Ranking the MCU Films: April 2015 Edition

This is going to be a short post because I’ve already talked about these movies a lot in the past. With that said, here’s how I currently rank the 10 films (pre-release of ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron) of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I guess you can say this is a ‘Top 10’ list because, in my opinion, there’s yet to be a ‘bad’ MCU film. Sure, there have been some ‘mediocre’ entries in the franchise but none that were ‘stinkers’.

10. IRON MAN 2

While it’s nowhere near as ‘bad’ as some say it is, the writing is still a bit of a mess, ultimately resulting in a case of ‘sequel-itis’; a film that tried to do a bit too much.

9. THE INCREDIBLE HULK

I do still prefer this film over the 2003 ‘Hulk’ and I like the film’s effective (maybe a little over-done) use of emotional moments. But, with the recasting of Edward Norton with Mark Ruffalo in the role of Hulk, this film ultimately is the least connected of the MCU nowadays. Not as messy of a story as ‘Iron Man 2’, though.

8. THOR: THE DARK WORLD

‘Thor: The Dark World’ does some things better than its predecessor, namely smoother action sequences and polished visuals. But in the end it suffers from having the weakest of the MCU villains, mostly because the film gave more screen-time to Loki due to his increasing popularity, and for playing things a little more safe, especially compared to the other Phase 2 films. It’s still a lot of fun to watch, which if you ask me is what really matters.

7. THOR

What could’ve been a disastrous entry in the MCU lineup due to it potentially coming off as being cheesy ends up not falling victim to that at all, being the first to truly expand the MCU beyond Earth and benefitting from solid direction from Kenneth Branagh, a brilliant lead performance by Chris Hemsworth, and above all else a nice balance in tone as it shifts between Earth and Asgard.

6. IRON MAN

It may seem shocking to some of you that I rank the first ‘Iron Man’ film so low, but ultimately this just goes to show how far the MCU has come since its early days. That’s nothing against ‘Iron Man’ though as it’s a well-directed, well-written, and well-acted superhero flick with an excellently set-up origin story for arguably the MCU’s most popular hero.

5. IRON MAN 3

Easily the most underrated MCU film to date, mostly because it gets a lot of unfair flak, mostly due to the Mandarin twist, WHICH ACTUALLY WORKED!!!

4. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER

Chris Evans’ earnest and charismatic performance as the Cap makes this a fun, old-school summer blockbuster and one with one of the greatest non-Avengers ensemble casts in the entire MCU.

3. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER

But suffice it to say, ‘Winter Soldier’ took Captain America, and the MCU, one step further. The bold routes taken in this film made a huge impact on the MCU as a whole but ‘Winter Soldier’ is also a well-constructed homage to the spy thrillers of the 70’s with excellent direction by the Russo Brothers and a great ensemble cast.

2. THE AVENGERS

All of the great build-up of the MCU’s Phase 1 led to this… a truly epic team-up of the MCU’s well-established heroes under the great direction of Joss Whedon. What’s not to love?

1. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

So why do I like this film more than either ‘Avengers’ or ‘Winter Soldier’? Because while I was initially hesitant about this film due to it focusing on a much more obscure superhero team in the Marvel Universe, I was thankfully proven wrong as ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ had much to love about it; great direction from James Gunn, a phenomenal ensemble cast, and, as I noted yesterday, a highly underrated villain, first of all. But then you factor in the fact that this film is the funniest of the MCU films while also effectively balancing the humor with genuinely heartfelt emotional moments. And that’s why ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ is my favorite MCU film to date.

Ranking the Marvel Cinematic Universe Villains

With the release of ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ almost upon us, I was looking into doing a post related to the MCU. But of course, since I’ve already talked about all of the 10 films that have, at the time I am writing this, been released here in the U.S. (‘Iron Man’ to ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’) in a very considerable amount of detail over the past few years, I realized that there weren’t many ideas for me to work off of without retreading too far into material that I’ve already written about in the past. Ultimately, I decided to do a list, but not of the films though for the record, a brief post of my current rankings will be released tomorrow. Instead, I’m going to look at one of the major aspects of the MCU; the villains. With that said though, it’s safe to say that there are a lot of people out there who feel that the villains are actually the weakest part of the franchise save for one; Loki. As I noted before in my Spoiler Post of ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’, I feel that we should stop comparing other MCU villains to Loki because I fear that Loki’s turn as the villain in the first ‘Avengers’ film set the bar so damn high that now other MCU villains are, in my opinion, getting unfairly compared to Loki. Not every superhero movie needs a ‘stand-out’ villain and in the case of the MCU, I feel that the great amount of character development for the main heroes more often than not makes up for their villains’ shortcomings.

Now with that said, I do agree that there has definitely been some ‘weak’ MCU villains. Not all comic book movie villains are going to be great and some of the MCU villains have definitely been proof of that. But I don’t think that all of the non-Loki MCU villains are, quote on quote, ‘bad’. In fact, I find that some are even a little underrated, again this being due to the fact that I don’t hold them all to the high standards set by Loki. So today I’m ranking the 8 main villains of the MCU so far. Why 8 even though there’s been 10 MCU films to date? Well first off, when I get to Loki, I’m accounting for both of his two turns as the main villain in an MCU rather than just splitting them up into two separate entries. But not only that, I’m not going to include ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’ on this list because I feel that there isn’t a ‘main villain’ in that film, per se. Technically speaking, HYDRA are the ‘main villains’ of the film but I’m focusing more on the singular character ‘villains’ just to keep things fair. And no, I don’t consider ‘The Winter Soldier’ as a ‘main villain’, even though his name is in the title of the film, because he’s more of a ‘henchman’ for HYDRA. So now that I got all of that out of the way, it’s time to rank the main villains of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, from worst to best.

