Back of the Head: Marvel

Showing posts with label Marvel. Show all posts

Saturday, May 7, 2022

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS

** SPOILERS **

"Are you happy?" Doctor Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) asks Wong, the Sorcerer Supreme (Benedict Wong). If he asked me, I'd answer with an unequivocal "yes." Sam Raimi's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness - the director's first superhero movie since his Spider-Man trilogy and his first foray into the Marvel Cinematic Universe - is a giddy good time, a wild and weird magic carpet ride through the Marvel Multiverse that was established in the animated Marvel's What If...? series and unlocked in live-action by Spider-Man: No Way Home. This is Doctor Strange's fifth movie appearance since his debut film in 2016 and it's the wizard's best outing as Strange and his magical and multiversal friends dive headlong into the wacky alternate realities of the greater Marvel Universe.

Perhaps the best thing about Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is that it's a direct sequel to WandaVision. Not surprisingly, Elizabeth Olsen's Wanda Maximoff is the best thing in the movie. When a teenage girl named America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez), who has the power to travel across the Multiverse, lands in the main MCU's Sacred Timeline (the universe designated 616), Doctor Strange decides to protect her from whatever is trying to steal her power. Seeking help from an Avenger, Strange turns to the other most powerful magic-user in the world, Wanda Maximoff, who wastes no time revealing she has become the Big Bad known as the Scarlet Witch. Still coping with the trauma of losing her husband, Vision (Paul Bettany), and her twin sons, Billy (Julian Hilliard) and Tommy (Jett Klyne), Wanda succumbed to the evil magic book called the Darkhold and became the Scarlet Witch. Wanda has simple desires: she wants to reunite with and be a mother to her sons. If she has to kill lots of people to be with her kids again, well, that's just her being reasonable. Wanda as the main villain is an unexpected treat but it logically follows up her fall from grace as a result of WandaVision, and she is a spectacularly frightening evildoer. Yet because it's Wanda, and she's still an Avenger at her core, we root for her even as she slaughters her way across universes. Elizabeth Olsen proves herself as the MCU MVP in Multiverse of Madness and she delivers what may be the best villain performance of the entire 28 movie MCU oeuvure.

As for Doctor Strange himself, life isn't going too well for the world's most famous magician. People seem 50/50 on Strange; some love him for his role in stopping Thanos (Josh Brolin) in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, but others question his judgment that there was "no other way" and Strange helping enable Thanos to wipe out half of all life in the universe for five years, to begin with. Meanwhile, Strange is still pining for the woman he gave up to become a wizard, Dr. Christine Palmer (Rachel McAdams), who he loves in every universe. But Christine always sees Strange for who and what he is - the one who always has to "hold the knife" - and she wisely moved on. Even America is wary of Doctor Strange since the other versions of him she's met (and we meet) are much less likable than ours. When Wong and Strange attempt to protect America from the Scarlet Witch, their magical stronghold of Kamar-Taj easily falls to Wanda's black magic. Strange and America flee through the Multiverse, landing in the 838 universe, which is where Doctor Strange gets really strange.

Strange and America are taken hostage by the Illuminati, a superteam comprised of incredible Marvel cameos and Easter eggs: Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), Captain Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell), Captain Marvel (Lashana Lynch), Black Bolt of the Inhumans (Anson Mount, getting the chance to redeem his hero from the godawful Marvel's Inhumans), Baron Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor), and, best of all, Reed Richards AKA Mr. Fantastic of the Fantastic Four (John Krasinski, fulfilling the most prevalent Marvel fan-casting of recent years). The Illuminati end up getting wiped out by the Scarlet Witch but just seeing this mind-bending assemblage of heroes is so dazzling and opens up so many possibilities, that it's worth the price of admission all by itself. Ultimately, Doctor Strange has to figure out a way to stop Wanda and it all leads to a MacGuffan called the Book of Vishanti, which is, cleverly, a swerve since the book is a non-factor. In the best Marvel tradition, the real key to beating Wanda is to force her and Strange to face their own internal inadequacies. Wanda comes face-to-face with her alternate universe self and realizes that she would be stealing her own children from herself. Meanwhile, Raimi, who already frolics in every weird idea screenwriter Michael Waldron conjures up, goes gonzo by having Strange possess a zombie version of himself, complete with multiple arms and a third eye.

