Marvel Cinematic Universe, Phase Three and BEYOOOOONND

[Bazza]

Both (I think).

 

What do you think his implied motives are?

[Starlord]

Revenge on Jon Snow and Sansa Stark for having his own hounds eat him alive?

[zslane]

Maximus' stated motive is the "freedom" of all Attilan inhabitants, the lower caste in particular. His implied motive is to become king and take control of Inhuman society. He frames the latter as merely a means to an end (the former), but I feel it is pretty much the other way around: manipulating the people into believing in his crusade for freedom is the means to the end of becoming the ruler of Attilan. Do any of us doubt that left unchecked he would/will become a tyrannical despot?

[Lawnmower Boy]

Revenge on Jon Snow and Sansa Stark for having his own hounds eat him alive?

Wait. That's wrong, now?

 

I may have to rethink my way of dealing with the neighbours' loud party last night.

[DasBroot]

Maximus' stated motive is the "freedom" of all Attilan inhabitants, the lower caste in particular. His implied motive is to become king and take control of Inhuman society. He frames the latter as merely a means to an end (the former), but I feel it is pretty much the other way around: manipulating the people into believing in his crusade for freedom is the means to the end of becoming the ruler of Attilan. Do any of us doubt that left unchecked he would/will become a tyrannical despot?

 

I believed him when he said he'd 'prefer not to' - because that's him flat out admitting (as if his actions already hadn't) that he would if anyone threatened his reign.

 

And he doesn't strike me as being hard to threaten especially since he's already fallen face first into the self-fulfilling prophecy trap.

[Ranxerox]

 Do any of us doubt that left unchecked he would/will become a tyrannical despot?

 

No, but I can see that the current royal family are already tyrannical despots.  They force a segment of their population into backbreaking, slave labor for the "crime" of having the wrong genes.  That is not the sort of thing that maintains itself.  When individual slaves act up you have to make an example out of them.  When there are slave revolts they must be brutally crushed.  These are just things that have to be done when you maintain slaves.  

 

To make matters worse, it is clear that this is not economic based slavery.  This is punitive slavery.  We see slaves mining by digging with shovels and even their hands, despite Attilan being a high tech society.  They could mine with machines and it would be faster and more efficient, but they are choosing not to do so.  Since efficient mining isn't the point, clearly leaving miner too exhausted to revolt or fight back must be.  Inhuman in old sense of the word as to mean cruel and barbaric.

 

Still, Maximus could turn out to be worse.  His hold on power will almost certainly be tenuous, and weak rulers often resort to extreme violence to maintain their position.  It is not that he necessarily will want commit massacres, but he is likely to find it necessary to hold on to his rule.  So Attilan is likely to move from a barbaric but stable government to one marked by violence and chaos.

[Greywind]

...and that fits perfectly well within the scope of the actual history of the Inhumans and the alpha primitives in the books.

[zslane]

No, but I can see that the current royal family are already tyrannical despots.  They force a segment of their population into backbreaking, slave labor for the "crime" of having the wrong genes.

 

If I'm not mistaken, in the comics the Inhumans were originally villains, more or less, so it wouldn't really be incongruous for them to be perpetuating a harsh caste society (which invariably involves exploiting the lower caste, even when the rule is not tyrannical or prone to despotism). But this show is presumably trying to paint Black Bolt and his family as the benign, sympathetic "good guys," which produces the same ethical dissonance that Princess Mononoke suffered from, IMO.

[Hermit]

For those with Hulu...

 

This could be very good

 

[Starlord]

Speaking of other new series, I found the first episode of the The Gifted on Fox Monday night to be pretty good.  A post X-Men-mutants-on-the-run-from-government storyline.  Quality FX and makeup included so far.

 

[Bazza]

The Critic Reactions For #ThorRagnarok Are Now Here

https://mcuexchange.com/thor-ragnarok-social-media-critic-reactions/

[Bazza]

HOW TECH BRINGS MARVEL TALES TO LIFE ONSTAGE IN ‘AGE OF HEROES’

https://www.digitaltrends.com/features/marvel-universe-live-circus-age-of-heroes/

[zslane]

The Gifted is a well-made show, I'll give it that. But I'm so tired of the villains being our own government. It seems that's the only thing Marvel can come up with these days. At least on Attilan, the conflict is Shakespearean in nature, and not stuck in a 1960s/1970s mindset.

[bigdamnhero]

The Gifted is a well-made show, I'll give it that. But I'm so tired of the villains being our own government. It seems that's the only thing Marvel can come up with these days.

I'm with you there. But then, fearing the government has always been pretty central to the X-Men mythos. The premiere didn't blow me away (like Legion did!), but I enjoyed it enough to keep watching for now.

 

Runaways OTOH looks so damn good it might be worth getting Hulu for.

[Bazza]

Just think of The Gifted's "evil government" trope as being part of the "mutant-industrial complex".

[zslane]

At least in Agents of SHIELD, the KKK analog (the Watchdogs) was an independent terrorist organization. In The Gifted, the KKK analog is actually an official government agency with a name (Sentinel Services) meant to misleadingly allude to an organization dedicated to benign guardianship (Social Services). The former is more authentic (in my view), while the latter is more subversive and manipulative (and tiresome, at least for me).