8. Malekith- THOR: THE DARK WORLD

At the end of the day, the weakest MCU villain to date is easily Malekith, played by Christopher Eccleston, from ‘Thor: The Dark World’. While this film is nowhere near as bad as some might say it is, unfortunately Malekith’s role in the film kind of serves as the shining example of why many feel that almost all of the MCU villains are weak and while of course I disagree with that notion, there’s no denying that Malekith is an incredibly mediocre main villain. I’ve heard that a lot of his backstory in the film ended up on the cutting room floor, including a whole subplot about his family. If it’s real, then that stuff is never brought up once in the entire film and it’s just a case of him seeking revenge against Asgard after Thor’s grandfather Bor defeated his forces of Dark Elves many eons before the events of the film. So okay, the villain’s under-written… that wouldn’t be such a big deal if the villain at least had an entertaining screen presence. But that’s not the case here; Eccleston is hindered not only by all of his character’s makeup but also the fact that he speaks most of his lines in the Dark Elves’ dialect. And ultimately he really wasn’t that intimidating as he was easily defeated by Thor and his friends at the end. It’s sad that a great actor like Eccleston was wasted here, primarily due to the fact that the filmmakers decided to give Loki a far more substantial role than originally intended due to his increasing popularity in the wake of ‘The Avengers’. So in other words, because Loki was so damn popular, it resulted in Malekith becoming the MCU’s weakest big baddie as a result of being pushed aside.

7. Whiplash- IRON MAN 2

We go from one weak villain wasting a potentially awesome casting choice to another with Ivan Vanko AKA Whiplash, the main villain of ‘Iron Man 2’… or to be more specific, the main villain for the first third or so of the film who then becomes the pawn of the other ‘villain’ in the film, Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), in the second act, and then puts himself back in charge again for the finale. Suffice it to say ‘Iron Man 2’ was a bit of a mess in terms of its story, and Whiplash’s overall role in the film is proof of that. Even Mickey Rourke was pissed at Marvel for how they handled his role in the film. Unlike Malekith, Vanko’s back-story is actually set up generally well for the most part. It’s shown that his father Anton used to work with Tony’s father Howard, who had him deported to Russia when he tried to sell the arc reactor invention that they both developed. So because of this set-up, establishing that he probably had a rough life due to his father losing all of his credibility after being deported, Whiplash had potential to be a memorable villain. But, as I just noted earlier, he becomes the secondary villain for the second half of the film and because of it never really gets the chance to shine. Justin Hammer is a more memorable villain than he is. A sad disappointing turnout for what could’ve been a really fun villain but if anything, he wasn’t shoved aside just because another villain was highly popular like Malekith.

6. Emil Blonsky- THE INCREDIBLE HULK

Now we’re getting into the MCU villains that I did like, starting with Emil Blonsky, AKA Abomination, from ‘The Incredible Hulk’. Now while I’ve heard some people list Blonsky as the weakest of the MCU villains, or near the bottom for the most part, I’d say that he’s actually a bit of an underrated villain. First of all, Tim Roth’s presence in the role is pretty damn memorable (“If that thing shows up again, you’re going to have a lot of professional tough guys pissing in their pants.”). That in my opinion is why most of these Marvel Cinematic Universe villains are better than what most give them credit for; their overall screen presence more often than not makes up for their shortcomings in terms of character development. With that said, I do think that Blonsky’s still an interesting villain. He’s a soldier who’s ‘past his prime’ who finds an opportunity to recapture his former glory when General Ross enlists him to help track down Bruce Banner. It soon leads him into taking a small dose of the ‘super soldier’ serum but it doesn’t stop Hulk from pretty much decimating him in battle. However, Blonsky ends up surviving this little encounter and slowly becomes insane, which leads to him transforming into another giant monster; ‘The Abomination’. First off, I love the visual design for Abomination; he’s basically a tan-colored version of the Hulk but with bones protruding from his back. The finale between Abomination and Hulk is pretty awesome as they smash through Harlem. So overall, I’d say Blonsky is an entertaining MCU villain; nowhere near the best, hence why he’s only at Number 6 on this list, but nowhere near the worst either.

5. Obadiah Stane- IRON MAN

Leading off as the first villain of the Marvel Cinematic Universe was Tony Stark’s mentor/business partner Obadiah Stane, played by Jeff Bridges, in the first ‘Iron Man’. Nowadays, it’s pretty interesting to look back upon the first ‘Iron Man’, first released at a time where no one would’ve ever guessed that Marvel would be able to create a successful ‘Cinematic Universe’ that would bring together Marvel’s greatest heroes. Of course we all know how that has since turned out but while there have been better MCU villains that have come in the years since ‘Iron Man’, Stane is still a pretty memorable adversary for Tony Stark. Of course you can’t go wrong when your villain is played by a charismatic actor like Jeff ‘The Dude’ Bridges. There’s some solid build-up for his character too, as we slowly but surely see how he’s going behind Tony’s back, orchestrating his kidnapping by the Ten Rings and developing his own ‘Iron Man’-like suit after recovering Tony’s Mark 1 suit that he used to escape imprisonment. While the finale of ‘Iron Man 2’ rehashed the ‘Iron Man suit vs. Iron Man suit’ final battle, the finale of the first ‘Iron Man’ is still pretty memorable even though it of course has since been out-shadowed by other MCU film finales. So ultimately I’m mainly basing this around the fact that ‘Iron Man’ was the first MCU film back when the MCU was in its infancy. A lot has happened since then but I still find Obadiah Stane to be a memorable ‘first villain’ for the MCU… things were only going to get better as time went on.

