Marvel Cinematic Universe, Phase Three and BEYOOOOONND

[Bazza]

I am sort of thinking that The Eternals, was going to be Marvel's "mutants" as the Inhumans film fell through (it was announced as a Phase Three film) and the tv series didn't set the world on fire. So I think The Eternals was going to fill this gap. 

[Hugh Neilson]

Another advantage of the Eternals was their relative "unknown-ness" which makes it easier to make one character gay, change the gender of three others and tack a disability on to one.  Much like Shang-Chi had to gain flight and energy blasting abilities so he will not be a "stereotypical Asian martial artists bolted on to the Avengers as a token to cultural diversity".

 

Odd that The Eternals may be the most "woke"/diverse Marvel movie to date, yet its central premise includes the much more physically diverse Deviants as the automatic Bad Guys, compared to the much more homogeneous and "normal standard of beauty and attractiveness" Eternals. 

 

I wonder how audiences would react to Karkas (the monstrous Deviant with the heart of a, poet) and Reject (the deviant rejected for his hideous appearance of a normal white male).  But the reconfiguration of the Deviants for the movies (making them snarling monsters rather than humanoids with different appearances; apparently only Warlord Kro possesses the ability to even speak) lets us deem all Deviants evil monsters suitable for violent ends at the hands of our much more physically attractive heroes.

 

Perhaps this shows how far we really haven't come, in reality, for all of our desire to show an embracing of diversity.

[Grailknight]

 

10 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

The thing that confuses me is... why?  Why make this?  To lock in the concept so a Second World movie by DC looks derivative?  I don't get it.  Of all the possible projects... The Eternals???  I would have much, much rather seen an Adam Warlock cosmic storyline.

 

Though, both were C-List, Eternals had a bigger part of the comics universe than Guardians of the Galaxy, especially since GotG is using the replacement team.

 

7 hours ago, Bazza said:

I am sort of thinking that The Eternals, was going to be Marvel's "mutants" as the Inhumans film fell through (it was announced as a Phase Three film) and the tv series didn't set the world on fire. So I think The Eternals was going to fill this gap. 

 

Inhumans were going to be the MCU's mutants in the original plan. That was evident to me from the the way they were used in AoS. But the internal company power struggle that took them out of Feige's oversight gave us the most horrifically bad product Marvel has put out since the start of the MCU(Only Iron Fist rivals it) and pretty much killed that off.

[Greywind]

13 hours ago, Old Man said:

Um. What state is this? I’d like to know so that I don’t go there, ever. 

 

Sounds like New Mexico.

[Christopher R Taylor]

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I am sort of thinking that The Eternals, was going to be Marvel's "mutants" as the Inhumans film fell through

 

That is kind of the sense I get as well, like they keep trying to make "Fetch" a thing

 

 

Quote

Though, both were C-List, Eternals had a bigger part of the comics universe than Guardians of the Galaxy, especially since GotG is using the replacement team.

 

Guardians has and had before the movie its own comic book recently.  And it gave them the broader universe for their setting, with cheap, gag-only versions of characters like the Collector and a touch of the cosmic stuff with Ego.  There doesn't seem to be a niche for the Eternals.

[Bazza]

 

[Bazza]

[Old Man]

I obviously haven't seen Eternals yet but I'm hearing there are two post credits scenes.  Just FYI.

[Dr. MID-Nite]

From my Facebook review....

 

Movie Review: (That recently released Marvel movie that shall for the moment remain nameless due to FB algorithms.) I found this movie pleasantly surprising. It's certainly not deserving of the hate it's been getting. The movie is long and is in general less action packed than other recent Marvel films. That's to be expected as the film is packed with characters that need at least a minimal amount of fleshing out. This movie is beautifully shot and the sense of scale in scenes involving the Celestials is impressive. The film also benefits from a good cast and impressive FX work. There are a few plot holes, but they're all minor. My only major gripe is that I would have liked more investigation into what a 5000 year old person would be like and the film only hints at that on occasion. In that sense, this would have worked somewhat better as a series. There's two post credit sequences...one of which was expected and the other which came as somewhat of a surprise. The film also has a very good end fight....which potential directors of a Superman/Flash clash should take note of. As far as the criticisms of it being "woke" (a term I hate by the way), if seeing people on screen who aren't WASPs bothers you that much, I can't help you. This film will be divisive, but as a foundation to build upon future cosmic level MCU stories, this really is a must see.

[zslane]

Does its third act throw away all its plot and character development in favor of a mindless VFX-heavy final battle? Were you at all bothered by the notion presented by the movie that all of early humanity's achievements were thanks to the Eternals, rather than the result of humanity's own ingenuity? I know of at least one reviewer who was critical of these two things.