[Pattern Ghost]

That's just part of the X-men mythos. I don't see it going away. At least in Fox's case, the X-men are contained in their own setting instead of polluting the main Marvel universe.

[Nolgroth]

At least in Agents of SHIELD, the KKK analog (the Watchdogs) was an independent terrorist organization. In The Gifted, the KKK analog is actually an official government agency with a name meant to misleadingly allude to an organization dedicated to benign guardianship (Social Services). The former is more authentic (in my view), while the latter is more subversive and manipulative (and tiresome, at least for me).

 

Thanks. I'll take your two comments thus far as ample reason to skip out on this. To be honest, every few years I get TV overload and have to skip out on a season or two. I am feeling that right now so I may just be grasping at whatever negative review I can find to not watch any TV at all. The only thing I am excited for is Stranger Things Season 2. Beyond that, maybe I'll catch up on Netflix next summer or something. 

[zslane]

That's just part of the X-men mythos. I don't see it going away. At least in Fox's case, the X-men are contained in their own setting instead of polluting the main Marvel universe.

 

Well, it's part of the X-men mythos I missed out on. I remember back in high school reading a stack of X-Men comics that a friend owned, and in those issues I detected hardly any of this government persecution stuff (the only time the Sentinels showed up was when Charles sent some of the team out to recruit Kitty Pryde for the school). The stack of issues I read began with Giant-Size X-Men #1 and ended just before the era of the New Mutants. The dystopian storyline of Days of Future Past turned me off and I stopped reading. I guess I just happened to read the only six year span of the X-Men in which their adventures weren't all about being hunted by the bloody government...

[Christopher R Taylor]

The original run of the X-Men had more persecution/mutant hysteria stuff, it was Stan Lee's take on bigotry and racism done with an allegory.  It was a different take as well, where people feared and resented the superheroes instead of liking them (Doom Patrol had the same kind of feel at the time).  Since then its sort of come and gone as the story demands, with sometimes people liking mutants fine and others disliking them.

 

Most of the anti-mutant stuff was a bit forced and implausible to me: it didn't work very well (as in the movies) but I appreciate what was being attempted.

[slikmar]

It especially stopped working when characters like Thor, Cap, FF, Spider-man etc were mostly liked and revered in the comics. Why is a GOD or Scientific experiment/accident character more trustworthy then a mutant. Especially as 90% of mutants look normal.

One of the funniest things in the original Civil War was Tony showing up at the X-Mens then home and saying he needed their help and registration and Scott telling him they already had to register for years and he can go to hell and they would sit back and watch the show now that the rest of the supers had to do it.

[Pattern Ghost]

Well, it's part of the X-men mythos I missed out on. I remember back in high school reading a stack of X-Men comics that a friend owned, and in those issues I detected hardly any of this government persecution stuff (the only time the Sentinels showed up was when Charles sent some of the team out to recruit Kitty Pryde for the school). The stack of issues I read began with Giant-Size X-Men #1 and ended just before the era of the New Mutants. The dystopian storyline of Days of Future Past turned me off and I stopped reading. I guess I just happened to read the only six year span of the X-Men in which their adventures weren't all about being hunted by the bloody government...

 

You missed out on it, then you mention Days of Future Past.

 

OK.

[zslane]

Showing the occasional mutant intolerance among the general population is one thing, but when you make the entire premise of an X-title (or in this case, a tv show) be that the full weight of the federal government is after you to disappear you into internment (or worse), it becomes more than just an allegory for racism or bigotry. It becomes a dystopian vision of genocide carried out in the name of species self-defense. That may make for an interesting storyline for several issues, but when it becomes the fundamental basis for an entire title or tv show, I know I'm in for too long an exhausting ride.

[Pattern Ghost]

Let me put it this way: It's a very popular storyline, a logical outgrowth of the mutant hysteria theme (despite that theme not fitting within the established universe), and it's been around 36 years. It's part of the mythos, such as it is. Having it be the basis for TV or movie versions of the franchise is inevitable.

 

The "I don't see it going away," in my above comment wasn't an endorsement, just a statement of inevitability. You know TV producers/networks are going to latch on to the darkest part of the franchise, and the one they can apply to a hot topic. And I agree with you that that sort of thing can get old fast. Fortunately, there are other less dark superhero (and non-superhero) shows to balance it out.

 

FWIW, the wife and I watched the firs episode the other day, and liked it. It was well-done. (That's for the general audience, I don't expect to sway you, zslane, as I can see where you're coming from. This clearly isn't to your tastes.)

[zslane]

Yeah, like I mentioned right up front, I think it is very well done. Well written, well directed, well acted, etc.

 

But it's a storyline that I feel is played out and doesn't resonate with me anymore, particularly the government-as-villain angle. But that's primarily a function of my age and the fact that I've seen this sort of thing done too many times now. Not too long ago it was used in a much less dark, and more broadly entertaining fashion in the first season of Heroes, and I guess an X-retread, while perhaps inevitable, just doesn't ring the freshness bell the way Fox (probably) thinks it does. Of course, to a population of millennials, everything looks shiny and new...