4. The Red Skull- CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER

Taking the award for being one of the best, arguably the best, cast MCU villain to date is Hugo Weaving’s Red Skull, the main adversary in the first ‘Captain America’ film. Weaving of course had already made quite the impression as the villainous Agent Smith in the ‘Matrix’ trilogy and that translated well into the character Johann Schmidt, head of the Nazi science division known as HYDRA. It is revealed that he also took the same ‘super soldier’ serum that Steve Rogers takes but at the time the serum hadn’t been perfected yet and it resulted in some permanent side-effects, namely the red-colored skull that earned him the nickname ‘Red Skull’. The makeup work for Red Skull is quite excellent and Weaving’s performance helps make something that could’ve been cheesy look pretty darn intimidating. And on that note, another great thing about Red Skull is that he has such a great presence. He may not actually do ‘that much’ within the film itself but you can certainly see his influence on major events throughout the course of the film. While it seemed like Red Skull was killed off at the end of the film, dissolved by the Tesseract, there have been rumors that he could return for a future film. I even saw some people speculate that it was going to be revealed in ‘Winter Soldier’ that Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford) was the ‘Red Skull’. Of course that was proven false but unfortunately it doesn’t look like Weaving is going to reprise his role in a future MCU film. Regardless, he did make quite a good impression in ‘First Avenger’ and that’s all that matters.

3. Ronan the Accuser- GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

Now here is where I majorly disagree with critics. Lee Pace’s Ronan, the main villain of ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’, has generally been considered to be the weakest part of the film, with reasons ranging from the usual ‘underdeveloped character’ argument to him being too serious in a film that was much more light-hearted and funny in nature. Not only that, but James Gunn did say in an interview with Screen Junkies that he did have to cut some of the stuff with Ronan. Despite that, though, I think Ronan’s a severely underappreciated villain. And there are three main reasons for this, which I’ve talked about before in the past in my Spoiler Post for the film. For one thing, there is at least a clear motivation for his character; he’s a radical Kree who seeks to take over Xandar in retaliation against the recent treaty between his people and the Nova Corps of Xandar. To do so, he allies with Thanos to go after the Power Orb, which of course we learn is actually an Infinity Stone, so that he can bring it to Thanos who would then help him destroy Xandar. I mean, if anything, it’s a better motive than just being evil… because! And at least he got more to work with than Malekith in ‘Thor: The Dark World’.

Also unlike Malekith, Ronan is actually a pretty intimidating adversary for the Guardians. Case in point? During the finale, he actually does manage to get back up after seemingly being defeated not once, but twice in the span of about 10-15 minutes. As I noted earlier in this post, you didn’t see that with Malekith. But then there’s one more major reason why I think Ronan is a far better villain than most people give him credit for; HE DEFIES FRIGGING THANOS!! Yes, after stealing back the Stone back from the Guardians, Ronan takes it for himself in an act of defiance against the Mad Titan. Yes, he’s still defeated in the end by the Guardians but going up against Thanos, and no I don’t care about the fact that he’s yet to do anything major in these films, and basically saying ‘screw you’ to him? That takes guts; you didn’t see Loki do that in ‘Avengers’ now, did you? That is why I’m much more positive about Ronan and Nebula than most, even though the latter was screwed over by the fact that she wasn’t given anything to do in the first half of the film, because they did something that no other MCU villain has ever done. Could there have been more done with them? Yes, and thankfully Nebula did survive the final battle so hopefully she’ll be brought back in future films, maybe even ‘Avengers: Infinity War’. But as is, Ronan is far from being a ‘weak’ villain and in fact, I’d say he’s one of the MCU’s best villains. ‘Guardians’ wouldn’t be my favorite MCU film if I thought that he wasn’t a memorable villain.

2. Aldrich Killian- IRON MAN 3

‘Iron Man 3’ is easily the most underrated film in the MCU… as such its villain, Aldrich Killian, is a pretty damn underrated MCU villain. Now of course, we all know what happened with this film in regards to the controversial twist involving the Mandarin. The person who we thought to be the Mandarin as advertised in the promotional material for the film was actually a drunk British actor by the name of Trevor Slattery who was merely a pawn in the master plan of Killian. During the final battle, Killian proclaims that ‘he is the Mandarin’ though, as revealed in the MCU One Shot ‘All Hail the King’, there still is a real ‘Mandarin’ out there and suffice it to say he ain’t happy about what Killian and Slattery have been doing. Hopefully this isn’t a result of the backlash against the controversial twist. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; the twist did actually work from a story perspective and was actually a nice little bait-and-switch that, to paraphrase the iconic line from Slattery, ‘we never saw coming’. As for Killian, first of all it’s great to see Guy Pearce continuing to get good work in Hollywood because he really is quite the underrated actor. Pearce makes Killian a great foil to Tony and yes his whole villainous plot is very much reminiscent of Syndrome’s in ‘The Incredibles’ right down to the same general specific beats of the plot. But that’s okay because Pearce still manages to make Killian a pretty damn compelling/charismatic villain. I know that there are people out there who are still pissed about the whole Mandarin twist but I implore those folks to let that frustration go and give this film, and its entertaining baddie, a second chance.

1. Loki- THOR/THE AVENGERS

At the end of the day, though, despite all that I’ve said in defense of most of the other MCU villains, there’s no denying that Loki is still the greatest ‘film’ villain that the MCU has ever had; I say ‘film’ because, as I mentioned earlier this month, I feel that Kingpin, through ‘Marvel’s Daredevil’, has actually overtaken Loki’s space as the best MCU villain to date. But of course Loki’s turn as the big bad in ‘Avengers’ is still a highly iconic supervillain performance, even if it now results in everyone unfairly comparing other MCU villains to him. Of course this wasn’t the first time that Loki had been the main villain of an MCU film as he originally started out as the main villain in the first ‘Thor’ film. However I hate to say it, but despite Tom Hiddleston’s excellent performance in the role and a really solid amount of set-up for the character in regards to his relationship with Thor and his overall scheme (get Thor banished so that he could become king of Asgard), I didn’t really find him to be that much of a threat in the first ‘Thor’ film. I mean it’s probably just because this was a film centered on a literal God of Thunder but despite all that Loki did in that film, he was ‘sort of, kind of’ easily defeated by Thor.

