MCU - Hawkeye v Snowcat

[IlyaP]

12 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

See now you lost me. Scarlett isn't perfect but she manages to grapple with the MCU style far better than Brie. She is able to do the snarky comments without coming across as bitter, she is able to laugh at herself, to not take herself seriously, and she managed to have chemistry with basically everyone she interacted with in all her movies. 

I've just never liked her in the role. Her acting is just...so boring to me. And her vocalisation is flat and uninteresting. She does get a few good moments in the Avengers movies (I've a soft spot for her "bringing the party" banter bit with Stark), but she just...I don't get the appeal with her. 

And her spoken Russian. Oh Heartofice, it's...it's so bad. Like, the cringe when she tries to speak Russian is so real. 

[IlyaP]

11 minutes ago, karaddin said:

Chum in the water is just bait btw.

Chums = friends, no?

So friends in the water? 

WHAT EVEN IS ENGLISH. 

*weeps*

[karaddin]

1 minute ago, IlyaP said:

Chums = friends, no?

So friends in the water? 

WHAT EVEN IS ENGLISH. 

*weeps*

The 'Choose your own adventure' language, just start making shit up and you can probably get people to go with it.

[lacuna]

15 minutes ago, karaddin said:

I think lacuna is assuming that one was edited with the static to try antagonize the haters even more? I don't actually know the youtuber in question, I took it to be the opposite - pointing out that her actual words are a nothingburger, in which case the annoying static edits would just be the style of that youtuber.

Chum in the water is just bait btw.

Obviously, I can't say wether it's incompetence, malice, coincidence or whatever, but someone took the time to add in those jarring sounds. And yes, I interpret that as an attempt at creating ill will towards the content of the speech. Maybe I just hate the sudden sound of loud static.

Tracing the origins of the video would be a hopeless task, videos are "stolen" all the time, reuploaded hither and thither.

And I used chumming to allude to the (some would say) lazy and low-effort sport fishing technique of repeatedly chumming an area to attract large amounts of fish, that you then try to catch.

[IlyaP]

2 minutes ago, lacuna said:

Obviously, I can't say wether it's incompetence, malice, coincidence or whatever, but someone took the time to add in those jarring sounds. And yes, I interpret that as an attempt at creating ill will towards the content of the speech. Maybe I just hate the sudden sound of loud static.

Tracing the origins of the video would be a hopeless task, videos are "stolen" all the time, reuploaded hither and thither.

Fair cop. I just went looking for the speech, and focused mostly on the presentation stuff, and kinda just blanked out the weird noise stuff, which in retrospect does seem kinda unnecessary. 

And thank you for clarifying on chumming - I did look online, but nothing I saw made any kind of contextual sense to me, so I had to ask, to make sure I understood your meaning correctly.

[lacuna]

3 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

And thank you for clarifying on chumming - I did look online, but nothing I saw made any kind of contextual sense to me, so I had to ask, to make sure I understood your meaning correctly.

No worries, mate!

[Heartofice]

17 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

I've just never liked her in the role. Her acting is just...so boring to me. And her vocalisation is flat and uninteresting. She does get a few good moments in the Avengers movies (I've a soft spot for her "bringing the party" banter bit with Stark), but she just...I don't get the appeal with her. 

And her spoken Russian. Oh Heartofice, it's...it's so bad. Like, the cringe when she tries to speak Russian is so real. 

I think that is fair, she does have a very flat delivery, and she isn't perfect, but I think her biggest asset is she managed to create good chemistry with her co stars, and its these relationships that count.

Brie has very poor chemistry with her co stars, it never really gelled with Sam Jackson and the banter just came off as nasty. This stuff is important.

Can't comment on her Russian but I wouldn't be surprised if it was awful, isn't that the case for most actors?

 

[IlyaP]

6 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

I think that is fair, she does have a very flat delivery, and she isn't perfect, but I think her biggest asset is she managed to create good chemistry with her co stars, and its these relationships that count.

In her defense, she's had more time over the course of all the movies in which to do that. She gets a hometeam advantage by default.

6 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Brie has very poor chemistry with her co stars, it never really gelled with Sam Jackson and the banter just came off as nasty. This stuff is important.

Eh. I enjoyed her with Sam Jackson. And I know BTS they were goofballs. I don't know if it's projection or just not being convinced? 

6 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Can't comment on her Russian but I wouldn't be surprised if it was awful, isn't that the case for most actors?

Some more than others. 

Everything in Black Widow hurt. 

But by comparison, remember Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull? Cate's Russian was FUCKING AWFUL, but everyone around her? Russian actors speaking honest to Dust Men real Russian. 

