I've always considered Jennifer Lawrence's Red Sparrow as the best Black Widow origin story, with all the brutal training, the red in the ledger, with the US/Russian agents being Clint and Alexei. But alas, the BW movie got us a bumbling Alexei as a father figure and Yelena as a wisecracker instead of a Fiona Volpe sexpot who's Natasha's BW rival.
Eh, I don't entirely agree with you on this one. Sometimes you don't need to know the details of a character's origins. Sometimes, broad strokes, and references just work better while allowing the character to maintain a little bit of mystery to them. My example being, we didn't need a Solo movie because we didn't really need to see him make the Kestle run, we didn't need to see his first meeting with Chewy, we didn't need to see him win the Falcon from Lando in a game a cards. All of that was sufficiently laid out for is in the original trilogy, and explicitly showing it doesn't really add any value.
From my fanfiction: "What are you going to do with me now?" Natasha asked, examining Barton's wounds. They were both sitting on the plane that was taking them to America. They both failed to complete the mission. She didn't kill the politician Guera, and Barton didn't kill her. Budapest has changed Natasha. He gave her hope that she could be free. "I'll take you my home," Barton smiled. "You think I'm easily dragged into bed?" Natasha said it jokingly, but her mind was calculating. Most men wanted this from her. Her charms and her sexy body. "My wife is unlikely to be happy with the three of us in bed. It's too small," Barton smiled impudently. "You have a wife and you are flirting with me? Didn't you buy me drinks at the Lajos Bar?" Natasha asked. Slowly bandaging Barton's shot shoulder. "The specifics of working as a spy. Laura understands that," Barton replied. Natasha was involved in a world of corrupt politicians, promiscuous women, secret spies. She knew all kinds of smiles. Barton's smile as he talked about Laura. It was something else. Not artificial. Not condescending. Honest. "She's probably the most special woman in the world," Natasha made a trivial statement. As should be said in this situation. Barton looked at her. Like the watchful gaze of a hawk. "You throw the cheapest text there is, and yet you mean it anyway," Barton replied. "You're Hawkeye. So easy to see through? Maybe I should change my career," Natasha said. "Hawkeye. I like it. It suits the archer. Robin Hood or Legolas would be too cheesy. If you came up with a nickname for me, I should come up with one for you," Barton said. Nickname for her? She was Agent Romanoff, one of the widows of the Red Room. She didn't need a nickname. "What for exemple?" Natasha asked. "Black Widow. Refers to your past. You were just one of the Widows, weren't you?" Barton asked. "Widow number 506," said Natasha. "And now you are just Black Widow. One and only," said Barton. "Why not give me a nickname that doesn't refer to the blood on my hands?" Natasha asked. "Does not apply to blood on your hands. I read your file. You survived the killer program. You are a survivor. When you meet her, Laura will confirm that too. You are Black Widow because you deserve it. Because Black Widow not have to be a sign of the great evil but your surving. It will be a sign of you. Natasha Romanoff, who managed to survive," said Barton, and he meant it. Natasha felt something. Something she hasn't felt in a long time. However, she did not show anything of herself. Her face was still a professional mask. "I'm Black Widow because I kill powerful men that hang around me. Usually on orders or for money, Barton," replied Natasha. "Not Barton. Not for you," Barton said, and grabbed her forearm. "Then who?" Natasha asked. "Clint or Hawkeye. Or whatever you want. Not Barton, though," he told her. Clint. No, Barton.'' It was only memory....fanfiction was about Loki :)
The problem with female characters in most media is the same problem that other diversity characters (black, asian, LGBTQ, etc.) have. The media fixates on *what* they are rather than *who* they are. This is why the women in Marvel movies are as Greg describes them, constantly putting down men, acting like they don't need men (except when they do, but you won't ever see them acknowledge that) basically men with boobs. People don't want women characters, what they want is good characters and if some of those characters happen to be women well that's a fringe benefit. The problem comes down to when they constantly go "HEY! HEY!!!! THIS CHARACTER IS A WOMAN! LOOK! PAY ATTENTION TO HER!!! AREN'T WE PROGRESSIVE!?!" whether that be through T&A or through this "Strong (because she has zero emotion and is a dick to everybody around her) Woman" nonsense.
Honestly, I’d say they had the right idea for a base with Natasha. For her the sexualizing makes the most sense because as a woman spy, she’d be taught to use everything at her disposal, which would to some degree involve seduction. This was actually well handled in her talk with Bruce in avengers 1 where she’s trying to be persuasive but he sees through it all. The problem is they clearly had no plan for her story arc which is a shame since she has one of the most compelling foundations for one, how does someone who committed wide scale murder and trained to kill and manipulate from a young age learn to function in a more genuine capacity?
@@gregowen2022 Natasha Romanov REALLY deserved, and needed, her own movie YEARS earlier. It's hard to give that many characters they time that they deserve in a large ensemble cast MOVIE like The Avengers. Her own movie to really develop her own character would have been great... or a dual-purpose movie with her and Hawkeye.
I think the real problem, is that Disney/Marvel wasnt going to go where it would need to go in order to tell Black Widows story. Similar to how they went with Scott Lang instead of Hank Pym for Antman, they really don't want to go into the darkness of those characters. Also why Magic just seems like science in Marvel, because Marvel isnt willing to truly explore the occult/mysticism
The Soviets actually have a spy school for women trained to use their... feminine wiles to either extract actually useful information from male targets in the West, like diplomats and scientists, or turn them wholesale. IIRC, it was called the Sparrow School.
I think Marvel was basically "gazumped" by the 20th Century Fox movie "Red Sparrow", which had a much better origin story than any MCU writer could have come up with. They were kind-of stuck, after leaving her "on the shelf" for way too long without her own movie, that a "super spy" origin for Black Widow would just look too much like a rip-off of that. So instead it was too little, too late (she's already dead).
They explain why Wanda was a brutal psychopath in Doctor Strange: she finds a dark book offscreen and it corrupts her. My problem with that is that it is blatantly explained, not really developed. They could have used that as its own plot point, showing Wanda seeking out the book, maybe show just how desperate she is for a family or tie in her sad past. Instead it is just a plot device "Oh she found the funny book that turns you evil and has never been referenced before," giving the movie a villain. Good video, it made me realize what felt off while I was watching Doctor Strange
Right, it was such a sharp turn. She was an emotional wreck with good reason leading up to the movie, but then she suddenly is a psycho? But it's ok because mind control. Again. Come on marvel, get a new plot device
I was thinking that they could have easily saved this story by having the demon who wrote the book subtly manipulating Wanda to free him. He's trapped in a special dimension and wants out. He's the first demon meaning he is literally the ONLY one in all the multiverse of his kind. So he mind messes with Wanda to convince her to get America so she could get her kids but in reality he wants her to open a portal to let him out.
@@cb-gz1vl Marvel can't do Magic properly because they don't want their stories to get too dark or to involve any religious/mystical aspects, Magic justb seems like some different type of science in MCU
I never understood why Wanda was treated like a walking plot device with powers changing on a whim and also we were meant to like her for it. Brainwashing entire towns? Destroying universes? Killing Jim from The Office (the worst crime of them all IMHO)? And yet we are supposed to like her. The whole Phase 5 is a one giant "WHY".
I suspect that's why Elizabeth Olsen responded to an interview question about being sad about no longer playing that character, by saying she kinda wishes she just signed on for the first few projects rather than devote 10 years of her career to that role. I'd imagine the money is great, but for an actor that cares about the roles they take, it probably stings her pride to go from something like Wind River and then cash in on Wanda. Not that anyone could blame her, but based on her comments and her past roles, it seems like she has an appetite for movies with a little more substance.
What I found most weird about Scarlet Witch was her sudden switch from "mother searching for her lost children" at the end of WandaVision to "rampaging lunatic intent on destroying everything" in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
You want a great Black Widow? Look up Earth's Mightiest Heroes and Avengers Assemble cartoons. In EMH, she was a double agent playing both Hydra and Avengers thinking she was a traitor. They even gave her an accent switch: when she was with Hydra she had her Russian accent and an American one when she was with the Avengers. Very cool detail and very Severus Snape from Harry Potter with her. Great storytelling from her in that. Wanda was better in Wolverine and the X-Men show. She was a true hero in that show and what Wanda in the MCU should have been. She was even better in X-Men Evolution! It's truly depressing how the MCU treated these two were treated. At least Gamora and Nebula were cool. So not a total loss. How did Disney go from Mulan 98, Pocahontas, Esmeralda, Nani (Lilo and Stitch), Kida (Atlantis), to this with Wanda and Natasha?! How is this the same company?!
Except that disney didn't make Black Widow a honey pot spy, MARVEL made her a honey pot spy, way back in the 60's, hence the name "Black Widow." Something made much more explicit in 2002's Ultimate Marvel.... Something that predates the first Iron Man movie by six years.
I think part of the problem is that so many woke writers hate normality. Most women aren't villainous, hypersexualized, nor masculine. Writers don't like that. It's too conservative. They've basically cornered themselves into the same tropes over and over that most of us can't relate to.
I'm not woke, but I do hate normality. Humanity is great precisely because it's creative, ambitious, and individualistic. Normalcy is all about conformity.
people use the word woke and literally describe what men think about of imaginery women 💀 Literally most old female "strong" characters are still hypersexualized and made for the male gaze.
Interesting Perspective video! Natasha is a character they really didn't have much plan for. Aside that, ufortunately, Wanda has always been a plot-point character, even in the comics. Over the years her powers have done whatever the story needs, and she usually doesn't have much depth outside of having children and being emotionally unstable/ becoming evil (then being redeemed) in a cycle... creating zombies & maybe also dating her brother in an alternate universe. Of course, I don't excuse that since the MCU rebooted so many comic characters (GOTG) and they had no reason not to take/use her competently. Or even change the vision narritave and build on it, before tearing it down.