[Christopher R Taylor]

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As far as the criticisms of it being "woke" (a term I hate by the way), if seeing people on screen who aren't WASPs bothers you that much, I can't help you.

 

Yeah its funny how woke went from "this is a term we're proud of and describes us" to "this is a horrible word and people should stop using it".  But the truth is, almost nobody is complaining about any woke crap in Eternals, most are remarking how refreshingly devoid of that it is.  Just slow and plodding and pointless.

[Ternaugh]

35 minutes ago, zslane said:

Does its third act throw away all its plot and character development in favor of a mindless VFX-heavy final battle? Were you at all bothered by the notion presented by the movie that all of early humanity's achievements were thanks to the Eternals, rather than the result of humanity's own ingenuity? I know of at least one reviewer who was critical of these two things.

 

That's similar to the main premise of the 1968 Erich von Däniken book (and 1970 film) Chariots of the Gods?  It informed much of the backstory of Stargate and Stargate: SG1. Given that the comic for the Eternals was originally from 1976, it wouldn't surprise me if this also figured into that backstory.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

That's similar to the main premise of the 1968 Erich von Däniken book (and 1970 film) Chariots of the Gods?  It informed much of the backstory of Stargate and Stargate: SG1. Given that the comic for the Eternals was originally from 1976, it wouldn't surprise me if this also figured into that backstory.

 

It would not shock me if Kirby did draw pretty heavily from that for his ideas.

[Lord Liaden]

That's also similar to the premise of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968 movie), which Jack Kirby adapted for comics in 1976, and followed up with a short-lived series; which parallels the concept in Eternals of advanced aliens meddling with the genes of human ancestors. Eternals resembled a blend of Clarke's and von Daniken's concepts, with a big dollop of Jack's New Gods. I remember reading a remark by Kirby that New Gods was written from the perspective of the gods looking down on humanity, whereas the Eternals took the viewpoint of humanity looking up at the gods.

[Dr. MID-Nite]

6 hours ago, zslane said:

Does its third act throw away all its plot and character development in favor of a mindless VFX-heavy final battle? Were you at all bothered by the notion presented by the movie that all of early humanity's achievements were thanks to the Eternals, rather than the result of humanity's own ingenuity? I know of at least one reviewer who was critical of these two things.

 

There is a final fight, but I don't think any character development is lost because of it. The movie seems to imply that Phastos wanted to give them much more advanced tech, but was held back....so I don't think humanity got "everything" from the Eternals. How much that element of the film bothers you is really up to each individual.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Everything I've read says that the movie really did not have time to give anyone character development with having to introduce so many new characters, an entirely new plotline, and an entirely new set of bad guys at the same time.  As Dr MID-Nite notes, this probably would have been better handled as a TV series, or a miniseries, but here we are.

[Twilight]

So I saw the Eternals and....well I didn't despise it the way I despised Jurassic Park: Fallen Kingdom or The Dark Knight Rises but, well I found the movie rather dull to be honest.  It looked like it was building to something but with an hour left in the movie I was well past caring since the characters weren't all that interesting, nothing much seemed to be happening and despite the movie focusing on Marvel's cosmic characters nothing cosmic seemed to be happening.  The thing that interested me most was Kingu being a one person Bollywood dynasty and that was ignored mere moments after it was brought up.  Sure 

Spoiler

Eros

shows up at the end, but that only made me wonder why he wasn't introduced earlier.  In short, I cannot recommend this flick.

[slikmar]

On 11/8/2021 at 6:19 PM, Dr. MID-Nite said:

From my Facebook review....

 

Movie Review: (That recently released Marvel movie that shall for the moment remain nameless due to FB algorithms.) I found this movie pleasantly surprising. It's certainly not deserving of the hate it's been getting. The movie is long and is in general less action packed than other recent Marvel films. That's to be expected as the film is packed with characters that need at least a minimal amount of fleshing out. This movie is beautifully shot and the sense of scale in scenes involving the Celestials is impressive. The film also benefits from a good cast and impressive FX work. There are a few plot holes, but they're all minor. My only major gripe is that I would have liked more investigation into what a 5000 year old person would be like and the film only hints at that on occasion. In that sense, this would have worked somewhat better as a series. There's two post credit sequences...one of which was expected and the other which came as somewhat of a surprise. The film also has a very good end fight....which potential directors of a Superman/Flash clash should take note of. As far as the criticisms of it being "woke" (a term I hate by the way), if seeing people on screen who aren't WASPs bothers you that much, I can't help you. This film will be divisive, but as a foundation to build upon future cosmic level MCU stories, this really is a must see.

