems to be Marvel's counterpart. A shame they didn't start out with just a couple of the characters, or doing Eternals as a fully fledged streaming series instead where you have 8-10 hours to play with.
To me it kind of felt like an origin story and a more ambitious sequel squashed into a single movie. The fact there were two almost completely separate conflicts going on really bogged the movie down. When the main Deviant showed up at the end, I couldn't work out how he got there or why he was there at all, other than 'because the movie was about to end'. I think this could have been really good if there was one main Eternal less to get to know and the whole thing got cut down by 30-40 minutes.
Zero desire to watch this movie. I think everyone besides Marvel fanboys completely checked out consciously or subconsciously the moment where they killed Robert Downey Jr's Iron Man. That was a ten year arc brought to a perfect close. It felt like the perfect ending. Even as an MCU fan I think I just zoned out from the franchise when Endgame finished and Tony Stark was laid to rest. I honestly think that was the end for a lot of people whether they know it or want to admit it or not. Everything post Endgame has felt like nothing more than DVD bonus content that only avid fans are interested in. The movie is over. Disney are now trying desperately to resuscitate a franchise because they thought they could perform a heart transplant by replacing Downey Jr as the heart of the franchise. I think they're now starting to realise their mistake. I think the smartest thing they could have done was rest the franchise and work on the new big hitters like Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, X-Men and Fantastic Four. People are burned out with relentless teases and post credits sequences teasing the next product on the conveyor belt. If you were to tease anybody coming in after Thanos, you need to tease a known heavyweight like Dr Doom, not Kang the Conqueror.
I just don't understand the continued obsession with the mcu. I understand there will be a core fanbase that will love it regardless but this pop culture trend where everyone must see the latest superhero movie is just weird. The stories arent even that good and like Kermode said are we not bored of this universe by now?
I dont like to say it but i have to disagree with Mark. Thought it was great. I couldnt believe how well they did the story with so many characters and story points to get through and it was done very clearly. Great plot twists and amazingly well acted. Loved it.
Thank you! There were so many positives about this movie and for Mark not to acknowledge any of them is very disappointing. I saw it on Thursday and I'm still thinking about it today! It was so beautifully shot and acted. And for MCU fans, it opens up an amazing new world with so many possibilities. I'm excited to see where it all leads!
The real problem is that the critic community is poised to turn on the Marvel movies, it’s part of their natural cycle of how they like things and then decide they don’t like things. So this movie comes out which is well-made and entertaining and the critics are trying to find a way to complain about it.
Opinions are fine and all, but I don't think it's valid to complain about the fact that this universe is continuing. As of right now, the MCU remains an exercise in experimental cinema/media. Really only comic books and maybe Star Wars/Trek have had this degree of world-building and interconnectness in any form of entertainment. I think the experiment should continue until audiences actually stop turning out for it.
Honestly was invested the whole way through and felt they characterised this huge ensemble really well, to the point where none of them felt like a waste. Considering these are unknowns with no background to them, I felt more comraderie and familiarity with them as a whole than the Avengers.
This is a really weird one. I was really looking forward to the mix between an indie director like Zhao, and the styles of the MCU, but that hasn't worked as well as I had hoped. Still, its a very admirable, and I have a lot of respect for its ambition, and very much appreciate that its heart is entirely in the right place. With the upmost respect for Kermode as a reviewer, I think he was a little harsher on the film than it deserved. With films like Venom 2 being released as Mindless noise, I did appreciate this one trying something really different and unlike anything before. Does that automatically make it good? No. But, for me, there was enough to make me want more like this and more of this universe...
I like that you pointed out it's heart and ambition. The effort put into this film is awe inspiring. Looking back on it, I am most impressed with it's artistry
Probably why Edgar Wright left Ant-man. Because no matter how interesting the director attached to the MCU project is, you can still feel the studio putting up bumper bars at every turn
What is most annoying is filmmakers claiming their film is performing poorly is down to anti this that and the other as opposed to the fact that the film they made is complete garbage
Thanks Mark - I actually had almost zero intention anyway of seeing this, because nothing after 'Avengers: Endgame' made me want to be excited about the MCU any more. This review clinched it.
Endgame should've been the end of MCU, but these movies make too much money, so MCU will continue until there would be a string of something like 10 movies that will lose money. Then they'll just reboot it.
Have you seen WandaVision (realise that’s a Disney+ show and not a movie). Personally it’s one of my favourite MCU pieces, and possibly even one of my favourite TV shows. Very interesting and clever.
I am not here to "pick a fight" everyone is entitled to their own opinions but I will say that I quite enjoyed the film, it's not perfect nor the best of Marvel but comparing to their latest releases I found myself enjoying it more than Shang-Chi (was more bored with the final battle there, his conflict with his dad to me was the best thing of the movie) and found it a lot better than Black Widow (which I found it ok, but pretty bland)
Shang Chi for me was looking like one of the finer entries in the MCU until the final battle. Here was a movie with a likable lead, a great, relatable villain, fun, dynamic action set pieces truly unique amibg what we get usually form Marvel, a very clear thematic through-line... And then a fucking cgi giant demon and a cgi dragon and a million chi flying squids. Whyyyyyy? This is a movie about a father and son relationship (or a broader family drama when you expand to the mother and sister). Why throw that away and then ten minutes of that shit? Not only did it immediately drop my rating from a 9 to a 6, it genuinely gave me a headache. Eternals on the other hand saw me going in with very low expectations and while it had a few bright moments, it was generally monotonous, though never really bad. So it never got over the 5/6 rating all through its running time and the ending was neither worse nor better than the rest. So I suppose my disappointment with the finale of Shang Chi made me view that movie far less favourably than the steady blandness of Eternals. As for Black Widow... Ya, that was a similar kind of bland, but with more action and a shorter running time. It also looked worse. But I dunno, I'm genuinely scratching my head at this year's superhero movies. DC delivered what I feel was the best one, with the suicide squad, but thanks to WB fucking up their release strategy this year, and thanks to the first one being a steaming pile of shit, not as many people saw it as it deserved. Then we have the instantly forgettable Black Widow, getting decent reviews. Then Shang Chi with outright overwhelming praise. And then Venom 2, which I genuinely found damn near unwatchable, a true torturous experience on a par with the Halle Berry Catwoman or the 2015 Fantastic Four, and that still somehow got ok reviews, far better than the first (admittedly stupid, but somehow more coherent) movie. At least in that one Hardy seemed to be having fun. In this he just seemed on drugs. So after those movies receiving good to great receptions, while I found them to be terrible at worst, watchable but disappointing at best, I was genuinely fearing for Eternals. If this one is getting such bad reviews, how horrible is it? But... It's not. It's just a big giant shrug.
Good review, although I think critics need to be very careful about "wanting to cheer on" individual projects just because they are inclusive and/or have a diverse cast and crew. On a macro level, I absolutely want Hollywood aswell as other media producing places to become more diverse and for work places around the world to be as inclusive as possible - that is certainly an admirable goal. It would not change my criticisms of an individual piece of media, though - in either direction. Contrary to some beliefs, Black Panther was a pretty good super hero movie and neither the greatest movie ever nor "terrible propaganda" because the plot and motivations of the characters made sense and were easy to follow and some of its ideas and environments were pretty neat - not because of the skin color of the actors or characters. It was certainly commendable to make a Black Panther movie and to (rightfully) have a large cast of dark-skinned actors, but it wouldn't have shielded the movie if the acting, script, direction etc. had been terrible, nor does it shield the movie from critics pointing out that some of the CGI was really shoddy.
The reaction to this movie is much more interesting than the movie itself. And I'm saying that as someone who liked the movie. I think it's the best movie they've released since the last Spider-Man.
Isn’t hating on a movie for being ‘woke’ not the same energy as praising a movie for being ‘impressively diverse’? It’s two sides of a coin of the same coin. Neither of which have anything to do with making a great movie.