Same goes with Tom Cruise speaking Russian in Ghost Protocol. That was fucking *DIRE*, Heartofice. DIRE.

[IlyaP]

(When that guy in MI4 said "Sergey you are not Russian?" I laughed out loud in the cinema. And I was...the only one. Because no one else understood how wildly implausible it would be to think Hunt's Russian was good enough to fake being an actual Russian.)

[Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II]

Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow was light years ahead of Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel.
 

You guys speak of humour, compare the banter of Natasha and Steve with anything in the Captain Marvel movie… at least I felt some emotion with Black Widow compared to…nothing with Captain Marvel. The problem is her character is not consistent - sometimes  she’s stoic, sometimes fish out of water, sometimes quippy like Tony Stark.Sam Jackson had more of a character arc than her in the Captain Marvel film, and was just much more fun. No wonder they cut her role drastically in the later Avenger films. 

 

Edited July 28, 2023 by Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II

[IlyaP]

13 minutes ago, Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II said:

You guys speak of humour, compare the banter of Natasha and Steve with anything in the Captain Marvel movie… at least I felt some emotion with Black Widow compared to…nothing with Captain Marvel. The problem is her character is not consistent - sometimes  she’s stoic, sometimes fish out of water, sometimes quippy like Tony Stark.Sam Jackson had more of a character arc than her in the Captain Marvel film, and was just much more fun. No wonder they cut her role drastically in the later Avenger films. 

How you experience is something is not how others will, Chuckles. I think Johannsen is a fucking atrocious choice for the MCU movies, and guess what? That's ALRIGHT. Because there's *no right answer*. You just need to learn to not phrase everything like it's a fucking black or white choice, numbnuts.  

Furthermore: Black Widow appeared in nine movies, across which viewers and in-world characters had time to form those bonds and also give her a character arc. Captain Marvel most decidedly has not, given her character debuted in 2019, a month or two before Endgame. So atop everything else, you seem to not understand know how to count. 

[Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II]

3 minutes ago, IlyaP said:

How you experience is something is not how others will, Chuckles. I think Johannsen is a fucking atrocious choice for the MCU movies, and guess what? That's ALRIGHT. Because there's *no right answer*. You just need to learn to not phrase everything like it's a fucking black or white choice, numbnuts.  

Furthermore: Black Widow appeared in nine movies, across which viewers and in-world characters had time to form those bonds and also give her a character arc. Captain Marvel most decidedly has not, given her character debuted in 2019, a month or two before Endgame. So atop everything else, you seem to not understand know how to count. 

Black widow had a strong foundation from the get go, Captain Marvel doesn't. I liked Natasha much more from her small debut in Iron Man 2, then Capt Marvel in her entire standalone movie. And yeah , thats my subjective opinion, I never stated once that it’s a fact.

Capt Marvel is unlikeable from the get go and they’ve steadily reduced her presence in the succeeding movies. Maybe she’ll improve in future movies, I certainly hope she does. But that means they’ll need to redo her arcs anyways cause her presence in the last few movies in terms of both plot and character amounted to basically nothing.
 

Whether it’s 2 or 9 movies, when you’re a terribly written character, it makes no difference. The reverse is also likely - one could argue Finn and Poe were stronger characters in TFA  then after doing 3 movies concluding with TROS. I shouldn’t need 9 movies to make me care about a character, all about the writing here. Iron Man did it in half. 

[IlyaP]

13 minutes ago, Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II said:

Black widow had a strong foundation from the get go, Captain Marvel doesn't.

Yes, because it's movie number NINE. She had the home field advantage. 

 

13 minutes ago, Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II said:

I liked Natasha much more from her small debut in Iron Man 2, then Capt Marvel in her entire standalone movie. And yeah , thats my subjective opinion, I never stated once that it’s a fact.

Capt Marvel is unlikeable from the get go and they’ve steadily reduced her presence in the succeeding movies.

Unlikeable to YOU. TO. YOU. 

Not the rest of us. It's annoying when you talk in categorical terms. This is not a science. She is not obejctively unlikable, she is unlikeable to YOU. There is a fucking difference. Learn how language works before you use it.

13 minutes ago, Ser Rodrigo Belmonte II said:

Whether it’s 2 or 9 movies, when you’re a terribly written character, it makes no difference. The reverse is also likely - one could argue Finn and Poe were stronger characters in TFA  then after doing 3 movies concluding with TROS. I shouldn’t need 9 movies to make me care about a character, all about the writing here. Iron Man did it in half. 

Oh don't bring Star Wars into this. I'm not interested in talking about them, and even less so with you, who can't hold an original thought in his head that wasn't born on some idiotic youtube channel.