If Multiverse of Madness has an inherent flaw, it's that Doctor Strange, try as he might (and he does try), is still the least interesting person in his own movie. In order of How Much I Love The Characters, I'd rank them: 1. Wanda 2. Wong 3. America 4. Doctor Strange's magical flying cape 5. The Illuminati 6. Doctor Strange. Yet Strange still becomes the most compelling and sympathetic version of himself in the Multiverse of Madness, and his pain and loneliness at having all the magical power he needs to save the Multiverse yet still never getting the girl - unlike, say, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) - is palpable and touching. Thankfully, Wong is a rock who has rapidly become one of the MCU's best characters, and Xochitl Gomez is a fantastic new addition to the pantheon of Marvel heroes. The day America meets Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld), Cassie Lang (Kathryn Newton), and the other new MCU heroes to form the Young Avengers can't come soon enough. Most importantly, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is about men and a woman wanting to literally take a young girl's power from her. And Doctor Strange learns that the right thing to do is to empower that girl and teach her to use it to kick a witch's ass. A relevant lesson for our world today. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is so much fun and so packed with Marvel goodness, that you'd practically need a third eye to take it all in, but multiple viewings will more than suffice.

Friday, December 17, 2021

Spider-Man: No Way Home

SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME

** SPOILERS **

With Spider-Man: No Way Home, Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios opened the toy box, turned it over, dumped everything onto the floor, and said, "Have at it!" Directed by Jon Watts, who helmed Tom Holland's previous Spider-Man movies set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which, I guess, is now the "Home Trilogy," Spider-Man: No Way Home is a massive list of fanboy Spider-Man movie dreams dutifully checked off. Watching it is like reading a dozen Marvel Comic books in a row at a breakneck pace. As a coherent movie, No Way Home teeters on disaster and then careens headlong into it, yet it also delivers the most relentlessly jaw-dropping fan service as the most pure comic book movie since Avengers: Infinity War, and that's a compliment. Give No Way Home too much thought - or any rational thought at all - and you'll be driven as mad as the Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe). So you know what? Don't. Just let the live-action Spider-Verse happen, man.

Spider-Man: No Way Home has an astounding amount of --- story's not the right word -- stuff it has to get done according to Marvel and Sony's big agenda. Oh, and there is an agenda here, and it's big. First off, No Way Home has to establish the Multiverse to set up Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness by having Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) play the thankless role of "Guy who's right about everything but Peter Parker won't listen or else the movie won't happen." No Way Home also has to immediately address the cliffhanger from Spider-Man: Far From Home, where Peter's secret identity is revealed by Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) and J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons). The first act of No Way Home is quite novel, showing us the fallout of Parker becoming "the most famous person in the world" and being hunted by the authorities as well as ordinary people coming out of the woodwork who want a piece of Spider-Man. Just like that, however, Peter's legal troubles are resolved, thanks to his blind lawyer Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox)! Did I mention guest stars? There are so many, like Wong (Benedict Wong), the new Sorcerer Supreme who pops up all over the Marvel Cinematic Universe now. No Way Home reflects the success Sony saw with Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse's Multiverse and saying, "We should do it in live-action too and make even more money."