I stopped at X-Men 2, from 2003. I haven't watched another superhero movie. Please God we pray that people stop making superhero movies, they are beyond redemption.
watch and decide for yourself. It's not as bad as critics say it is, they're just bitter that Dune underperformed. It's not "the worst MCU movie" that the haters are saying.
ETERNALS This is the new Marvel movie directed by Chloe Zhao and has an all star cast including Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Angelina Jolie and Barry Keoghan among others. They play "The Eternals" a group of immortal beings who have lived among humans for thousands of years and have been forced to re-unite to protect the earth from the evil alien species known as the Deviants. This movie represents a new chapter in the Marvel universe and is set after the major battles of the Avengers vs Thanos. The Eternals are instructed not to get involved in any human conflict unless Deviants are involved. They are a fresh new set of superheroes to continue the MCU. This film has divided opinion among critics but for me there were actually more positives than negatives. Chloe Zhao has gone from directing "Nomadland" to directing a Marvel movie which is quite a leap across genres. But she's done a good job. The cinematography and filmmaking style with a lot of background and scenery is one unique to her. And she has brought a slight indie vibe to the MCU. There was also of good humour and gaffs brought to this in particular from Kumail Nanjiani. The only real negative that stood out was the battle scenes as good as they were, were a bit samey and wasn't really anything new compared with earlier Marvel films. That said, it had enough depth and character development coupled with good humour and good visuals that it is worth a watch. I wouldn't say the same level as the better Avenger films but decent and I would watch the sequel. 7/10
Also, if you set unrealistic diversity quotas for your hiring, you'll end up having to hire people who are under-qualified, and your product will be bad. I'm all for diverse hiring practices, but the targets have to be realistic.
The avengers aren't the be all and end all of the MCU the only people who are maybe getting bored are non comic book fans who don't really get that the world built extends way past what's been presented so far
I get the point from Kermode the truth is that, Eternals does no fulfill its possibilities…. It could be much more compelling and connected to everything we saw before… the lore is rich, the Ancient Alien wave is strong, but they refuse to embrace it…
Sometimes I think people forget that corporate decisions are based ENTIRELY on the pursuit of profit. Whether or not we are 'tired' of the MCU is 100% dependent on if the beancounters say we are tired. The quality of originality of a movie is inconsequential from the view of the people financing it.
This confirmed literally all the thoughts I had seeing the trailer. I seriously don't care about the MCU movies anymore. Endgame was the end of it all for me, I wanna see new and original things. It would take something big to get me to watch another marvel movie now
Multiverse of Madness doesn't even sound a little intriguing to you? How bout Guardians 3? Or Black Panther what they do following the passing of Chadwick Boseman?
They have a huge legacy to carry forward after endgame in an original way. Eternals was a bad pea in the pod but introduces some interesting ideas. But watching shang-chi and what-if? Really gives me hope there's still a real spark coming from endgame into phase 4.
i think a big problem is having them be "GODS".... fans arent interested in gods, its an unreachable fantasy...besides you know they'll win in the end because they are gods. superheroes are at least a bit relatable, they are human with character traits and emotions.
Production line is a great way to describe a lot of these Marvel Movies. The worst thing about these movies is that there is no sense of who Directed it. The actors feel like a production line items use to fill a gap to meet another Financial target. I’m saying this as I did tear up by the end of End game.
As a marvel comics fan and someone who has read the source material, this film delivers more than a number of other marvel movies. The only issue i had with it was the incredibly long running time... They tried to fit to much character history into the film and that's why people think it's boring. Other than that i really enjoyed the movie, loved the characters and even enjoyed the acting and the story.....but, it was just to damn long.
It's not even close to being the most boring Marvel movie; in fact I give it a lot of points for making you care about the characters (most of them anyway) as much as it did
I don’t think the team behind this didn’t pull their weight.. it looks like they actually worked hard on it. But I’d DOES look like they didn’t understand the science project to begin with lol. I wonder if Chloe zhao has even watched the rest of the movies to understand what she was working with. Oh well, hopefully Disney will make sure of that going forward when they hire new directors
Spot on. A few nice touches here and there but it’s the first Marvel movie that’s had me checking my watch. Pretty in places with a few cool ideas but otherwise dull.
I'm fairly soft on marvel movies as i give them the benefit of the doubt due to the overall series value. However this one really did little for me,i am not sure who it is for or what it is trying to do.
Stories should be paramount, art should be paramount, when you prioritise representation, diversity etc over telling a good story people can feel it when they watch it. Two great examples of brilliant and beautiful films with limited to no "diversity" are 12 angry men and moonlight, both have pretty much a homogeneous cast but both are great emotive pieces of cinema. It is great to see a range of different people in movies representing different ideas, cultures etc, but the story/journey must always come first, otherwise people will justifiably think that the priority was the so called diversity.
I really wasn’t interested in seeing it, went with my three teenagers and I really enjoyed it, it was all over the place but the time periods and special effects were good I thought and I liked it overall. It was a lot better than justice league so I had low expectations and was pleasantly surprised and wasn’t bored.
Totally agree, after Shang-chi , which was a breath of fresh air. Saw it last night and, told wife, we could go if she wanted about an hour in. With the pre screening could no-one be honest enough to say it was bad. The bloke who played Raj, the shop keeper in the David Walliams tv stories was the best thing in the film.What topped it all off was when Harry styles came on at the end as a super hero. That was Marvel saying we can give u any old crap and you'll happily watch it. Sad really.
Very well put. The "woke" part didn't annoy me at all...it was just so boring. It has some decent scenes...but it was just sooo boring. I had to go grab a beer after the first hour to make it more fun. Was in the right company so we had some good laughs by doing live commentary
I'm not sure what's so pioneering about this. Most of the Marvel films of recent years have had a diverse cast. I'm all for that. But when you push the diversity of your characters beyond even the diversity of the world population itself, it just starts to look like self-righteous tokenism. And it doesn't make the story better.
I personally quite enjoyed it. Wouldn’t say it was the best MCU film, but I was interested in all the characters and I was personally into the big issues being more to do with an ethical dilemma than an obvious big baddie. I totally get the argument for doing it as a 6-part tv show and slowly introducing the characters
I saw the huge cast and honestly just thought... maybe should be a tv series. got the vibes from the trailer, the reviews... seems like a lot to put into one film. the other films had a huge cast but the majority had been set up at that point.
Eternals certainly plays to the more “involved” part of the MCU fan-base and it won’t appeal to everyone. But I must I didn’t find it boring (and neither did my kids) and whilst, I agree with Dr K on the special effects and the narrative structure, I was engaged in the story right through to the end. Lots of comparisons being made to Dune, which is understandable if a little misguided. What I will say is that whilst I appreciated and respected Dune, I enjoyed Eternals more. Dune is a marvellously made monotonous doom portent, but there is no variation in tone throughout the film (one, maybe two moments of levity). Eternals is messy and illogical, but it never really pretends to be anything else.
chloe zhao is not a great film maker, nomadlands was just ordinary and overrated, why on earth would she be qualified to make an action adventure super hero film?
Making a film diverse and making every character able to fly shooting lasers out of their hands and eyes doesn’t make it entertaining. He’s right it’s starting getting a bit tiresome should of left it at endgame instead of carrying and trying to milk it for every penny they can get. Now we have the pound shop avengers
From very early in the MCU they built up Thanos, and then what comes after Thanos? They've done very little to keep people who aren't the obsessives interested. Pretty much the only thing they did to build up post-Endgame was introduce Spiderman relatively early in the previous cycle - the one character they had who was a guaranteed instant hit anyway. Guardians and Thor will still be interesting, but they're kind of a detached comedy troupe rather than being as connected as the original set of characters were.
I saw it today, it's important to expand the MCU but really this is too much about too many romantic relationships between characters that have not been introduced properly prior to this so we don't have any investment in them yet to care about their personal relationships, ultimately we get a lot of slow moving personal scenes alternating with fights with monsters. They could have focused more on the structure of the historical sequences but they are just dropped in, I think the film tries to be too many different things that re unconnected to each other and really would have been better served as a TV series.