Yes, it was so clear that Natasha was just there for boobs in the beginning. Then the MCU took off and they didn't know what to do. It's why Disney's virtue signals are empty because they couldn't even develop their own character. And you're right they could have expanded Wanda. The MCU has made it clear that they diverged from the comics, so they can't lean on them as an excuse for mishandling a character.
I'm wondering if there was a plan somewhere to have Natasha fall pregnant to Banner. That scene where she tells him she was sterilized was weird. Maybe Banner's gamma sperm would have impregnated her and led to a World War Hulk storyline. Probably just my fan fic really.
I feel like the lack of development for Black Widow and Scarlet Witch in Phases 1-3 was more a product of them being side characters. You could say the same things about Hawkeye having no real influence on the larger MCU as you did about Black Widow. Natasha may not have had much of a role in the plot of the MCU, but, if anything, Black Widow's role as a tease to Stark, a foil to Steve Rogers, and as Hulk's muse, made her much more important character in the MCU than every other side-Avenger. Come to think of it, she really is the glue of the Avengers team... even more than Nick Fury. In Phase 4, they were done dirty and discarded because of the rush for the new super-"inclusive" female Avengers superseded the desire to properly feature and/or send off the existing female characters. Also... all the new writers on the MCU just suck.
I find it so weird for Wanda that all the other avenger just leave her even hawkeye who she bonded with some what was just gone making all the other avenger seem like assholes after she lose everything she cared about😵
TLDR warning ⚠️ I’ve been working on some content in this same vein: I think Disney sexualises and/or ‘masculinizes’ men because they are wanting to create fantasies for women. They want to engage with female audiences, who as statistics show, spend considerably more money. My wife’s best friends mom’s house is literally covered top to bottom with Disney memorabilia; including a full garage and one bedroom dedicated to it. I mean I don’t know if you noticed but while we weren’t paying attention they turned the Avengers into ‘girls get it done’, I think the only male left is Hulk and his replacement is on standby… so what *really* happened with that snowplow 🤔… The rightie boys are always super focused on the grooming thing, which isn’t that far off. They do introduce sexualised content to kids way too early, but it’s not for any QAnon/Pizzagate related reasons: grooming is consuming. By “empowering” (aka transforming girls into consumers) girls and women they are creating a bond, a virtue signalling reciprocal altruism, that hooks their grimey Disney hooks in them for life. They become like surrogate parents: telling kids about the birds and the bees before mom and dad have the chance to fumble that mess up. Since, in a deeply capitalist society where consumerism is internalised in a way similar to religious experience, Disney becomes a sort of pseudo-church. Charlie Brooker pointed this gatekeeping out in the greatest tv series ever made “How TV ruined your life” where he pointed out Hannah Montana’s weirdly adult life and relationships. Now kids are introduced to an emulate-able character with an adult life, whereas most boy characters still act like Dennis the menace or Beaver Cleaver. This is also why Marvel is trying to portray their male characters as weaker, so to let women fully assume the “boss bitch” moniker: which if a man did the same would be labeled ‘toxic masculinity’. 🤷🏻♂️
That is remarkably well put. I have a few videos lined up, but you need to make this before I do! The way they get into kids' brains from a young age is wild and the existence of hardcore Disney adults really proves it. They sell childhood magic, but you are right that in the end it's just selling. It's a product.
@@gregowen2022 check out the book ‘Subjectivity, the unconscious and consumerism’ by Marlon Xavier it has some really interesting ideas on “Disney Magic” I’ll let you know when I finish my video, if you beat me to it so be it, since it would only be my 2nd vid 😮
You are thinking in terms of money, but this isn't about money, it is about faith. Their unholy faith tells them masculinity is evil and so they preach that message to the masses. Zeal explains why quality unrelated to messaging has gone down at the same time they've increased ideological content- because they aren't selecting for profit, but true believers.
@@samuelskinner7704 why do they want to push the faith though? Disney is a company and faith doesn’t do anything for the bottom line unless it can be monetized. They make true believers so the true believers buy more $h!t because nobody spends money like zealots
@@ashbirk4681 Shareholders care about the bottom line. Disney isn't run by the shareholders. Yes, running the company into the ground is a given, but piety is how hiring is decided, so it is rational. Everyone competes to be more pious, the core focus of the firm is tossed and it goes under and dies and the people who killed it get rewarded and go onto the next one. There is a point looting can't continue, but if they were capable of realizing that, they wouldn't have gone down this path in the first place.
In the end of Infinity War before vision was destroyed, it seemed that Black Panther's sister had finished fixing Vision(because they said that she could still keep his memories of Wanda) before she was attacked by Thanos henchmen. I thought that they would bring him back in Endgame, and I was looking forward to it, but they didn't.
It was too late at that point. They would have to de-Age Natasha and Clint for AN ENTIRE movie. Where it SHOULD have taken place was DURING the BLIP. The fact that Marvel just SKIPPED over what the characters were up to in that time and no one calls that out is CRAAAAZY to me😭🤦♂️. So much story potential with Power being up for grabs and half the world disappearing. Theres no way EVERYone was depressed...a LOT of people would've lost their minds in RAGE. There would be GLOBAL CHAOS if something like that happens, not just mass depression.
A lot of the sanitized half measures have to do with the executives in marketing, combined with what the actresses are willing to do. Which largely amounts to just wearing a full body leotard and not going into details on things/deflecting, certain things.
I think Wanda/scarlet witch could’ve been a great villain/super hero. I don’t really remember any character who has sever depression or mental problems like Wanda. How she falls into depression. Wanda vision does this greatly and we see how torn and broken she is…… and is then thrown into being a mad driven mother by a book.
The first time I saw Scarlet Witch was in the game X-Men Legends 2, which came out for 6th gen consoles. And in it, she was a villain (only working with the X-Men along with Mag's group as part of an Enemy Mine sitch), so ScarWitch probably was originally conceived as a villain.
@@gregowen2022 I think they could still do it however writing for women is not a strong suit of Marvel. Female characters in general get shortchanged in the MCU. Jane Foster has to be the most underutilized character in the MCU. In Dark World, she spends 75% of the movie being a piece of luggage. In Love and Thunder, her Mighty Thor is Thor's sidekick.
@@gregowen2022 I think some of the reason for how they handled Scarlet Witch so badly is that they had decided that Brie Larson's Captain Marvel was the new "face of Marvel". Captain Marvel just had to be the... well... bestest ever... so Wanda either had to go, or become a villain. Too much competition... and that may apply to Brie Larson, as much as to Captain Marvel...
@@FrankWilliams-wi8zs Marvel may have actually swallowed the Left-wing BS about how people won't go to see a female superhero... in spite of how well Captain Marvel did at the box office. Thus, they may feel a need to FORCE them on viewers (DIE) by ramming them down our throats in ensemble movies and such... and, yes, "tweaking them" into masculine women.
@@punkbjork In superhero comics💀. Also unlike the female heroes in the MCU ALL the male superheroes are BAREBACKED at least once in their franchises Cap Thor Tony...when he's a genius and being hot is not a character trait Peter Parker...in his first two movies and its played as a joke when MJ tries to take a peak Peter Quill Bruce...but that makes sense Tchalla Drax is always barebacked up until the very last movie in that franchise💀 Namor as well but it can be argued thats his costume...but at the same time he has worn more clothing for a WHILE now in the comics Hugh Jackman as wolverine has done that side pose a couple times I just find it funny how people who care and cry about sexualization sOOOooo much...NEVER talk about how the men as well are done the same💀. In the comics these characters are drawn like God's and Godesses and given unreleastic body proportions cause that's what humans LIKE TO LOOK AT. The most STRIKING art styles and animations always distort body proportions in some way. Theres a philosohpical way to look at it. These characters LOOK perfect...but throught their stories you see that they aren't. So as much as people chase this idea of physical perfection...they'll never truly attain perfection cause it doesn't exist Superficially speaking tho...theres an entire documentary on why humans like looking at things that are "more human than human"🤷♂️
@@punkbjork oh and the original comment never said the male superheroes did it too, they just explained the pose and its usage💀. But since you got so offended that you forgot basic comprehension, I answered it for you😂🤦♂️
Another observation on the Scarlet Witch.... As much as I enjoy Dr. Strange in his second film (as I hated the first one) her arc is literally senseless: A non parent striving desperately to recapture a false moment in her life when her powers allowed her to create children from nothing to have a family life. The kids are literally fiction in the Wandavision show, yet in Dr. Strange, suddenly not only are they real in every other universe to the point that she's always dreaming about them, but she completely abandons any interest in reclaiming her lost relationship with Vision, who she wanted to have that family with. There was a remark by Feige I believe along the lines of not wanting to have Dr. Strange in the Wandavision show because they didn't want her to be taught by a white male, so are they trying to justify not having vision because she shouldn't be pursuing a man, despite that man being the only real thing in the scenario as far as she knows before Dr. Strange 2??? Are we so in on women never having to do anything with men in these films that she can't use an actual relationship she developed as a means to explain her mental breakdown, which is what her whole run after Endgame is about? The decisions for this character are baffling.
I would be sympathetic to the criticism by people in Hollywood about sexualizing women, if they weren't such moral hypocrites about it. Time and again, it turns out they're perfectly fine with sexual hedonism, sexualization in general, and immorality, as long as it's on THEIR terms, and not some director, producer, or even the audience's. It all just goes back to the relativism they cling to: they don't care about sexualization on an objective moral principle, it's solely based on how they FEEL about it, or if THEY have the power. I've been dabbling in writing for the past decade (mostly fanfics with my own characters and settings) and am currently developing a spec script for one of them. I'd like to think those who're fans of female MCs, and want some alternative to Hollywood, would be interested; but then again, she doesn't necessarily conform to their standards either.