Just got back from it and I would agree with everything written here.

I felt, as the movie got further in, that we got a better Justice League movie (especially if you take the similarities to some of the characters - Ikarus - Superman, Phastos - Batman (with higher tech), Gilgamesh - sort of Aquaman, Thena - Wonder Woman, Makkari - Flash). and despite not being 4 hours (needed per Snyder, still haven't seen his version), I would say you got some pretty good character development. At least I, who never read Eternals, understood each ones character pretty well. In the end, the whole movie is about varying degrees of Love and loyalty.

[zslane]

12 hours ago, slikmar said:

I would say you got some pretty good character development. At least I, who never read Eternals, understood each ones character pretty well.

 

Out of curiosity, and without giving away any spoilers, which characters in Eternals went through substantial changes (of character) over the course of the movie?

[Ranxerox]

8 hours ago, zslane said:

 

Out of curiosity, and without giving away any spoilers, which characters in Eternals went through substantial changes (of character) over the course of the movie?

 

That is a hard question.  The characters are asked to make some very tough moral choices and they are all affected by them. But there is the question of which ones are changed by the choices and which just have there true character revealed.

 

Sprite, Sersi, Thena, Ikaris, Druig, and Kingo all have have interesting arcs.  However, which are changed versus which are revealed I couldn't say.

[zslane]

5 minutes ago, Ranxerox said:

Sprite, Sersi, Thena, Ikaris, Druig, and Kingo all have have interesting arcs.

 

Do they? It doesn't quite sound like they do, at least not from how I'm hearing the movie described.

 

Without change there is no "arc" (the arc metaphor represents a trajectory of change in the character due to the events of the story; the arc is not the story itself). If there is no obvious change for viewers to observe and be moved by, then the characters don't really have an arc; they have no meaningful development (in a conventional dramatic sense). I think screenwriters these days lack a strong grasp of character development, and try to be too subtle and nuanced with their characters. They mistake "naturalistic" portrayals with character development. Developing a character is not the process of slowly revealing a character's beliefs, traumas, and driving forces. It is the process of changing those beliefs and driving forces as a consequence of the drama they get caught up in. In Star Wars (ANH), Han Solo has a character arc. Obi-Wan Kenobi does not. Luke Skywalker has a character arc. Princess Leia does not. Darth Vader does not get a character arc until RotJ.

[slikmar]

I would say that Ikaris, Phastos and Ajak all had changes to their belief system, as it was presented, though Ikaris came late. I would also say that upon learning the major reveal of the movie, they all had moral choices to make, some moreso then others. I would say all ended up going with their personality as it was presented, which is not bad. We don't say Steve Rogers didnt have a interesting character arc because he ALWAYS stuck to what he believed was right.

Again, if you haven't seen it, it would be tough to explain. Granted Gilgamesh and Thena had interesting characters but not so much an arc. At the center of the movie, it really is about Sersi, Ikaris and Sprite. The others are support, but all have their ingrained personality and beliefs and stick with them. I say all that while trying not to give away the movie. It is better then people are saying. I did not find it boring, as I thought there was enough action along the way and I found the characters interesting for the most part.

[Ranxerox]

33 minutes ago, zslane said:

 

Do they? It doesn't quite sound like they do, at least not from how I'm hearing the movie described.

 

Without change there is no "arc" (the arc metaphor represents a trajectory of change in the character due to the events of the story; the arc is not the story itself). If there is no obvious change for viewers to observe and be moved by, then the characters don't really have an arc; they have no meaningful development (in a conventional dramatic sense). I think screenwriters these days lack a strong grasp of character development, and try to be too subtle and nuanced with their characters. They mistake "naturalistic" portrayals with character development. Developing a character is not the process of slowly revealing a character's beliefs, traumas, and driving forces. It is the process of changing those beliefs and driving forces as a consequence of the drama they get caught up in. In Star Wars (ANH), Han Solo has a character arc. Obi-Wan Kenobi does not. Luke Skywalker has a character arc. Princess Leia does not. Darth Vader does not get a character arc until RotJ.

 

Setting aside the superficial stuff and embracing ones essential core is a change even if the core was secretly there all along.

 

[Ranxerox]

14 minutes ago, slikmar said:

Granted Gilgamesh and Thena had interesting characters but not so much an arc. 

 

I think that Thena has an arc, but it is more related to her illness than the external events of the movie.

 

[Starlord]

Electro and Thor always have strong character arcs.