I agree with most of the points, especially how it feels mechanical in a way that all the characters just say what happened and what needs to happen exactly, theres not much life to each indivudal Eternal. But the idea of the MCU being boring and done, seems to be coming from a place of distaste for the genre and looking down on them as a whole.
I think there's an appetite for more self-contained stories, and the MCU is quite old now. Endgame felt like an ending just like No Time To Die was an end for the Daniel Craig era, but this movie universe keeps going. The MCU raised the stakes so high that some people also aren't sure whether it's worth being invested anymore. Spider-Man: No Way Home will bring a lot of people back in though.
Hands Down!! Eternals is the worst MCU movie, it makes Thor the Dark World & Iron Man 2 & 3 look like Masterpieces in Comparison. Eternals was an extreme BOREFEST!!! 😔😔😔
I really, really liked this movie! (But I am pretty invested in the MCU at this point…) I don’t think it strayed that far from ”the formula”, but I did enjoy that many of the main characters felt less clear cut and more morally ambivalent than heroes in previous entries. Yes, it was a lot of talking - but I was quite gripped by it! And I do actually think it handled the big cast surprisingly well.
In my opinion the film wasn't boring, sure it wasn't the best Marvel film ever but compared to Black Widow I found it more enjoyable and liked the characters better, even with a huge bias to Florence Pugh.
I'm not clear why Kermode considered it so 'brave' and 'adventurous' just to add a splash of diversity to a movie, in 2021. This is a comic-book movie, the key demographic is teens and young adults up to the age of 40ish - Precisely the cohort of people amongst western moviegoers who aren't going to bat an eyelid. Oooh, a gay kiss! _So brave_ ! Moonlight was a brave movie. Brokeback Mountain was a brave movie. Marvel embracing diversity to sell tickets is just woke capitalism - The equivalent of slapping a pride flag on a jumbo jet. Marvel will happily allow authorities in other world markets to censor anything they consider contentious, anyway.
Here's the thing: I grew up in the 70s and 80s. I didn't read many superhero comics, a couple here and there, not a lot. But I had friends who did. I knew who Captain America is, Iron Man, Spider Man, Wolverine and the X-Men, Hulk, etc... I have never heard of the Eternals, maybe once, I don't recall. The Deviants? No clue. To me they were made up last month and are still pretty obscure. Don't particularly care. Why is this a big-time movie? Shouldn't these characters have been introduced in smaller way? Perhaps on a TV series? Maybe have an X-men movie where Xavier learns about them, or meets one? Just about anything would have been better. Learning what one or two super heroes and villains can do is enough. Learning about a half dozen at one time, plus villains...? Mehhhh.
The double whammy of Infinity War and Endgame was such a natural ending it's just so hard to care anymore.
Couldn't agree more. Honestly, with the exception of the new spider man film, I'm not as excited for the upcoming phase 4 films as much as I was for the films in the Infinity Saga. I honestly wanted the MCU to end with Endgame because it managed to deliver a solid ending to a decade's worth of world building and character development. How could you possibly top that?
I'll still most likely see the other films, but not with the emotional investment that I had in the franchise back then.
Comments above nailed it
Marvel should just focus on the individual heroes from the MCU going forward. The new Spider-Man project sounds like a lot of fun. And the Black Panther, Thor and Guardians of the Galaxy sequels could well turn out to be satisfying follow-ups. Trying to do another Endgame-type build-up scenario is the wrong approach.
Exactly. For me, Infinity War was the peak of the MCU, and everything after just has a less-than quality to them. I enjoyed WandaVision and Loki and am looking forward to Moon Knight and feel that format may be where Marvel's strengths are now.
Mark: (Explains plot) "Got it?"
Simon: "No!"
Their banter kills me 🤣
The problem I find these days is that fandom is completely out of control and I think the internet has partly played a roll in this. A large portion of mcu fans care more about their favourite thing being successful and therefore will say it's amazing no matter how bad it is and will support it no matter what.
There will always be a portion of any fan base that loves it no matter what. Even if they don’t think it’s as good as others from that series.
Also on the other end of the spectrum there are those who review bomb rotten tomatoes and IMDb in order to try and control the perception of how ‘objectively’ bad something is.
It’s actually spectacular!
You might want to actually watch it!!
I am admittedly a huge Marvel fan and thought the movie was fine. It wasn't as good as some Marvel movies, it wasn't as bad as others. I hope people enjoy it.
For the most part, that is true.... but this one does try something new, and deserves a bit of credit
Exactly lol, I like some mcu films but I’m ready to admit when a lot of their stuff is terrible, especially recently.. a lot of fans just blindly defend marvel with their lives
Here's how I see it;
Marvel movies are burgers. Some of these burgers are amazing, most good, a few bad but they are ALL burgers. If you're force fed burgers long enough then it doesn't matter how good or bad it is. You're still sick of them.
100%. Shang Chi was one of the most boring movies I've ever seen.
The big CGI fight at the climax is getting SO repetitive. It's so obvious that Shang Chi should have ended with a fight where his Dad doesn't have the Rings and it's just a pure grounded martial arts fight not some big CGI nonsense.
lol none of the burgers are amazing. Maybe three of them are really well directed and genuinely good films that will stand the test of time, and three is being generous.
@@burner9481 Yeah, if Shang Chi would have been more grounded it would've been a lot better. The whole family dinamic subplot was one of the most interesting narrative choices in the MCU but it was sadly wasted by the whole CGI fest. First half is very fun to be honest, second half is awful. I went in expecting something bad as usual and it almost won me over, but Marvel just can't chill for once, it's always the fate of the world and universe at stake or nothing.
Some of you act like you're physically forced to watch the movie at gunpoint. If you don't like it just stop watching.
@@nectarinedreams7208 how good is any burger compared to steak?
I think part of the problem is the escalation of superhero power they are falling into. It all started with characters like Ironman and Cap. Real people with issues and vulnerabilities that we could relate to. Now they are all over powered invincible space beings.
The reason why batman is so popular of late compared to superman.
I agree with this.
If characters are too powerful wheres the real conflict?
Interpersonal conflict is what makes people watch movies, especially multiple times...
That’s a very good point, and part of the reason why they had to sideline Captain Marvel for most of Endgame.
You _can_ write interesting stories that revolve around ultra-powerful characters such as Superman, but the problems arise when they have to inhabit the same universe as a hundred other characters and you end up with a massive power imbalance that you’ve got to write around.
But it's a comic book franchise. Anything is possible.
I was more interested in seeing your review than seeing the movie after seeing the trailer!
Agree
@@aikighost you need to go in for the post credit scene of Eternals then….😉
@@aikighostYep! I am curious to see what they come up with. I don't really want a beat for beat retread of the original tho or an excess CGI fest!
Agreed. The trailer didn't sell the movie at all. Turns out there was nothing to sell and the movie is just boring pointless green-screen cape nonsense.
“Are we all not tired of this universe now?” Absolutely nail on head. This is a prime example of the law of diminishing returns. Enough, Disney.
They should have taken a 5 year hiatus after Endgame. The timing ended up being perfect too with the whole Covid debacle. I liked Shang Chi, but that one didn't connect to the other movies really. Could have taken place at any time.
@@JorgeM270 well that’s not true one of its major characters was in Iron man 3 in 2013… and I guess you didn’t stay until the post credits screen
Not now...ten years ago.
@@JorgeM270 you can tell that both of you are not marvel fans
Nooo, phase 12 ftw! *Disney rubs hands while the world laps it all up*
Fighting deviants? Where were they when Jimmy saville was mooching about
Lmao
Damn!!!
