Unless you've been living under a rock for the past seven or so years, you're probably familiar with the phenomenal success of the various films release under the Marvel Studios banner which invariably seem to rake in grosses in the upper hundreds of millions, if not billions.
The collection of live-action productions (films both short and feature-length, and now TV shows) that share characters, events, and other elements is now known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe (referred to hereafter as the MCU). The idea of carrying storylines over different films is certainly not unprecedented. James Bond, Luke Skywalker, Indiana Jones, and countless others have had multiple adventures on-screen over the years, and though they're usually standalone tales, some (such as Star Wars) have featured ongoing story arcs. Still, the idea of having one protagonist in one film, then another in a second, seemingly unrelated film, but having a shared universe building to something big is pretty much uncharted waters for the big screen (as opposed to TV).
At this point, the MCU is approaching the Star Trek universe in its breadth, which I suppose can make the idea of jumping in at this point a bit daunting for one who's not familiar with this saga. Perhaps I can help some people catch up and perhaps pique their interest a bit. There are certainly some things worth remembering (some of which may not seem important at the time) and a few you really shouldn't sweat. For simplicity's sake, this diary will cover only the first batch of films in the MCU, collectively known as Phase One, which consists mostly of films that introduce the principal characters (or "origin stories", if you will).
Full disclaimer: I will be injecting my own opinion into the subject matter, which is of course just that. Like any art form, a film's enjoyment factor and even quality are subjective. Those who read this may feel differently (though some opinions are more foolish than others).
Still with me? Then follow me below the fold.
Before we get to the movies themselves, I feel I should provide a bit of back story:
For the last half-century or so, Marvel has one of the two dominant names in the comic book industry, the other being DC comics, which produces Superman and Batman, among others. Marvel's notable properties include Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Captain America, Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, and The Punisher. (I'll elaborate on most of those characters in their respective films below). In the comics, the above characters all exist in the same universe and have often not only met but, when facing particularly grave threats several of them have formed a team known as the Avengers.
And much like DC, every couple of years, some studio head would get in their head to attempt to adapt one of their properties to some live-action production on TV or film.
The results for much of the last century and well into this one can be charity described as mixed. Partly because of this, and partly because outsourcing properties didn't earn Marvel a big share of the profits, about ten years ago, Kevin Feige, the Number Two guy at Marvel's film division got the idea producing their own films in-house. Although several of their properties like Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, and X-Men were licensed to studios like Sony or Fox, they still had many of their core characters, whom you're about to meet, starting with...
Iron Man (2008)
Summary: Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is a billionaire inventor, specializing largely in weapons manufacturing. He's more interested in partying and bedding beautiful women than contemplating the morality of his work. (In other words, he's basically a modern-day Howard Hughes, minus the jars of urine). That changes when he finds himself on the business end of some of said weapons and finds himself taken prisoner by a Middle Eastern warlord and forced to build weapons for him. Instead, he turns the tables and builds a powerful and deadly armored suit that allows him to escape. He comes away with some scars from the incident, both emotional and physical, namely an electromagnet, powered by a miniature arc reactor, implanted in his chest that prevents the shrapnel embedded in his body from reaching his heart. Enraged, when he learns people in his own company have been selling to the other side under the table, he builds an even more powerful suit to destroy his own weapons, becoming something of a hero in the process. Eventually, dispensing any pretense of a secret identity, he goes public with his actions, accepting the persona of "Iron Man".
Thoughts: Given the ambition of what Marvel was attempting to do, they really needed to hit the ground running with their first picture. Fortunately, this movie does almost everything right. Downey, who nearly tanked his career during the 90's and early 00's by partying even harder than Tony does, is completely seamless in his embodiment of this reckless, yet oddly charming character. Gwyneth Paltrow, as Tony's assistant and later love interest Pepper Potts is kind of underused, but at least her chemistry with Downey is fun in a "His Girl Friday" sort of way. Jeff Bridges, who plays Obadiah Stane, the envious number two guy at Stark Industries and the main badguy, who builds a much bigger and meaner suit to take on Tony's, is a snarky, forbidding presense, but for whatever reason, villains in Marvel films tend not to be all that memorable, for whatever reason (with one major exception).