Now is the time to get out there with a quality product that runs counter to the mainstream. It's all gotten so bland, people are dying for something fresh. I think you'll find a more willing audience than you think. You should really polish it and start shopping it.
Standards? Don't worry, considering how much disappointment, how much the mainstream audience has suffered these days, they probably won't mind finding value in works, which are comsidered by many in entertainment industry 'sub-standard'.
@@lakshaykochhar6799 That's true. But I was talking more of general audiences who hate Hollywood messaging, yet still would not like something that, say, their grandparents' generation would've considered quality. It's like how everyone will complain about "woke Third/Fourth Wave feminism" but think "Second Wave feminism" and its icons are all automatically legit, just being hijacked by modern lefties". The heroine I'm writing isn't someone people would immediately think of as a superhero, nor would the actresses I'd consider for the role necessarily so. But it has nothing to do with "the message" in the current sense, but more on the themes of "being drawn from the water" or "I'll make you fishers of men".
Fantastic discussion. How about instead of just strong women, Disney should focus on strong characters? That way both men & women are included, and the focus is on the character rather than their sex ( men or women). That way we get rid of the female girl boss mentality, it’s not empowering, it’s infuriating!
I completely agree. Most writers will write a good character who is a man, among other things. Then they write a she woman lady and her womanly womenness is all the she, a woman, is allowed to be. It's a real disservice
The disappointment I had when I left the theaters on may 6th,I was expecting marvel to take an approach of Wanda slowly decending into and endless cycle of grief,becoming a villian in like phase 6-7 in a house of m type of style movie in which she is a villian,but she is not a psychotic killer instead she is burdened with her endless power,manipulated over time by her own grief but no,she becomes a quick solution of a villian,a manipulatee of an ancient book .It would have been better if the villian was Chthon and he was possessing Wanda,so that she can get America chavez’s powers and leave his dimension.But no they went for the easier route and just killed her off at the end in a Nobel sacrifice.Waste of potential
Right? It was just so disrespectful and lazy. How do write this character into a spot where they would logically act like a villain? Hmm, seems hard, we'll just go with MIND CONTROL for the seventeenth time
Black widow is a sexual character even In the comics she was designed to sleep with the enemy and kill them in their sleep but once the money was done she said ....she was used a sexy object did she know who she was portraying
Her comments on the character were very weird. It's sounds very hypocritical to play a sexual character for years and then when you're older, decry the sexism of it all
@@gregowen2022 It served her career THEN... but now that she's getting older, it works AGAINST her... and, lo and behold... they seem to have... ahem... replaced her with a younger model.
While I'm not here to defend Disney, I have to be fair w/ some of the criticisms in this vid. Black Widow's sex appeal is a prominent part of her character, which is reflected in her code name & career choice. Cap & Thor's sex appeal aren't really part of their character, so Disney wasn't just sexualizing the women (they just sexualized certain characters). And Wanda went from reluctant villain, to reformed hero, to "crazy witch chick" in the comics, so they're kinda following the source material. Disney has come a far way from their stereotypical "damsels in distress" & overly evil villainess type female characters; but I agree they still have a long way to go, like most other forms of media (outside those who already push an over-the-top & annoying "female empowerment" message). I think the better argument is that Disney really doesn't write good characters and/or stories, even if it's an adaption of a previously popular work (i.e. old stories, fairy tales, comics, or any other IP they buy out, and/or whatever they can get that's in Public Domain). I just hope they remedy this before they bring the X-Men to the MCU, because those female characters are infinitely more interesting & better written (even more so than many of the main male characters of Marvel).
All the MCU had to do was turn the comic books we liked in the seventies and eighties into movies plain and simple. And what is so bad feeling to me is that when they made Winter soldier not only was it a good movie but it was a smash hit which even if it wasn't they hid the fact that she was prominent in that movie and it was literally a winter soldier movie then they should have done the Black widow Solo movie right after that movie. Because in the comic books the winter soldier helped train Natasha and they not only went on missions together but had a romantic side to their relationship. I mean it literally wrote itself and made way more sense than what we got.
That the MCU has pretty much entirely stopped adapting stories from the comics is one of the most baffling things I've ever seen in my life. There are literally hundreds to choose from and they come with something very much like storyboards already!
If the writers don't want to show the characters depending on men which is fair enough then why not show them depending on other women? Instead of making them hyper independent they could be flawed, have weaknesses and support each other. Marvel is clearly trying to grow a female audience and that's a story that would appeal to women.
I think with both characters of Natasha and SW were just...nobody cared enough to write them a good story it seems? There should have been a black widow movie years before we got one and it SHOULD have been her and Hawkeye, heck, they might've been able to squeeze out two, a backstory one and a follow up one. For Witchy girl...I don't know what the fuck happened there, MOM was insanely bad because they decided they had to follow up on her overt evil from her TV show, I guess. They also forget about Vision during that whole descent into madness. So she does too, despite white vision being vision and definitely existing...but she doesn't even look for one in a different universe.
Right, nothing about her transformation into a monster makes sense at all, they just took a good character and made a j turn into a ditch. I'm so sad we'll never get a Clint and Natasha movie, hell it could have even been a Disney plus show.
This is a good video, I agree with basically all of it, and am commenting entirely because of that one part with lion king where you said it was weird that two characters gave each the eyes in an explicitly romantic scene ,':/
@@gregowen2022 Haha I see why you feel that way, but honestly I don't mind this sort of thing. I think it tends to go over kids' heads, and I think it's nice when pieces of art have stuff that you can come to interpret differently as you grow older. The Incredibles is a good example of this, when you're a kid it's like "ooh fun family superhero movie" and then watching as an adult you're like "holy shit mrs incredible thinks he's cheating on her and that guy just attempted suicide"
5:49 Well yeah, Clint had a relatively normal life outside of being a SHIELD agent so his sense of justice is more hammered in and we see that in how he only goes after criminals like Yakuza members who he sees as not deserving to survive while innocent people were snapped away. Clints actions were still relatively acceptable, especially considering how screwed up the world likely was in the years during the Snap Wanda however had basically never known peace. She grew up in a war torn country, lost both of her parents because of that war, was subjected to horrible experiments along with her brother, saw said brother get killed right in front of her, is later persecuted by the world for her past actions and later watches as the last person she has a truly loving relationship with is ripped away from her. Wanda then uses her powers to essentially hold a town hostage, basically believing, somewhat understandably, that the only way to have what she wants and protect her loved ones is to put them in a bubble she controls and when she's forced to give that up, she effectively snaps completely. Comparing her to Hawkeye isn't exactly One to One is all I'm saying.
Personally, since Disney's movies mostly seems like bad fan fiction, maybe they should think about checking out some of the better writers on the major fan fiction sites. They probably wouldn't do much worse.
People either need to give Disney all the credit for Phases 1,2 &3 or hold Kevin Feige accountable for the disaster of Phase 4 and the terrible start of Phase 5. Credit and Blame both go up the ladder, and if you say one person should have the credit when things go well, then that person is the one to blame when things don't. If you want to blame a company for when things go bad, then when things go flawlessly well, the the company gets the credit. Consistancy, you can't have it both ways. Also using The Little Mermaid and The Lion King are bad examples as we know by the point Ursula says 'You have your looks' we knew she's the villain, the bad guy and we shouldn't take her advice and niether should Ariel. As for The Lion King, it's kind of established that Nala and Simba would get together, and applying human standards to animals, even as anthropomorphic as we see in The Lion King is not fair.
I feel what they should have done with Wanda in Doctor Strange is have her actually help Strange, Wong and America but was subconsciously causing the conflict in the movie which they would realize in the climax.
*Disney:* "We want to write powerful female characters that break with traditional stereotypes!" *Also Disney:* [Makes their most powerful female character an emotional, lovesick wreck, defined purely by her uterus and entirely dependent on the men in her life, not to mention prone to destructive fits of hysteria.] Well done you guys. You sure avoided every historical negative stereotype about women on that one.
I see no problem making a character who embodies stereotypical traits. Emotional, lovesick wrecks don't exist? I don't see the issue. It's far more annoying when they make the woman a hyper-masculine prick, which is also something real that women do, but far more annoying and far less realistic.
@@Selrisitai I don't understand how you can arrive at the conclusion that one stereotype isn't problematic because it exists, while the other is, and that it's somehow less realistic, even though it also exists.
@@henrikhumle7255 what don't you understand. People are quick to cry and feel like they have to tell the whole world about female characters being sexualised and villainized, but feel empowered when a character is a total d**k (Captain Marvel) look at Wanda's gay audience having a meltdown, cause they can't accept she's a villain 😂
I do find it odd how in this one he downplays Natasha having a character but in the Hulk vs Iron Heart video he plays up how the scene was a great showing of her character. Not to mention how her interrogating her captures in the earlier Avengers scene was also well done.
Hades 'throwing the right curves' at Hercules literally means Meg, because Hercules was already interested in her. Hades wasn't just about to throw any woman at Herc. Megara was telling her boss that this guy he's been ranting about was showing genuine signs of interest, so Hades set up a plan using the tool he had available.
If the women don't have interesting arcs then yes they should have great curves. But one thing you leave out is BOTH Hawkeye and Natasha are rather useless. The two ONLY human characters. Hawkeye with his 19 arrows. All he does is stand on a roof in Avengers. They are way dwarfed by everyone else. Oh and don't forget they also completely nerfed Hulk. So this isn't just some issue with Natasha. They destroyed everyone.
I forgot about Hawkeye. He’s way more useless than black widow, but I didn’t see his show either. Yeah it’s not just female characters that Disney is screwing up, it’s all of the characters. Hawkeye was a forgettable stand-in character from the beginning.
