You're Wrong About Gravik, and Here's Why
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- Опубліковано 26 лип 2024
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(I should clarify, the 'you' in the title refers to the subset of viewers reading Gravik as a 'villain with a point', and that this is a defence of Gravik conceptually, not of the character's execution.)
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Here's the article I show at the video's start. It is a good article - I just don't think Gravik neatly fits the wider pattern the article discusses.
www.motherjones.com/media/202...
#marvel #secretinvasion #mcu
Timestamps:
0:00 Introduction
0:31 'They had a point' villains
5:03 Gravik isn't one
7:08 The defence
10:56 Conclusion
In the MCU Disney+ Secret Invasion show, Nick Fury learns of a secret invasion of Earth by a faction of shapeshifting Skrulls; Fury joins his allies, and together they race against time to thwart an imminent Skrull invasion and save humanity. Gravik was the leader of the radical Skrull Resistance and Skrull General in the Skrull Council, who grew disillusioned and spiteful of Nick Fury for failing to deliver on his promise to find his race a new planetary home. - Розваги
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Gravik is a hella lot stronger villain (character-wise) than Karli Morgenthau, too. He's closer to the older Disney villains that were just pure evil or bad, not misunderstood or anti-heroes with a change of heart at the last minute. Gravik is more an Emperor Palpatine than Darth Vader. A guy who takes advantage of (and causes in part) a very fraught political and social situation to gain control.
Super Skrulls using powers similar to the fantastic four is just tough to watch when you know they aren't in the universe yet
Agree.
Agreed
Just like when the Human Torch got the rest of the FF's powers in Rise of the Silver Surfer.
Here's the thing, theres so many moments in this show that are GOOD. Like dialogue that is engrossing, interesting, engaging, emotional. Fury and Rhodey/Varra's talks were great (which would have been improved if we knew Rhodey was a skrull from the start), Fury and Talos' convos and relationship. All of that is great, except then the show goes a complete different direction than those talks implied. Fury never has to own up to the problems that Talos brought up AND he never defended himself. What we know of Fury now, is that most of his knowledge, power, leverage, secrets, etc, came from his secret Skrull force, not necessarily from his own efforts. Nick Fury is not Captain America of course, he's done some terrible things in the comics, but this show does nothing to argue against Talos and Gravik's assertions about Fury, and it's really sad.
Gravik has such a good monologue at the end, only to be wasted since he was talking to G'iah and not Fury himself, effectively ruining the moment. It's just sad.
I mostly agree with your argument but...Fury still has to command the Skrulls in strategic manner to use the information they gather. Also as the show proved Talos still needs Fury to succeed. Two different Skrull loyal to Gravik were shot by Fury when Talos failed to defeat them in combat. Also Also what's the difference in Fury giving Captain America orders and a Skrull orders. It's not like Captain America screw you Fury I have powers and you don't so I'll protect the world my way. Besides Talos pretended to be the Director of Shield so he was being a hypocrite.
It's annoying the writers didn't have Fury defend himself by pointing any of these things out. It's ok for a male character to be vulnerable or humbled the way Iron Man was in Infinity War but Fury was humiliated in Secret Invasion in ways that were unnecessary. Especially since there are well written and well acted scenes that show Fury's vulnerability in a way that strengthens the character and gives him emotional depth.
I do think G'iah was saying everything Fury felt. In an earlier Fury did admit Gravik was his failure and that he had to deal with him on his own. I don't think the show wrote that scene very well but I would be surprised if Fury didn't feel those feelings of failure that G'iah told Gravik about.
I did like Gravik's final words to G'iah about being weak. Because she is essentially being used by Fury to kill Gravik by taking advantage of her desire for revenge.
Gravik is easily the best part of the show, and one of the best MCU villains
Yep.
I think people forget a lot when it comes to Kilmonger is that he’s basically the CIA in Black Panther with him wanting to overthrow and put in a new political power in a foreign government, not to mention he used to work for the US military. Saying Kilmonger was the real hero would be like saying the Contras had a point
4:21 Minor asterisk, but based on what we see of Haiti in Wakanda Forever, it does look like T'Challa's outreach programs did have *some* impact.
That being said I think your breakdown of the trope in the beginning of the video is great. I also agree with the latter points of Gravik as a product of conflict and being Fury’s failure.
Gravik is basically Anakin Skywalker and Fury is Obi Wan Kenobi. G'iah is basically Reva. 😂
The only thing smoother than the skrull transitions was that ad segue 👍
Came here to say this.
Gravik and his followers are basically way better versions of Karli and the Flag Smashers since they're similar in their position and circumstances
Mainly cause Karli was supposed to be the sympathetic rebel, but her actions are against the kind of character she's supposed to be
Whereas Gravik has been constant menace who truly keeps going down the path that Skrulls gradually can no longer follow as the show goes on
It's a shame, Gravik along with the characters/cast and direction and tone are the best qualities of Secret Invasion, but they're held back by limitations of the 6-episode format that led to iffy pacing and writing.
Secret Invasion could've been up there like WandaVision, Loki, and Moon Knight as well as be comperable to Star Wars's Andor, but its potential was not fully realized (Secret Invasion finale makes WandaVision finale look beautiful)
And that's scary because the WandaVision finale was trash. But Secret Invasion finale was worse. Gravik's anti human Skrull faction should have been placed in a movie if budget issues were going to make it hard to utilize them to their full potential in a 6 episode TV Show.