Edited July 28, 2023 by IlyaP

[Heartofice]

I thought this was a decent article, amongst many that highlight the major flaw in Captain Marvel, that essentially Carol Danvers has no story arc at all. Her character starts and ends the movie the same way, she doesn't grow, she doesn't learn anything, she doesn't really have any major weaknesses. Larson didn't do a great job in the role but the movie itself really screwed her over by just being badly constructed.

https://medium.com/@matthewkadish/captain-marvels-biggest-flaw-she-s-not-a-strong-character-storycraft-f45b13af512c

 

Quote

Carol Danvers was a static character with no attempts to transform her, thus ultimately making her dull and uninteresting. I believe this is why so much of Captain Marvel’s audience is ambivalent toward her, because they were never given the opportunity by the storytellers to actually connect to her through the lack of a character arc. Had Captain Marvel been a better crafted story, we’d have either gotten to see Carol Danvers transform in some way, or we’d have gotten to see the core of her character challenged in a manner that she had to effectively resist. Either of these things would have created the necessary emotional connection to the character to make the audience really attached to her. But neither of these things were present in the actual movie.

 

Edited July 28, 2023 by Heartofice

[IlyaP]

40 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

I thought this was a decent article, amongst many that highlight the major flaw in Captain Marvel, that essentially Carol Danvers has no story arc at all. Her character starts and ends the movie the same way, she doesn't grow, she doesn't learn anything, she doesn't really have any major weaknesses. Larson didn't do a great job in the role but the movie itself really screwed her over by just being badly constructed.

A thankfully not vituperative read around the subject of Larson. But one that I think failed to engage in a close read of the film, to use a wanky as hell literary term. (Though I saw he has numerous essays around The Last Jedi, and man, I am not touching that with a mile long foot pole, as I am sick to f*cking death of Star Wars.)

But back to Captain Marvel: the film does pepper moments around her, of growth, which I found quite emotionally engaging, meeting with people who knew her but who she could not remember (helped all the more by Toprak's score, which knew when to dial back the bombast and allow for moments of mystery and intrigue ('Finding the Records', 'Photos of Us', 'Learning the Truth'). It almost kinda felt a bit like it was leaning into Bourne Identity ideas at moments, with the amnesiac plot. But from what I understand, the movie also was undergoing constant rewrites, and was being directed by people who don't have a big budget, studio film kind of experience (Only Geneva Robertson-Dworet had any big studio experience, as a writer on the 2018 Tomb Raider reboot). It is also a very desaturated and not visually interesting movie - which is a known Marvel issue that started around Phase 2. 

Her personality, though somewhat static, does show growth over time, as upon rewatch, the theme that I *think* they were *attempting* to explore - based on how the narrative evolves - is 'unlocking potential', as a kind of a metaphor for self-actualisation. Could it be read as female empowerment? Absofrigginlutely. Watching it in cinemas, I had a takeaway of the aforementioned self-actualisation theme, but I can absolutely see how there are other possible readings of the film. (That said, I can see how the empowerment angle is played, especially with eye-rolling scenes like the "got a smile for me?" scene, that's 100% pure groan, and...I think? a T2 homage?)

But I think we need to look at the film as a story of self-discovery and Carol's rediscovering and embracing her humanity. There's a scene in the movie where Fury comments on the humanity involved in and around breaking orders and following one's gut, and Vers comments on how she's been trained to always follow orders and do as she's told. Thus, why, by film's end, we get the "I have nothing to prove to you" scene. The whole movie sets up an interesting play of sub-themes around gaslighting and power struggles and "proving" ones worth and the struggle over what one is or isn't, can or can't be. (I've been watching the movie tonight, while writing this, so I'm bringing a fresh, 28 July 2023 perspective on it, baybee!)

Obviously, I understand that this ain't everyone's cup of tea, especially Sargeant Chuckles von Braind Flush, but the character arc of Carol Danvers in this strikes me as one of rediscovering her humanity, after being gaslit by Kree for however many years, and embracing herself for who and what she is. @karaddin, what would you say to that?

That said, I think Marvel fumbles the ball a bit by not making it clearer, consistent, and impactful. But there's also the issue that the movie is serving as a setup for Other Stuff, which, frankly, annoys the hell out of me, as it's something that started to take root in MCU movies/shows somewhere between Phases 2 and 3, where every story is never /quite/ complete, but also serves to set up another story, and where every bit of dramatic growth is undercut by the need to Set Up More Stuff. This was particularly prevalent in nearly everything in Phase 4, including Loki, which was almost good, and then...dropped the proverbial cosmic ball and then was followed by WandaVision, Hawkeye, Falcoln and the Winter Soldier, and Ms. Marvel - all of which failed to just be their own standlone stories.