In ‘Avengers’, however, with his newfound ability to take control of the minds of his enemies, which he uses on Dr. Selvig and Hawkeye, and his army of Chitauri soldiers, suddenly Loki became much more intimidating. Now he was a legitimate threat, one that required more than just his brother to stop him; this was a job for ‘The Avengers’, setting the stage for one of the most epic superhero films of all time. And here was where Hiddleston really started to get into the role, oozing charisma more than any MCU villain that came before or after him. He was so popular that his role in ‘Thor: The Dark World’ was expanded upon… at the cost of the character development for that film’s villain, Malekith. See what happens when you build something up like that, folks? It can ruin other things, like a villain that could’ve been awesome but ultimately was shoved aside in favor of the far more popular one. Still, who doesn’t love Loki? And with the ending of ‘Thor: The Dark World’ showing that he was now secretly in control of Asgard in place of Odin, it’ll be very interesting to see what happens next with everyone’s favorite ‘God of Mischief’.

So that’s how I rank all of the major MCU villains to date. Thanks for reading and check back tomorrow for my updated rankings of the first 10 Marvel Cinematic Universe films.

Thor: The Dark World (2013) review

One could say that Marvel took a very huge risk in developing a Cinematic Universe, something that we have really never seen before in the world of film. But in the end, they did succeed at their goal, creating a massive universe for their superheroes to live in. How did they do it? They made a whole bunch of solo films focusing on the characters that would later come together to form ‘The Avengers’. However, of these heroes, one’s first solo outing was perhaps the biggest risk Marvel had faced up to that point. The idea of a ‘Thor’ movie was tricky. Not only did Marvel had to work around the fact that the Asgardian God of Thunder did not come from Earth but from the mystical realm of Asgard, but they also had to worry about making it work without it being too campy. Thankfully, 2011’s ‘Thor’ was far better than expected thanks to the Shakespearian influence from director Kenneth Branagh and the charisma of star Chris Hemsworth in the title role. Sure, it had some flaws, namely the fact that the film really didn’t explore the universe of the Nine Realms that much, but nevertheless it was an extremely entertaining film.

Thor and his brother Loki would return again for ‘The Avengers’, with the latter establishing himself as one of the premier villains of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a huge improvement from his rather underdeveloped role in ‘Thor’. In fact, if Tom Hiddleston’s surprise appearance at this year’s Comic-Con proves anything, it is that Loki has become perhaps the most popular character in the MCU. Now, everyone’s favorite gods return for the next MCU film, ‘Thor: The Dark World’. This time, Branagh is not directing; instead, it is Alan Taylor. He has been mostly known for his work on television, but when one of those shows is ‘Game of Thrones’, it’s clear that this man was qualified for the job. Overall, Taylor manages to improve on Branagh’s film in regards to the action, visuals, and for doing a better job at immersing us in this universe. It’s still not entirely perfect, mostly because of some pretty weak villains, but as a whole, ‘Thor: The Dark World’ is another great entry in the MCU, thanks in part due to the performances from its two leads.

After helping the Avengers save Earth from an alien invasion led by his brother Loki (Hiddleston), Thor (Hemsworth) returns home to Asgard where he continues to bring peace to the Nine Realms while Loki is imprisoned in the Asgardian dungeons. However, things start to change when, back on Earth, Thor’s love interest and astrophysicist Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) becomes infected by a substance known as Aether. This draws the attention of the race known as the Dark Elves, led by Malekith the Accursed (Christopher Eccleston), who attempted to use the Aether to take over the world many eons ago before he was stopped by Thor’s grandfather Bor. Sensing that she is in danger, Thor brings her to Asgard in order to find a way to get the Aether out of her. However, when the Dark Elves begin to attack, Thor is forced to team up with Loki in order to stop this new threat.

In a lot of ways, ‘The Dark World’ improves on some of its predecessor’s biggest problems. Most of ‘Thor’ was spent on Earth instead of on Asgard. Now, that’s necessarily a bad thing because the stuff on Earth was well-handled in terms of helping Thor grow as a character, but we never really got a chance to immerse ourselves in the universe that is the Nine Realms, or Thor and Loki’s home world of Asgard for that matter. That’s not a problem here. More time is spent off-planet and we get a better sense of the universe. Also, from a visual perspective, it does actually look nicer than it did in ‘Thor’. Taylor also works better in regard to action scenes while still maintaining the light-hearted atmosphere and humor that worked so well in Branagh’s film.

However, this film suffers from one major problem. The villains in this film are really weak. In fact, dare I say it they’re the weakest villains to date in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and considering what we’ve seen from these movies, that is saying a lot. The great Christopher Eccleston is wasted in the role of Malekith, who spends most of his time brooding and speaking in Elvish. There could have been some really good character development in terms of the relationship between him and Thor, seeing how he was thwarted by the latter’s grandfather but sadly we don’t get that. His second in command Algrim (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje) is a more threatening villain. Even then, and I’m not spoiling anything, they don’t do much with him either, even when he transforms into a stronger character known as Kurse in the comics.

But on the bright side, the film is well-acted. As Thor, Hemsworth is once again excellent as he continues to maintain Thor’s charming and likable personality. We also see that Thor has grown as a character since the last film (‘Thor’ that is, not ‘The Avengers’) because he isn’t as brash as he was in the first film. Equally great here is Tom Hiddleston as Loki. Hiddleston just owns the role and even steals the spotlight from Hemsworth at times. In fact, the best scenes in the entire movie are when the two of them are on screen together. Natalie Portman unfortunately gets reduced to a ‘damsel in distress’ role for this film, but her chemistry with Hemsworth improved quite a bit. As for the rest of the cast, some do get more substantial roles than what they had in the previous film (like Rene Russo as Thor and Loki’s mother Frigga and Idris Elba as Heimdall) but some are still stuck in minor parts, like Sif and the Warriors Three. There could’ve been some good romantic tension between Jane and Sif for Thor’s affections, but it kind of seems like that stuff ended up on the cutting room floor.