Omg 🤣
Here is the issue... we all... most of us... want diverse, inclusive casts as we go forward
But if that is pushed as a selling point and attached to mediocre to poor scripts or stories, then the cause of diversity and inclusion suffers by association
we need good storied that everyone can enjoy, with diverse cast and crew
Well said! And its not just about studios putting diversity in front of the screen. inclusive groups need to be in the writing room developing scripts and making key decisions too!
@@passiveagressive4983 exactly and it has to be done right no white washing or black washing
Marvel is trying to reestablish a whole new phase and it’s just a bit rushed. This film literally rushes through thousands of years of content, we don’t care about these characters or their critical role in the MCU because we’ve only just met them. I really agree that a tv series would have been a better path for this franchise
Thats a bummer.
@@oezibanana8664 it's a fun time, it's not the most significant MCU films nor does it have to be.
what if we are not supposed to care as much the movie is one in many to come
Yeah seemed to me that they made a film that DC tried and failed with justice league and suicide squad. Haven't seen either so i'm saying from an outside view
@@bayoolatunji3996 you'd surely want the introduction to the characters being the most engaging then?
When the films first started coming out, they were refreshing to consume over the comics because the comics had gone on for so long, become so bloated, and have all this continuity baggage that you would get scared off from jumping in. That on top of the stakes having been flattened by Galactus/whoever killing everyone only for them to come back anyway 100 times by then.
The films have run on so long that that's where we're at now too. I think the smarter thing to do is just forget continuity, get creative with the genres, and allow more freedom to take characters places without this long shadow of Thanos and Iron Man and the previous 20 films hanging over them.
But they are interconnected. That's the whole point of the MCU.
@@anthonymartensen3164 yeah but they were interconnected for ten years weaving a storyline that culminatted in endgame. and that was a hell of a satisfying end to it all. mcu could end there and people would be satisfied. everything so far has felt aimless, they are teasing stuff, but its all vague and ultimately it fails to create hype. there is no direction. remember iron man 1 started all this with a huge tease, avengers, and after that it kept building on that and it kept momentum. after endgame things came to a halt, and marvel seems to struggle to start the engine again, despite continuing delivering entertaining shows and movies.
@@anthonymartensen3164 Yeah I think best thing to do is have then all interconnected but also have separate little storylines so it doesn't become overwhelming and saving the hugely connected stuff for the avengers movies. Which is what they're doing.
I mean, yeah, the smarter thing from an artistic standpoint would be to admit now that the grand overarching master plan was always about 10 films too long and stop producing increasingly uninspired bilge, but I'm confident they'll squeeze every last penny out of this thing.
This is a great point I hadn't considered. The interconnectedness is great when it all adds to one big epic story, but at a certain point it just becomes bloat.
The most interesting part of these films is never the stuff that makes them the same and connected, but the stuff that makes them different. The interesting part of Thor is the norse mythology stuff. The interesting part of Hulk is all the cold war nuclear weapons analogy. Instead of another shared universe wise cracking Thor movie, why not make a trilogy of wagnerian norse mythology movies that is it's own thing? It's the same thing with Eternals - they should have had a smaller group of characters and focused on the Highlander / Interview With Vampire esque idea of immortal beings living through history, and ignored the generic comic book stuff.
My review of Eternals: Wait to watch this on a streaming service one Sunday afternoon... or not. You’re missing nothing.
My advice: Go see Dune instead.
Dune is a bore. 2 hours+ of dreaming with just Paul stabbing one guy. Watch Eternals instead
@@budigunawan5624 nope. Dune is stunning. Eternals is a boring mess. Should have started out as a Disney plus series culminating into a film. They made the DC mistake of trying to stuff too much in one movie. At the end, I didn’t care at all.
Finally Eternals have ALWAYS had this problem - even the comics for the most part don’t care about the eternals.
@@budigunawan5624 neither sound especially inspiring both could be watched via streaming
B1001, have you seen the movie? Is this guy on point with it being bland all the way through? Just curious
Should have been a one-off 4 to 6 episode D+ Ltd Series that led into a future movie (like WandaVision) especially as the writers/director have confirmed they initially had 12 Eternals in the first draft let alone the villains & the world-building to develop! The very end credit scene should have made it more explicit who the 'cameo' was!
Hope the very mixed reviews don't put off Feige/MCU taking future big swings - just hope they choose the right medium to tell those stories effectively!
They tried with The Inhumans, it's easily the worst thing in the MCU.
or you know maybe it could just have not been anything? every c list marvel character of the silver and bronze age doesn't need a live media adaption, controversial opinion now days I know.
But this is a really epic tale that the film basically says that created modern days' mythology. I think it is more fitting to have a feature film. None of the D+ shows so far had the feel of a film.
I completely agree, that's exactly what I had been thinking too.
Every episode could have featured an Eternal and had that epi revolve around their story, starting with Sersei and the penultimate epi being about Ikarus (and revealing the twist that he had killed Ajak). Obviously not every Eternal would get a feature, but it would have given more room for context, world building, and character development (which I found was quite rushed what with them going around the world and back and forth through time).
The last episode is the final face off between characters we actually care about and the Celestial being born.
Just been to see this and I’m a massive marvel/sci fi fan. I rushed to see it, so I wouldn’t hear any reviews. But I was disappointed. It doesn’t help that I have been to see Dune twice and loved it. What Dune got right, this got wrong. You had wide sweeping shots, but they weren’t epic. The plot, well, I was think ‘what’ to myself a few times, some things just didn’t seem to work. Maybe a Disney plus show over 6 episodes might have helped.
I am curious to know what makes Dune different from this, I loved the hella out of Dune. Watched it twice in cinemas just because it was that good but what makes Eternals meh? Is it too much exposition? Cause Dune had exposition but on the second rewatch you realize how minimal that actually is and most of the run time is just seeing the scenery that Denis put into the world
@@2slowpoke929 IMO Dune is more interesting, both visually and story-wise. Eternals has a lot of typical MCU tropes despite being somewhat fresh in some aspects. There are also too many main characters of equal importance in this one, so 2.30 hours is just not enough to flesh out everything. In Dune, sure we have to learn about plenty of characters, but we really have to care about a few to make the plot work. I also felt that the pacing in Dune was more consistent.
Imagine even comparing this tripe to Villeneuve's Dune 🤣
Huh 🤔 I thought Dune was disappointed in Dune
I just watched it and I didn't get a 'what' feeling. Instead, I saw the MCU doing something different. I don't compare it to other movies but rather why so many people are going to see it, the movies before. And it was new and different than the other MCU movies.
Idk, I don't go out to see movies anymore. This was different when the MCU started getting formulaic. Not incredibly different, but much slower than any other MCU I can think of.
Problem is the MCU has rushed through so much material from the comics that they've lost a lot of interesting story arcs and development.
There's a constant reaching to go more epic to the point it's now completely overblown and disjointed. The threat level is manifested in a way that seems safe and predictable to the point it's become meaningless and boring.
They gave every big character pretty much their own film before they brought them together for the first Avengers film, back then they didn't rush into it.
How do you "rush" by spending 10 years barely scratching the surface?
Don't worry.. We all know that these films will all get remade over and over again
They didn't rush, of course if they covered everything that happens in the comics then there would need about 50 films just to cover the basics.
"Got it?" "No." Eternals in a nutshell.
Kermode & Mayo in a nutshell 😂
"Enough" sums up my feelings on the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The biggest issue for me was the 2 “leads” Gemma Chan and Richard Madden were the dullest leads in a marvel film yet. Both actors were given nothing to do for 2.5hrs and have zero charisma or chemistry on screen.
To reprise my comment on another UA-cam review of Eternals: It sounds like Eternals has the same problem as the comics on which it's based. The "ancient aliens"/"ancient astronauts" stuff with the Celestials and Eternals is a potentially fun idea for a visually inventive sci-fantasy comic or movie, but when you put that kind of story into an existing "superhero universe" with tons of other superbeings, ancient god-like creatures etc., it's much harder to make it work, partly just because making the ancient wise demigods wear brightly coloured pleather armour and spandex jumpsuits potentially devalues the concept, but also because it feels weird to have such a weighty concept be just another facet of an already crowded universe. The Eternals' role in human history suggests that they should either be the most important "superhero team" on Earth, or antagonists to the upstart young modern "superheroes" with their own ideas about how things should be, or mentor figures or similar. Having them be just kind of adjacent doing their own thing and rarely if ever interacting with all the other world-shaking stuff going on makes them feel like an afterthought.