The second phase of No Way Home happens after Peter bungles Doctor Strange's magical "Make the world forget Peter Parker is Spider-Man except for six people" spell and it somehow cracks open the Multiverse so that supervillains who know Peter Parker is Spider-Man jump from the Sony movie universes to the MCU. The Spider-Villain parade includes Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina), Sandman (Thomas Hayden Church), and Green Goblin from Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man movies and Electro (Jamie Foxx) and Lizard (Rhys Ifans) from Andrew Garfield's Amazing Spider-Man movies. It's awesome to see Tom Holland's Spidey face the classic non-MCU villains he's never fought before. But despite Doctor Strange's pragmatic warnings that the villains need to go back from whence they came, Peter goes rogue when he learns that the villains are fated to die fighting the Spider-Men of their universes. Admirably, Peter "does the right thing" and tries to save the villains, and he even uses his science-y smarts to cure the crazy ones like Doc Ock and Green Goblin. But it's also not the right thing to do. In fact, in many very important ways, it couldn't be the more wrong thing to do, but No Way Home's rules are unfathomable, contradictory, full of holes, and glosses over the tough questions about the Multiverse to fulfill Peter's moral imperative and keep this train hurtling along.

While rumors abounded for years that Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield would share the screen with Tom Holland in No Way Home, to actually see it happen is immensely satisfying. Never mind that Maguire seemed to be constantly trying to remember what playing his version of Peter Parker was like. Meanwhile, Garfield was really just playing himself in a Spider suit but he was clearly happy to be included. The three Spider-Men hanging out and swinging into battle together is worth the price of admission as 100% giddy fan service. Just as satisfying, No Way Home worked to give closure to elements from Maguire and Garfield's movies that were left hanging. Tobey's Peter reunited with Dr. Otto Octavius as friends after Holland's Peter cured the malfunctioning A.I. chip that twisted Doc Ock's brain because of his robot arms. Andrew's Peter had some touching moments with Electro, and he caught MJ (Zendaya) from falling to her death, saving her in a way that he couldn't save Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone). No Way Home hit all the fanboy notes and contrasted how the three movie Spider-Men are different but also the same - Garfield feels left out because Maguire fought an alien in Venom (Topher Grace) but Holland's been to space to fight an alien, Thanos (Josh Brolin) - and it was worth all of the Multiversal hijinks.

Unfortunately, the most frustrating part of No Way Home is Tom Holland's Peter. The MCU's version of Spider-Man is the youngest version of the live-action movies but No Way Home especially equates Peter's youth for being dumb. Peter even admits he's dumb multiple times in the movie. But the movie needs Peter to do a million dumb things to enable its plot to happen and to get to the cool guest stars and cameos. Tom Holland does his best to keep the audience on Peter's side even while he's literally wrecking reality by not thinking things through, and he pays for his mistakes tragically when the Green Goblin murders Aunt May (Marisa Tomei). To his credit, Tom Holland embodies the whirlwind of emotions as Peter and he suffers a Multiverse's worth of tragedy (mostly self-inflicted) in No Way Home. After the roller coaster of Spider-Man: No Way Home, you're too exhausted to ask questions like, "How could MJ and Ned forget Peter entirely? Didn't they still go to school with him?" It's better to remember the thrills of seeing Holland, Maguire, and Garfield facing all of their super villains and hum the Spider-Man theme until we see the web-slinger again.

Tom Holland's Spider-Man has always been far luckier than his predecessors: He has a devoted girlfriend in MJ, whose surname was retconned to Watson, he's got his Man in the Chair, Ned (Jacob Batalon), he had his Aunt May, two surrogates Uncle Bens in Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau), and he's an Avenger. When Spider-Man: No Way Home winds down, Sony's ultimate agenda becomes clear as they systematically strip all of the good things in Peter's life away to bring him to the mold of the lonely Spider-Man Maguire and Garfield are, complete with a classic Spidey suit he sewed himself, so no more Stark Tech for him. It's a sad ending for the plucky young Spider-Man of the MCU to lose everything and everyone he held dear as Sony resets him for the next wave of Spider-Man movies, but Parker grins and bears it as the penance he must pay for almost breaking the Multiverse. After all, nothing is more Spider-Man than suffering alone. Like Maguire and Garfield said, "It's what we do."