I'd made a comment on another Secret Invasion video talking about a loose thread that never really got resolved that I think might have even added some greatly needed context. We basically find out that Talos WAS the Supreme General or whatever during the Kree-Skrull war. And we also get some lines about how Talos isn't proud of some of the things he did.
I feel like something that might have helped the show and the story would be exploring exactly how the Skrulls GOT in their position. When you're a race of shapeshifters, how do you prosecute a war? My idea is that Fury didn't just GIVE UP on finding the Skrulls a home, it's that no one fucking wants them in their neighborhood. And this isn't born entirely out of bigotry. Give it a scene or two discussing how, when the conflicts between the Kree and Skrull states started ramping up, the Skrulls leveraged their most powerful asset, shapeshifting, to infiltrate and sabotage the Kree but also OTHER groups. Skrull would take out and replace some state's leader and then campaign from within that they should join on the Skrull side because the Kree were a-holes.
Once this plot gets revealed, the whole cosmic political side turns on the Skrulls. They become persona non grata EVERYWHERE. And Talos and Fury can have a discussion about how it's not fair to these Skrull kids that never did anything wrong, but that the realities of what the Skrull LEADERSHIP did in their war can't just be ignored.
And this can be part of what shapes Talos's view on becoming part of Earth society. Why he called all of them here. Humans were one group that the Skrulls had not betrayed, and maybe they can find a fresh start here. This would, in turn, make the President's actions at the finale hit so much harder as it would mean the Skrulls had lost the trust of the people even here.
The problem is that the Skrulls are an allegory for the Jewish Diaspora. The characters speak what sounds like Hebrew, Talos quotes a Zionist political leader from the 30's, and they're running from Space Nazis (edit: and a co-writer/co-director of Captain Marvel is Jewish.)
Now, this implies Secret Invasion was a terrible story to go with in the first place (and the comic was pretty dumb and weirdly anti-Muslim also by inventing a pan-galactic space Jihad from scratch), but it would be even worse if the Skrulls "had it coming." There was no need to make the Skrulls an actual antisemitic conspiracy instead of an enlightened commentary on all of the evil, messed up antisemitic conspiracies going around.
Marvel had a chance to improve on the comics the way later comics did with Annihilation and Runaways and Young Avengers and some other pre-Secret Invasion booms.
Captain Marvel succeeded.
Secret Invasion spiked the ball at the 50 yard line.
@@MrBazBakeHere's counter arguments.
1. The anti human Skrulls are a specific faction and not representative of all Skrulls. Kanye West and other anti semite conspiracy theorists aren't representative of all humans. It would have been better if the show had more Skrulls believe in Talos and the storyline becomes a Civil War storyline amongst the Skrulls.
2. There are plenty of nationalists within Isreal in real life that mistreat and harm Palestinians who are not hostile. However there are Palestinians who are incredibly hostile. The Kree-Skrull conflict could have been an allegory for the Israel-Palestine conflict but the writing needed to be more consistent to make that work.
3. There was a Kree woman named Dr. Lawson who helped the Skrulls in Captain Marvel. So it's lazy and unfair to say all the Kree are bad and are space nazi's. Also the Kree were open to engage in peace talks with Xandar. Ronan called the new Kree government weak and became a terrorist. It's silly to just say all Skrulls are good and all Kree are bad and it's not consistent with the larger MCU storyline.
Overall I enjoyed Secret Invasion, but the ending was definitely.....something. It makes the other endings look like Phase 3 quality.
Agreed.
I agree. The ending hurt the show a lot. It did start out strong.
I do still wish that the show did have Gravik really meet Fury in the final episode so we at least saw Fury admit to Gravik that, yes, he did create this villain.
absolutely. It’s intensely weird this didn’t happen
@@PillarofGarbage From what I have heard, Kevin Feige wanted a big fight scene with two Super Skrulls using a bunch of different powers, focusing too much on the superhero spectacle.
Which is a weird paradox given the way Secret Invasion was set up it didn't feel like the superhero spectacle was going to be a big part of it given its small scale. In fact, there is no reason the spectacle for a superhero story needs to go big. With Moon Knight, my favorite part was the character dynamic with our protagonists.
@@dragonstormxKevin Feige loves to okie doke fans or over promise and under deliver.
Remember how underwhelming Quantamania was or how little Multiverse we got in a movie called Multiverse of Madness and a better Multiverse movie came out a month before called Everywhere Everything All At Once.
Those two projects got extra hype from Feige and fans left the theater disappointed both times. Without Thanos, Iron Man, Cap, Full powered Hulk and Stormbreak Thor. Kevin Feige's dishonesty and laziness has been exposed without these top tier characters to distract us from these issues.
@@PillarofGarbageI do think Fury admitted to I think Talos that he failed Gravik. But I do agree Fury and Gravik should have a confrontation.
Perhaps have Fury wear a static mask over a helmet to protect his lungs from radiation. Give Gravik the Harvest but have it be filled with that chemical Sonya used to interrogate Gravik's soldiers to break the machine. Then have G'iah appear and fight against Gravik with the discount Fantastic Four powers.
