It was a bit shit, wasn't it?
Not irredeemably so, mind you, it did have it's qualities but overall I'd say I enjoyed about 30% of the movie, tolerated 20% and found the rest of it quite hard to sit through. Now I'll be the first to admit that mostly, I give very little of a shit about the Marvel Cinematic Universe and you might rightfully accuse me of not bringing the amount of goodwill to it that I bring, for example, to the new Star Wars movies or these Harry Potter prequels they are making now. And you know what? Fair enough, I'm absolutely willing to concede that someone watching this movie from the perspective of a fan who has enjoyed this franchise this far will have a significantly different experience than me. But you know what the thing is? I keep giving these movies chances.
For a bit of context: I gave up on this franchise somewhat after the first Avengers which made me realize that this whole project will never have a satisfying payoff. It was watchable, barely, but more than anything it was thoroughly underwhelming as an action movie and kept itself afloat through its character interactions. Every once in a while I dropped back into the franchise to see if it had gotten good now (Mostly because critics keep inexplicably praising them) and each time I come away from them dissapointed. Winter Soldier was a poor mans spy thriller. Guardians of the Galaxy was a poor mans Luc Besson movie. Civil War was a poor mans Batman v Superman. And Black Panther... okay, I actually liked Black Panther which is why I gave Infinity War a chance. Panther wasn't great, far from it, but it seemed like an admirable attempt to improve on the visuals, the action setpieces and the worldbuilding. And hey, it even kinda was about something, clunky as its messages were.
Now, Infinity War did seem to learn a thing or two from BP and is indicative of the franchise improving. At the same time it's very much a testament to all the things that had been weighing it down from the very beginning. Perfectly so, actually. It being an ensemble piece it's very easy to seperate the stuff that works from the stuff that doesn't. And the stuff that works... works pretty well, actually. Josh Brolin delivers one hell of a performance as Thanos and why it's debatable if the material he's been given to work with is all that strong on its own his performance absolutely sells it. By all means, this character shouldn't have worked nearly as well as he does but Brolins portrayal is nuanced, subtle and emotional and the man deserves all the respect in the world for it. Especially the interactions between him and Gamora were the absolute highlights of the movie. Marvel has by now figured out how to do decent action sequences. Especially everything involving Dr. Strange was cool as hell. The visuals in general were mostly good, especially all the stuff set on alien worlds hat a beautiful space opera look to it which... well, mostly called attention to how bad all the stuff on earth looked but at least they knew where their focus should be.
Now that we are done with all the things I liked what's left is... kind of a mess, honestly. A lot of your enjoyment of this movie will depend on how much you like these characters to begin with. Here's a statement that will prove a bit controversial: The MCU has exactly two characters. Okay, technically three, but we'll get to that later. So as I said, two characters: the funny, sarcastic guy who sometimes gets serious. And the serious, stoic guy who sometimes gets funny or sarcastic. To be fair, it's more of a scale than a binary but it's a rather rigid one. And on that note something that I think needs to be pointed out: It can't be overstated just what an unlikeable prick Tony Stark seems like in a post Elon Musk world. But as I mentioned before, there's technically a third type of character which brings me to my next point: The women.
These movies have major issues when it comes to female representation and female characterization. It's not that Scarlett Johansson ever managed to be much more than an attractive redhead in a tight leather suit (a blonde in this movie)until she got older and they brought in another attractive redhead in the form of Scarlett Witch that the male audience can stare at, it's not even their consistent refusal to have a female lead her own movie, it's about how neglected their female characters are in general compared to the men. It's not that I have anything against handsome blonde men named Chris but the problem is, even the better female characters in this movie are very much defined by their relationship to men. In this movies case mainly Gamora through her relationship to Thanos and Quill. That's another thing I had hoped they were getting over with after Black Panther. Okoye isa pretty good character and Shuri is a pretty good character too. And also my waifu.
All of that stuff aside, the frustrating thing about the MCU is how it never really fulfills its potential to be anything more than live action superhero cartoon. I mean, in terms of plot they're finally upgrading from "Power Rangers show" to "Generic Shonen Anime", now actually being ambitious enough to juggle multiple different plot threads at once and making full use of an ensemble cast, but as a whole the movies still don't concern themselves much with "overarching themes" and "social commentary" and all of that girly shit. I can watch something like Batman v Superman or Logan or the better X-Men movies and confidently say that they're about something other than themsselves. The comment on the world they exist in and they treat their characters and their interactions, unrealistic as they might be, as abstractions for something real.