And Captain Marvel suffers from that a bit. But with its need to forever have stories expanding, and issues around hiring indie filmmakers who could be easily controlled, and have VFX handled by others, and so on, as we've seen from the numerous stories that have emerged, I feel like Captain Marvel might have been a bit of a casualty on that front. 

Anyways, I've rambled on long enough, and should let myself fall over sideways into bed as I attempt yet again to reread Stephenson's The Confusion, a book that aggravates every single editorial muscle and instinct within me. 

[IlyaP]

Back on topic, it looks like Secret Invasion did no real favors for the MCU. 

https://www.darkhorizons.com/the-mcu-impact-of-secret-invasion/

Edited July 28, 2023 by IlyaP

[Heartofice]

1 hour ago, IlyaP said:

Her personality, though somewhat static, does show growth over time, as upon rewatch, the theme that I *think* they were *attempting* to explore - based on how the narrative evolves - is 'unlocking potential', as a kind of a metaphor for self-actualisation. Could it be read as female empowerment? Absofrigginlutely.

I think you've kind of nailed it here, the problem however is that really isn't a very compelling story. It pretty much is the boilerplate female empowerment scenario that seems to apply to all female characters these days, and it's very boring. Apparently all female characters are just inherently amazing, they just need to believe a bit more and discover their own inner amazingness. Carol doesn't grow in the movie, she just remembers why she's amazing.. Yawn. 
 

1 hour ago, IlyaP said:

Back on topic, it looks like Secret Invasion did no real favors for the MCU. 

https://www.darkhorizons.com/the-mcu-impact-of-secret-invasion/

A review of this show on the guardian compared it to 'having to do your homework' rather than an enjoyable experience. I think that sort of sums it up as well as a lot of the Disney+ offerings, it's trying to tie into other movies and set stuff up, and almost forces you to watch it if you want to understand what is happening in the next MCU movie. It isn't an enjoyable show however. 

I don't know if I'll ever finish it, and that article has basically spoiled a lot for me, not that I give a shit. You can see just how much of the plot will be discarded and never brought up again. 

Secret invasion should have been a major event for Marvel but instead it was utterly underwhelming and small scale.

[Rhom]

< Wakes up and sees four full new pages of discussion in the MCU thread... >

< Thinks to self:  "Oh, that's a lot of talk about Secret Invasion all of a sudden... I wonder who got a chance to watch the finale last night..." >

< Clicks on page 15... >

Oh...

[IlyaP]

10 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

I think you've kind of nailed it here, the problem however is that really isn't a very compelling story. It pretty much is the boilerplate female empowerment scenario that seems to apply to all female characters these days, and it's very boring. Apparently all female characters are just inherently amazing, they just need to believe a bit more and discover their own inner amazingness. Carol doesn't grow in the movie, she just remembers why she's amazing.. Yawn.

Heh, I have pretty low standards and am pretty easily entertained. So while I can see why it might not be everyone's cup of tea, if the performances are sufficiently engaging (excuse me while I swoon into Mr. Ben Mendelsohn's arms), and the soundtrack doesn't try to blow my ears off with unhinged mixes, I'm a pretty easy target for movies. I'll watch damn near anything.

10 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

A review of this show on the guardian compared it to 'having to do your homework' rather than an enjoyable experience. I think that sort of sums it up as well as a lot of the Disney+ offerings, it's trying to tie into other movies and set stuff up, and almost forces you to watch it if you want to understand what is happening in the next MCU movie. It isn't an enjoyable show however. 

I don't know if I'll ever finish it, and that article has basically spoiled a lot for me, not that I give a shit. You can see just how much of the plot will be discarded and never brought up again. 

Secret invasion should have been a major event for Marvel but instead it was utterly underwhelming and small scale.

Pretty much bang on nailed it there. Talked to my bro from another mo about it and he said to skip it, as it'd just annoy me. Nothing that I've read about this show makes me think "Why yes @Heartofice, this is *clearly* Must See TV!" (cue canned audience laughter track). 

I think it's a show you Hate Watch with a good drink, if anything. Like, drink everytime the plot does a swerve and twist 'cause COMIC BOOK SETUP. 

Which, with Marvel, is increasingly becoming All The Time. 

[sifth]

Captain Marvel just came off as wooden and boring to me. Maybe Brie Larson just sucks at comedy, or more likely the writers do. The most impressive thing about the movie was the CGI used to deage Samuel L Jackson; something I'm still amazed they were able to pull off. That being said, Disney must be happy that film made over a billion, because deaging him had to be expensive. I'd love to read how much it cost, because Samuel L Jackson, is basically in the entire film.