Things to Remember: Besides Tony becoming Iron Man, he crosses path with a secretive agency called the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division (or SHIELD), with two people in particular. Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg), who looks more like a bureaucrat than a field agent (but looks can be deceiving) in a major supporting character and ally throughout the film. The second doesn't even show up until after the end credits (I recommend getting the habit of sticking around to the end of those). The eye patch-wearing SHIELD Director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) shows up at Tony's home to tell him about an upcoming project called "the Avengers initiative". Tony's military liaison and friend Jim "Rhodey" Rhodes (Terrence Howard), at one point gives a glance at gray-colored early version of Tony's armor and says "next time, baby", foreshadowing the fact that in the comics, Rhodes eventually gets his own armored suit and becomes a hero in his own right by the name of War Machine. As it turned out, however, Don Cheadle would replace Howard as Rhodes in all subsequent appearances (the reasons for which depend on whom you ask). In the comics, Tony has a butler named Edwin Jarvis, but to avoid similarities with Batman's butler Alfred, the film changes the character to an A.I. system called J.A.R.V.I.S. (voiced by Paul Bettany). Also, watch for the prerequisite Hitchcock-esque cameo by Marvel publisher Stan Lee in this and every subsequent production.
The Incredible Hulk (2008)
Summary: If you know the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno TV series from the 70's and 80's, you already know the set up: Years ago, an experiment gone wrong bombarded scientist Dr. Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) with a massive dose of gamma radiation. Now, when Banner become angry (or aroused, apparently), he transforms into a massive, green, super-strong, uncontrollable rage monster known as the Hulk. Not wanting to hurt anyone, or become a lab specimen, Banner goes on the run and skips out of the country. Lured back to the US, he has a violent encounter with the military commanded by General "Thunderbolt" Ross (William Hurt) and his right hand man Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), which doesn't go so well for the military. Wanting to have the power to take on the Hulk, Blonsky ends up taking a version of an old super-soldier serum (see below) which does help him capture the Hulk. Wanting more power, however, he injects himself with some of Banner's blood, becoming a deranged monster even worse than the Hulk, which forces Ross to relase Banner so that the Hulk can take him down.
Thoughts: While this movie is leaps and bounds better than the CG-bloated mess that was the Ang Lee-directed attempt in 2003, it's still pretty forgettable. That's all I have to say.
Things to Remember: Not that much, frankly. The story's pretty standalone with basically no consequences in subsequent movies. The initial super soldier serum that Blonsky takes is based on a World War II-project to create the ultimate soldier (whom we'll meet, a couple of movies from now). Robert Downey Jr. makes a post-credit cameo as Tony Stark, but doesn't tell us anything that anyone who's seen both movies doesn't already know. As for Banner himself, Norton does a decent job, but due to "creative differences", this is another role ended up recast in later appearances, making it that much easier to skip this one.
Iron Man 2 (2010)
Summary: Tony Stark in reveling in his celebrity/superhero status. He brushes off attempts by the government to turn his armor over to them, but there's a few things that are a little harder to brush off. First, the arc reactor embedded in his chest that he acquired in the first film turns out to be toxic, slowly killing him, unless he find a suitable element with which to build a new one. Second, a rival business owner Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), wanting to one-up Stark, recruits a Russian engineer Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) to build his own metal soldiers. Vanko's motivation isn't make money for Hammer's company, however, but to build an arsenal to take down Stark, because of a falling-out their father had decades earlier.
Thoughts This movie wasn't nearly as good as the first. Our main badguy is another dude in an armored suit. Some decent character moments here, but, again, if you skip this one, it's not a big deal. The same certainly cannot be said for the next two films.
Things to Remember: While, maybe not as much as the Incredible Hulk, this movie lifts right out, without too much trouble. Samuel L. Jackson has a slightly bigger role as Nick Fury here and the film does introduce two new major long-term characters: Scarlett Johannson plays a new assistant for Tony, who turns out to be an undercover SHIELD agent named Natasha Romanoff, aka the Black Widow. She'll ultimately prove to be a good character who's fairly important, but, again, you don't really need to see her introduction here to know all that. We also get to see an old movie of Tony's late father Howard (John Slattery), which not only provides a clue to help Tony create a new non-toxic arc reactor, but also tells us a little more about the elder Stark, whom we'll eventually see at a younger age. The end credits show Agent Coulson in the New Mexico desert, reporting a strange finding: a massive hammer has fallen to the earth, which leads us to...
