{"id":14187,"date":"2021-11-12T03:02:09","date_gmt":"2021-11-11T23:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blue-subtitle.com\/blog\/?p=14187"},"modified":"2021-11-12T03:02:09","modified_gmt":"2021-11-11T23:32:09","slug":"with-everyone-fighting-over-eternals-whats-next-for-marvels-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blue-subtitle.com\/blog\/with-everyone-fighting-over-eternals-whats-next-for-marvels-future\/","title":{"rendered":"With Everyone Fighting Over \u2018Eternals,\u2019 What\u2019s Next for Marvel\u2019s Future?"},"content":{"rendered":"

SPOILER WARNING:<\/strong>\u00a0This story includes discussions of the ending of\u00a0Marvel Studios\u00a0\u201cEternals,\u201d currently playing in theaters.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u201cEternals\u201d was always meant to shake things up.<\/p>\n

When Chlo\u00e9 Zhao first met with Marvel Studios about the possibility of directing the film, she was told from the start by the company\u2019s executives that \u201cEternals\u201d was seen internally as a reset button for the Marvel Cinematic Universe after the conclusive events of 2019\u2019s \u201cAvengers: Endgame.\u201d It would be a way to cleanse the studio\u2019s storytelling palate from the Infinity Saga, and set up the next decade of MCU narrative possibilities. While characters in \u201cEternals\u201d do mention other Marvel luminaries (Thanos, Iron Man, Steve Rogers etc.), no one from the previous 25 feature films in the MCU\u00a0makes an appearance\u00a0\u2014 the first time that\u2019s ever happened in the MCU. (Even \u201cDoctor Strange\u201d includes Thor in its post-credits scene.) It\u2019s as close to a clean slate as an MCU movie has ever been.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was Marvel\u2019s hope, you know,\u201d Zhao told\u00a0Variety<\/i>\u00a0the day after the film\u2019s world premiere in October. \u201cFrom the beginning, they told me that this film will explore the origin of the MCU, therefore redefining a lot of things. It will have repercussions to the future of the MCU.\u201d<\/p>\n

Divisive critically\u00a0and\u00a0less-than-stellar commercially, it\u2019s fair to say that \u201cEternals\u201d has indeed made quite an impact for Marvel Studios \u2014\u00a0if not quite like the company intended. But let\u2019s not overstate things: Why else would Marvel hire a filmmaker with as singular a creative vision as Zhao\u00a0\u2014 to tell\u00a0a story that re-writes no less than the origins of human civilization and the universe itself \u2014\u00a0if\u00a0not<\/i>\u00a0to shake up what a Marvel movie could be?<\/p>\n

On a basic level, \u201cEternals\u201d does set the stage for a cataclysmic event for the MCU at some point in its future. The Eternals, led by Sersi (Gemma Chan), stop a new Celestial from emerging within the Earth and destroying the entire planet. Arishem (David Kaye), the lead Celestial, subsequently appears looming over the Earth, pulls Sersi, Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry) and Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani) into space, and announces that he will judge the fate of the entire planet on their experiences with humanity.<\/p>\n

One would expect that, say, Bruce Banner, Doctor Strange, and the leaders of Wakanda will have some\u00a0opinions<\/i>\u00a0about the giant, petrified corpse of a Celestial poking out of the Indian Ocean, let alone a planet-sized god suddenly zapping into orbit and then just as suddenly zapping away. It\u2019s unclear whether Arishem\u2019s threat to destroy the Earth was heard only by the Eternals or the entire planet, but either way, that\u2019s the kind of high-stakes storytelling the MCU thrives on.<\/p>\n

But \u201cEternals\u201d \u2014 as a film and as a critical and social media lightning rod \u2014\u00a0poses an even more intriguing and existential question about the future of the MCU:\u00a0How<\/i>\u00a0will its titles tell those stories?<\/p>\n

Since its earliest days, Marvel Studios has earned a reputation, fairly or not, for sanding down its filmmakers\u2019 singular voices to fit inside its cohesive cinematic universe, typified by the lasting sting of Martin Scorsese\u2019s pronouncements in 2019 that Marvel movies are not cinema. It\u2019s true that other filmmakers \u2014 especially James Gunn (with the two \u201cGuardians of the Galaxy\u201d movies) and Taika Waititi (with \u201cThor: Ragnarok\u201d) \u2014 have brought more idiosyncratic filmmaking voices to the MCU. But \u201cEternals\u201d feels like an active rebuke against Marvel\u2019s image as a superhero factory. The studio hired Zhao specifically so she would infuse \u201cEternals\u201d with an aesthetic and narrative sensibility that stood apart from the rest of the studio\u2019s output to date.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s sort of a National Geographic approach,\u201d Zhao told\u00a0Variety<\/i>. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t do this crazy thing. It\u2019s just shows you what it is, and then you immerse.\u201d This appears to have been a happy collaboration; Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige even\u00a0half-joked\u00a0to\u00a0Variety<\/i>\u00a0in April that he hoped to be talking up \u201cEternals\u201d as an Oscar contender following Zhao\u2019s best picture and director wins for \u201cNomadland.\u201d<\/p>\n

Feige can probably keep his tuxedo in storage: Fans and critics alike have found \u201cEternals\u201d to be an uneasy, even off-putting mix \u2014 not quite the MCU, not quite Zhao \u2014 and have had no problem expressing their displeasure all over the internet. The reaction has effectively called out Marvel for doing the thing everyone seemed to want them to do: Give an A-list filmmaker greater leeway to make an MCU movie their way.<\/p>\n