@@anotherrandomguy8871 "but I didn’t see his show either." To be fair he never got a show. Oh sure there was TOTALLY a show called Hawkeye.... Shame he wasn't the main character in it.
@@anotherrandomguy8871 "oh right, I completely forgot, yeah wasn’t the show more about his daughter than Hawkeye himself?" Worse, it was literally just some random teenage girl with a bow & arrow, and the worlds most obnoxious zoomer personality.
Like Captain Marvel or Superman in DC, it is VERY difficult to make effective teamwork when one hero is stronger than everyone else combined so Wanda would have needed nerfing to keep her as a long term character. Being a mother would have meant a lot more if her sons had any characterization at whatsoever.
Superman isn't more powerful than anyone else combined. Martian Manhunter is "invisible Superman who can read your mind". Even Superman has flat out stated that J'onn J'onzz is the one person he'd fear having to face in open combat.
Alternative idea for Wanda in Multiverse of Madness: our Wanda isn't the villain. The villain would be a variant of Wanda who has let her obsession with her hypothetical children drive her to madness. Our Wanda has to team up with Strange to protect America. Her arc would be learning the Darkhold is not a toy, and resolving to not use it without the help of the Avengers. This felt more in line with her character after Wandavision, which still had her as a good guy.
would have liked that Widow Loki scene better if after his monolog she breaks, shaking and sobbing, hurries out of the room as soon as she's out of eye line she drops it and hits the coms
Right? I can understand the Black Widow decision from a marketing standpoint, even if it's still in poor taste. But Wanda? What a waste of a potentially good character! She could have carried them into future phases
@@gregowen2022 I can picture a bunch of guys in a boardroom: "Well, we lost another billion dollars. What do you want to do now." "Do it again! Do it again!"
Excellent commentary, you nailed it very well, they saw comment on Twitter and said we don't need men anymore, forgetting 2 key points, 1 Men make more money than women, 2 Movies are generally outings and or dates, who pays for dates 99% of the time, men so if you make men hate your content by making them watch their old hero's get kicked in the gonads every 30 minutes then they will not come to your movie and 95% of women don't watch movies alone.
I feel that you were way too reductive with Natasha's character to try and prove a point. Which kinda falls through without that. The best example is the slow meaningful scene of how she describes part of her life in the red room to Banner. And how she, because of that, feels like more of a monster than the Hulk. Which you describe as being missable even though it's like five minutes long. How long do you blink for? I honestly think you need to take a deeper analysis of Black Widow's character because you seem to have only seen the surface level. And clunge onto the idea she's only supposed to be eye candy, even though she plays a pivotal role in every movie she is in. Without her the day doesn't get save multiple times over. And this is why I hated her movie because it takes all those great qualities, including her sezuality, and throws them away for stereotypical MCU sludge hero. And that brings me to my final point that: it's fine that they sexualized her because 1. They made it make sense for the character 2. She is more than just that There are plenty of examples in media of character that are just sexualized to be sexualized. Black Widow from at least Avengers to Endgame is not one of them. She was sexualized along with being her own character with her own morals, goals, and abilities.
I don't know, i thing natasha was great, but wanda going full villain in the first oportunity wasn't. The original script where she is slowly tempted and only in the third act she falls would be better. Would be more tragic and understandable, sice we would see her bright side troughout the movie and how she feels about her loss, at the end, she finally loses her cool when is closer then ever to retrieves it's family
Ironically, as horny as the Japanese are, they still write women better than Hollywood does. If anyone has read chainsaw-man part 2 you know exactly what I mean.
Definitely true. I'm watching anime right now to try and see why everyone likes it so much(and do a video). Yes, the milkers are massive, but they still write the women as actual people. What a concept!
@@gregowen2022 "Definitely true. I'm watching anime right now to try and see why everyone likes it so much(and do a video). Yes, the milkers are massive, but they still write the women as actual people. What a concept!" Mate we had fictional women as real defined & interesting characters for literally decades. We only had to stop writing women as characters when feminists got sand in their vaginas about women being written as flawed, at which point female character had to either become entirely replaceable, or become over the top perfect mary sues who could kill like 900 guys without breaking a sweat. The epitome of the Galbrush Paradox in action. Now there's a topic for your next video, the Galbrush Paradox & how capitulating to woke assholes every demand has turned female characters from the nuanced characters we had in the 1970, thru early 2000's, in to nothing but walking talking 2 dimensional boredom.
It's interesting hearing all the whispers about movies getting pushed back and re-shoots and stuff like that. It's clear that, even though this really started in Phase 3, that the woke pedal to the medal in Phase 4 really blew up in their face. These characters, especially the female characters, have no depth, no character arc. There's nothing appealing about their characters. There's no reason to root for them. There's no challenge to overcome - other than some artificial challenges that they make sound more serious than they are. (See: She-Hulk gets cat called and that makes her able to control the Hulk powers 'infinitely better' than Bruce). They took a very, very simple premise that the best comics have run with for decades (flawed character, challenges and tragedies to overcome, growth, hero) and turned it into a platform for every cause or belief they have - whether it is in any way related to the character or not. I can only hope that when the compared/contrasted movies that WERE successful the last few years to the movies and shows they made, they'll have an 'ah hah!' moment and change course. If characters like Carol Danvers and Jennifer Walters were written better, Disney would still be riding that cash cow with no end in sight.
Yeah, the forced conversion to an all female MCU is not going well. The method they used is also why. Thanos' ashes hadn't floated to the ground before they were shoving these new female versions of the older characters at us. We were never given a reason to like them, we were just told to
There is nothing woke about phase 4. Men still dominate. Shang Chi is a male and will get a sequel. The Eternals had too many characters in it but it was mostly male. Love and Thunder revolved around Thor. Spiderman was about Spiderman. MOM had a woman going crazy. Once you get past The Marvels, the movies largely revolve around men. Women still get shortchanged in the MCU. There is nothing to complain about.
Thank you for this. I have been so pissed by the treatment of Wanda I haven't been able to bring myself to watch any more MCU. I am female with bipolar disorder, what I saw in WandaVision was a depressed woman with powers losing control and being able o litterly live in her fantasy. Wanda is someone in dire need of therapy, and an intervention. My husband is of the opinion that because most of the original avengers are dead or retired there is no one to do this role. But this misses the fact that there are TWO scorcer Supremes who's main job is to what out for and interven when magic is used inappropriately. Both Wong and Strange failed Wanda, but hey it's the dark holds fault and the fact she was week, not that others didn't do thier jobs and get the woman who had such a mental health breakdown that she mindcontrold an entire town accidently. If I am drowning and yelling for help is it my fault or the fault of the people on shore watch doing nothing if I die?
It seems to me that Hollywood and especially Disney only knows one story when it comes to character who is or feels betrayed - revenge. Revenge is the most immature and childish response to betrayal. There is healing and regaining trust. Not everyone is betraying friend, not everyone is a hopeless victim who turns into a psychotic monster when betrayed. There is forgiveness. Even animals can realize that, why not Disney?
I think it depends on the directors/writers how badly it's done. The Russos seemed to have a lot more respect for Black Widow and Johansson herself than Whedon or Favreau did. I hated her in Iron Man 2, liked her better in Avengers, and actually cared about her in Winter Soldier.
Yea. It’s not like make marvel hero’s get sexualized. Is there any Thor movie Hemsworth has kept his shirt on throughout? I thought his interview about how to dehydrate for shirtless day was interesting.
Well in the comic books Scarlett Witch went back and forth from hero to villain and whatnot. And also in the books she did just snap and go psycho and kill billions of people so it's actually not a wrong take on the character
it doesn't matter how sexualized you make a woman if she's a horrible person who's really annoying and you wouldn't want to be around even if they're super physically attractive, but it's worse now because, not just in disney, but in general, media is making women physically unattractive, but also extremely unlikable.
If you’re looking for a break from that, there’s a great webcomic called The Cursed Princess Club. The main character is Gwen, the third princess of the Pastel kingdom. She’s unattractive, but likable. She bakes pies, loves possums, and is extremely kind. But her kindness is a fault. Not in the sense that kindness itself is a flaw, rather she gives it to everyone freely, but when her sense of self asks for some, she doesn’t let it have a lick of the spoon.
@@Queen1001N look up the series "schooled in magic" by christopher g. nuttall, a likable character. watch rings of power, or she hulk for ugly characters that may be physically attractive.
T&A sure, it is like a comic book come to life and rightly so. Girls are super athletic, powerful and sexy, dudes are buff, cool and sexy too. We all either want to be like them or with them. From the pages of a comic book to the silver screen. For BW I dont mind, for SW it was dumb.
Shit well your not wrong. Alot of the black widow stuff makes sense to me because she is supposed to be the femme fatale type but youre not wrong saying none of it lead to anything which I didnt notice til you pointed it out. I was actually pretty excited for black widow because by that time I finally cared about her character but then the move got delayed and I stopped watching marvel but I couldnt believe they didnt give us the Budapest stuff with her and Clint once I finally heard about the movie
Okay, I really like this analysis. I'll admit I actually love at least two of the characters you identified as examples, but this is very much a serious issue with the MCU and with a lot of other recent content. And I'm speaking as someone on the far left here. It really frustrates me to see the causes I advocate for getting co-opted by huge corporations that didn't give a single crap about marginalized people until they realized that they could make more money by pretending to. Honestly, I think Endgame is the perfect example of this pseudo-feminism. They have five significant female characters who survive the snap. Out of those five, well…Captain Marvel, Okoye, and Valkyrie are sidelined for vague reasons and miss the entire main plot of the movie. Then Black Widow gets killed off (though of course only Tony gets a big funeral), and Nebula gets captured and replaced by an evil duplicate, and she's been given so little connection with the main team that literally nobody notices the change. I think Nebula's actually my go-to character to look at here. She was given an interesting villain-to-hero arc and one hell of a compelling backstory, and out of all the heroes she had the most compelling connection with Thanos. He was her main villain-he hurt her more than he hurt anyone else, she'd spent her whole life dealing with the impact he'd left on her, and she was seeking catharsis against him. And she never got that catharsis because that'd mean taking glory away from Tony and Thor. Defeating the big bad is a privilege reserved for the guys, so she doesn't get to actually get to defeat her villain, even though it felt like that was what her entire arc was building up to. (Plus, I gotta say, it's pretty screwed up that the writers tried to paint Thanos as sympathetic after all that he was established as having done to her.) So ultimately, if her arc doesn't culminate with her finally getting to decisively strike back against Thanos, Nebula's overall role in the MCU is just to repeatedly suffer so that Thanos is seen as more threatening. No group shot of all the female characters can negate how awful that is.