Saturday, October 2, 2021

Venom: Let There Be Carnage

VENOM: LET THERE BE CARNAGE

** SPOILERS **

Venom: Let There Be Carnage is what everyone dreaded the first Venom movie would be. Director Ruben Fleischer's Venom was an oddball entertainment with the bizarre relationship between Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) and Venom (Tom Hardy) at its center. In contrast, Andy Serkis directs Venom: Let There Be Carnage and strips away the connective tissue that made the original Venom a movie, leaving only the guts (but no blood, because Let There Be Carnage is PG-13). Venom: Let There Be Carnage is the equivalent of three Saturday morning cartoons smashed together with a threadbare plot (credited to Tom Hardy and Kelly Marcell) that was probably scribbled on a cocktail napkin during an all-night bender. And yet, despite my loathing this cacophonous misery, Carnage literally says, "Let there be Carnage!" in the movie, and saying the title of the movie in spoken dialogue nets the film an automatic four stars from me.

As set up by Venom's ending, Let There Be Carnage is about a serial killer named Cletus Kasady (Woody Harrelson, who has nothing to play and plays that nothing right off a cliff). Cletus is holed up on death row in San Quentin but he bites reporter Eddie Brock and swallows some of the Venom symbiote. The result is Cletus is transformed into his own, even grosser, more prehensile tail-y, space monster named Carnage. Cletus/Carnage murder their way out of the clink and head straight for San Francisco to reunite with Cletus' childhood love, Frances Barrison (Naomie Harris). Barrison is also a superpowered freak who can emit sonic screams and she's been locked up her whole life. However, Carnage, Venom, and all of these goopy symbiotes only have two fatal vulnerabilities: fire and really loud noises. So naturally, Carnage isn't too happy that Cletus' missus can kill him if she opens her yap. Three's definitely a crowd there. But the bottom line is Carnage sucks; he's a hideous, terrible, eyesore who's somehow both barely in the movie yet in too much of the movie.

Meanwhile, Eddie, who was a loser in the first movie, is having a career renaissance where he's now the most important and respected reporter in San Francisco, despite still being a swarthy, twitchy weirdo who is clearly hiding a psychotic pile of murderous ooze beneath his skin. Venom is bored of being with Eddie and how controlling his human host is. Eddie won't let Venom eat human brains and he keeps shooting down Venom wanting to call their dynamic duo the "Lethal Protectors." It's not easy being in a symbiotic/romantic relationship with a symbiote and, just like in any rom com, Eddie and Venom break up and go their separate ways for a while. Unfortunately, Eddie has no heterosexual outlet with a human female to turn to because his ex-fiancee, Ann Weying (Michelle Williams), is now engaged to Doctor Dan Lewis (Reid Scott), who, strangely, turns out to be the most heroic person in the movie. For his part, Venom has a scene where he hits a rave and has a fantabulous emancipation of Venom - or he tries to, anyway, but Venom soon realizes he literally can't live without Eddie.

What passes for a plot in Venom: Let There Be Carnage is summed up thusly: Cletus wants to kill Eddie/Venom, marry Frances (who also got a codename, Shriek), and then kill Ann, Detective Mulligan (Stephen Graham), the cop who shot Frances years ago but didn't know she survived, Dan, and the priest who was going to marry him and Frances, not necessarily in that order. The movie culminates in a church, not unlike Spider-Man 3, where the ringing of a giant bell helps kill Carnage, just like how Venom (Topher Grace) was defeated in Sam Raimi's unloved threequel. To get to the church on time (record time, almost, since the movie is only 90 minutes long), Venom: Let There Be Carnage packs a lot of nonsense into its short runtime, and it rockets through scenes that barely even qualify as scenes. But that's okay, I guess, since this thing barely qualifies as a movie. Every scene with Michelle Williams, who is barely in the movie, mind you, is made more baffling when one remembers she's been Academy Award-nominated four times.