Have Fury throw multiple grenades to exhaust Gravik's extremis healing factor. Sonya could have fought Skrull Rhodey on her own. Then Fury is forced to leave for the space station because he's a fugitive still and the President refuses to grant him a pardon.
@@RenaldyCalixte I liked both those movies you brought up and while I enjoyed Everything Everywhere All At Once I don't get how it showed us more of a multiverse we mostly traveled through some universes that all looked the same apart from the one where our main characters were rocks. A universe with no life on Earth isn't what I was expecting when I heard about travels to a universe that looked different.
This doesn't work with hella told since she was always the one doling out the repression next to Odin
I put Hela in the subcategory of ‘villains who use a valid critique as the cause belli for selfish action’
I think she is ok, since odin is shown as fault there, nd sh ws a wapon he was hiding,and asgardians change,at least when he gives the office tovalcyry butiwish he did itou tof more the incompitence.
It feels weird to hear Hela grouped in with Killmonger & The Flagsmashers because Hela may talk about the way Asgard was built on colonialism, but - unlike the other two - she likes that and isn't trying to cause a reckoning to Asgard because of that, she's very much doing it because she was rejected and exiled for "going too far" (oh wait, you *just* got to that part). I can understand the criticism of Kilmonger being a guy with a good point who goes too far (he's set up that way from early on, unlike the Flagsmashers, but it still does feel like a diminishing of his points), and it's especially questionable for the Flagsmashers because it did seem like a very sudden escalation of their actions (I can see where the writers were coming from, but I think we needed the bombing to either be more accidental, at least in terms of who it harms, or at least another incident or two to escalate us there in a more reasonable manner).
I would lump Gravik in with Hela, though, as people who say some things that are right (maybe along with Kaecilius from Doctor Strange) but overall they're just in it for themselves. It's the feeling I had with Gravik the entire time I was watching Secret Invasion: the "Skrulls deserve a place to live free as Skrulls" rhetoric just felt like manipulation so that he could get his revenge on Fury.
this is ultimately only a small nibble and doesn't really have anything to do with the main point of the video (which I have absolutely no qualms with tbh), but the recurring mention of Vulture as a "villain with a point" kinda irks me, cause the whole point of the Vulture in Homecoming is that he is somebody who *affects* the mannerisms and speech of the working class, but is actually incredibly well-situated himself and is willing to sacrifice whoever and whatever stands in his way for his own enrichment. maybe at the start of the film during the flashback he actually is the common working man just trying to look out for his crew (though he's already a small business owner), but by the time the main plot has come around, he has become a full-fledged arms dealer using his contractor business as a front, and he is very visibly wealthy, all while still trying to portray himself as just a poor working class schlub and willingly sacrificing the actual working class to keep his grift aloft. he is bourgeois to the core.
basically, he's a trump voter. and you've all been duped by michael keaton's charisma into believing his shtick.
I do agree. I briefly lumped him in here with the subcategory 'villains who use a valid critique as the casus belli for selfish action', but were I to make a Homecoming video one day, this is an angle I'd be sure to make more explicit.
@@PillarofGarbage not the worst idea for a vid. I'd definitely watch it.
I feel like there's a bunch of villains that get "misunderstood" as having a point when they really don't, from the somewhat understandable like vulture, spanning the questionable "how could you miss that he's wrong" like thanos, to the "goddamn what is wrong with you to agree with this" like senator armstrong from metal gear rising.
@@YourEvilHenchman A 'Thanos Never Had A Point' video has been on my list of 'maybes' for like nearly two years haha
@@PillarofGarbage DO IT
I would have liked Gravik a lot more if he was trying to frame Fury for starting WW3. It would have made his plan line up with his personal grievance with Fury much better. It seemed like they started off that way with the killing of Maria Hill but like, what if Gravik had taken Fury’s form during the motorcade fight? So much missed potential in this show…
Hello thanks for the video. In France a youtubeur popularize the syndrom of the villain advocate for a good cause but we don't really address the issue because the villain is going to do something to make forgotten/make unsympathetic the cause of the hero as the magneto syndrom (le syndrome de magneto) because magneto is a very good example of this behaviour. Present a social issue but never really address it because well the villain advocate for it.but yes gravik is not a magneto syndrom he is a bad person made bad by war trauma and exploitations. The biggest bad guy is the us government who exploited this ppl for dirty work and then dismissed them with cynical and hateful way
He's not bad villain but wish he has more motivative and plans to conquer earth
1:16 i call forcing likable villains to act out of character for the sake of appearing evil to the audience “killmongering” 🤣
The villains are usually my favorite part to any show or movie! Often more interesting than the protagonist. 🙂 Thanks!
Great vid - as always - but disagree A LOT as always - I didn't really factor G's politics as to why he did not work. He just seemed very functional plank of wood frankly. But interesting analysis
oh yeah, even if I think there's something to Gravik _conceptually_ I'll be the first to admit the execution wasn't brilliant
That's a fair assessment
The actor did pretty well in Barbie so he's still got a banner year all in all
Continued success cheers@@PillarofGarbage
I think what makes Gravik interesting is that he's absolutely evil, but he's also a product of Fury's actions. Maybe he was always going down the path of extremism, but the things Fury did absolutely didn't help, and it makes him a more compelling villain not because he's sympathetic, but because he makes our protagonist seem deeply flawed.