More briefly - If you want the human-shaped demigod servants of a race of space-gods, who've lived among humans for thousands of years and shaped human history, to come across as an epic awe-inspiring concept, then maybe don't drop them into a universe which already has an ancient order of dimension-hopping sorcerers, Norse gods jumping through wormholes, technology which eats known physics for lunch, and a Malthusian lunatic who killed half the population of the universe with a cosmic space bling glove and nearly destroyed it totally.
Seems they were made far too human. If they had been wise, even inscrutable intelligences, maybe like variations of Dr. Manhattan, really re-imagined deeply as ancient cosmic beings, it might have been an interesting movie.
Yep, plus it's garbage which doesn't help.
I feel that the Celestials and Eternals stuff is so weighty as you say that’s it almost has undercut everything else that’s occurred in the MCU. The movie and characters didn’t earn that level of importance with the audience or story. The film feels so detached from the MCU whilst simultaneously now being a huge huge part of it. Just felt forced and rushed. Worst thing was the characters and plot just felt like they were saying they were above everything else in the MCU and that everything is secondary to them and the celestials now.
The trailer for this film was very clever. The trailer was so bad, it lowered my expectations to such an extent that i came out of the film thinking, "well that was better than i expected".
Is it possible that the ticking of all the boxes is one of the problems. It seems that film makers are getting lazier, in that once all the boxes are ticked they feel that's job done and relax so the rest of the movie suffers as a consequence.
I’ll honestly be pretty amazed if Marvel are able to capture the public imagination again like the Infinity War saga did.
Oh they will. Just wait till they bring in the X-Men. I can wait, but for all the movies that already exist about them, many fans are so impatient to see the future MCU version.
@@lastudentessa nah, the x-men have already been done to death too.
I'm tired of a lot of the MCU myself, but to be fair, they are doing that with Spider-Man: No Way Home. People are losing their minds over that. Otherwise this year though, Eternals and Black Widow were mediocre. Haven't seen Shang-Chi but that's supposed to be solid. I think people will be invested in Thor: Love and Thunder, Guardians Of The Galaxy 3, Doctor Strange 2 and Black Panther 2.
@@nick1635 I agree that Fox ran X-Men into the ground. I hope Marvel takes their sweet time to introduce them. Like I said *I* can wait. Others are way too eager to start it all over again. I think Feige is smart enough to play the long game. Marvel Studios can only make movies or shows based on their comics so they *have* to make each project as distinct as possible without oversaturating us. It seems they already passed that point with Kermode but definitely not with millions of others.
@@idakev I'm tired of Spider-man. By the end of this year Holland will have appeared in 6 movies within 6 years. Add that to the other versions with Maguire and Garfield and we've had 11 movies in 21 years. Approximately every 2 years another Spider-man appearance. I am tired. However based on the internet hype plenty of people are living for the next movie.
People who have been following the film's production have noted, since pretty much the beginning, the oddness of taking on board Chloe Zhao as a director for a project that seems to play to none of her creative strengths - dynamic action sequences, characters painted in broad brushstrokes, and big complicated sets and effects work are just not things you see on her resume.
The "wokeness" isn't the problem - everyone working on this film has delivered compelling entertainment with the right material. It seems to be that the heads in charge of Marvel, not really having a clue as to how to approach a story this big in scope and existential import, decided to pick an auteur on the grounds that she'd invent the approach for them - regardless of whether or not she was the right fit for the project.
Chloe Zhao ASKED to take this project. Bravo for her to try something new.
She managed to bring a fresh perspective to things with the film.
lol have you been asleep the last 12 years? The MCU's MO is to hire up and comers and boss them around so that every film feels the same despite having some genuinely talented directors on board. The only exceptions are GOTG 2 and maybe Ragnarok.
@@popculture70 Corporations, particularly ones that large, don't choose directors "just to be diverse". Yes it's a marketing boon, but on some level they calculated Zhao's intimate and sincere filmmaking style would benefit a family story like Eternals. Ryan Coogler also had no directorial experience with big-budget adventure films and Black Panther was wildly successful; Branagh has lots of experience directing actors in theatrically-styled performances of flowery language and Thor was a dud. Taika Waititi was an indie filmmaker and Thor: Ragnarok is widely beloved; the Russo brothers were known primarily for their comedic work before coming out with The Winter Soldier. The MCU has a long history of taking small gambles with their directors and the successes and failures don't always occur where you'd expect. Zhao was another gamble and the most plausible reason for it not working out is that the studio bit off more than they could chew, and the scope of the script outweighed Zhao's ability to rein in the difficult bits. Joss Whedon is arguably the director most responsible for the MCU's explosion of popularity and its current house style and even he fell victim to the exact same thing when the studio handed him an overstuffed brief for Age of Ultron.
@@anthonymartensen3164
Yes an action movie with dull action sequences..
Felt like a DC film to me. A sub-standard Avengers with characters you don't really know, telling jokes that aren't really funny.
Worse, it's the kind of film where you think other filmmaker would do a much better job. The problem is, that other filmmaker is Zack Snyder.
Seriously.
Yup. More on point than 5 paragraphs trying to explain how the movie is misunderstood.
Yeah since black widow the humor is bad, hope the spiderman no way home dont lose the quality
DC >>> Marvel
But DC is also knocking it out of the park recently. Mostly with the independent films. Looking forward to “The Batman” 🤙
marvel fans on Bonfire Night 2021: You don't know how long I've been waiting for this film.
mark kermode fans on Bonfire Night 2021: You don't know how long I've been waiting for this review.
The critical reaction has been fascinating. Savage.
Just seen it and I'm glad I did, I went in with low expectations after the rather naff looking trailers and Mark's review. I disagree with Mark on this one, this is one of Marvel's better MCU movies and one I won't have forgotten about in a couple of days. Every other week the world is ending in the MCU but this looked and felt much grander. I really liked the flash backs through time, the entire cast some got to shine more than others that you wished had more screen time but it's understandable the movie is long enough. Cinematography was stunning, a pleasant surprise for me especially when Mark complained it was SFX on top of SFX I didn't feel like that at all. Marvel splashed out big on this movie and it didn't look like CGI teams ran out of time, everything was so well polished (I was particularly impressed how realistic the CGI was done in the forest night battle).
Does Angelina Jolie age, she might actually be a vampire!
BTW there are 2 post credit scenes!
Completely agreed, I feel like the critics saw a different movie than I did.
Seen it yesterday and I liked it
"I was particularly impressed how realistic the CGI was done in the forest night battle" Not to take anything away from your enjoyment of the movie, but for me that's the problem with a lot of modern blockbusters (Superhero movies, Jurassic World etc). When I'm watching those I'm thinking "that's some well done cgi", rather than being absorbed into the world. Watching, say, Lord of the Rings I never once thought about the effects, I was so swept up in the story, so invested in the world. Now blockbusters feel more like effects demos rather than engaging stories. But maybe that's just me.
I enjoyed it too. But i think they could’ve done without the deviant at the end, he was kind of superfluous. The inner conflict among the Eternals was enough.
God I’m sick of marvel
I knew Mark was going to hate this; glorious.
Why is that glorious?
I have to say this is the first MCU film I've actively disliked. It managed to tick a lot of my NOPE boxes all at once, mainly the ancient aliens interfering/being responsible for human development thing. Thor managed it well by only implying the Asgardians visited and maybe battled on Midgard. Here, these goons are directly responsible not only for protecting people from these Deviants, but also for providing some technological advancements. I *loathe* those types of stories as I feel it diminishes our ancestors actual accomplishments.