So why sit through and endure Venom: Let There Be Carnage at all? Well, the Sony Spider-Man Universe is in a symbiotic relationship of its own with Marvel Studios and they finally pulled the trigger on bringing the universes together. In Venom: Let There Be Carnage's headscratcher of a mid-credits scene, Eddie and Venom are in bed together on a beach vacation when Venom randomly starts waxing philosophical of all of the crazy things he's seen traveling through 80,000 lightyears of space. Venom decides to show Eddie some of what he's seen but somehow, they end up transported into a hotel room in the Marvel Cinematic Universe right at the end of Spider-Man: Far From Home. Specifically, the moment when the MCU's J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons) publicly reveals Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is Spider-Man. How did that happen? How does any of this work? Who cares. At least the mid-credits scene clocks in as the only memorable thing in Venom: Let There Be Carnage, though it's not as standout a moment as when Tom Hardy crawls into a lobster tank and starts eating crustaceans in the first Venom.

Saturday, September 4, 2021

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

SHANG-CHI AND THE LEGEND OF THE TEN RINGS

** SPOILERS **

Instantly upon meeting Shang-Chi (Simu Liu) and Katy (Awkwafina), it's clear that they are the best platonic friends in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a title previously held by Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) and Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson). Steve and Nat are both gone now but nature abhors a vacuum and so Shang-Chi and Katy seamlessly slide into their spot. They even top Rogers and Romanoff because Shang-Chi and Katy know how to have fun, whether it's jacking luxury rides in their day jobs as hotel valets or refusing to go to bed at a sensible hour and staying up all night getting drunk and singing karaoke. With these two as the focus of director Destin Daniel Cretton's entertaining adventure yarn, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, we're in good hands even when things get really weird, really fast.

Before Shang-Chi goes viral by fighting off assassins from the Ten Rings, including the hulking Razor Fist (Florian Munteanu), on a speeding San Francisco bus, Katy only knew him as "Shaun." (Katy rightfully gives Shang-Chi shit for his unimaginative choice of alias). Shaun has been in America for ten years and, like Katy, he's content to go nowhere while enjoying his life as it comes. But Shaun has a secret: He's really a master of kung fu and a super-assassin trained by his father, Xu Wenwu (Tony Leung), the leader of the Ten Rings, China's most powerful criminal organization. The Ten Rings was the Middle Eastern terrorist outfit Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) fought in Iron Man and Iron Man 3, but faster than you can say "retcon," Shang-Chi reveals their true origins as the network led by Wenwu, who is a thousand years old and the master of the mysterious Ten Rings, which are ten powerful bracelets of alien origin. Wenwu always knew Shang-Chi was in San Fran but he decided it's time to summon his son home.

Shang-Chi and Katy, who is also caught up in this mess, travel to Macau to find Shang-Chi's sister, Xu Xialing (Meng'er Zhang), who runs an underground fight club like she's the Chinese Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum). Only instead of the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), one of Xialing's prizefighters is the Abomination (Tim Roth), who makes his return to the MCU after his lone appearance in The Incredible Hulk 13 years ago. Shang-Chi and Katy also meet Wong (Benedict Wong), one of the Masters of the Mystic Arts, who has basically become the new Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) since Wong seems to know everybody in the Avengers now. These are Shang-Chi and Katy's first steps into the larger, crazy world of the MCU, but it turns out Shang-Chi's China is pretty goddamn crazy itself.

The forward movement of Shang-Chi's plot is interrupted by numerous flashbacks showing how Wenwu met his beloved late wife Ying Li (Fala Chen), their happy early years of marriage, and Shang-Chi's childhood before and after Ying Li is murdered. Lots of family secrets are spilled, including Shang-Chi's shame that he let his father turn him into a killer. Meanwhile, Xialing harbors her own resentments at being her father's forgotten and ignored child, but she turned herself into a self-made crime lord all her own, so she's a chip off the old Ten Rings. Shang-Chi also makes a big deal of both of Wenwu's kids having jade pendants given to them by their mother. Wenwu goes to a lot of trouble to take the jade pendants from his children but there's no real payoff for it. But at its core, Shang-Chi is about family, the one you're born into and the ones you make your family, and living up to your potential while staying true to yourself.