I can’t really call ‘Thor: The Dark World’ the best film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Sure, Alan Taylor manages to improve on some of the flaws of the previous film but this film really suffers from having perhaps the weakest villains in the MCU, underusing Christopher Eccleston in a role that could have had so much more to it. Thankfully, the film is still very entertaining, mainly thanks to the charismatic performances from Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston as Thor and Loki, respectively. It seems likely that another ‘Thor’ film will happen, probably after ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’. Hopefully for the next one the villains are far better. Considering how this film ends (again, not giving anything away), how about they make Loki the main villain again? Perhaps we can get a Loki spin-off as well?

Rating: 4/5

(P.S. Don’t forget to stay through the credits for there are two post-credits scenes in this one, the first giving us a glimpse as to what’s down the road in the MCU (‘Avengers 3’, I’m guessing considering what route Joss Whedon is apparently taking with ‘Age of Ultron’.))

Marvel Cinematic Universe Retrospective

The next film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, ‘Thor: The Dark World’, is set to hit theaters this upcoming weekend. So, instead of just doing a single review on its predecessor, I decided to do a look back at the entire Cinematic Universe as a whole from the first Iron Man film back in 2008 to ‘Iron Man 3’, which was released back in May. Since I started this blog back in May of 2012, I’ve actually only covered two of these films; The Avengers (which was the very first review that I posted on this site) and Iron Man 3, for which I did both a regular review and a Spoiler Post regarding the film’s controversial twist. So now it’s time for me to talk about the other five films that were released before ‘Avengers’; Marvel’s ‘Phase One’. Since I’ve talked about Marvel’s success in creating this Cinematic Universe multiple times already, I’ll leave it at that because otherwise you’ll know what I would say next. So, let’s take a look back at the past seven films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

IRON MAN (2008)

I can easily sum up the reason why this movie is so good in three simple words; those three words are ‘Robert Downey Jr.’. This is easily one of the best casting decisions in the history of superhero films, if not the best. If it wasn’t for him, I have a feeling that this movie wouldn’t have turned out as good as it did. Don’t get me wrong; this is still a really good movie, but it is Downey’s performance as Tony Stark, billionaire turned superhero, which really elevates the material. Admittedly, there’s really not much I can say about this film other than it is a top-notch superhero film and it did its job at establishing what was to come in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It hit all of the right notes in terms of story and character development and as such, it certainly stands as one of the best superhero films of the last few years.

Rating: 5/5!

THE INCREDIBLE HULK (2008)

Marvel first brought the character of the Hulk to the big screen in 2003 with Ang Lee’s ‘Hulk’. However, the film was sort of a flop at the box office so Marvel decided to reboot the franchise, which would now be a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This Hulk film, directed by Louis Leterrier, is much better than its predecessor for one key reason. Lee’s film was more focused on the drama than the action. I’m not necessarily saying that’s a bad thing because I do think that the dramatic material was at least well-written, but it made the film rather boring at times. This one takes a more ‘action-packed’ route and while that might mean that the screenplay is a little lacking at times, it is still a very entertaining film. Edward Norton and Tim Roth both do excellent jobs as Bruce Banner and Emil Blonsky (the latter becoming ‘The Abomination’ by the end of the film), respectively. While Norton was eventually overshadowed by his successor, Mark Ruffalo, in ‘Avengers’ in terms of their respective performances, he still does a great job at displaying the character’s struggles and emotions. As for Liv Tyler and William Hurt as Betty and General Ross, they do okay jobs but I think that Jennifer Connelly and Sam Elliott were better in the roles in Lee’s ‘Hulk’. Still, this ‘Incredible Hulk’, while not perfect, is at least better than the previous ‘Hulk’ film. I do look forward to seeing another Hulk film with Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner. However, that film unfortunately might not happen for a while, at least until after ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’.

Rating: 4/5

IRON MAN 2 (2010)

It’s common knowledge that sequels are never as good as the original. Iron Man 2… is one of those movies. Now, while I do rank this film at the bottom when it comes to ranking all of the Cinematic Universe films, I don’t think it’s a bad movie; far from it in fact. It’s very entertaining as most superhero films are and Robert Downey Jr. is still fantastic as Tony Stark. So what’s the main problem, then? Well, it seems like the filmmakers went a little too far in terms of ‘raising the bar’, as is usual with sequels. There are just too many characters in this movie, which means that some get less development than others, namely the main villain Whiplash. Mickey Rourke is very good in the role, but at one point he is reduced to being the pawn of another villain, Justin Hammer. On the bright side, Sam Rockwell steals the show whenever he’s on screen but unfortunately that means that Whiplash gets thrown to the sidelines. One thing that could have helped was if S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t really overused in this film, which I feel they are. I’m fine with the inclusion of Black Widow but I feel that Nick Fury should have just stayed as a brief cameo. There are some other minor gripes that I have, one of them being that Tony is a bit too arrogant in this film. Now, I can see where they were going, because there’s this other plotline that Tony’s dying from palladium poisoning because of the substance’s use in his arc reactor, but I’m not sure that plotline went far. Still, despite its flaws, ‘Iron Man 2’ is still an entertaining superhero film but it could have been much better.