So will Marvel do it again? The company\u2019s slate is already scheduled for the next two years, from Waititi\u2019s \u201cThor: Love and Thunder\u201d (due July 2022), which just wrapped, to Peyton Reed\u2019s \u201cAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania\u201d (due July 2023) which is already in production. So any fallout from \u201cEternals\u201d won\u2019t be evident until the fall of 2023\u00a0\u2014 and whomever is announced to direct Marvel\u2019s (as yet unannounced) next slate of movies.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also worth underlining that, one, Marvel\u00a0wanted<\/i>\u00a0\u201cEternals\u201d to be different, and two, Marvel chose \u201cEternals\u201d\u00a0as the film to be different.\u00a0<\/i>Created by Jack Kirby in a limited run in the 1970s, \u201cThe Eternals\u201d was never central to the great Marvel comics narrative. Sure, the title\u2019s origin story for the universe has reverberated throughout the Marvel canon, but as a limited, carved-out narrative many comics fans were free to outright ignore. And, again, Zhao knew this going in.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get to really play and make a standalone movie, which I think is a tribute to Jack Kirby,\u201d she said in October. \u201cIf you think about Jack Kirby\u2019s \u2018Eternals\u2019 run, it was created very much on the periphery of these really popular characters. He was telling stories about something so much bigger through this little group of outcasts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just compare \u201cEternals\u201d to the next film in the MCU: \u201cSpider-Man: No Way Home.\u201d Debuting in just over a month, \u201cNo Way Home\u201d is widely expected to be the highest-grossing film of the year, and the first pandemic-era release to open with over $100 million domestically. Co-produced with Sony Pictures, \u201cNo Way Home\u201d also promises to remake not just the MCU, but Sony\u2019s growing suite of Marvel adaptations by unleashing the looser narrative constraints of the multiverse. In fact, no matter how \u201cEternals\u201d changes the MCU, the multiverse \u2014 introduced by the recent Disney Plus series \u201cLoki\u201d and \u201cWhat If\u2026?\u201d \u2014 already has, by opening up an infinite number of possible strands to explore, and paving the way for versions of Tom Holland\u2019s Peter Parker to exist within the MCU and Sony\u2019s separate Marvel-verse.<\/p>\n

Also, not to put too fine a point on this, but while Jon Watts has proven to be a lively director of Holland\u2019s \u201cSpider-Man\u201d films, his previous output \u2014 including the indie films \u201cClown\u201d and \u201cCop Car,\u201d and video shorts for the Onion \u2014\u00a0had not established him as a unique cinematic voice. If anything, Watts is far more of what most Marvel Studios observers think of when they talk about Marvel\u2019s \u201chouse style\u201d: a highly effective and competent craftsperson who disappears into their movies.<\/p>\n

Not coincidentally, since his inception in 1962, Spider-Man has lived at Marvel\u2019s very center, so it would stand to reason that Marvel and Sony wouldn\u2019t want to take a big, risky swing with such a valuable character.<\/p>\n

And yet, Sony did just that with 2002\u2019s \u201cSpider-Man,\u201d directed by Sam Raimi. A horror auteur with an unmistakable style honed over years as a no-budget indie filmmaker, Raimi brought his sensibility whole cloth to \u201cSpider-Man\u201d and its 2004 sequel, which is still widely considered one of the best comic book movies ever made. By 2007\u2019s bloated \u201cSpider-Man 3,\u201d however, studio demands and commercial considerations had drained away much of Raimi\u2019s voice. The movie made more money than any Spidey film before it ($895 million), but it was widely derided as an embarrassment, and Raimi left the franchise. That prompted the reboot with Andrew Garfield and director Marc Webb, which suffered from the same sense of bloat and creative anonymity, which ultimately drove Sony to its unprecedented partnership to make Spider-Man movies with Marvel Studios.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Marvel Studios\u2019 follow-up to \u201cSpider-Man: No Way Home\u201d \u2014 \u201cDoctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness\u201d \u2014 is directed by, yes, Sam Raimi. Much like with Chlo\u00e9 Zhao, it\u2019s hard to imagine\u00a0why Marvel would hire Raimi and not want him to do his\u00a0thing<\/i>. We\u2019ll know soon enough; the film has wrapped and is currently scheduled to debut in May 2022.<\/p>\n

Source: variety<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SPOILER WARNING:\u00a0This story includes discussions of the ending of\u00a0Marvel Studios\u00a0\u201cEternals,\u201d currently playing in theaters. \u201cEternals\u201d was always meant to shake things up. When Chlo\u00e9 Zhao first met with Marvel Studios about the possibility of directing the film, she was told from the start by the company\u2019s executives that \u201cEternals\u201d was seen internally as a reset […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14188,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7036],"tags":[8644,8642,8643],"class_list":["post-14187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-eternals","tag-everyone-fighting-over-eternals","tag-whats-next-for-marvels-future"],"yoast_head":"\nWith Everyone Fighting Over \u2018Eternals,\u2019 What\u2019s Next for Marvel\u2019s Future? - blue subtitle<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blue-subtitle.com\/blog\/with-everyone-fighting-over-eternals-whats-next-for-marvels-future\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"With Everyone Fighting Over \u2018Eternals,\u2019 What\u2019s Next for Marvel\u2019s Future? - blue subtitle\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"SPOILER WARNING:\u00a0This story includes discussions of the ending of\u00a0Marvel Studios\u00a0\u201cEternals,\u201d currently playing in theaters. \u201cEternals\u201d was always meant to shake things up. 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