There's also a lot of exposition in Shang-Chi's bonkers third act, which takes place in the magical Chinese village of Ta Lo, an enchanted land that has all manner of exotic mythological beasts, including a dragon called the Great Protector. In Ta Lo, Shang-Chi learns how to use his mother's powers to enhance his martial arts abilities thanks to his aunt, Ying Nan (Michelle Yeoh). Katy also turns out to be an incredibly quick study with a bow and arrow and basically becomes another Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) in a day. Weirdest of all, Shang-Chi learns that thousands of years ago, a great evil soul-sucking dragon attacked Ta Lo from another universe and all that's keeping it back is a door in a mountain that the lovesick Wenwu wants to bust down because he thinks his dead wife is on the other side. It's a lot of bizarre data to absorb and there's no time because there's kung fu fighting and CGI flying monsters the movie has to get to. Shang-Chi's third act is a scaled-down version of the Battle of Wakanda in Avengers: Infinity War mixed with Mulan with as much dragon-riding as the final season of Game of Thrones.

In the comics, Shang-Chi is known as "The Master of Kung Fu," but the MCU's Shang-Chi isn't necessarily the greatest hand-to-hand combatant in the world (although he probably will be the best eventually), and it's a little disappointing when he uses the Ten Rings to explode the soul-sucking evil dragon but he doesn't deliver a cool kung fu blow to the beast as a coup-de-grace. Then again, in the comics, the Ten Rings are actually rings worn by a Chinese supervillain called the Mandarin, but Iron Man 3 changed the Mandarin into a blundering actor named Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley) who posed as a terrorist and almost dismantled the U.S. government. Trevor returns in Shang-Chi, which has to do MCU continuity clean-up for Iron Man 3, but Kingsley's guest spot is just wacky comedy from an otherwise unnecessary character. Overall, Shang-Chi's terrific martial arts action scenes compensate for its paint-by-numbers origin story and plot, and the movie becomes a bewildering CGI spectacle in its third act. However, the charming camaraderie of Liu and Awkwafina as Shang-Chi and Katy holds the whole thing together, while Leung's Wenwu is an emotionally-driven villain who's more interesting than a lot of Marvel bad guys.

The title Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings seems like a bit of a misnomer since we learn very little about the Ten Rings themselves. The bracelets are weapons of immense power, we're told, but mostly, Wenwu just uses them to leap long distances, throw super punches, and make energy whips. Despite a thousand years of wielding the Ten Rings, they jump from Wenwu to Shang-Chi pretty easily, and the latter figures out how to use them maybe too quickly. The Ten Rings don't actually get interesting until Shang-Chi's first end-credits scene, which is one of the best MCU stingers: Wong summons Shang-Chi and Katy to analyze the bracelets' alien design and the best friends meet Bruce Banner and Carol Danvers (Brie Larson). It's an obvious set-up for Shang-Chi to join the Avengers and it's pretty awesome. Hopefully, Shang-Chi and Katy bring karaoke nights to the Avengers' get-togethers. We know Wong is down for it.

Wednesday, July 14, 2021

Black Widow at Screen Rant

BLACK WIDOW AT SCREEN RANT

Natasha Romanoff is my favorite Avenger and Black Widow, her long-awaited solo film, was worth the wait. Along with giving Scarlett Johansson the spotlight, Black Widow also introduces amazing new characters like Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), and told a spectacular James Bond-like spy movie fused with Marvel Studios' trademark action. I'm covering Black Widow from numerous angles and here are my collected Screen Rant Features.