@@gregowen2022 Oh heck, I'm incredibly glad you liked my comments this much! If you're thinking of continuing the series, another interesting character to look at could be the Wasp. In the comics, the Wasp (Janet van Dyne) is honestly one of the best characters among the Avengers, but in the movies they replaced her with Hope, who's one of the flattest characters I've ever seen. The MCU still has Janet, but she doesn't get to be a hero, most likely because Marvel doesn't have the guts to actually have a middle-aged woman as an Avenger. I'd personally love seeing Scott and Janet as a multi-generational hero duo-it'd be so much fun. But it'll never happen because Marvel is trying desperately to make Hope happen even though there's absolutely nothing to her character. It's kinda impressive that they saw one of the best female characters Marvel comics had to offer and decided to make *this* instead.
@@evelynivy6124 The problem with Hope is the bad writing. She did a great job in what was supposed to be the final scene when she and Scott faced being trapped in the QR. I would also like to see Janet as Wasp as well because they would make a great duo with Scott.
Wanda was not a bad character but she did go down the wrong path. She was in love with Vision, but when Vision had her destroy the mind stone that was in his head she was very sad, but then when thanos used the time stone to reverse so he can get the last stone, that means Vision's death was all for nothing, so she went through grief, and she created a place called the Hex where she and vision could be together again, She realized she had to destroy the Hex and free the townspeople of Westview. In muiltverse of madness she was a villain, but she was just trying to have a family.
Honestly Natasha was my favorite female character from the mcu. I like how they did her character over the years up until the end. Mainly because she wasn't portrayed as a hero who trumps her fellow men superheroes. She knows her role in the group and sticks with what she does best. I love that about her character. Everyone after her can eat dirt
Agree that was the best thing about Black Widow and Hawkeye. They were not super powered and knew it. Part of their entire arc was knowing they could not do what the superpowered people can do but had their own skills.
Honestly I don’t think they did a bad job with Wanda so far. Wandavision was about her dealing with her grief over vision. She was never able to get over him and so she tried to use the dark hold to make a perfect world for herself. I don’t see how people think how she acted the way she did in the doctor strange movie. She was already acting pretty crazy In wandavision. Holding awhole town against their will
I'm pretty sure she went batshit in the comics, so, they were somewhat following her "actual" story arc, but yes, she was paper thin and not well-written.
Tbh the MCU kind SUCKS at writing side character heroes. I mean look at Hawkeye, Rhodey and Falcon. They don't have ANY character progression whatsoever. Its just their base character traits carrying them this ENTIRE TIME💀 Its not till there shows(and a bit earlier for Hawkeye with the whole rushed Ronin arc) that we see some development...even if we dont agree with the changes. Rhodey has yet to have gotten his
Tell me your idea for a Clint/Natasha origin story
Definitely Budapest! My husband acted like I was weird for being stuck on that. Thank you for validating my marvel views(me).
I've always considered Jennifer Lawrence's Red Sparrow as the best Black Widow origin story, with all the brutal training, the red in the ledger, with the US/Russian agents being Clint and Alexei.
But alas, the BW movie got us a bumbling Alexei as a father figure and Yelena as a wisecracker instead of a Fiona Volpe sexpot who's Natasha's BW rival.
@@Shadi092986 underrated comment
Eh, I don't entirely agree with you on this one. Sometimes you don't need to know the details of a character's origins. Sometimes, broad strokes, and references just work better while allowing the character to maintain a little bit of mystery to them. My example being, we didn't need a Solo movie because we didn't really need to see him make the Kestle run, we didn't need to see his first meeting with Chewy, we didn't need to see him win the Falcon from Lando in a game a cards. All of that was sufficiently laid out for is in the original trilogy, and explicitly showing it doesn't really add any value.
From my fanfiction:
"What are you going to do with me now?" Natasha asked, examining Barton's wounds. They were both sitting on the plane that was taking them to America. They both failed to complete the mission. She didn't kill the politician Guera, and Barton didn't kill her. Budapest has changed Natasha. He gave her hope that she could be free.
"I'll take you my home," Barton smiled.
"You think I'm easily dragged into bed?" Natasha said it jokingly, but her mind was calculating. Most men wanted this from her. Her charms and her sexy body.
"My wife is unlikely to be happy with the three of us in bed. It's too small," Barton smiled impudently.
"You have a wife and you are flirting with me? Didn't you buy me drinks at the Lajos Bar?" Natasha asked. Slowly bandaging Barton's shot shoulder.
"The specifics of working as a spy. Laura understands that," Barton replied. Natasha was involved in a world of corrupt politicians, promiscuous women, secret spies. She knew all kinds of smiles. Barton's smile as he talked about Laura. It was something else. Not artificial. Not condescending. Honest.
"She's probably the most special woman in the world," Natasha made a trivial statement. As should be said in this situation. Barton looked at her. Like the watchful gaze of a hawk.
"You throw the cheapest text there is, and yet you mean it anyway," Barton replied.
"You're Hawkeye. So easy to see through? Maybe I should change my career," Natasha said.
"Hawkeye. I like it. It suits the archer. Robin Hood or Legolas would be too cheesy. If you came up with a nickname for me, I should come up with one for you," Barton said. Nickname for her? She was Agent Romanoff, one of the widows of the Red Room. She didn't need a nickname.
"What for exemple?" Natasha asked.
"Black Widow. Refers to your past. You were just one of the Widows, weren't you?" Barton asked.
"Widow number 506," said Natasha.
"And now you are just Black Widow. One and only," said Barton.
"Why not give me a nickname that doesn't refer to the blood on my hands?" Natasha asked.
"Does not apply to blood on your hands. I read your file. You survived the killer program. You are a survivor. When you meet her, Laura will confirm that too. You are Black Widow because you deserve it. Because Black Widow not have to be a sign of the great evil but your surving. It will be a sign of you. Natasha Romanoff, who managed to survive," said Barton, and he meant it. Natasha felt something. Something she hasn't felt in a long time. However, she did not show anything of herself. Her face was still a professional mask.
"I'm Black Widow because I kill powerful men that hang around me. Usually on orders or for money, Barton," replied Natasha.
"Not Barton. Not for you," Barton said, and grabbed her forearm.
"Then who?" Natasha asked.
"Clint or Hawkeye. Or whatever you want. Not Barton, though," he told her.
Clint. No, Barton.'' It was only memory....fanfiction was about Loki :)
And instead of learning from their mistakes, they're still sticking with them.
Definitely. They committed hard to social politics and it's going to keep hurting them for some time
@@gregowen2022
When will this madness seriously end?
@@MrATPCO The problem is that most buisnesses can take losses for years. So I assume Disney can ruin themselves for a while.
this is why they killed off tony stark, they were jealous
@@attilamarics3374 Why the hell won't this stop and we end this by force?
The problem with female characters in most media is the same problem that other diversity characters (black, asian, LGBTQ, etc.) have. The media fixates on *what* they are rather than *who* they are. This is why the women in Marvel movies are as Greg describes them, constantly putting down men, acting like they don't need men (except when they do, but you won't ever see them acknowledge that) basically men with boobs.
People don't want women characters, what they want is good characters and if some of those characters happen to be women well that's a fringe benefit. The problem comes down to when they constantly go "HEY! HEY!!!! THIS CHARACTER IS A WOMAN! LOOK! PAY ATTENTION TO HER!!! AREN'T WE PROGRESSIVE!?!" whether that be through T&A or through this "Strong (because she has zero emotion and is a dick to everybody around her) Woman" nonsense.
Honestly, I’d say they had the right idea for a base with Natasha. For her the sexualizing makes the most sense because as a woman spy, she’d be taught to use everything at her disposal, which would to some degree involve seduction. This was actually well handled in her talk with Bruce in avengers 1 where she’s trying to be persuasive but he sees through it all.
The problem is they clearly had no plan for her story arc which is a shame since she has one of the most compelling foundations for one, how does someone who committed wide scale murder and trained to kill and manipulate from a young age learn to function in a more genuine capacity?
You're right, they left themselves so much potential. Then they wasted all of it. It's just a sad disservice
@@gregowen2022 Natasha Romanov REALLY deserved, and needed, her own movie YEARS earlier.
It's hard to give that many characters they time that they deserve in a large ensemble cast MOVIE like The Avengers.
Her own movie to really develop her own character would have been great... or a dual-purpose movie with her and Hawkeye.
I think the real problem, is that Disney/Marvel wasnt going to go where it would need to go in order to tell Black Widows story. Similar to how they went with Scott Lang instead of Hank Pym for Antman, they really don't want to go into the darkness of those characters. Also why Magic just seems like science in Marvel, because Marvel isnt willing to truly explore the occult/mysticism
The Soviets actually have a spy school for women trained to use their... feminine wiles to either extract actually useful information from male targets in the West, like diplomats and scientists, or turn them wholesale. IIRC, it was called the Sparrow School.