Rating: 3.5/5

THOR (2011)

This film was easily the biggest risk that Marvel was taking during ‘Phase One’ because this could have ended up being a very campy film, which would not have been good for Marvel if Thor was to be one of the Avengers. But in the end, this film turned out to be much better than expected, mainly because of two reasons. One is director Kenneth Branagh, whose experience with Shakespeare translates to this film. The themes of honor and family are constantly present in the film and are very well-handled. The other is the performance from Chris Hemsworth in the titular role, who flawlessly displays both charm and arrogance as Thor. The rest of the cast is great as well, although some could have been given a little more to do, including Natalie Portman as Thor’s love interest Jane Foster and Tom Hiddleston as Loki, though for the record in the case of the latter that’s just in this film. Obviously, that changes with ‘Avengers’. Another positive about the film is the surprising amount of humor in the screenplay and it works very well. My only major complaint with the film is that if feels like it is mostly setting up what’s to come later. For a film that takes place in a universe like the Nine Realms, we only see three of them; Asgard, Jotunheim, and Earth… and we spent more time on Earth than in the other two worlds. The one thing that I want to see in the next film is that they explore this universe more. Thankfully, the trailers seem to indicate like that will be the case. But as a whole, the first ‘Thor’ movie is another great entry in the Cinematic Universe.

Rating: 4/5

CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER (2011)

Out of all of these films, ‘Captain America’ probably seems the closest to an old-school summer blockbuster, being set in the 40’s during WWII for the majority of the film while still having some of the more modern storytelling aspects from the other Cinematic Universe films. This film manages to find the right balance of the old and the new; director Joe Johnston is at his best whenever he does period films, like ‘Rocketeer’ or ‘October Sky’ and this film is no exception. Like with the other Marvel films, the filmmakers did a great job at casting the lead hero, in this case Chris Evans as Captain America/Steve Rogers. As Rogers, Evans is extremely likable and charismatic, and his ‘never give up’ attitude is very admirable. Even after he becomes Captain America, he maintains that likable persona throughout the film. This film has perhaps the best ensemble cast (aside from ‘Avengers’ of course) of Phase One. How can you go wrong with a cast that includes Hugo Weaving, Tommy Lee Jones, and Stanley Tucci? This film also one of the best, shall we say, ‘superhero couples’ in Cap and Peggy Carter (played by Hayley Atwell). Their chemistry feels genuine and this helps make the ending scene of the film quite emotional. All in all, while I can’t say ‘The First Avenger’ is the best of the Phase One films, it is my personal favorite.

Rating: 5/5!

THE AVENGERS (2012)

For a more ‘detailed’ review of the film, here are links to both my original review and the post where I listed this film as the best film of 2012 (which I still stand by, for the record):

Review: http://rimoviecorner.blogspot.com/2012/05/avengers-2012-review.html

Top 10 post: http://rimoviecorner.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-top-3-films-of-2012.html

Do I really need to talk about this one? You probably know what I’m going to say, seeing how I named this my number one favorite film of 2012. So, I‘ll keep it short. ‘The Avengers’ is one of the finest superhero films to date. You really have to hand it to Marvel on this one. They took their time, developed their universe and the characters, picked the right cast to play these heroes, and finally brought them all together under the direction of Joss Whedon for one of the most epic films to date. Whedon, a director who does a great job at working with a large cast, gives equal time and development to each of the main heroes. No single hero is more important than the others and some get better development that what they had in previous movies, namely Black Widow and Hawkeye. Tom Hiddleston also establishes himself as a premier super villain in the role of Loki. Admittedly, it takes a while for the film to get going but once it finally does, it’s incredible. The screenplay is full of witty dialogue, leading to a lot of funny moments. My personal favorite scene; when Hulk and Thor crash a Leviathan down into Grand Central. Once they get up, Hulk suddenly punches Thor off-screen. It’s so unexpected and yet so funny at the same time. The bottom line is that if you haven’t seen this film yet, I strongly urge you to do so because it is one of the best of the superhero genre.

Rating: 5/5!

IRON MAN 3 (2013)

Here are the links to the two ‘Iron Man 3’ posts I did back in May:

Original Review: http://rimoviecorner.blogspot.com/2013/05/iron-man-3-2013-review.html

Spoiler Post: http://rimoviecorner.blogspot.com/2013/05/iron-man-3-spoiler-talk.html

Like many 2013 summer blockbusters (e.g. Star Trek Into Darkness, Man of Steel), ‘Iron Man 3’, despite receiving solid reviews from critics and becoming the second Marvel film in a row to gross over 1 billion at the box office, has received a rather mixed reception from audiences. From what I’ve seen, some of this negativity is a little unfair, namely from those who hated it just because of the controversial twist surrounding the film’s ‘main villain’. Yes, it is a big change from the comics, but it actually did work from a story perspective. As for another ‘complaint’ about where S.H.I.E.L.D. and the other Avengers were during the events of this movie, I can answer that… they had their own s*** to deal with. Remember that the biggest reason why ‘The Avengers’ worked so well is because Marvel took their time and developed their universe and the characters in it by doing solo superhero films. Not every Marvel film can be ‘The Avengers’ and directed by Joss Whedon; solo superhero films are still effective. Besides, aren’t the ‘Iron Man’ films the highest grossing solo films in the Cinematic Universe?

Okay, rant over, back to ‘Iron Man 3’. The reason why the film works so well is because it has a solid character-driven story, as Tony tries to deal with the anxiety from his near-death experience at the end of ‘Avengers’. This is perhaps Robert Downey Jr.’s best performance in the role; he still maintains the arrogant attitude that Tony is known to have, but it’s dialed down (which is a huge improvement over ‘Iron Man 2’) because of what he went through. This is a Tony Stark story; the fact that he’s not in the Iron Man suit as much doesn’t hurt the movie (another sort of unfair criticism if you ask me). The suit doesn’t make the man. It is the man who makes the suit. The ending, while definitely raising questions of how Tony will play into the next two Avengers films, serves a fitting conclusion to both this film and the whole trilogy itself.