I disagree that you don't see the effects of villains exposing a flaw in the hero. Take Thor and Hela the reason Thor stops acting like a god is because Hela exposes his legacies true history and Thor even recognise that Hela have the right to rule but she can't because she would go back to the old ways. A decision that directly ties into Thor recogniseing that he shouldn't rule either.
As for Killmonger. We see that T'Challa starts open up to the rest of the world in fact the way Shuri first treat Namor is exactly because of Killmonger. It is first when she accept he cannot be reasoned with that she changes. Therefore i would say that we haven't seen Falcon change yet because it was the last episode.
Yeah we see in both endgame and love and thunder that thor isn’t king and that Valkyrie is the leader her people
Also it’s important to point out the they are refugees without a home and that they had to let go of the wealth they got through imperialism. This isn’t some center left minor changes it’s a complete reshaping of their society
The thor takes are definitely the worse part of the video and it feels so weird when a lot of this guys other videos is complaining about this exact sort of thing
Graviks could have been great. I feel like it was rewritten a few times that someone forgot to re-read it once the changes were done.
What makes Gravik comparatively more 'right' than Karli is that he knows that co existence with humanity is a far far harder endeavour than killing all the humans. Even Fury himself thinks so as well. He can be compared to Eren from AOT. Going to genocide due to the fact that co existence seems more like a pipe dream.
Even Gi ah herself doesn't think that co existence is possible. She is just following the footsteps of her father but this time, with much more cynicism and lack of trust.
The problems with Gravik aren't a late turn, they're a seeming rewrite of earlier episodes that become more obvious the more you think about it. This is what people think he shares with Karli, not the specific timeline of the rewrites.
Gravik is a villain tied to two unrelated schemes held together by Kingsley Ben Adir's exceptional performance. The two schemes are the human genocide plot and the unknown Fury mystery/Harvest plot. I refer to "unknown mystery" because the finale scene of Gi'ah and Falsworth in front of thousands of off-site Skrull captive cocoons with completely different, more expensive production design than the metal cages used to store Rhodey and Ross in a nuclear wasteland unexposed implies this scene was taken from a completely different story we didn't watch. Also, the science of the Harvest makes no sense and was introduced in Episode 4.
First scheme-wise, Gravik wants to torture Fury but doesn't want to kill him. In fact, Gravik never interacts with anyone directly involved in a plan to kill Fury onscreen and he lashes out when someone says he doesn't want to kill Fury -- in Episode 5. This whole detour is incoherent, takes up three hours of storytelling, and is contradicted every time Gravik is onscreen with Nick Fury or talks about him.
Second scheme-wise is the cacklingly evil human genocide plot. This is completely incoherent as well given Gravik's emotional attachment to killing a single random person. Additionally, he uses a nuclear war that would be started by taking out a UN plane as *bait* to out Gi'ah when actually following through would enact his whole plan overnight. And he condescendingly explains his 4-dimensional thinking with, "Why would I willingly destroy a resource like [this one plane]?" A plane that would be destroyed in a nuclear genocide.
Gravik's plans repeatedly don't involve him giving orders or interacting with people and have him contradicting his own motivations for plot convenience. And this makes people believe that the rewrites, which involved all of three episodes and part of two episodes and began with Episode 2 onward, were to change Gravik's entire plan. One plan to explain why he doesn't kill Fury, one to make him Skrull Hitler.
I thought the UN plane situation was an "option select" - the plan goes off with a hitch, starting a nuclear war, or it gets interrupted, exposing the mole....
I guess your take could also apply to Kali and Killmonger, where their extremism comes from experiencing injustice. The difference is execution. Great with Killmonger, bad with Kali.
7:23 There is no Rise of Skywalker in Ba Sing Se
Great video! Pillar you should make a video about the Terminator Tv show The Sarah Connor Chronicles, I heard it’s pretty good
The only Terminator media I’ve seen is 1, 2, and Salvation 💀
@@PillarofGarbage Its really good. And lena headey is a great sarah connor, and summer glau also, and dekr works with that version of john. i wish season 3 were to be renewed.Even through it a tea it still kinda works.
Really good.Great even. And i thinkit might be after 2 and e its own thing, but great.
It's possible for a villain to have been wronged, either by a specific character or society itself, and still BE wrong. Like, Gravik has understandable reasons for being angry about the Skrull's current situation, but his solution is wrong and not even the only option.
Very well said! A sob story doesn’t give anyone the right to murder others and inflict pain, especially when those they hurt had nothing to do with their grievances. And the same logic applies to Killmonger, Vulture, The Flagsmashers, Gorr, etc. That people claim that these complex villains that often fall under the Well-Intentioned Extremist trope take actions that “assassinate their character,” make them do a “U-Turn,” or were “forced” on them by the writers to make them “less sympathetic” never fails to make my eyes roll in its nonsense. If anything, I feel The Falcon and the Winter Soldier writers tried to generate more sympathy for the Flagsmashers than they deserved. After those jackasses revealed they knew where Sam’s family lived and threatened them, either Sam or Bucky should’ve verbally ripped into them and deconstructed their holier than thou attitude, like Star-Lord did to the High Evolutionary during his monologue or Frank Castle did to the main villain in The Punisher Season 1, Episode 10.