I think Marvel was basically "gazumped" by the 20th Century Fox movie "Red Sparrow", which had a much better origin story than any MCU writer could have come up with.
They were kind-of stuck, after leaving her "on the shelf" for way too long without her own movie, that a "super spy" origin for Black Widow would just look too much like a rip-off of that.
So instead it was too little, too late (she's already dead).
They explain why Wanda was a brutal psychopath in Doctor Strange: she finds a dark book offscreen and it corrupts her. My problem with that is that it is blatantly explained, not really developed. They could have used that as its own plot point, showing Wanda seeking out the book, maybe show just how desperate she is for a family or tie in her sad past. Instead it is just a plot device "Oh she found the funny book that turns you evil and has never been referenced before," giving the movie a villain.
Good video, it made me realize what felt off while I was watching Doctor Strange
Right, it was such a sharp turn. She was an emotional wreck with good reason leading up to the movie, but then she suddenly is a psycho? But it's ok because mind control. Again. Come on marvel, get a new plot device
I was thinking that they could have easily saved this story by having the demon who wrote the book subtly manipulating Wanda to free him. He's trapped in a special dimension and wants out. He's the first demon meaning he is literally the ONLY one in all the multiverse of his kind. So he mind messes with Wanda to convince her to get America so she could get her kids but in reality he wants her to open a portal to let him out.
@@cb-gz1vl Marvel can't do Magic properly because they don't want their stories to get too dark or to involve any religious/mystical aspects, Magic justb seems like some different type of science in MCU
@@Tony-fq5bn Magic is also like that in DC. They explained it as the energy left over after creation.
Didn’t she find the dark hold In wandavision. I thought she had it at the end of the show
I never understood why Wanda was treated like a walking plot device with powers changing on a whim and also we were meant to like her for it. Brainwashing entire towns? Destroying universes? Killing Jim from The Office (the worst crime of them all IMHO)? And yet we are supposed to like her. The whole Phase 5 is a one giant "WHY".
I suspect that's why Elizabeth Olsen responded to an interview question about being sad about no longer playing that character, by saying she kinda wishes she just signed on for the first few projects rather than devote 10 years of her career to that role.
I'd imagine the money is great, but for an actor that cares about the roles they take, it probably stings her pride to go from something like Wind River and then cash in on Wanda. Not that anyone could blame her, but based on her comments and her past roles, it seems like she has an appetite for movies with a little more substance.
What I found most weird about Scarlet Witch was her sudden switch from "mother searching for her lost children" at the end of WandaVision to "rampaging lunatic intent on destroying everything" in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
They tried to hand wave it with "she was under mind control by the dark hold" but that's the weakest writing imaginable
You want a great Black Widow? Look up Earth's Mightiest Heroes and Avengers Assemble cartoons.
In EMH, she was a double agent playing both Hydra and Avengers thinking she was a traitor. They even gave her an accent switch: when she was with Hydra she had her Russian accent and an American one when she was with the Avengers. Very cool detail and very Severus Snape from Harry Potter with her. Great storytelling from her in that.
Wanda was better in Wolverine and the X-Men show. She was a true hero in that show and what Wanda in the MCU should have been. She was even better in X-Men Evolution!
It's truly depressing how the MCU treated these two were treated. At least Gamora and Nebula were cool. So not a total loss.
How did Disney go from Mulan 98, Pocahontas, Esmeralda, Nani (Lilo and Stitch), Kida (Atlantis), to this with Wanda and Natasha?!
How is this the same company?!
Except that disney didn't make Black Widow a honey pot spy, MARVEL made her a honey pot spy, way back in the 60's, hence the name "Black Widow."
Something made much more explicit in 2002's Ultimate Marvel.... Something that predates the first Iron Man movie by six years.
I think part of the problem is that so many woke writers hate normality. Most women aren't villainous, hypersexualized, nor masculine. Writers don't like that. It's too conservative. They've basically cornered themselves into the same tropes over and over that most of us can't relate to.
I'm not woke, but I do hate normality. Humanity is great precisely because it's creative, ambitious, and individualistic. Normalcy is all about conformity.
people use the word woke and literally describe what men think about of imaginery women 💀 Literally most old female "strong" characters are still hypersexualized and made for the male gaze.
Most males aren’t going to watch a female in a movie without her being attractive
Interesting Perspective video! Natasha is a character they really didn't have much plan for.
Aside that, ufortunately, Wanda has always been a plot-point character, even in the comics.
Over the years her powers have done whatever the story needs, and she usually doesn't have much depth outside of having children and being emotionally unstable/ becoming evil (then being redeemed) in a cycle... creating zombies & maybe also dating her brother in an alternate universe.
Of course, I don't excuse that since the MCU rebooted so many comic characters (GOTG) and they had no reason not to take/use her competently. Or even change the vision narritave and build on it, before tearing it down.
Yes, it was so clear that Natasha was just there for boobs in the beginning. Then the MCU took off and they didn't know what to do. It's why Disney's virtue signals are empty because they couldn't even develop their own character.
And you're right they could have expanded Wanda. The MCU has made it clear that they diverged from the comics, so they can't lean on them as an excuse for mishandling a character.
I'm wondering if there was a plan somewhere to have Natasha fall pregnant to Banner. That scene where she tells him she was sterilized was weird. Maybe Banner's gamma sperm would have impregnated her and led to a World War Hulk storyline. Probably just my fan fic really.
I feel like the lack of development for Black Widow and Scarlet Witch in Phases 1-3 was more a product of them being side characters. You could say the same things about Hawkeye having no real influence on the larger MCU as you did about Black Widow. Natasha may not have had much of a role in the plot of the MCU, but, if anything, Black Widow's role as a tease to Stark, a foil to Steve Rogers, and as Hulk's muse, made her much more important character in the MCU than every other side-Avenger. Come to think of it, she really is the glue of the Avengers team... even more than Nick Fury.
In Phase 4, they were done dirty and discarded because of the rush for the new super-"inclusive" female Avengers superseded the desire to properly feature and/or send off the existing female characters. Also... all the new writers on the MCU just suck.
Teeny Little Super Guy!
I’m happy that the algorithm suggested one of your videos as they are very well made and enjoyable to watch. I see this channel going far!
Thank you very much! I'm glad you enjoyed them
I find it so weird for Wanda that all the other avenger just leave her
even hawkeye who she bonded with some what was just gone
making all the other avenger seem like assholes after she lose everything she cared about😵
Right? It's cool they were trying to show a character having a mental break, but it became a little contrived when they made everyone act cold to her
TLDR warning ⚠️
I’ve been working on some content in this same vein: I think Disney sexualises and/or ‘masculinizes’ men because they are wanting to create fantasies for women. They want to engage with female audiences, who as statistics show, spend considerably more money. My wife’s best friends mom’s house is literally covered top to bottom with Disney memorabilia; including a full garage and one bedroom dedicated to it.
I mean I don’t know if you noticed but while we weren’t paying attention they turned the Avengers into ‘girls get it done’, I think the only male left is Hulk and his replacement is on standby… so what *really* happened with that snowplow 🤔…
The rightie boys are always super focused on the grooming thing, which isn’t that far off. They do introduce sexualised content to kids way too early, but it’s not for any QAnon/Pizzagate related reasons: grooming is consuming. By “empowering” (aka transforming girls into consumers) girls and women they are creating a bond, a virtue signalling reciprocal altruism, that hooks their grimey Disney hooks in them for life.
They become like surrogate parents: telling kids about the birds and the bees before mom and dad have the chance to fumble that mess up. Since, in a deeply capitalist society where consumerism is internalised in a way similar to religious experience, Disney becomes a sort of pseudo-church.
Charlie Brooker pointed this gatekeeping out in the greatest tv series ever made “How TV ruined your life” where he pointed out Hannah Montana’s weirdly adult life and relationships. Now kids are introduced to an emulate-able character with an adult life, whereas most boy characters still act like Dennis the menace or Beaver Cleaver. This is also why Marvel is trying to portray their male characters as weaker, so to let women fully assume the “boss bitch” moniker: which if a man did the same would be labeled ‘toxic masculinity’. 🤷🏻♂️
That is remarkably well put. I have a few videos lined up, but you need to make this before I do! The way they get into kids' brains from a young age is wild and the existence of hardcore Disney adults really proves it. They sell childhood magic, but you are right that in the end it's just selling. It's a product.
@@gregowen2022 check out the book ‘Subjectivity, the unconscious and consumerism’ by Marlon Xavier it has some really interesting ideas on “Disney Magic”
I’ll let you know when I finish my video, if you beat me to it so be it, since it would only be my 2nd vid 😮
You are thinking in terms of money, but this isn't about money, it is about faith. Their unholy faith tells them masculinity is evil and so they preach that message to the masses.
Zeal explains why quality unrelated to messaging has gone down at the same time they've increased ideological content- because they aren't selecting for profit, but true believers.
@@samuelskinner7704 why do they want to push the faith though? Disney is a company and faith doesn’t do anything for the bottom line unless it can be monetized. They make true believers so the true believers buy more $h!t because nobody spends money like zealots
@@ashbirk4681
Shareholders care about the bottom line. Disney isn't run by the shareholders.
Yes, running the company into the ground is a given, but piety is how hiring is decided, so it is rational. Everyone competes to be more pious, the core focus of the firm is tossed and it goes under and dies and the people who killed it get rewarded and go onto the next one.
There is a point looting can't continue, but if they were capable of realizing that, they wouldn't have gone down this path in the first place.
In the end of Infinity War before vision was destroyed, it seemed that Black Panther's sister had finished fixing Vision(because they said that she could still keep his memories of Wanda) before she was attacked by Thanos henchmen.
I thought that they would bring him back in Endgame, and I was looking forward to it, but they didn't.