Another big improvement over 2 is that Don Cheadle finally gets time to shine in this film and his camaraderie with Downey Jr. is much better. The whole cast is terrific, particularly the two main villains. As for Ben Kingsley, he succeeds at working with the major twist surrounding his character, being very intimidating while he’s The Mandarin, and goofy when he’s the actor Trevor Slattery. As for Guy Pearce who, spoilers, is basically the main villain, he’s also great. I like how the character was set up as an effective ‘demon’ for Tony. My one complaint about the film is that the female parts are rather underwritten. Yes, Gwyneth Paltrow still has fantastic chemistry with Downey Jr. and she does don the Iron Man suit for the first time in the film… for about 2 minutes. Aside from that moment and the finale, she’s once again stuck in the damsel in distress role the whole time. Rebecca Hall is stuck in a similar situation; not given anything to do. In fact, the movie really doesn’t make it clear about whose side she’s really on, especially considering that they kill her character off. But in the end, ‘Iron Man 3’, while not the best Iron Man movie, comes pretty damn close to being on the same level as the first film.

Rating: 4.5/5

As an added bonus, here are my further thoughts on ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ now that a few more episodes have aired and my thoughts on the first trailer for ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’.

Agents of SHIELD- 5 Episodes In

A couple of weeks ago, I gave a very positive review of the pilot for ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’, where I praised the show’s more humanistic approach to the Cinematic Universe and for its terrific cast, especially Clark Gregg as Coulson (obviously) and Chloe Bennet as Skye. Now, there have four more episodes since the pilot and at the time I am posting this, the next episode will be airing tonight. Unfortunately, this show has now been hit with the same curse as ‘Iron Man 3’ and ‘Star Trek Into Darkness’; pretty solid critical reviews, but audiences have been mixed and, like ‘Into Darkness’, I’ve been hearing more negative reviews than positive.

Overall, I stand by my thoughts on the series. Sure, it may not be the best TV show ever but it continues to do a great job at developing its characters and the universe that they now live in after the events of ‘Avengers’. As far as the main cast goes, the only characters I think who haven’t really got much opportunity to shine in the show so far have been Fitz and Simmons. Both De Caestecker and Henstridge are doing great jobs, but for the most part, they’ve only played minor roles so far in the series. On the other side of the spectrum, Agent May, Agent Ward, Skye, and Coulson have been given more to do so hopefully they give more to Fitz and Simmons down the road. I do like that this series has actually started to establish future villains; one of whom being the character of Graviton (played by Ian Hart, who you might recognize as Quirrell from ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’). I also appreciate how the writers are still using the Extremis serum plot-point from ‘Iron Man 3’. It’s good to see that this series is continuing to establish its place in the Cinematic Universe.

Like in the pilot, the writers continue to do a very good job in developing its characters and, more importantly, some of the mysteries surrounding them; the biggest being whether or not the Coulson we know really died in ‘Avengers’ and the reason why he somehow miraculously survived. In Episode 4, ‘Eye-Spy’, the team tracks down a thief who turns to be a protégé of Coulson. At the end of the episode, the protégé speaks with May and mentions that ‘something’ is different about Coulson, giving further speculation to what really happened after Coulson was stabbed by Loki. Could he be a life-model decoy, perhaps? Another interesting storyline is revealed in Episode 5, ‘The Girl with the Flower Dress’, where Skye reveals to Coulson why she joined his team. She’s looking for her parents, who were connected with S.H.I.E.L.D. When Coulson mentions that she might not like what she finds, I get the feeling that this could spell trouble down the road. Could this possibly lead to some future villains on the show?             

Admittedly, the second episode was a little lackluster compared to the pilot (except for the awesome cameo from Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury), but recently the show has really started to take off and it’s become one of my favorite shows currently on television. I’m excited to see what routes the writers take in future episodes and how they might connect with the upcoming Marvel films, namely ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’ because of how big of a role S.H.I.E.L.D. will play in that film. I do hope this series stays running for a while. The show did get a full-season order from ABC, but with the decreasing ratings and the increasing ‘meh’ response from audiences, a second season may be doubtful. I for one hope it does happen, especially considering how unlucky Whedon shows have fared in the last decade (‘Firefly’ after only 1 season and ‘Dollhouse’ after 2).

Speaking of Winter Soldier…

Captain America: The Winter Soldier- First Trailer Review

The first thing that hit me about this trailer is that it seems to eliminate the biggest fear I have about this movie; if directors Joe and Anthony Russo could handle a big summer blockbuster (albeit one coming in April, but that’s beside the point) when they have been mostly known for television work. On that note, the action looks really incredible and the film looks great from a visual standpoint. My other big praise about this trailer is that the film really feels like a true sequel to ‘The Avengers’. No offense to ‘Iron Man 3’ and ‘Thor: The Dark World’ (I’m guessing not much S.H.I.E.L.D. involvement in the latter, though I won’t hold that against it) but considering the level of involvement that S.H.I.E.L.D. has in this film, this one feels the closest to being the follow-up to ‘Avengers’. I’m also interested in seeing how they handle the more political aspects of the story because Cap is not entirely supportive of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s methods as we saw in ‘The Avengers’.

My sole complaint is how they portray the Winter Soldier in this trailer. For those of you who haven’t read the comics, the Winter Soldier is actually Captain America’s best friend James Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) who apparently died in ‘First Avenger’. As you can see, he actually survived and is brainwashed to become an assassin. The trailer doesn’t make any mention about how Barnes is the Winter Soldier so unless you knew about it going in, you might not recognize who the Winter Soldier is. However, I’m pretty sure that they will establish the relationship between him and Cap in the movie. But aside from that, the movie looks very good and I think it actually has the potential to be the best of the Phase Two films.

A review of ‘Thor: The Dark World’ will be out soon.

2013 Preview: November

We are now two months away from the end of 2013 and the start of a new year of movies. Welcome back to Rhode Island Movie Corner’s year-long preview of the films set to come out during 2013. This is Part 11 and today we’ll be looking at the lineup for the month of November 2013. There are quite a lot of films to talk about this month, including some blockbuster sequels, a couple of animated films (including Disney’s latest), and much more.