Thor (2011)
Summary: You've heard of the mythical Norse God of Thunder? Well, it turns out the myths are true. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is a celebrated warrior-prince from the space-kingdom of Asgard, and firstborn son of its king, Odin (Anthony Hopkins). Thor, wielding a powerful hammer called Mjolnir (mee-ol-neer) that only he can wield, Thor's racked up an impressive battle record over the millennia, keeping peace in the Nine Realms. Unfortunately, his success has gone to his head and made him more belligerent than a future king should be. When Thor's arrogance provokes a war with a neighboring world, a furious Odin strips him of his power (including the power to lift his hammer) and banishes him to earth to learn a much-needed lesson in humility. While Thor is adjusting to life on earth and making friends, Odin falls ill, which puts Thor's envious trickster brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) on the throne. Wanting to eliminate the competition, Loki sends a deadly weapon to dispose of Thor (and anyone else in its path), which leads to Thor finding his strength again, allowing him to return to Asgard in time to confront Loki.
Thoughts: The story has a near Shakespearean / medieval feel to it, which makes Kenneth Brannagh a good choice to direct. Loki is, without a doubt the best villain in a Marvel film up to that point (or really since). While Thor's not as quite as fun or relatable a hero as Stark, he's charismatic enough to keep you interested.
Things to Remember: Quite a bit. The film introduces one of our major heroes, Thor, and our villain, Loki, who'll be a major thorn in the side of not just Thor, but several other characters later on. This is the first film to introduce characters from other worlds (get used to that), though the film introduces from important Earthbound characters as well. When Agent Coulson and SHIELD take custody of the fallen hammer, we also get a brief appearance of a particularly proficient sniper named Clint Barton aka Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) who prefers a bow and arrow to a gun. Thor also meets and falls for astrophysicist Dr. Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) and befriends her colleague Dr. Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgård), whose Scandinavian heritage allows him to fill in some of the gaps about the myth of Thor. Though Loki seemingly dies when he falls into a celestial abyss after his fight with Thor, we see him in in the post-credit scene hiding, spying on Selvig, who's been recruited by SHIELD to study an artifact they found a decades ago: a strange glowing blue cube that may be an immense source of power...
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
Summary: The year is 1943. World War II is raging. A young man named Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) desperately wants to serve his country, but the army has little interest in a scrawny 98-pound asthmatic, no matter how courageous he might be. His repeated efforts to enlist, however, catch the attention of an expatriate German scientist named Dr. Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci), who works for an the Strategic Scientific Reserve, an Allied agency tasked with developing a new breed of super-soldier.
The experiment works and Steve emerges looking like a Greek god, with superhuman speed and strength, but an act of sabotage leaves Erskine dead and Steve as the only super-soldier. The SSR commander Col. Phillips (Tommy Lee Jones) has little use for only one such soldier when the SSR is reassigned to the European front, so a US senator ropes Steve into becoming a mascot touring the nation, pitching war bonds under the patriotic name of Captain America. Meanwhile, the Nazi research division called HYDRA has gotten his hands on a glowing blue cube (remember that?), which they manage to tap as an incredible power source. After using it to build a futuristic arsenal, the HYDRA commander, Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving), decides he doesn't need Hitler, and HYDRA breaks away from the Nazis, so he can conquer the world himself.
After skipping his European tour and pulling off an unauthorized raid on a HYDRA base that liberates a few hundred allied POW's including his oldest friend "Bucky" Barnes (Sebastian Stan), Captain America is re-tasked with leading an elite unit whose mission is to wipe HYDRA bases off the map. The final battle between Cap and Schmidt ends with Cap forced to crash a plane in the Arctic. He awakes to find himself in a very different New York City, where a present-day Nick Fury informs him that he's been frozen for nearly seventy years.
Thoughts: When I first heard about this one, I honestly couldn't imagine how they'd pull it off, honestly. The idea conjures up imagine of a campy character similar to the Adam West Batman who you simply can't take seriously. To the immense credit of Evans, you actually do buy Steve's earnest nature, and they come up with a clever and plausible scenario for how he adopted his nom de guerre, as well as his red, white, and blue outfit, which they actually managed to make look somewhat practical (other than the total lack of camouflage).