The story of Budapest should have been what the black-widow movie was about 😢
When they announced it, I thought for sure that's what the plot would be. Nope, just a launch platform for Yelena
It was too late at that point. They would have to de-Age Natasha and Clint for AN ENTIRE movie. Where it SHOULD have taken place was DURING the BLIP. The fact that Marvel just SKIPPED over what the characters were up to in that time and no one calls that out is CRAAAAZY to me😭🤦♂️. So much story potential with Power being up for grabs and half the world disappearing. Theres no way EVERYone was depressed...a LOT of people would've lost their minds in RAGE. There would be GLOBAL CHAOS if something like that happens, not just mass depression.
A lot of the sanitized half measures have to do with the executives in marketing, combined with what the actresses are willing to do.
Which largely amounts to just wearing a full body leotard and not going into details on things/deflecting, certain things.
I think Wanda/scarlet witch could’ve been a great villain/super hero. I don’t really remember any character who has sever depression or mental problems like Wanda. How she falls into depression. Wanda vision does this greatly and we see how torn and broken she is…… and is then thrown into being a mad driven mother by a book.
Yes! They gave themselves so much potential for a complex character dealing with grief and decided "absolute psycho" was the way to end it. Disgusting
The first time I saw Scarlet Witch was in the game X-Men Legends 2, which came out for 6th gen consoles. And in it, she was a villain (only working with the X-Men along with Mag's group as part of an Enemy Mine sitch), so ScarWitch probably was originally conceived as a villain.
@@gregowen2022 I think they could still do it however writing for women is not a strong suit of Marvel. Female characters in general get shortchanged in the MCU. Jane Foster has to be the most underutilized character in the MCU. In Dark World, she spends 75% of the movie being a piece of luggage. In Love and Thunder, her Mighty Thor is Thor's sidekick.
@@gregowen2022 I think some of the reason for how they handled Scarlet Witch so badly is that they had decided that Brie Larson's Captain Marvel was the new "face of Marvel".
Captain Marvel just had to be the... well... bestest ever... so Wanda either had to go, or become a villain.
Too much competition... and that may apply to Brie Larson, as much as to Captain Marvel...
@@FrankWilliams-wi8zs Marvel may have actually swallowed the Left-wing BS about how people won't go to see a female superhero... in spite of how well Captain Marvel did at the box office.
Thus, they may feel a need to FORCE them on viewers (DIE) by ramming them down our throats in ensemble movies and such... and, yes, "tweaking them" into masculine women.
The stance black widow uses is a common body building pose, men do it all the time for the same reason. It shows off everything.
oh please. where are the male superheroes posing like that?
@@punkbjork In superhero comics💀. Also unlike the female heroes in the MCU ALL the male superheroes are BAREBACKED at least once in their franchises
Cap
Thor
Tony...when he's a genius and being hot is not a character trait
Peter Parker...in his first two movies and its played as a joke when MJ tries to take a peak
Peter Quill
Bruce...but that makes sense
Tchalla
Drax is always barebacked up until the very last movie in that franchise💀
Namor as well but it can be argued thats his costume...but at the same time he has worn more clothing for a WHILE now in the comics
Hugh Jackman as wolverine has done that side pose a couple times
I just find it funny how people who care and cry about sexualization sOOOooo much...NEVER talk about how the men as well are done the same💀.
In the comics these characters are drawn like God's and Godesses and given unreleastic body proportions cause that's what humans LIKE TO LOOK AT. The most STRIKING art styles and animations always distort body proportions in some way.
Theres a philosohpical way to look at it. These characters LOOK perfect...but throught their stories you see that they aren't. So as much as people chase this idea of physical perfection...they'll never truly attain perfection cause it doesn't exist
Superficially speaking tho...theres an entire documentary on why humans like looking at things that are "more human than human"🤷♂️
@@punkbjork oh and the original comment never said the male superheroes did it too, they just explained the pose and its usage💀. But since you got so offended that you forgot basic comprehension, I answered it for you😂🤦♂️
Another observation on the Scarlet Witch....
As much as I enjoy Dr. Strange in his second film (as I hated the first one) her arc is literally senseless: A non parent striving desperately to recapture a false moment in her life when her powers allowed her to create children from nothing to have a family life. The kids are literally fiction in the Wandavision show, yet in Dr. Strange, suddenly not only are they real in every other universe to the point that she's always dreaming about them, but she completely abandons any interest in reclaiming her lost relationship with Vision, who she wanted to have that family with.
There was a remark by Feige I believe along the lines of not wanting to have Dr. Strange in the Wandavision show because they didn't want her to be taught by a white male, so are they trying to justify not having vision because she shouldn't be pursuing a man, despite that man being the only real thing in the scenario as far as she knows before Dr. Strange 2??? Are we so in on women never having to do anything with men in these films that she can't use an actual relationship she developed as a means to explain her mental breakdown, which is what her whole run after Endgame is about?
The decisions for this character are baffling.
I would be sympathetic to the criticism by people in Hollywood about sexualizing women, if they weren't such moral hypocrites about it. Time and again, it turns out they're perfectly fine with sexual hedonism, sexualization in general, and immorality, as long as it's on THEIR terms, and not some director, producer, or even the audience's. It all just goes back to the relativism they cling to: they don't care about sexualization on an objective moral principle, it's solely based on how they FEEL about it, or if THEY have the power.
I've been dabbling in writing for the past decade (mostly fanfics with my own characters and settings) and am currently developing a spec script for one of them. I'd like to think those who're fans of female MCs, and want some alternative to Hollywood, would be interested; but then again, she doesn't necessarily conform to their standards either.
Now is the time to get out there with a quality product that runs counter to the mainstream. It's all gotten so bland, people are dying for something fresh. I think you'll find a more willing audience than you think. You should really polish it and start shopping it.
Standards? Don't worry, considering how much disappointment, how much the mainstream audience has suffered these days, they probably won't mind finding value in works, which are comsidered by many in entertainment industry 'sub-standard'.
@@lakshaykochhar6799 That's true. But I was talking more of general audiences who hate Hollywood messaging, yet still would not like something that, say, their grandparents' generation would've considered quality. It's like how everyone will complain about "woke Third/Fourth Wave feminism" but think "Second Wave feminism" and its icons are all automatically legit, just being hijacked by modern lefties".
The heroine I'm writing isn't someone people would immediately think of as a superhero, nor would the actresses I'd consider for the role necessarily so. But it has nothing to do with "the message" in the current sense, but more on the themes of "being drawn from the water" or "I'll make you fishers of men".
Fantastic discussion. How about instead of just strong women, Disney should focus on strong characters? That way both men & women are included, and the focus is on the character rather than their sex ( men or women). That way we get rid of the female girl boss mentality, it’s not empowering, it’s infuriating!
I completely agree. Most writers will write a good character who is a man, among other things.
Then they write a she woman lady and her womanly womenness is all the she, a woman, is allowed to be. It's a real disservice
"Marvel only cares about Black Widow's sex appeal.
Anyway lemme ignore everything except her sex appeal."
Weren't in the old days they had men who did the same things too? Especially, for villains.
I loved Natasha in Winter Soldier. And despite all it’s faults- I did love Black Widow movie - it is a bummer that’s the last we saw of her
It was so sad that she didn't get a real ending and her movie got bumped for captain marvel. She had real potential
The disappointment I had when I left the theaters on may 6th,I was expecting marvel to take an approach of Wanda slowly decending into and endless cycle of grief,becoming a villian in like phase 6-7 in a house of m type of style movie in which she is a villian,but she is not a psychotic killer instead she is burdened with her endless power,manipulated over time by her own grief but no,she becomes a quick solution of a villian,a manipulatee of an ancient book .It would have been better if the villian was Chthon and he was possessing Wanda,so that she can get America chavez’s powers and leave his dimension.But no they went for the easier route and just killed her off at the end in a Nobel sacrifice.Waste of potential
Right? It was just so disrespectful and lazy. How do write this character into a spot where they would logically act like a villain? Hmm, seems hard, we'll just go with MIND CONTROL for the seventeenth time
Black widow is a sexual character even In the comics she was designed to sleep with the enemy and kill them in their sleep but once the money was done she said ....she was used a sexy object did she know who she was portraying
Her comments on the character were very weird. It's sounds very hypocritical to play a sexual character for years and then when you're older, decry the sexism of it all
@@gregowen2022 right if it was an issue she should have said something in iron man 2
@@gregowen2022 It served her career THEN... but now that she's getting older, it works AGAINST her... and, lo and behold... they seem to have... ahem... replaced her with a younger model.
Imma be 100% honest I thought Black Widow is the female version of Captain America.
A fun fact about that, in comics Black Widow is actually as old as Cap, she took a Russian variation of the super soldier serum
While I'm not here to defend Disney, I have to be fair w/ some of the criticisms in this vid. Black Widow's sex appeal is a prominent part of her character, which is reflected in her code name & career choice. Cap & Thor's sex appeal aren't really part of their character, so Disney wasn't just sexualizing the women (they just sexualized certain characters). And Wanda went from reluctant villain, to reformed hero, to "crazy witch chick" in the comics, so they're kinda following the source material. Disney has come a far way from their stereotypical "damsels in distress" & overly evil villainess type female characters; but I agree they still have a long way to go, like most other forms of media (outside those who already push an over-the-top & annoying "female empowerment" message).
I think the better argument is that Disney really doesn't write good characters and/or stories, even if it's an adaption of a previously popular work (i.e. old stories, fairy tales, comics, or any other IP they buy out, and/or whatever they can get that's in Public Domain). I just hope they remedy this before they bring the X-Men to the MCU, because those female characters are infinitely more interesting & better written (even more so than many of the main male characters of Marvel).
All the MCU had to do was turn the comic books we liked in the seventies and eighties into movies plain and simple.
