Marvel News

I finished watching Daredevil season three over the weekend and, like the critics, I see it as a return to form after a disjointed season two. With that said, it's not in the upper echelon of Netflix products (for me consisting of season one, Jessica Jones one, and Punisher one). It reminded me, in a way, of The Force Awakens in how it paralleled the first season of Daredevil. If, as some suspect, we're in the final phase of Marvel Netflix shows, it's an excellent swansong.

I won't do a full review here, but I will touch on a few elements. Matt's arc is strong--essentially the reverse of when we first meet him in season one (instead of him learning to accept his Daredevil identity, here he has to learn to accept being Matt Murdock). Foggy has a solid if unspectacular arc, even if it feels a bit jarring (his family and their situation manifesting out of nowhere); Karen's plotline, unfortunately, comes across as tangential--well done, but too much time is spent on it given the limited payoff (there's also no reflection whatsoever about her time on The Punisher). Wilson Fisk is excellent as usual, but there's no evolution of the character, such that Bullseye (Dex) is actually the standout villain. As for agent Nadeem, he's adequate, but he doesn't carry the weight intended (he comes across as wishy-washy and I can't decide if that's the writing, acting, or both). Once again Netflix ruthlessly ignored references to its own corner of Marvel (one throwaway line about Jessica Jones is as meaty as it gets, despite the fact that it should be filled with Punisher-references given the storyline), as it resolutely resists embracing its own integration. At this point the shows are resembling the disconnected superhero films of 15-20 years ago rather than a shared universe. It's difficult to know if this disjointedness is from the creators or Netflix--I think it's the latter, as we know Steve Lightfoot (showrunner for The Punisher) was told he could not include the other characters (at a guess I think Netflix doesn't want to pay the licensing fees associated with crossovers--this may be part of why there were creative differences over Luke Cage that resulted in its cancellation).

Speaking of cancellations, could they be corporate maneuvering from Netflix ala Universal's (ie Comcast) refusal to work with Disney? Big picture, losing out on whatever profits Netflix derives from the Marvel shows isn't that relevant to their bottom line. As sad as it would be if the changes are simply a cynical ploy in corporate competition, it is within the realm of possibility (although, frankly, it's a limp blow by Netflix if that's the case, as Marvel has innumerable characters to put on their own service regardless).

Business Insider, in trying to track down reasoning for the cancellations, points to a reduced impact on social media for the sequel seasons. Unfortunately, the only context they offer are the other Marvel Netflix shows rather than other superhero shows and other Netflix shows--without that context it's difficult to intelligently gauge how much the drop in social media resonance impacted the decision. They also don't justify why this is a useful way to judge Netflix keeping or cancelling a show (as in they don't include prior examples or comments from the company).

We have further reporting (by which I mean a leaked photo) that suggests the Rescue armour story is real. It's an interesting development--I mentioned when I discussed it last time that I thought that if it was true it would serve largely as an easter egg, but could there be more to it? I still doubt it, unless Pepper is going to appear on one of Disney's shows on its new streaming service. Outside her role in the MCU Gywneth Paltrow hasn't had a hit movie in a very long time, so if this new identity has a longer planned future it's on TV.

Conrad has posted a very strange rumour--I say strange simply because of the source of the rumour. Frank Grillo (Crossbones) was interviewed and talked about the possibility of Chris Evans leaving the Captain America role and speculated that the role "could be African American [or it] could be a woman." How this qualifies as a rumour is beyond me--not only is the speculation from someone who doesn't even know if Cap is gone, he also has no access to the MCU's process. He never specifically says Falcon gets the role (which is Conrad's conclusion). This is CBR-levels of reporting and if Conrad continues down this path the credibility he garnered with his Eternals scoop is going to vanish and he'll become another Umberto Gonzalez.

One thing Grillo did confirm was his own rumoured appearance, saying it's in a flashback (this could also mean time travel, as Grillo is unlikely to truly understand the context of his role). Grillo was outspokenly unhappy with his death in Civil War and he's apparently disinterested in the olive branch the Russo's have given him by having him appear in the MCU again (he's been very open in saying what undoubtedly the filmmakers would prefer was kept quiet). I do think, as I've mentioned before, that the fact that time travel (or flashbacks) are so well understood by fans that we'll see it shown or referenced in either the teaser or trailers prior to Avengers 4.

Speaking of Gonzalez, he's reporting that actress Katherine Longford is in Avengers 4 in an undisclosed role. This is a pretty innocuous scoop so is likely true. Whether Longford is playing some ancillary, one-off role or has been cast in something going forward remains an open question. If we want to venture into speculation land, we can wonder if it's tied to the rumour that Emma Fuhrmann was cast as a 16-year Cassie Lang. We could go down the road of wondering if there's some sort of New Avengers theme going on, but I think it's far too early to delve into that.