NOVEMBER 1- A trio of films open up the month, along with the nationwide expansion of a major awards contender.

*The first animated film of the month, ‘Free Birds’, is directed by Jimmy Hayward (director of 2009’s ‘Horton Hears a Who!’). The film focuses on two turkeys (voiced by Owen Wilson and Woody Harrelson) that team up and steal a time machine to travel back in time in order to change history so that the turkey is no longer a staple of the Thanksgiving menu.

*Author Orson Scott Card’s 1985 best-selling novel ‘Ender’s Game’ gets its big-screen adaptation directed by Gavin Hood (‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’). After an alien race known as the Formics attack Earth, a group of young children are trained in order to find the next leader of the ‘International Fleet’. Hugo’s Asa Butterfield stars at the titular Ender alongside Harrison Ford, Ben Kingsley, Hailee Steinfeld, Abigail Breslin, and Viola Davis.

*A group of Hollywood legends headline ‘Last Vegas’, a comedy directed by Jon Turteltaub (‘National Treasure’). Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Kevin Kline, and Morgan Freeman star as a group of friends who head to Vegas for a bachelor party when Douglas’ character gets married.

*It seems like this year’s Oscar race will come down to two films; Alfonso Cuaron’s ‘Gravity’ and ’12 Years a Slave’, directed by Steve McQueen (‘Shame’). Based on the book of the same name by Solomon Northup, the latter film tells the tale of Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a violinist living with his family as a free man in New York in the year 1841. However, he is then forced into slavery in the South. The cast includes Michael Fassbender as Northup’s vicious slave owner, Benedict Cumberbatch, Brad Pitt, Paul Giamatti, and more.

NOVEMBER 8- Only one film is set to open this week but hey, when that film’s a Marvel film, you can see why no one else wants to compete with it.

*The next film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, ‘Thor: The Dark World’, the sequel to 2011’s ‘Thor’, hits theaters as the second film in Marvel’s ‘Phase Two’. Chris Hemsworth reprises his role as the titular Asgardian God of Thunder, as he fights to save the Nine Realms from a new threat; the Dark Elves led by Malekith the Accursed (Christopher Eccleston). The majority of the main cast from the first film, including Natalie Portman as Thor’s love interest Jane Foster, Tom Hiddleston as Thor’s brother/nemesis Loki, and Anthony Hopkins as their father Odin, return to reprise their roles from the previous film and are joined in this film by Eccleston, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Zachary Levi (Levi replacing Joshua Dallas in the role of Fandral).

NOVEMBER 15- Again, only one film this time; this one being a sequel to a film that came out 14 years ago.

*Malcolm D. Lee, cousin of Spike Lee, directed a romantic dramedy in 1999 called ‘The Best Man’. Now, 14 years after that film was released, Lee and the main cast of the original film (Taye Diggs, Morris Chestnut, and Regina Hall among others) return for ‘The Best Man Holiday’.

NOVEMBER 22- The next entry in the Hunger Games franchise goes up against a Vince Vaughn comedy.

*Vince Vaughn stars in ‘Delivery Man’, a remake of director Ken Scott’s 2011 film ‘Starbuck’. Vaughn plays a man who learns that, through being a sperm donor, he has fathered over 500 children. When most of them try to sue the sperm bank in order to reveal this information, he must decide whether or not he should come forward about it. Chris Pratt and Cobie Smulders co-star.

*The first film adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ best-selling book series, ‘The Hunger Games’, opened to very positive reviews and almost 700 million at the box office when it opened back in March 2012. Its first sequel, ‘Catching Fire’, will hit theaters this weekend. Francis Lawrence (‘I Am Legend’, who will also helm the final two films, ‘Mockingjay Parts 1 and 2’) takes over directing duties from Gary Ross for the film, which finds Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) caught in a rebellion that is brewing in the districts of Panem following their victory in the 74^th annual Hunger Games. Woody Harrelson, Liam Hemsworth, Elizabeth Banks, and Lenny Kravitz return with most of the original cast and are joined by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright, Sam Claflin, and Jena Malone.

NOVEMBER 27 (Wednesday):  The biggest week of the month starts early with 4 major releases, including Disney’s newest film and an American remake of a Japanese classic.

*Director Spike Lee’s newest film, ‘Oldboy’, is a remake of the 2003 South Korean film of the same name. Josh Brolin stars as a man who is imprisoned for years, eventually seeking revenge against those responsible once he gets out. The film also stars Sharlto Copley, Elizabeth Olsen, and Samuel L. Jackson.

*The latest Disney film, ‘Frozen’, is based off of the fairy tale ‘The Snow Queen’ by Hans Christian Andersen, author of ‘The Little Mermaid’. The film is co-directed by Chris Buck (co-director of Tarzan) and Jennifer Lee (screenwriter for ‘Wreck-it Ralph’). The film follows Anna (Kristen Bell), a princess of the land of Arendelle, who has to team up with a mountain man named Kristoff (Jonathan Groff) and a snowman named Olaf (Josh Gad) to find her sister Elsa (Idina Menzel), the other princess of Arendelle who has the ability to create snow and ice who, after having gone into hiding, caused an eternal winter across the land. The film will feature songs written by Robert and Kristen Anderson-Lopez (‘Avenue Q’).

*While not starring in it, Sylvester Stallone produced and wrote the screenplay for ‘Homefront’, an action-thriller starring Jason Statham as a DEA agent who comes into contact with a group of drug traffickers led by a meth kingpin named Gator (James Franco). The film also stars Winona Ryder and Kate Bosworth.

*Finally, there’s ‘Black Nativity’, which is an adaptation of a retelling of the Nativity story with a black cast originally written by Langston Hughes. The cast includes Forest Whitaker, Angela Bassett, and Jennifer Hudson.

And that’s the film lineup for November 2013. Come back next month for the final part of this year-long preview where we’ll take a look at December’s lineup of movies.