BLACK WIDOW'S DARK AVENGERS SET UP OUTDOES FALCON & WINTER SOLDIER

BLACK WIDOW THEORY: YELENA'S MISSION IS TO RECRUIT KATE BISHOP

(BY KILLING HAWKEYE)

WHY BLACK WIDOW REPLACED TONY STARK'S CAMEO WITH ROSS

HOW THE WORST JAMES BOND MOVIE

FORESHADOWED BLACK WIDOW'S RED ROOM TWISTS

BLACK WIDOW'S DREYKOV FIXES THE MCU'S VILLAIN PROBLEM

(BY BEING IRREDEEMABLE)

BLACK WIDOW EXPLAINS WHY NATASHA IS SPECIAL (& WHAT HER REAL POWER IS)

HOW POWERFUL IS TASKMASTER? BLACK WIDOW'S SUPER SOLDIER EXPLAINED

HOW OLD NATASHA AND YELENA ARE IN BLACK WIDOW (& WHEN NAT DIED)

BLACK WIDOW RETCONS NATASHA'S WEAPONS

WHERE NICK FURY & COULSON WERE DURING BLACK WIDOW'S PROLOGUE

VAL DEBUTING IN FALCON & WINTER SOLDIER

WORKED OUT BETTER THAN BLACK WIDOW

BLACK WIDOW IMPROVES AGE OF ULTRON'S WORST BLACK WIDOW MOMENT

BLACK WIDOW SET UP THOR'S NEW ASGARD

EVERY JAMES BOND TRIBUTE IN BLACK WIDOW

BLACK WIDOW REPEATS HER WINTER SOLDIER SHIELD TRICK

BLACK WIDOW FIXES AN MCU RUNNING JOKE

Thursday, July 8, 2021

Black Widow

BLACK WIDOW

** SPOILERS **

It took 24 films for the Marvel Cinematic Universe to deliver a Bond movie and director Cate Shortland's Black Widow is both a great Bond movie and a top-tier Marvel movie. At last, Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) takes center stage in a film that delves into her origins and her complicated feelings about the family she had before she became an Avenger. Black Widow also details what makes Natasha special and unique, even among the scores of other young girls who were taken into Russia's mysterious Red Room and trained to be relentless female assassins codenamed Black Widow. We know Natasha died saving the universe in Avengers: Endgame, but in Black Widow, she is, appropriately, never more present, more capable, more alive, more human, and more glorious.

Not that Natasha doesn't have competition from her own sister. Florence Pugh makes a spectacular debut in the MCU as Yelena Belova, who is 5 years younger and was part of a spy family planted in Ohio for three years in the 1990s. Natasha and Yelena's origin is a page out of The Americans; their 'parents' were Russian agents Alexei Shostakov (David Harbour) and Melina Vostokov (Rachel Weisz). Alexei is Russia's first and only Super Soldier codenamed Red Guardian and his career is made up of war stories against Captain America (Chris Evans) that he never fought because Steve Rogers was still frozen in ice when Alexei was Red Guardian. Melina was a loving mother figure to young Natasha (Ever Anderson) and young Yelena (Violet McGraw) but when their mission is compromised in 1995, they had to violently flee from S.H.I.E.L.D. before they were betrayed in Cuba by their handler, Dreykov (Ray Winstone). Their fake family is separated and the two girls are handed over to Drekov's Red Room to be turned into Black Widows. This not only includes weapons and spy training to make them deadly assassins but they were also subjected to hysterectomies, although the adult Yelena and Natasha joke about it now.

Natasha's story is obviously world-famous: she defected and joined S.H.I.E.L.D. before becoming a superhero and an Avenger. When they're reunited, Yelena taunts her sister that little girls look at Natasha on magazine covers and made an assassin their hero. But when Black Widow picks up Nat's story, it's 2016 in the MCU's timeline, and Captain America: Civil War has just happened, meaning Romanoff is a fugitive being hunted by Secretary Ross (William Hurt) for violating the newly-minted Sokovia Accords and the Avengers have just fallen apart. Black Widow is set before Natasha reunited with her fellow ex-Avenger on the lam, Steve Rogers, and the film happens two years before Avengers: Infinity War. Of course, as a superspy, Natasha has resources of her own, including Rick Mason (O-T Fagbenle), a fixer who set her up with a hideout in Norway and acquires her supplies and gear, including her Black Widow costumes and even an Avengers Quinjet. It's amusing that Natasha hid in Norway years before the Asgardians arrived to set up New Asgard after Thor: Ragnarok.