The film actually isn't the jingoistic, flag-waving affair you might think. Cap is unquestionably the main hero and really the best the nation has to offer, but he also leads an international team that's heroic in his own right. Cap, love interest Agent Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell) is British, as is one of Cap's commandos. The team also includes a Free French partisan, and an American of Japanese descent, as well as an African-American (segregation doesn't seem to exist in the MCU). And of course, it's a principled German scientist who made it all possible.
They also did an impressive job of portraying both the spirited, but frail Steve, and the ultra-fit hero he becomes. Evans, like Chris Hemsworth before him, got his Captain America physique the old fashioned way, with intense weight training and eating a farm's worth of chicken. For the skinny Steve, they digitally removed muscle mass from his body, or occasionally placed his head on a body double.
Honestly, this is easily my favorite of the films up to this point.
Things to Remember: This is the opposite of "The Incredible Hulk". Pretty much EVERYTHING is important here. We learn a bit more about what the cube (formally known as the Tesseract) is capable of, both powering the HYDRA weapons, and sending Schmidt to some unknown abyss when he mishandles it. Get used to it, because it's going to be equally important in the next film. Steve's love interest Agent Peggy Carter will get her own chance to shine in a few later productions. Bucky, who seemingly dies after falling off a cliff before the final climax, will resonate later as well. Also it turns out Tony's father Howard (a younger version here, played by Dominic Cooper), had a hand in building the hardware that Erskine uses to test the serum on Steve. The post-credit scene is really only a trailer for...
The Avengers (2012)
Summary: Loki's back. Armed with a strange scepter that controls minds, and an alien army in the wings, he's decided if he can't rule Asgard, he'll settle for Earth. To that end, he brainwashes both Hawkeye and Dr. Selvig and makes off with the cube, reducing a massive SHIELD facility to rubble in his wake. Nick Fury knows he'll need more help than usual on this one, so, after relocating to SHIELD's flying aircraft carrier, he reaches out to Steve, Tony, and even Banner. Cap, Iron Man, and Black Widow manage to capture Loki (but not the cube), only to have a violent run-in with Thor, who's been dispatched to Earth to take both Loki and cube back to Asgard. Cooler heads prevail and the group take the capture Loki back to the carrier, only to discover, too late, that the still-brainwashed Hawkeye is leading an attack on the carrier. The trauma causes an out-of-control Hulk to come out, before both he and Thor are thrown from the carrier. Though Black Widow manages to knock some sense into Hawkeye (literally), the carrier is disabled, Loki escapes, and Agent Coulson dies at Loki's hands. With Loki preparing to summon his alien army to invade the earth, staring with New York, the scattered and demoralized heroes must regroup and defend the city as a team.
Thoughts: In terms of making money, the build-up for this film meant it was impossible for it not to make money. And yet it's so much more than a passing grade. Writer/director Joss Whedon gives manages to draw out both the chemistry and the conflct between these characters wonderfully (especially the clashing personalities of Cap and Iron Man). Mark Ruffalo earned a great deal of praise for taking over the Hulk's green mantle after Edward Norton dropped out, and he deserved every last bit of it. He convey an awkward charm, while showing us a guard who's (understandably) hesitant in everything he says or does. The action is extraordinary. It never becomes tedious or confusing. We actually see some honest effort on their part to get people out of the line of fire (I'm looking at you, "Man of Steel"), and nobody, in the final battle, at least, feels short-changed.
Things to Remember: Well, it's was all leading up to this, so hopefully you were paying attention. This brings Phase One of the MCU to a close, but even then, there's a few threads that'll lead into Phase Two. A defeated Loki is taken in chains back to Asgard by Thor, along with the cube, though Loki will find ways to stir up trouble in the next "Thor" film. And in a mid-credits sequence, we get a glimpse of Loki's mysterious benefactor: A powerful villain by the name of Thanos, whose plans are just beginning...
Anyways...
That pretty much covers Phase One. Hopefully, some of what I've written here appeals to some folks with a passing knowledge or interest in the MCU. While some of the films are a bit more forgettable than others, Marvel actually has a pretty impressive track record, with no real stinkers in the bunch. They're genuinely worth watching, if you give them a chance.