Now,it is possible to make such a story that will entertain me, but it has to have strong characters, and I found myself not caring about these people at all, even forgetting which ones were in certain scenes.
It also begged the question of where Doctor Strange and co were. You mean the 10 Rings can get their attention, but a global earthquake and suddenly appearing island doesn't warrant a look?
There were parts I liked, such a the inclusiveness. It was just there, and not made a preaching talking point. It trusted it's audience to grasp that.
It just kind of had that huge hill to climb and ended up sliding down to the bottom.
Eternals could have worked. But they made the WB/DC mistake in trying to do too much in one film. In the end, you have 10 “heroes” that no one really cares about.
What marvel SHOULD have done is started this out as a Disney Plus series culminating into a film called The Eternals. You have 10 heroes in the story. There is no way you can adequately tell the stories of all of these heroes and make you care about them. At the end of this mess of a film, I didn’t care about any of them.
Joss Whedon's Justice League also had too many characters, a clunky plot, boring CGI and a dull bad CGI villain.
Eternals seems to be Marvel's counterpart. A shame they didn't start out with just a couple of the characters, or doing Eternals as a fully fledged streaming series instead where you have 8-10 hours to play with.
They should have just followed Neil Gaiman's Eternals graphic novel
To me it kind of felt like an origin story and a more ambitious sequel squashed into a single movie. The fact there were two almost completely separate conflicts going on really bogged the movie down. When the main Deviant showed up at the end, I couldn't work out how he got there or why he was there at all, other than 'because the movie was about to end'. I think this could have been really good if there was one main Eternal less to get to know and the whole thing got cut down by 30-40 minutes.
Zero desire to watch this movie. I think everyone besides Marvel fanboys completely checked out consciously or subconsciously the moment where they killed Robert Downey Jr's Iron Man. That was a ten year arc brought to a perfect close. It felt like the perfect ending.
Even as an MCU fan I think I just zoned out from the franchise when Endgame finished and Tony Stark was laid to rest. I honestly think that was the end for a lot of people whether they know it or want to admit it or not.
Everything post Endgame has felt like nothing more than DVD bonus content that only avid fans are interested in. The movie is over.
Disney are now trying desperately to resuscitate a franchise because they thought they could perform a heart transplant by replacing Downey Jr as the heart of the franchise. I think they're now starting to realise their mistake.
I think the smartest thing they could have done was rest the franchise and work on the new big hitters like Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, X-Men and Fantastic Four. People are burned out with relentless teases and post credits sequences teasing the next product on the conveyor belt. If you were to tease anybody coming in after Thanos, you need to tease a known heavyweight like Dr Doom, not Kang the Conqueror.
I just don't understand the continued obsession with the mcu. I understand there will be a core fanbase that will love it regardless but this pop culture trend where everyone must see the latest superhero movie is just weird. The stories arent even that good and like Kermode said are we not bored of this universe by now?
The reason it carries on is because there's still more that can be done. Simple as that. People are still interested in it.
This should off been a TV show, and still can be. With every episode dealing with 1-2 of them, and they cross each others paths.
No
exactly, IT'S BORING AS HELL, I mean there is no stakes, no emotions, nothing, actors are wooden, just bad. 3/10
OOf, that just preview clip was super rough.
I dont like to say it but i have to disagree with Mark. Thought it was great. I couldnt believe how well they did the story with so many characters and story points to get through and it was done very clearly. Great plot twists and amazingly well acted. Loved it.
Thank you! There were so many positives about this movie and for Mark not to acknowledge any of them is very disappointing. I saw it on Thursday and I'm still thinking about it today! It was so beautifully shot and acted. And for MCU fans, it opens up an amazing new world with so many possibilities. I'm excited to see where it all leads!
The real problem is that the critic community is poised to turn on the Marvel movies, it’s part of their natural cycle of how they like things and then decide they don’t like things. So this movie comes out which is well-made and entertaining and the critics are trying to find a way to complain about it.
Opinions are fine and all, but I don't think it's valid to complain about the fact that this universe is continuing. As of right now, the MCU remains an exercise in experimental cinema/media. Really only comic books and maybe Star Wars/Trek have had this degree of world-building and interconnectness in any form of entertainment. I think the experiment should continue until audiences actually stop turning out for it.
Honestly was invested the whole way through and felt they characterised this huge ensemble really well, to the point where none of them felt like a waste. Considering these are unknowns with no background to them, I felt more comraderie and familiarity with them as a whole than the Avengers.
Can they stop making films from comic books please. Some of us haven't picked up a comic book in their life.
Can they stop making films from novels please. Some of us don't read.
This is a really weird one. I was really looking forward to the mix between an indie director like Zhao, and the styles of the MCU, but that hasn't worked as well as I had hoped. Still, its a very admirable, and I have a lot of respect for its ambition, and very much appreciate that its heart is entirely in the right place. With the upmost respect for Kermode as a reviewer, I think he was a little harsher on the film than it deserved. With films like Venom 2 being released as Mindless noise, I did appreciate this one trying something really different and unlike anything before. Does that automatically make it good? No. But, for me, there was enough to make me want more like this and more of this universe...
I like that you pointed out it's heart and ambition. The effort put into this film is awe inspiring. Looking back on it, I am most impressed with it's artistry
Probably why Edgar Wright left Ant-man. Because no matter how interesting the director attached to the MCU project is, you can still feel the studio putting up bumper bars at every turn
It’s an awful film. He was correct in his analysis
"Should be great. But it isn't."
Sums up the film perfectly.
"You can object to the movie for whatever reason, but objecting to it because it's what you think as "woke" is nonsensical." Love that quote from Mark
Yep. It could literally be the best film in the world ever... But the lead is a female lesbian... so it has to be rubbish?!
I loved it, don't understand the negative criticism of it, Black Widow was alot worse and doesn't have anywhere near the same level of criticism.
What is most annoying is filmmakers claiming their film is performing poorly is down to anti this that and the other as opposed to the fact that the film they made is complete garbage
Thanks Mark - I actually had almost zero intention anyway of seeing this, because nothing after 'Avengers: Endgame' made me want to be excited about the MCU any more. This review clinched it.
It's an admirable film.... there are merits to it, even if it doesn't completely work
Endgame should've been the end of MCU, but these movies make too much money, so MCU will continue until there would be a string of something like 10 movies that will lose money. Then they'll just reboot it.
Have you seen WandaVision (realise that’s a Disney+ show and not a movie). Personally it’s one of my favourite MCU pieces, and possibly even one of my favourite TV shows. Very interesting and clever.
I am not here to "pick a fight" everyone is entitled to their own opinions but I will say that I quite enjoyed the film, it's not perfect nor the best of Marvel but comparing to their latest releases I found myself enjoying it more than Shang-Chi (was more bored with the final battle there, his conflict with his dad to me was the best thing of the movie) and found it a lot better than Black Widow (which I found it ok, but pretty bland)
Stating your opinion is not warranting a fight, you're allowed to enjoy the movie
Shang Chi for me was looking like one of the finer entries in the MCU until the final battle. Here was a movie with a likable lead, a great, relatable villain, fun, dynamic action set pieces truly unique amibg what we get usually form Marvel, a very clear thematic through-line... And then a fucking cgi giant demon and a cgi dragon and a million chi flying squids. Whyyyyyy? This is a movie about a father and son relationship (or a broader family drama when you expand to the mother and sister). Why throw that away and then ten minutes of that shit? Not only did it immediately drop my rating from a 9 to a 6, it genuinely gave me a headache.
Eternals on the other hand saw me going in with very low expectations and while it had a few bright moments, it was generally monotonous, though never really bad. So it never got over the 5/6 rating all through its running time and the ending was neither worse nor better than the rest. So I suppose my disappointment with the finale of Shang Chi made me view that movie far less favourably than the steady blandness of Eternals.
