[Marvel Rants] Of failures and high standards

“…Perhaps when you standards are that high, your definition of what is and isn’t a failure starts to change”

Cinemablend

No shit, Sherlock!

I’ve been waiting for the right time to unleash this rant and thank God for small miracles, on Friday afternoon the Cinemablend article came on my Facebook feed. I don’t think it’s a mystery that I’ve waited “Age of Ultron” with as much hype and anticipation I could muster. I had high standards and I wanted to see lighting hitting twice. Boy, I was so wrong. I liked the movie, you can read my review but since the execs speak in numbers, by George, let me hit you with numbers!

IMDb:

8,1 vs 7,8. It’s not such a big difference. Come on! I’m not going to nitpick on a 0,3 difference but when you have a movie put together to be the culmination of Phase Two, you either go big or go home. Look at the difference in the reviews section, the number of reviews by critics. Something made the ever popular IMDb demonstrate we’re indeed speaking of a failure. Let’s continue with the critics.

Rotten Tomatoes:

Here’s where we can see the failure and the high standards. Avengers was a critical success – 92% on RottenTomatoes, an average rating of 8/10 and 289 fresh reviews – and Age of Ultron a failure – 74% on RottenTomatoes, still fresh but barely there, an average rating of 6,7/10 and 209 fresh reviews with 72 rotten, almost three times more than they were for the 2012 movie.

Still thinking that chez Disney, the execs have high standards? Let’s check the box-office.

Box Office Mojo:

And there you have it. I see a domestic failure and a worldwide incapacity to deliver while the production cost is bigger with 30 million dollars. In US this movie was a failure for Marvel and Disney, it survived thankfully with the help of international grossing.

In 2015, Universal won the box-office battle with Furious 7, Jurassic World and Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. Marvel stumbled to make it to the finish line with the last chapter of Phase Two, the ill chosen product, Ant-Man.

For the past days, we’re heard about the inside battles between Kevin Feige and Marvel’s CEO, Isaac Perlmutter. Perlmutter loves to keep the money and avoid extra costs. We’ve seen that during awards season. If Michael Bay thought he had a shoot with Transformers last year, in 2013, Disney should have campaigned like a motherfucker for the chance of getting some Oscar nominations.

We’re talking about the ruckus that came over expensive and extensive re-shots. The last two years saw a decline of Marvel big screen movies, saved by Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Thor: The Dark World suffered from added footage – mostly fan-service over the rise in fame and popularity of Loki – and the lack of a convincing villain. Iron Man 3 marched towards a conclusion for Tony Stark but was afraid to attack sensible subjects like drugs abuse, alcoholism, infidelity and insanity while playing on the nemesis up to the point the Mandarin became a joke and a subject of dissension among fans.

Marvel’s Cinematic Universe suffers from being controlled by the board of CEOs and producers, the directors voice is shut when it comes to a clash with the collective vision, the characters and story-lines suffers and next year is the big test.

Civil War goes to battle at the box-office with Batman vs Superman. When the latter’s trailer hit the social media outlets, I felt goosebumps. Just to clarify something, I am a Marvel girl at heart but I don’t hate DC and I like many of their heroes and story lines. Back to Marvel, we’ve got a leaked Civil War trailer and honestly, I didn’t get the same vibe. It lacks epicness, power, it’s not character driven and it feels like a put together product in order to have something to show to the fans and stock owners. As I said over and over again, Civil War is my favorite Marvel story and I want Feige and co to do justice on an awesome material and avoid compromising too much.

Back to “Age of Ultron”, for me it was a step back from what I got in 2012. It didn’t give me the thrill and the desire to come back and re-watch it as many times as I did with “Avengers”. It’s not because of the darker tone, thank God for the dark tone, it was necessary by now as well as seeing an evolution of the characters. It’s because it failed to deliver on purpose. Ultron seemed like a story worthy of an Iron Man movie not an Avengers one and we’re back on the weakest link of MCU. The villains. They need a purpose and a strong backstory. We don’t need another Malekith or Crimson Dynamo. If you get your hands on a good actor, dear Marvel, give that man or woman a good part and do not compromise on the quality of the script over chair meetings thoughts and strategies. We’re all aware by now a product like MCU is not made with sticks and stones, it’s a calculated move involving a ton of money and the expectations are high. CEOs are not directors and screenwriters, let the men and women hired to do that. Don’t make visionary directors and actors come at wits ends because you want to apply your winning formula like a template on every movie. It doesn’t work like that.

“Avengers: Age of Ultron” was a failure if we compare it to “Marvel’s Avengers”. Let’s stop denying it and put some effort to avoid a meltdown on what is set in motion for Phase Three.