Yelena and Natasha reunite when the younger Black Widow is freed from her mind control thanks to a special red gas. Natasha is stunned to learn that not only is the Red Room still active but Dreykov is still alive when assassinating the Russian master spy was her ticket to joining S.H.I.E.L.D. That was the Budapest mission that Natasha and Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) joked about in The Avengers, but it was a tragic job Natasha had to do which led to Dreykov's daughter Antonia (Olga Kurylenko) ending up in the line of fire. But unbeknownst to Natasha, both of the Dreykovs lived. The father reestablished the Red Room and perfected his mind control of the Black Widows, planting a legion of brainwashed lady assassins all over the world. Meanwhile, Dreykov's greatest mind-controlled creation is his own daughter, who he turned into a silent assassin called Taskmaster, who can instantly learn anyone's fighting style and use it against them. Amusingly, Super Soldiers who can topple governments was the basis of the failed Winter Soldier program in Captain America: Civil War, but Dreykov achieved the same plot with Black Widows. He even turned the Red Room into his version of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Helicarrier, which was foreshadowed early in the film when Natasha watches the Roger Moore Bond movie, Moonraker.

Natasha and Yelena are electric together; both are equally skilled and dangerous but they fall into a sisterly dynamic where Yelena goofs on Natasha for her superhero landing pose and for hanging around with Avengers like the 'god from space' who she considers her family. But to get to Dreykov, the Black Widows bust Alexei out of a Siberian gulag and they reunite with Melina, who has been working for Dreykov as his architect all along. What transpires are years of pain spilling out at the dinner table from a family that was thrown together and cruelly torn apart by their own government. Still, as Natasha learned with the Avengers, the only people you can trust are your family, and Black Widow delivers thrilling spy double-crosses as Natasha masterminds a face-to-face confrontation with Dreykov in the Red Room. The Bond-style spy games give way to Marvel-style mega-action (which also the modern Bond style led by Rachel Weisz's real-life husband, Daniel Craig, in his 007 movies) where Natasha takes on dozens of Black Widows solo and repeatedly hurls herself from the plummeting space station to perform impossible rescues. Daredevil is called the Man Without Fear but Natasha Romanoff can see but does what she does anyway, so she one-ups Matt Murdock there.

As a swan song for Natasha Romanoff, the original and best Black Widow, her long-awaited solo movie delivers in spades. Johansson, who is also executive producer, knows Natasha inside out, and she's a calm, wise, uber confident, effortlessly cool, but appropriately emotional and suitably awesome center who is every inch a superhero. Black Widow is also a rollicking passing of the baton to Yelena and Pugh has a bright future in the MCU, as evidenced by the post-credits scene setting up her next appearance in Disney+'s Hawkeye. With the MCU already introducing the Multiverse and Loki setting up the concepts of Variants, Johannson could return someday but the Natasha Romanoff who fans have watched for a decade since she debuted in Iron Man 2 is sadly gone. But Black Widow was worth the wait and it's gritty and globetrotting Marvel superheroics at its finest. Even the opening credits sequence (rare for a Marvel film) is spectacular: a disturbing montage of Natasha and Helena's indoctrination into the Red Room set to a moody cover of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" that plays like the brainwashing scene in A Clockwork Orange. Black Widow is Johansson and Natasha's equivalent to Captain America: The Winter Soldier and there's no higher compliment.

Friday, April 9, 2021

The Falcon and The Winter Soldier at Screen Rant

THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER AT SCREEN RANT

Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) and Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) are back to take on the new world order of the Marvel Cinematic Universe after Avengers: Endgame! Here is all of my Screen Rant Feature coverage of the Disney+ sequel series to Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Captain America: Civil War.

ISAIAH BRADLEY CREATED A SHIELD & WINTER SOLDIER PLOT HOLE