Film fans have zero grace when it comes to this franchise.

Lets examine a few things, and talk about why quality dropped off.

Chapek and his blundering accounting decisions from hell

Chapek told Marvel to effectively double their output of productions, without giving them subsequent staff, creatives, and resources to keep their quality control they had (for the most part) maintained over the course of 25 some movies. Ask yourself, how is Kathleen Kennedy (wrong nerd rage target) Kevin Feige and the storytellers at Marvel supposed to maintain quality while having effectively double the work.

You’re all probably adults, and have had more work tossed on your pile than you can handle. How many people here can honestly say they kept the quality of their work up when they have had staff turnovers, more responsibilities, and increased output? I’m guessing none of you, and if you’re saying you kept it you’re a liar.

Marvel was kneecapped from a greedy accountant. Not the creatives fault.

Covid

Here’s also a big one. Any of you guys work in film and television? I do. And I can tell you, we all had to learn, from the ground up, how to shoot movies again while following a bunch of TSA level security theatre charades on set. So from Covid, issue number one. We can’t shoot the way we have shot movies for over 100 years anymore, lets see how this works out. This happened in all films during this pandemic as well, not just with Marvel. But oh just you wait, there’s even more Covid bullshit that fucked Marvel up.

Release orders and shooting orders were all changed around multiple times because of the pandemic.

What’s the one key thing that Marvel has had that no franchise before it had? A concise A-line through all the films weaving together a bunch of movies (and now shows thanks to D+) into a singular cohesive story. This was taken away by shuffling the release order (which is an understandable solution studio side of things, because they need movies to come out even during Covid), but still, a studio decision not a Marvel decision.

Untimely outside events

So another sad part of this is that outside events really hampered the MCU as well. Chadwick was supposed to be a really large part of the next phase and he unfortunately passed, requiring extensive reworks to multiple projects. On top of this, John Majors also had a major controversy which effectively killed off an entire major villain arc (and good for them, did it mess up some films? Sure, but I’d rather them can someone than pull a Spacey and ignore the scandals).

Added thought

For a lot of people, the shows were too much. Totally get it, but what I respect is that they tried numerous formats, styles, run lengths, release schedules, to see what people liked and what people didn’t like. The only one universally disliked was Secret Wars, and there was some actual good ones. too. Again, I get it, but I do respect that they at least had the balls to try different things and see what works and what doesn’t. Looking at Daredevil, I think the future in this part of the franchise is very bright.

Is there some fatigue for Marvel? Sure. But to act like they aren’t popular, or that they’re just ‘bad’ now is just a sophomoric view of the problem, why there’s a problem to begin with, and where the franchise is going as a whole.

Ok I’m going back to my scotch now.