Great analysis of Gravik.
narratively speaking, Gravik makes sense, but it also feeds into the vilification of refugees in general.
I'm getting really tired of the "villian with a point" trope because it ends in the enforcement of the status quo because god forbid the heros end up being wrong
Gravik’s definitely not some kind of progressive. From the word go, he’s an incredibly *petty,* narrowminded, self-absorbed character.
It’s so weird to me how people will accuse stories of using characters like Gravik as undercutting progressive causes when the character in question actively undermines their own alleged cause out of pure spite.
I thought Nick Fury was the "bad guy" and Gravik was insane due to Nick Fury's betrayal. Additionally could it legally be argued he is mentally ill, or is the scale too big to consider anything other than evil villian.
If I’m being frank, MCU fans that critique the MCU by saying the heroes are “defenders of the status quo” or “[Insert Villain] did nothing wrong” or that Disney somehow makes the MCU writers change the scripts (the bigwig execs only care about making money, nothing more, nothing less; they wouldn’t care how someone makes a product as long as it sells) kinda get on my nerves more than the anti-woke, DeSantis-worshipping jackasses. Because at least with them, their arguments are illogical and repetitive and kinda blend together after a while. I think Star-Lord’s crude yet effective retort to the High Evolutionary’s monologuing encompasses how I ultimately feel toward fictional villains that act holier than thou and hide behind a facade of good intentions while murdering and hurting anyone that gets in the way of their goals: “I don’t need another speech from some impotent whack-job whose mother didn’t love him trying to rationalize why he needs to conquer the universe.” Speaking of the High Evolutionary, I personally think the MCU could benefit from lowering the number of complex, “well-intentioned” villains that drastically increased in Phases 4 and 5 in favor of including more villains that are vile yet entertaining and inflict pain and suffering upon people because they enjoy it. Villains with a similar vibe to ones like Green Goblin, Carnage, Ramsay Bolton, Joker, Kilgrave, Angelus, Ego, Homelander, etc. That way the fans can all hate the villains in unanimous agreement and not have any off-putting takes about who we should be rooting for.
I feel like Gravik didn’t really do anything and then died. It feels almost irrelevant to talk about him after the fact as he had no effect on the story
Gravik is probably the best part of this mess of a show. He's definitely not a Karli Morgenthau - he doesn't pretend to be a misguided freedom fighter, he is a terrorist through and through, and though his grievances with Fury are 100% legit, his solution of killing all human has no leg to stand on (and his plan for doing it is stupid). He's not doing violence because "that's the only language they understand", he simply does not consider Human lives to be valuable, and he's willing to do whatever it takes to take care of his own people. This is very much the mentality of terrorists, and also the mentality of armies in general - the enemy is othered, deemed sub-human and unworthy of compassion, therefore our actions are justified. It's a shame the show doesn't really explore this mentality from the side of the "good guy".
One thing I liked here was how they initially depicted the Skrulls - this is an alien society with a specific culture, with a protocol for granting Gravik unlimited power because he's demonstrated his superior power over others. It's a nice touch that elevates him above other "bad guys with a point".
You could argue that the U-turn isn't that he "took things too far", but rather the fact that his goal was to kill all humans to save the Skrulls but then he just started massacring his own people, which seemingly makes no sense, but a counter to that could be that he never truly wanted to save the Skrulls, he just wanted revenge. Also, that scene could have been handled better with him explaining that anyone doubting him isn't devoted enough to the cause and therefore a traitor, which would fit the whole militaristic society with a authoritarian ruler theme, instead of him just... yelling angrily, immediately followed by all of his people turning on him.
I mean, the show sucks, yeah? But there was something here. I wonder what it looked like before they practically reshot the whole thing, and what exactly made them do that in the first place.
7:26 😂
It's honestly crazy how much Secret Invasion is hated. Like pretty much every person in the MCU sphere either hates this show or thinks it's mediocre.
I enjoyed it as I was watching it but I just don't see myself revisiting it. I rewatched She Hulk, F&WS, and all the other D+ shows, and most of the phase 4 movies, but this one just didn't feel like it did anything fun or worthwhile enough to warrant a rewatch. Maybe with an exception of Samuel L. Jackson's acting and his consistent characterization. If talos hadn't died, their banter probably would've made me rethink this but as it stands, I'm probably not gonna watch anything other than the super skrull fight at the end
For me, this is the first time I felt the 6 episode season format felt TOO long for the story they were trying to tell.
I haven't seen it, but I think some of this might be because of the ongoing strike and how the show's failures just stand out more in light of it. Then there's the fact that the opening title was at least partially AI-generated, which already leaves a bad taste going in
In order to hate it, it'd have to make me feel something.
I think my issue is that the story doesn't communicate very well what Gravik wants. At the start, he seems to believe in Skrull supremacy, and is enacting plans to achieve that. But by the end he doesn't seem to really care that much about other Skrulls? His plan seems to involve wiping out all the Skrulls loyal to him, and giving himself super powers. I mean ignoring the fact that nuclear war would leave a rather rubbish world for Skrulls to rule, it also won't even have the skrulls who were loyal to him. What's the point?