Imaginary Axis attempts to deduce how Thanos will be defeated by going through all his defeats in the comics. He concludes the solutions are all ultimately due to Thanos' own personality flaws (or, perhaps, on some meta level him wanting to lose), rather than brute force. The idea that force alone is not enough is what I believe as well (as I went over in my Avengers 4 Speculation article).

Speaking of Conrad, he reported a rumour about a Nick Fury series on Disney's streaming service, which was then denied by Slash Film's Peter Sciretta. Normally I would leave it at that, but Conrad is claiming Sciretta is simply attacking him due to a fight the pair had over Star Wars leaks back in 2014 (!). For me what's notable is that Conrad didn't have enough faith in the rumour to do more than Tweet about it (the link provided is from elsewhere discussing it), therefore whatever Sciretta's motivations are there's a chance he's right regardless. Fury would be an easy character to write a series for, but by himself he's not a big enough character to draw fans into a show (and no, Maria Hill doesn't add enough to change that). Conrad mentioned a Fury show and something else, but has no idea what the latter is other than to say it's not Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), not Moon Knight, not Namor, not Nova, not She-Hulk, and not the Avengers Hulk and Hawkeye.

The DCEU's New Gods was announced back in March, with Marvel announcing The Eternals a month later. For the most part the MCU hasn't specifically countered DCEU films, but it has happened before (the third Captain American film became Civil War in response to Man of Steel 2 becoming Batman v Superman). Going back to Jeremy Conrad's scoop at the time (via the link) I wanted to touch on a couple of his specifics:

Marvel is looking to launch The Eternals as a new franchise post-Guardians of the Galaxy 3.... The decision to do them came after the success of ... Thor: Ragnarok and DC developing their New Gods movie, but they’ve been preparing for them for a while.... The rumor says the movie is currently on the Phase 4 schedule for 2021 or 2022, and there’s a possibility some of the Eternals could pop up in Guardians of the Galaxy 3 before being spun off into their own franchise.

While the plan remains to use James Gunn's script, Guardians 3 has moved down the schedule, so how does that impact The Eternals? I'd written some speculation about this, but THS is now confirming the film has not moved and will appear in 2020 (November). I think whatever links were imagined for Guardians 3 will be switched (perhaps to Avengers 4 or a third 2020 film, because I believe there will be a third Marvel film in 2020). Will it have the same lighthearted tone of the Guardians films or the reinvented Thor? Or will it be more serious? The THS description:

The story of ‘THE ETERNALS’ is set millions of years ago when the cosmic beings known as the Celestials genetically experimented on humans, creating the super-powered individuals as well as more villainous off-shoots known as Deviants. The two groups went on to battle each other throughout history to see which would eventually become the ultimate race. The story involves the love story between Ikaris, a man fueled by cosmic energy, and Sersi, who relishes moving amongst humans.

Unlike the disappointment you'll read below, this sort of prequel (set millions of years ago) is just fine by me. Dramatic tension remains because I have no idea what will happen. THS reports that the series will owe more to Jack Kirby's original 1976 conception than to Neil Gaiman's from 2006 (this isn't that surprising given the reverence for Kirby and Gaiman's general decline over the last fifteen years). This adds some doubt to Umberto Gonzalez's suggestion that we'll be getting Gaiman's version of Sersi (which wouldn't be surprising given his hilarious error with Mary Jane in Spider-Man: Homecoming).

Incidentally, about THS as a source: their speculation is typically wrong, but their scoops have been quite good, which is why I take the report as legit.

I've been hoping that rumours that the Black Widow film would be a prequel were wrong, but now THS has dropped the definitive bomb that that's what we're getting. Their description:

At birth the Black Widow (aka Natasha Romanova) is given to the KGB, which grooms her to become its ultimate operative. When the U.S.S.R. breaks up, the government tries to kill her as the action movies to present-day New York, where she is a freelance operative. The standalone film will find Romanoff living in the United States 15 years after the fall of the Soviet Union.

This is really disappointing. It leaves no room for dramatic tension whatsoever because no matter what happens in the film she's going to wind up in the same place we saw her in Iron Man 2. The film is getting the May, 2020, release date and I wonder how they'll spruce up the film with other characters. Right now I can't think of anything interesting for the film to do, but I'm hoping to be pleasantly surprised.

Wonder Woman 1984's release has been shifted seven months from November, 2019, to June, 2020. This now means DC has just two releases in 2019. The move seems to be an effort to make more room for the Joker coming out in October--it also takes advantage of Marvel removing it's July, 2020, film from the schedule.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)