Does Infinity War do that? Maybe I'm missing something but I don't think so. Black Panther had some political commentary, it wasn't very subtle but it worked. There was some stuff about freedom and control in Winter Soldier. Just as there was some stuff about what the existence of powerful individuals means to the real world in Civil War, it being, as I mentioned, a poor mans Batman v Superman. But what is Infinity War about, exactly? What does Tony Stark respresent? What does Thanos represent? What does it say about the real world? Maybe I'm not giving the movie enough credit but I feel like the answer is "not much". I mean, sure, you can view Thanos' plan to preserve ressources by killing half of the worlds population as a commentary on... something, I'm sure but is anything ever engaged on an ideological level in this movie? Not really. And I'm not even saying there should be endless dialogue and monologue on what everyone believes but something like Logan managed to make its greater point withouth ever verbally adressing them. Logan is helping a mexican refugee flee to Canada., they're hunted by a powerful companies private military, an attentive viewer will understand what it's about, even when the characters don't directly talk about it. Infinity War doesn't really do that. Is Tony Stark used to say something about the Military Industrial Complex. Does the guy named Captain America have anything to say about american exceptionalism? Couldn't there be something said about colonialism when Thanos' henchmen attack Wakanda? Am I being a whiny leftist complaining that the movie doesn't confirm to his politics? Maybe, yes, but it's not like the potential for it wouldn't be there.
The sad thing is, Infinity War has all the superficial elements of a groundbreaking epic. It's long, it has huge stakes, it has a big scale, it has a large cast, it succesfully executes a large number of distinct plotlines but all of this serves to tell a story that's thematically shallow and emotionally (mostly, god, some of that stuff between Thanos and Gamora was fucking good) empty. I mean, at the end of the day, sure it's fun, it has cool fights and battles and some alright dialogue but when you're making a 2:30 hour movie I feel like there should be some kind of greater point to it. I mean, this movie made more money than the last three Star Wars movies, all three of which I felt had considerably more going for them, flawed as they might be. Again, it felt like a cartoon from the 80s or nineties. Neat design, neat action but more than anything it felt like a pretense to sell toys and not much more.
I wish there was a good version for this movie like Batman v Superman was the good version of Civil War. In a more wholesome world this good version might have been Justice League but in this world Justice League is the even worse version of Infinity War. So... I dunno, if you really like this series so far chances are you're gonna be really into this one too but I wasn't feeling it. Maybe once this thing is over with Marvel can do sort of a soft reboot and focus more on the things that made Black Panther good and distance themselves from the older stuff weighing it down, but as it is Infinity Wars one saving grace is Brolin as Thanos, who really plays the hell out of that role. Props to him.
Not irredeemably so, mind you, it did have it's qualities but overall I'd say I enjoyed about 30% of the movie, tolerated 20% and found the rest of it quite hard to sit through. Now I'll be the first to admit that mostly, I give very little of a shit about the Marvel Cinematic Universe and you might rightfully accuse me of not bringing the amount of goodwill to it that I bring, for example, to the new Star Wars movies or these Harry Potter prequels they are making now. And you know what? Fair enough, I'm absolutely willing to concede that someone watching this movie from the perspective of a fan who has enjoyed this franchise this far will have a significantly different experience than me. But you know what the thing is? I keep giving these movies chances.
For a bit of context: I gave up on this franchise somewhat after the first Avengers which made me realize that this whole project will never have a satisfying payoff. It was watchable, barely, but more than anything it was thoroughly underwhelming as an action movie and kept itself afloat through its character interactions. Every once in a while I dropped back into the franchise to see if it had gotten good now (Mostly because critics keep inexplicably praising them) and each time I come away from them dissapointed. Winter Soldier was a poor mans spy thriller. Guardians of the Galaxy was a poor mans Luc Besson movie. Civil War was a poor mans Batman v Superman. And Black Panther... okay, I actually liked Black Panther which is why I gave Infinity War a chance. Panther wasn't great, far from it, but it seemed like an admirable attempt to improve on the visuals, the action setpieces and the worldbuilding. And hey, it even kinda was about something, clunky as its messages were.
Now, Infinity War did seem to learn a thing or two from BP and is indicative of the franchise improving. At the same time it's very much a testament to all the things that had been weighing it down from the very beginning. Perfectly so, actually. It being an ensemble piece it's very easy to seperate the stuff that works from the stuff that doesn't. And the stuff that works... works pretty well, actually. Josh Brolin delivers one hell of a performance as Thanos and why it's debatable if the material he's been given to work with is all that strong on its own his performance absolutely sells it. By all means, this character shouldn't have worked nearly as well as he does but Brolins portrayal is nuanced, subtle and emotional and the man deserves all the respect in the world for it. Especially the interactions between him and Gamora were the absolute highlights of the movie. Marvel has by now figured out how to do decent action sequences. Especially everything involving Dr. Strange was cool as hell. The visuals in general were mostly good, especially all the stuff set on alien worlds hat a beautiful space opera look to it which... well, mostly called attention to how bad all the stuff on earth looked but at least they knew where their focus should be.