I think I really couldn't get over the world war three plan. It just seems like a shockingly stupid thing to do for a race who can literally replace world leaders and guide it in any direction they like. And worse is that it almost works. It absolutely drives me mad that the president, while in an unsheltered hospital, is considering launching a strike which will almost certainly lead to the death of everyone on earth, including himself! And no-one other than Rhodes is in the room with him!
I think to some extent the show was hampered by covid restrictions, but honestly I think the solution is to tell a different story, not to go ahead with something which makes no sense!
I'll give a counterpoint; assimilation works only to a limited degree in the real world. People of color in the US are still effectively segregated and systematically discriminated against. The nationalist choice, of "we need our own land" was made famous in the US by Malcolm X. One of his points was that the black people of the US do not own the land they live on, and therefor, do not have the same literal ownership of the country that is expected as a part of the social contract for the majority. This has been reflected by other villains in Marvel comics, specifically Magneto, who was written to echo Malcolm X quite a bit, whose assumptions were that those who are different will never be equals, and that trying to be "one of the good ones" by fitting in to what the majority expects is doomed to fail because there is no actual good one.
This duality of Professor X - the moderate for assimilation that believes in the inherent good of the majority, vs. Magnet - the one who believes that there is a hard limit to acceptance, and that the underlying hatred of those different may temporarily recede, but is inherent to humanity.
Now, I'm being kind to Gravik. I'm also being kind to Magneto, and using the cases where he was written with depth and care. But there is a point to saying "just try to fit in with the majority" is something that only one of the majority can think has a chance to work without a *ton* of effort.
I don't think Hela fits into this mold either, she IS a former member of that privilege and establishment and she's a fascist seeking to return them to that previous status quo that she held power in. the eventual conclusion that the film reaches and STAYS a status quo is that the wealth and power and comfort and prosperity built upon that wrong doesn't get to continue to exist, it is a sacrifice that can be made to ensure the survival of that cultures people, and puts to test the claim that said culture and it's people are meaningful outside of that power and prosperity. Hell for all of love and thunders up and down, part of the idea is even additionally built upon, not only is asgard a people not a place but a people is held together BY it's culture, not it's blood. But yeah much as I like killmonger and still thinks he's a very well written villian, he is an example of the pattern.
ha he could be a gret villain,in a better show.
Dr who did secret invasion better than secret invasion
Yep, coleman does not help the comparisons.
I think they got a great actor and wasted him in a bad story, but yeah couldn’t process this much about him, I didn’t want to think too much about the show because I could just tell there wasn’t gonna be much to this show from the get go
I wrong about Gravik?
I don't understand why you put Hela here.
She isn't supposed to be sympathetic, she wants things to be when nobody cared that Asgard was making itself rich with gold obtained trough bloodshed. She practically was shouting Make Asgard Great Again.
She wasn't the republicans trying to deny slavery, she was the KKK telling slavery should come back.
Even if she showed the truth to Thor she never intended to make a positive change.
I guess it's because Hela exposed to Thor and the audience that Asgard was built on conquest. But unlike the other examples, she doesn't really condemn this at all
I don't think hela belongs in this conversation either and really only the flag smashers are examples of this being problematic. Hela was never really meant to be an activist. She's far more like if some British knight or royal from the 1800s came back from the dead and tried to make britian into a true empire again. She's a pure evil antagonist whose existance points out the issues with colonialism, empire building, and the existance of a covered up dark past that doesn't make total sense in the greater continuity but works quite well for the themes of the broken legacy of all of the thor films.existence.
Out of all the many flaws in this show, Gravik was not one of them. Unlike what happened with The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, I greatly appreciated that Secret Invasion didn’t try to paint him as misunderstood or “misguided” and act like he was nothing but a victim in the end. I also like how from the beginning, the show made great effort to show that he’s not someone worth rooting for or justifying. Gravik never made a “U-Turn” or anything like that. His first episode alone has him gunning down Maria Hill with a sadistic smile on his face and blowing up dozens of people without blinking.
Besides that, I’m honestly getting a little tired of villains with sympathetic motivations and a sob story. Not so much because of the villain trope itself; I often enjoy how these sorts of villains showcase how the cycle of violence and abuse can distort people and turn them into someone as bad as, if not worse, than their oppressors/abusers. But more so because of how some fans come away from the depictions of those villains saying “X did nothing wrong” or “X was right.” Obviously you see this with the MCU in the cases of Killmonger, Vulture, Thanos, The Flagsmashers, Wanda, and Gorr. A sob story and sympathetic motivations are not an excuse to root for a villain, claim their heinous actions were “forced” to make them less sympathetic, and justify their actions till the end. A lot of real-life monsters had/have sob stories that contextualize why they became the way they are, but they’re considered villainous monsters regardless.
I see the prior mentioned MCU villains and their tragic backgrounds that made them the way they are as hardly different than someone like Homelander from The Boys. Homelander arguably has a more tragic background than all of those MCU villains combined. He basically grew up in a living hell. Treated as a lab rat. Isolated from society. Had depression before he even became a teenager. Beaten. Developed DID as a method of coping with his abuse. No speck of familial love. And, perhaps most disturbingly, as heavily implied in the final episode of The Boys: Diabolical, his primary handler/mother figure did… things to him, likely before he was of age, to keep him dependent on her and loyal to the company that viewed him as nothing more than a living product that, let’s just say, explains his raging Oedipal Complex he’s got going on throughout the series. But anyway, despite all that, the show always makes it perfectly clear that the living hell he grew up in does not excuse his present heinous actions, and it’s completely correct in that regard.