As for Black Widow... Ya, that was a similar kind of bland, but with more action and a shorter running time. It also looked worse.
But I dunno, I'm genuinely scratching my head at this year's superhero movies. DC delivered what I feel was the best one, with the suicide squad, but thanks to WB fucking up their release strategy this year, and thanks to the first one being a steaming pile of shit, not as many people saw it as it deserved. Then we have the instantly forgettable Black Widow, getting decent reviews. Then Shang Chi with outright overwhelming praise. And then Venom 2, which I genuinely found damn near unwatchable, a true torturous experience on a par with the Halle Berry Catwoman or the 2015 Fantastic Four, and that still somehow got ok reviews, far better than the first (admittedly stupid, but somehow more coherent) movie. At least in that one Hardy seemed to be having fun. In this he just seemed on drugs.
So after those movies receiving good to great receptions, while I found them to be terrible at worst, watchable but disappointing at best, I was genuinely fearing for Eternals. If this one is getting such bad reviews, how horrible is it? But... It's not. It's just a big giant shrug.
Good review, although I think critics need to be very careful about "wanting to cheer on" individual projects just because they are inclusive and/or have a diverse cast and crew. On a macro level, I absolutely want Hollywood aswell as other media producing places to become more diverse and for work places around the world to be as inclusive as possible - that is certainly an admirable goal. It would not change my criticisms of an individual piece of media, though - in either direction.
Contrary to some beliefs, Black Panther was a pretty good super hero movie and neither the greatest movie ever nor "terrible propaganda" because the plot and motivations of the characters made sense and were easy to follow and some of its ideas and environments were pretty neat - not because of the skin color of the actors or characters. It was certainly commendable to make a Black Panther movie and to (rightfully) have a large cast of dark-skinned actors, but it wouldn't have shielded the movie if the acting, script, direction etc. had been terrible, nor does it shield the movie from critics pointing out that some of the CGI was really shoddy.
The reaction to this movie is much more interesting than the movie itself. And I'm saying that as someone who liked the movie. I think it's the best movie they've released since the last Spider-Man.
I think the reviews on captain marvel and Eternals are equally interesting as studies in critical group think.
You’re mad 😂
THIS review would be considered ‘Fresh’ on RT, as long as he says, “I liked it.”
We'll isn't it a posiitive review if you say in that review that you liked the movie you are reviewing?
Reviewers tell RT whether to mark their reviews fresh or rotten.
Not true considering he literally submitted his review as ‘Rotten’ lmao.
Hey, we're putting the band back together!!
Isn’t hating on a movie for being ‘woke’ not the same energy as praising a movie for being ‘impressively diverse’? It’s two sides of a coin of the same coin. Neither of which have anything to do with making a great movie.
I stopped at X-Men 2, from 2003. I haven't watched another superhero movie. Please God we pray that people stop making superhero movies, they are beyond redemption.
Some of them are good.
Honestly sounds like 9 rings was the total opposite of this i had fun with that film
watch and decide for yourself. It's not as bad as critics say it is, they're just bitter that Dune underperformed. It's not "the worst MCU movie" that the haters are saying.
@@budigunawan5624 Dune didn't under perform, and has nothing to do with reviews of this film. Good try though sir.
ETERNALS
This is the new Marvel movie directed by Chloe Zhao and has an all star cast including Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Angelina Jolie and Barry Keoghan among others. They play "The Eternals" a group of immortal beings who have lived among humans for thousands of years and have been forced to re-unite to protect the earth from the evil alien species known as the Deviants.
This movie represents a new chapter in the Marvel universe and is set after the major battles of the Avengers vs Thanos. The Eternals are instructed not to get involved in any human conflict unless Deviants are involved. They are a fresh new set of superheroes to continue the MCU.
This film has divided opinion among critics but for me there were actually more positives than negatives. Chloe Zhao has gone from directing "Nomadland" to directing a Marvel movie which is quite a leap across genres. But she's done a good job. The cinematography and filmmaking style with a lot of background and scenery is one unique to her. And she has brought a slight indie vibe to the MCU. There was also of good humour and gaffs brought to this in particular from Kumail Nanjiani. The only real negative that stood out was the battle scenes as good as they were, were a bit samey and wasn't really anything new compared with earlier Marvel films.
That said, it had enough depth and character development coupled with good humour and good visuals that it is worth a watch. I wouldn't say the same level as the better Avenger films but decent and I would watch the sequel. 7/10
Diverse, inclusion etc is great, but at the end of the day, the writing still needs to be solid, otherwise the rest of it doesn't matter.
exactly! and this one was bad. Most of the good reviews I've read almost intentionally skipping referring to the script.
Also, if you set unrealistic diversity quotas for your hiring, you'll end up having to hire people who are under-qualified, and your product will be bad. I'm all for diverse hiring practices, but the targets have to be realistic.
Watched it...I really wanted to love it, I really did...but didn't.
The avengers aren't the be all and end all of the MCU the only people who are maybe getting bored are non comic book fans who don't really get that the world built extends way past what's been presented so far
I get the point from Kermode
the truth is that, Eternals does no fulfill its possibilities…. It could be much more compelling and connected to everything we saw before… the lore is rich, the Ancient Alien wave is strong, but they refuse to embrace it…
Sometimes I think people forget that corporate decisions are based ENTIRELY on the pursuit of profit. Whether or not we are 'tired' of the MCU is 100% dependent on if the beancounters say we are tired. The quality of originality of a movie is inconsequential from the view of the people financing it.
I’m surprised Mark’s not mentioned the exorcist or 2001.
He didn't mention Mary Poppins either. Is he feeling OK? 😊
He did mention 2001.
Those are both great films...
He does mention 2001.
He mentioned 2001 in this review.
This confirmed literally all the thoughts I had seeing the trailer.
I seriously don't care about the MCU movies anymore. Endgame was the end of it all for me, I wanna see new and original things. It would take something big to get me to watch another marvel movie now
Multiverse of Madness doesn't even sound a little intriguing to you? How bout Guardians 3? Or Black Panther what they do following the passing of Chadwick Boseman?
They have a huge legacy to carry forward after endgame in an original way. Eternals was a bad pea in the pod but introduces some interesting ideas. But watching shang-chi and what-if? Really gives me hope there's still a real spark coming from endgame into phase 4.
@@abdullahahmad4239 dude chill out, my point is that the movies are probably gonna be good regardless of all of the "I'm done with the MCU" people.
i think a big problem is having them be "GODS".... fans arent interested in gods, its an unreachable fantasy...besides you know they'll win in the end because they are gods. superheroes are at least a bit relatable, they are human with character traits and emotions.
This.
The one thing I can say about The Enternels is the two best things about it are the two end credit scenes enough said as someone once said.
Production line is a great way to describe a lot of these Marvel Movies. The worst thing about these movies is that there is no sense of who Directed it.
The actors feel like a production line items use to fill a gap to meet another Financial target.
I’m saying this as I did tear up by the end of End game.
“Production line” is a great way to describe ALL of these Marvel movies. McDonalds Happy Meals.
Taika Waititi managed it pretty well too.
The thing is Chloe Zhao won an oscar for a low budget indie movie. Not a huge $200m blockbuster.
Thank you. I was on the fence, just because it’s playing at the imax, on a screen I love-but I know you and trust that it’s not worth my time.
“Umpty Thrumpty”. That’s Numberwang!
As a marvel comics fan and someone who has read the source material, this film delivers more than a number of other marvel movies. The only issue i had with it was the incredibly long running time... They tried to fit to much character history into the film and that's why people think it's boring. Other than that i really enjoyed the movie, loved the characters and even enjoyed the acting and the story.....but, it was just to damn long.
It's not even close to being the most boring Marvel movie; in fact I give it a lot of points for making you care about the characters (most of them anyway) as much as it did
Eternals is the equivalent of that one kid in a class project who doesn't pull their weight and expects the same praise.