Now that we are done with all the things I liked what's left is... kind of a mess, honestly. A lot of your enjoyment of this movie will depend on how much you like these characters to begin with. Here's a statement that will prove a bit controversial: The MCU has exactly two characters. Okay, technically three, but we'll get to that later. So as I said, two characters: the funny, sarcastic guy who sometimes gets serious. And the serious, stoic guy who sometimes gets funny or sarcastic. To be fair, it's more of a scale than a binary but it's a rather rigid one. And on that note something that I think needs to be pointed out: It can't be overstated just what an unlikeable prick Tony Stark seems like in a post Elon Musk world. But as I mentioned before, there's technically a third type of character which brings me to my next point: The women.
These movies have major issues when it comes to female representation and female characterization. It's not that Scarlett Johansson ever managed to be much more than an attractive redhead in a tight leather suit (a blonde in this movie)until she got older and they brought in another attractive redhead in the form of Scarlett Witch that the male audience can stare at, it's not even their consistent refusal to have a female lead her own movie, it's about how neglected their female characters are in general compared to the men. It's not that I have anything against handsome blonde men named Chris but the problem is, even the better female characters in this movie are very much defined by their relationship to men. In this movies case mainly Gamora through her relationship to Thanos and Quill. That's another thing I had hoped they were getting over with after Black Panther. Okoye isa pretty good character and Shuri is a pretty good character too. And also my waifu.
All of that stuff aside, the frustrating thing about the MCU is how it never really fulfills its potential to be anything more than live action superhero cartoon. I mean, in terms of plot they're finally upgrading from "Power Rangers show" to "Generic Shonen Anime", now actually being ambitious enough to juggle multiple different plot threads at once and making full use of an ensemble cast, but as a whole the movies still don't concern themselves much with "overarching themes" and "social commentary" and all of that girly shit. I can watch something like Batman v Superman or Logan or the better X-Men movies and confidently say that they're about something other than themsselves. The comment on the world they exist in and they treat their characters and their interactions, unrealistic as they might be, as abstractions for something real.
Does Infinity War do that? Maybe I'm missing something but I don't think so. Black Panther had some political commentary, it wasn't very subtle but it worked. There was some stuff about freedom and control in Winter Soldier. Just as there was some stuff about what the existence of powerful individuals means to the real world in Civil War, it being, as I mentioned, a poor mans Batman v Superman. But what is Infinity War about, exactly? What does Tony Stark respresent? What does Thanos represent? What does it say about the real world? Maybe I'm not giving the movie enough credit but I feel like the answer is "not much". I mean, sure, you can view Thanos' plan to preserve ressources by killing half of the worlds population as a commentary on... something, I'm sure but is anything ever engaged on an ideological level in this movie? Not really. And I'm not even saying there should be endless dialogue and monologue on what everyone believes but something like Logan managed to make its greater point withouth ever verbally adressing them. Logan is helping a mexican refugee flee to Canada., they're hunted by a powerful companies private military, an attentive viewer will understand what it's about, even when the characters don't directly talk about it. Infinity War doesn't really do that. Is Tony Stark used to say something about the Military Industrial Complex. Does the guy named Captain America have anything to say about american exceptionalism? Couldn't there be something said about colonialism when Thanos' henchmen attack Wakanda? Am I being a whiny leftist complaining that the movie doesn't confirm to his politics? Maybe, yes, but it's not like the potential for it wouldn't be there.
The sad thing is, Infinity War has all the superficial elements of a groundbreaking epic. It's long, it has huge stakes, it has a big scale, it has a large cast, it succesfully executes a large number of distinct plotlines but all of this serves to tell a story that's thematically shallow and emotionally (mostly, god, some of that stuff between Thanos and Gamora was fucking good) empty. I mean, at the end of the day, sure it's fun, it has cool fights and battles and some alright dialogue but when you're making a 2:30 hour movie I feel like there should be some kind of greater point to it. I mean, this movie made more money than the last three Star Wars movies, all three of which I felt had considerably more going for them, flawed as they might be. Again, it felt like a cartoon from the 80s or nineties. Neat design, neat action but more than anything it felt like a pretense to sell toys and not much more.
I wish there was a good version for this movie like Batman v Superman was the good version of Civil War. In a more wholesome world this good version might have been Justice League but in this world Justice League is the even worse version of Infinity War. So... I dunno, if you really like this series so far chances are you're gonna be really into this one too but I wasn't feeling it. Maybe once this thing is over with Marvel can do sort of a soft reboot and focus more on the things that made Black Panther good and distance themselves from the older stuff weighing it down, but as it is Infinity Wars one saving grace is Brolin as Thanos, who really plays the hell out of that role. Props to him.