So basically, I view the more “complex” MCU villains under the same lens. “Cool motive. Still murder.”
Overall i feel like it's one of the better shows but i still think FATWS is the BEST Show with Loki and then Secret Invasion following, Wanda was a let down and so was Moon Knight it's ending however carried. I like how they made the viewer paranoid on who could be a skrull but it didn't live up to it's full potential.
Secret Invasion's finale was BEYOND RUSHED and it highlights how much the whole show was effected by it, with major character deaths happening too frequently and totally brushed over, like how are Both Talos and Mariah Hill gonna die??? Gravick's encounter with Fury at the end was a total waste as it was "gIaH aLl AlOng" which took away some needed development for Fury and undercutting Gravick's performance.
Going to be honest, the “Hela had a point” is the dumbest argument I’ve ever heard, her whole origin was that she loved conquering and killing other nations to the point Odin stepped in and stopped her and when she comes back she wants to go back to the old ways. How people think she is sympathetic is beyond me
I think you’re massively wrong about Gravik. I think his points are reasonable (in his context not ours) and he very much is a victim of the blow up the building trope Marvel is addicted to. You make a good point about the cycle of violence and trauma. But I think you fall short of trying to understand the full weight of having your entire adolescence and adult life, your identity, be formed around trauma can have. Furthermore, you say “as far as the Skrulls know things are just taking a while.” Yeah him and his entire generation’s entire lives. Orphaned by imperialistic genocide, stripped of his face and name and made into a spy slave (what choice did any of them have on earth without Fury’s protection). Only to grow up and see no home in sight. Of course he became a terrorist. Furthermore, we keep putting human logic onto someone who isn’t human. Gravik has lived his entire life in someone else’s skin, doing Fury’s dirty work. Fury has clearly abandoned his promise to find them a planet and even Fury himself is at first strongly convinced that there is no coexisting. Quite rightly so, from Gravik’s position he’s seen the humans endlessly tear each other apart and their world, over meaningless differences. “There isn’t room on this planet for another species” says Fury. Gravik has no reason to expect there is any peaceful outcome to this situation. So him resolving to take what his people deserve (and they do deserve a home) by force from the genocidal, xenophobic warmongers who will probably destroy it themselves anyway makes perfect sense. Of course it’s bad to do terrorism, but him wanting a home for his people who have been made refugees, used and lied to and then abandoned, is perfectly reasonable. Him turning on his own people, using their lives as bargaining chips, being a ruthless dictator who kills all who challenge him with no debate when he’s established as the only person taking proactive steps to improve the Skrull’s situation??? That’s character assassination. Gravik draws Gi’ah out and kills her with dignity in private for the good of protecting the operation. Gravik kills Pagan (I think that was their name) purely because he’s a bad guy and him killing someone for speaking up signals him as a bad guy. The same as Karli blowing up the building goes against her established goals of preserving and protecting life. Gravik was a revolutionary with a totally founded reasonable perspective. Yes he was a bad guy who wanted to kill all humans, what possible reason does he have to care about that? Why should he want to keep us safe and protect us?
'But I think you fall short of trying to understand the full weight of having your entire adolescence and adult life, your identity, be formed around trauma can have' - I see how the trauma contributes to the 'why' of Gravik, but not the 'what' of his point. I sympathise with it - and that's important - but I don't think it creates a justification to inflict similar trauma on others. Also, just a nitpick, but per Talos, the Skrull lifespan is around 300 years, and Gravik is little more than an adolescent. I don't say that to diminish his trauma, but I think it was included as a detail to underscore the 'impatience' angle.
I think there's _some_ evidence in the text that Gravik was intended to be, deep down, the desperate freedom fighter you're describing, but I think there's plenty more for him as a power-hungry, cult-of-personality-building would-be demagogue stoking the flames of the Skrull situation to gain control and a planet.
I also think we differ on what you call 'human logic' - the human side on this show tends to take for granted that killing (human _or_ Skrull) is to be avoided unless necessary, that, broadly, Skrull life is to be valued as equal to human life. As I'm reading your comment, it seems like you're arguing it's reasonable the Skrulls shouldn't feel the same way about humans, and if that is what you're saying, I'd disagree that this is how the show ever wanted us to view it.
'Why should he want to keep us safe and protect us?' He may not have a reason to want to protect us, but that lack doesn't mean he _does_ have a justifiable reason to kill us all. Gravik is answering wrongs with other wrongs, and we all know what they say about that.
@@PillarofGarbage Omg discourse. I'm not saying he is justified objectively and everyone should have a Che Gravik poster, my point is that he is justified within the bounds of survival for his people (to an extent). As I really ponder it now it does occur to me that I was saying that being victimised justifies you to victimise those who had nothing to do with you ending up in your situation. So upon reflection I'm going to retract that and agree with you that yes Gravik is in fact not justified in enacting the cycle of violence onto humanity.