I don’t think the team behind this didn’t pull their weight.. it looks like they actually worked hard on it. But I’d DOES look like they didn’t understand the science project to begin with lol. I wonder if Chloe zhao has even watched the rest of the movies to understand what she was working with. Oh well, hopefully Disney will make sure of that going forward when they hire new directors
Spot on. A few nice touches here and there but it’s the first Marvel movie that’s had me checking my watch. Pretty in places with a few cool ideas but otherwise dull.
I'm fairly soft on marvel movies as i give them the benefit of the doubt due to the overall series value. However this one really did little for me,i am not sure who it is for or what it is trying to do.
The second film will see the black Knight kill Arishem with his spooky sword
Stories should be paramount, art should be paramount, when you prioritise representation, diversity etc over telling a good story people can feel it when they watch it.
Two great examples of brilliant and beautiful films with limited to no "diversity" are 12 angry men and moonlight, both have pretty much a homogeneous cast but both are great emotive pieces of cinema. It is great to see a range of different people in movies representing different ideas, cultures etc, but the story/journey must always come first, otherwise people will justifiably think that the priority was the so called diversity.
I really wasn’t interested in seeing it, went with my three teenagers and I really enjoyed it, it was all over the place but the time periods and special effects were good I thought and I liked it overall. It was a lot better than justice league so I had low expectations and was pleasantly surprised and wasn’t bored.
Totally agree, after Shang-chi , which was a breath of fresh air. Saw it last night and, told wife, we could go if she wanted about an hour in. With the pre screening could no-one be honest enough to say it was bad. The bloke who played Raj, the shop keeper in the David Walliams tv stories was the best thing in the film.What topped it all off was when Harry styles came on at the end as a super hero. That was Marvel saying we can give u any old crap and you'll happily watch it. Sad really.
Even that clip is kinda dull… And I watched the clip for Shang-Chi on this channel too and rushed to the movie theatre immediately…
Watched it this evening. Agree with Mark wholeheartedly. Turgid nonsense, miscast and empty...
Very well put. The "woke" part didn't annoy me at all...it was just so boring. It has some decent scenes...but it was just sooo boring. I had to go grab a beer after the first hour to make it more fun. Was in the right company so we had some good laughs by doing live commentary
I'm not sure what's so pioneering about this. Most of the Marvel films of recent years have had a diverse cast. I'm all for that. But when you push the diversity of your characters beyond even the diversity of the world population itself, it just starts to look like self-righteous tokenism. And it doesn't make the story better.
I personally quite enjoyed it. Wouldn’t say it was the best MCU film, but I was interested in all the characters and I was personally into the big issues being more to do with an ethical dilemma than an obvious big baddie. I totally get the argument for doing it as a 6-part tv show and slowly introducing the characters
I saw the huge cast and honestly just thought... maybe should be a tv series. got the vibes from the trailer, the reviews... seems like a lot to put into one film. the other films had a huge cast but the majority had been set up at that point.
Inhumans was a TV series a terrible one at that.
"It's boring, and it doesn't work".
...Ouch!
I actually quite enjoyed it.
Eternals certainly plays to the more “involved” part of the MCU fan-base and it won’t appeal to everyone. But I must I didn’t find it boring (and neither did my kids) and whilst, I agree with Dr K on the special effects and the narrative structure, I was engaged in the story right through to the end.
Lots of comparisons being made to Dune, which is understandable if a little misguided. What I will say is that whilst I appreciated and respected Dune, I enjoyed Eternals more. Dune is a marvellously made monotonous doom portent, but there is no variation in tone throughout the film (one, maybe two moments of levity). Eternals is messy and illogical, but it never really pretends to be anything else.
chloe zhao is not a great film maker, nomadlands was just ordinary and overrated, why on earth would she be qualified to make an action adventure super hero film?
She sure ain't no Michael Bay! 🤭
Making a film diverse and making every character able to fly shooting lasers out of their hands and eyes doesn’t make it entertaining. He’s right it’s starting getting a bit tiresome should of left it at endgame instead of carrying and trying to milk it for every penny they can get. Now we have the pound shop avengers
From very early in the MCU they built up Thanos, and then what comes after Thanos? They've done very little to keep people who aren't the obsessives interested. Pretty much the only thing they did to build up post-Endgame was introduce Spiderman relatively early in the previous cycle - the one character they had who was a guaranteed instant hit anyway.
Guardians and Thor will still be interesting, but they're kind of a detached comedy troupe rather than being as connected as the original set of characters were.
I love this channels reviews! They always end at a point where I have to check my phone, thinking my wifi stopped working (again). 😅
I saw it today, it's important to expand the MCU but really this is too much about too many romantic relationships between characters that have not been introduced properly prior to this so we don't have any investment in them yet to care about their personal relationships, ultimately we get a lot of slow moving personal scenes alternating with fights with monsters. They could have focused more on the structure of the historical sequences but they are just dropped in, I think the film tries to be too many different things that re unconnected to each other and really would have been better served as a TV series.
I agree with most of the points, especially how it feels mechanical in a way that all the characters just say what happened and what needs to happen exactly, theres not much life to each indivudal Eternal. But the idea of the MCU being boring and done, seems to be coming from a place of distaste for the genre and looking down on them as a whole.
I think there's an appetite for more self-contained stories, and the MCU is quite old now. Endgame felt like an ending just like No Time To Die was an end for the Daniel Craig era, but this movie universe keeps going. The MCU raised the stakes so high that some people also aren't sure whether it's worth being invested anymore. Spider-Man: No Way Home will bring a lot of people back in though.
I love this movie. It‘s a really great marvel movie, and it has so many new thing in it. Utterly disagree
Hands Down!! Eternals is the worst MCU movie, it makes Thor the Dark World & Iron Man 2 & 3 look like Masterpieces in Comparison. Eternals was an extreme BOREFEST!!! 😔😔😔
I really, really liked this movie! (But I am pretty invested in the MCU at this point…) I don’t think it strayed that far from ”the formula”, but I did enjoy that many of the main characters felt less clear cut and more morally ambivalent than heroes in previous entries. Yes, it was a lot of talking - but I was quite gripped by it! And I do actually think it handled the big cast surprisingly well.
Yes, it's an interesting new direction full of possibilities! I'm excited to go along for the ride!
In my opinion the film wasn't boring, sure it wasn't the best Marvel film ever but compared to Black Widow I found it more enjoyable and liked the characters better, even with a huge bias to Florence Pugh.
I will always support anything born out of the old Jack Kirby weirdness, mess or no.
Diversity-Wokeness is just a construct to reach a wider audience. It's a money thing. A good movie follows it's characters not the money.
I'm not clear why Kermode considered it so 'brave' and 'adventurous' just to add a splash of diversity to a movie, in 2021. This is a comic-book movie, the key demographic is teens and young adults up to the age of 40ish - Precisely the cohort of people amongst western moviegoers who aren't going to bat an eyelid.
Oooh, a gay kiss! _So brave_ !
Moonlight was a brave movie. Brokeback Mountain was a brave movie. Marvel embracing diversity to sell tickets is just woke capitalism - The equivalent of slapping a pride flag on a jumbo jet. Marvel will happily allow authorities in other world markets to censor anything they consider contentious, anyway.
Here's the thing: I grew up in the 70s and 80s. I didn't read many superhero comics, a couple here and there, not a lot. But I had friends who did. I knew who Captain America is, Iron Man, Spider Man, Wolverine and the X-Men, Hulk, etc... I have never heard of the Eternals, maybe once, I don't recall. The Deviants? No clue. To me they were made up last month and are still pretty obscure. Don't particularly care. Why is this a big-time movie? Shouldn't these characters have been introduced in smaller way? Perhaps on a TV series? Maybe have an X-men movie where Xavier learns about them, or meets one? Just about anything would have been better. Learning what one or two super heroes and villains can do is enough. Learning about a half dozen at one time, plus villains...? Mehhhh.