But I must clarify further, firstly I don't see Gravik as a desperate John Connor style freedom fighter, I see him as a violent revolutionary seeking to emancipate his people, at least at first. I definitely think the power hungry, petty demagoauge is in there. Personally I feel that's a result of a writing clash, Gravik very much came across to me as a Killmonger figure in the first couple episodes, with an even more founded point. Seeing as there is a far greater chance of reasonable conversation and peace being made between humanity than between humanity and an alien species. So Gravik resorting to violent upheaval of the system is a far more logical step than Killmonger in my opinion (but there is more justice in Killmonger's point because of the history but that's a whole other thing).
Regarding the age point, I personally feel that with long lived characters i.e skrulls or asgardians, the narrative has always treated them as aging at a human rate and then just staying adults for a really long time. Like real people, one will only develop an understanding of how impatient they were in later life. An "adolescent" Gravik is functionally an adult like every other 30 something year old Skrull or Asgardian. Realistically just like any real person will struggle in the moment to understand "this is a blip in my lifespan", they will also struggle greatly. So Gravik being impatient is deeply unfair in my opinoion. A Skrull like Talos on the other hand may understand how little time in Skrull terms has actually passed, but youth is wasted on the young.
Furthermore, I agree the show obviously doesn't want us to agree with Gravik that human life isn't valuable. I agree with you totally that Gravik is portrayed as a straight up bad guy who is just bad. But I think that comes specifically after he kills Pagan, everything after that moment to me is a nosedive into being a sadistic warmonger. The show definitely doesn't want us to agree with his view on human life. My point is that in any dynamic similar to the Skrulls and the Hymans , i.e. disenfranchised, brutalised, used minority group is victimised by Imperialism (aka violence) and then live as second class citizens in a new land, those people becoming radicalised and violently seeking to stake their own land and emancipate themselves is justified. That's what I mean by he is justified within his context. If you're fighting for the survival and freedom of your people, why should you value the life of those who would exterminate you for being different? This all counts until the point where he starts to kill his own people, not to protect them, but to be that power hungry dictator you see him as. Because at that point he isn't doing terrible things for justified reasons, he is just doing terrible things.
tl;dr- In my opinion violence is a justified response to Imperialism, violence also is justified to save and emancipate your downtrodden people. Don't get me wrong I obviously don't want Gravik to win because that would be the death of humanity, but that isn't because of a moral judgment, it's simply survival.
Additional clarification being that just as the Skrulls or any similarly victimised people are justified in violently seeking to emancipate themselves and live as free people. Those who control the land they live in are also justified in protecting themselves from them (provided they weren't the ones who victimised those people in the first place). So in my view the humans are justified in seeking to stop Gravik and protect themselves, just as Gravik is justified in seeking to free his people, the humans are unfortunately just in the way.
Also on a meta level. Doesn't Gravik being just a bad guy, when in universe he passes himself off as and is considered a freedom fighting saviour, reinforce the blow up the building trope? Even if he was bad from the out-set, there is a genuine cause in the plight of the Skrulls, a genuine need for them to be treated better. But rather than display that cause with nuance, a cause that would provoke discussions of the unfairness of the status quo, the need for mutual aid and would cause general social upheaval and progress, Marvel have made the main spokesperson for it just straight up evil?
But don't worry guys there's one good Skrull who ultimately believes in the goodness of humanity and is certain that if they slave away under them and lose their lives for them for long enough. They will finally say "hey, you deserve basic rights and freedom and recognition". The whole thing reeks of Disney's pro establishment agenda . So much opportunity for rich discourse on the nature of revolution and power dynamics between the marginalised and the dominant? And the final conclusion is violence bad unless you do it in service of the status quo so they give you humanity out of pity???? WHen Gi'Ah and Talos spoke on that bench, I found myself agreeing with her wholeheartedly that her dad was delusional, and with Gravik that he was cowardly for not taking it upon himself to try harder for his people.
Though I'm not saying Talos should have gone with Gravik, as I can totally understand why Talos or an older, calmer figure who knows the horror of war (many examples in similar stories) chooses a peace in the absence of tension rather than war in the pursuit of justice. I don't think any of the characters in the show are wrong or right and they're all justified from their perspective.
It kills me how often a progressive position is given to the villain and made to look bad by a liberal protagonist. :(
Fairly enjoyed the show quite a bit but gravik and falsworth stole the series for me
:0
Gravik in the show never strikes me as a menacing villain but rather a grown up cry baby with a naive mind. I think I'm supposed to fear his presence like Thanos but he can't even compete with Olivia as Sonya
Gravik was always a Lenin or Stalin (watch out the MLs loosing their shit in 3, 2, 1...) - a guy who wears the colors of the revolution/ideology, might even delude himself that what he believes is the same cause, but it is all really just a lust for power clothing itself into a socially well received excuse (for others and in his case apparently to himself) that superficially seem like the real deal but it is really just skin deep.
That being said, his actor did a fucking fantastic job imo, and it saddens me he was wasted like this.
Yep. Pretty much the same thing with the Flagsmashers from The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
Nobody in this show was wasted more than Kingsley Ben-Adir, whose character was a complete nothing-burger without real direction… Maybe if the show was a quarter as smart as it *thinks* it is he’d have been a great villain, even with the character we got, but without Ben-Adir and his charisma there’s nothing to work with; not really, anyway.
Nah Ben-adir definitely didn't go to waste as it is universally accepted that he was the best part of this entire show.