And what is so bad feeling to me is that when they made Winter soldier not only was it a good movie but it was a smash hit which even if it wasn't they hid the fact that she was prominent in that movie and it was literally a winter soldier movie then they should have done the Black widow Solo movie right after that movie. Because in the comic books the winter soldier helped train Natasha and they not only went on missions together but had a romantic side to their relationship.
I mean it literally wrote itself and made way more sense than what we got.
That the MCU has pretty much entirely stopped adapting stories from the comics is one of the most baffling things I've ever seen in my life. There are literally hundreds to choose from and they come with something very much like storyboards already!
If the writers don't want to show the characters depending on men which is fair enough then why not show them depending on other women? Instead of making them hyper independent they could be flawed, have weaknesses and support each other. Marvel is clearly trying to grow a female audience and that's a story that would appeal to women.
I think with both characters of Natasha and SW were just...nobody cared enough to write them a good story it seems? There should have been a black widow movie years before we got one and it SHOULD have been her and Hawkeye, heck, they might've been able to squeeze out two, a backstory one and a follow up one.
For Witchy girl...I don't know what the fuck happened there, MOM was insanely bad because they decided they had to follow up on her overt evil from her TV show, I guess. They also forget about Vision during that whole descent into madness. So she does too, despite white vision being vision and definitely existing...but she doesn't even look for one in a different universe.
Right, nothing about her transformation into a monster makes sense at all, they just took a good character and made a j turn into a ditch.
I'm so sad we'll never get a Clint and Natasha movie, hell it could have even been a Disney plus show.
This is a good video, I agree with basically all of it, and am commenting entirely because of that one part with lion king where you said it was weird that two characters gave each the eyes in an explicitly romantic scene ,':/
Thank you very much! I didn't notice it as a kid, but holy crap that was such a weird scene in a kid's movie, right?
@@gregowen2022 Haha I see why you feel that way, but honestly I don't mind this sort of thing. I think it tends to go over kids' heads, and I think it's nice when pieces of art have stuff that you can come to interpret differently as you grow older. The Incredibles is a good example of this, when you're a kid it's like "ooh fun family superhero movie" and then watching as an adult you're like "holy shit mrs incredible thinks he's cheating on her and that guy just attempted suicide"
5:49 Well yeah, Clint had a relatively normal life outside of being a SHIELD agent so his sense of justice is more hammered in and we see that in how he only goes after criminals like Yakuza members who he sees as not deserving to survive while innocent people were snapped away. Clints actions were still relatively acceptable, especially considering how screwed up the world likely was in the years during the Snap
Wanda however had basically never known peace. She grew up in a war torn country, lost both of her parents because of that war, was subjected to horrible experiments along with her brother, saw said brother get killed right in front of her, is later persecuted by the world for her past actions and later watches as the last person she has a truly loving relationship with is ripped away from her. Wanda then uses her powers to essentially hold a town hostage, basically believing, somewhat understandably, that the only way to have what she wants and protect her loved ones is to put them in a bubble she controls and when she's forced to give that up, she effectively snaps completely.
Comparing her to Hawkeye isn't exactly One to One is all I'm saying.
2:54 And that's what turns people into furries later.
Personally, since Disney's movies mostly seems like bad fan fiction, maybe they should think about checking out some of the better writers on the major fan fiction sites.
They probably wouldn't do much worse.
I think they sould start adapting stories from the comics again. That worked pretty well in the first 3 phases.
your channel is so underrated omgg
Thank you so much for watching!
People either need to give Disney all the credit for Phases 1,2 &3 or hold Kevin Feige accountable for the disaster of Phase 4 and the terrible start of Phase 5. Credit and Blame both go up the ladder, and if you say one person should have the credit when things go well, then that person is the one to blame when things don't. If you want to blame a company for when things go bad, then when things go flawlessly well, the the company gets the credit. Consistancy, you can't have it both ways. Also using The Little Mermaid and The Lion King are bad examples as we know by the point Ursula says 'You have your looks' we knew she's the villain, the bad guy and we shouldn't take her advice and niether should Ariel. As for The Lion King, it's kind of established that Nala and Simba would get together, and applying human standards to animals, even as anthropomorphic as we see in The Lion King is not fair.
Me four months in the future and catching up. Intersting to note the changes in your background set-up while gling through your back catalog.
I'm just glad I dropped that lapel mic. I didn't like that audio. Live and learn
I feel what they should have done with Wanda in Doctor Strange is have her actually help Strange, Wong and America but was subconsciously causing the conflict in the movie which they would realize in the climax.
That would have been a fun twist and more subtle. That would have been great
*Disney:* "We want to write powerful female characters that break with traditional stereotypes!"
*Also Disney:* [Makes their most powerful female character an emotional, lovesick wreck, defined purely by her uterus and entirely dependent on the men in her life, not to mention prone to destructive fits of hysteria.]
Well done you guys. You sure avoided every historical negative stereotype about women on that one.
I see no problem making a character who embodies stereotypical traits. Emotional, lovesick wrecks don't exist?
I don't see the issue.
It's far more annoying when they make the woman a hyper-masculine prick, which is also something real that women do, but far more annoying and far less realistic.
@@Selrisitai I don't understand how you can arrive at the conclusion that one stereotype isn't problematic because it exists, while the other is, and that it's somehow less realistic, even though it also exists.
@@henrikhumle7255 what don't you understand. People are quick to cry and feel like they have to tell the whole world about female characters being sexualised and villainized, but feel empowered when a character is a total d**k (Captain Marvel) look at Wanda's gay audience having a meltdown, cause they can't accept she's a villain 😂
@@henrikhumle7255Yet you femcels wont talk about the Male stereotypes.
I do find it odd how in this one he downplays Natasha having a character but in the Hulk vs Iron Heart video he plays up how the scene was a great showing of her character. Not to mention how her interrogating her captures in the earlier Avengers scene was also well done.
Hades 'throwing the right curves' at Hercules literally means Meg, because Hercules was already interested in her. Hades wasn't just about to throw any woman at Herc. Megara was telling her boss that this guy he's been ranting about was showing genuine signs of interest, so Hades set up a plan using the tool he had available.
They write their women how they think men act. They're wrong on all counts.
Oh, no! He's back with another banger and going hard in the paint!
I'm getting tired of Disney's subvert messaging of no mommies.
If the women don't have interesting arcs then yes they should have great curves.
But one thing you leave out is BOTH Hawkeye and Natasha are rather useless. The two ONLY human characters. Hawkeye with his 19 arrows. All he does is stand on a roof in Avengers. They are way dwarfed by everyone else.
Oh and don't forget they also completely nerfed Hulk. So this isn't just some issue with Natasha. They destroyed everyone.
I forgot about Hawkeye. He’s way more useless than black widow, but I didn’t see his show either. Yeah it’s not just female characters that Disney is screwing up, it’s all of the characters. Hawkeye was a forgettable stand-in character from the beginning.
@@anotherrandomguy8871 "but I didn’t see his show either."
To be fair he never got a show.
Oh sure there was TOTALLY a show called Hawkeye.... Shame he wasn't the main character in it.
@@matthewlane oh right, I completely forgot, yeah wasn’t the show more about his daughter than Hawkeye himself? Thanks for the reminder.
@@anotherrandomguy8871 "oh right, I completely forgot, yeah wasn’t the show more about his daughter than Hawkeye himself?"
Worse, it was literally just some random teenage girl with a bow & arrow, and the worlds most obnoxious zoomer personality.
@@matthewlaneYour description of this character reminds me of ant-man’s daughter in the recent 3rd installment of the ant-man movies.
Like Captain Marvel or Superman in DC, it is VERY difficult to make effective teamwork when one hero is stronger than everyone else combined so Wanda would have needed nerfing to keep her as a long term character. Being a mother would have meant a lot more if her sons had any characterization at whatsoever.
Superman isn't more powerful than anyone else combined. Martian Manhunter is "invisible Superman who can read your mind". Even Superman has flat out stated that J'onn J'onzz is the one person he'd fear having to face in open combat.
Natasha did help out rhodey and tony at the end of iron man 2. Plus theres her actions and growth in winter solider.
2:26 Ursula and Hades are villains, I wouldn't really trust them to give out good moral advice to kids, and most people wouldn't either
Alternative idea for Wanda in Multiverse of Madness: our Wanda isn't the villain. The villain would be a variant of Wanda who has let her obsession with her hypothetical children drive her to madness. Our Wanda has to team up with Strange to protect America. Her arc would be learning the Darkhold is not a toy, and resolving to not use it without the help of the Avengers.
This felt more in line with her character after Wandavision, which still had her as a good guy.
would have liked that Widow Loki scene better if after his monolog she breaks, shaking and sobbing, hurries out of the room as soon as she's out of eye line she drops it and hits the coms
2:27 it's because it's stuff for the adults who are watching to understand, when the kids get older they will understand it too.
I always wonder what the suits think they are getting out of this.
Right? I can understand the Black Widow decision from a marketing standpoint, even if it's still in poor taste. But Wanda? What a waste of a potentially good character! She could have carried them into future phases
@@gregowen2022 I can picture a bunch of guys in a boardroom: "Well, we lost another billion dollars. What do you want to do now." "Do it again! Do it again!"
It is a demonstration of piety- easy to do with shareholder money.
Excellent commentary, you nailed it very well, they saw comment on Twitter and said we don't need men anymore, forgetting 2 key points, 1 Men make more money than women, 2 Movies are generally outings and or dates, who pays for dates 99% of the time, men so if you make men hate your content by making them watch their old hero's get kicked in the gonads every 30 minutes then they will not come to your movie and 95% of women don't watch movies alone.
I feel that you were way too reductive with Natasha's character to try and prove a point. Which kinda falls through without that.
The best example is the slow meaningful scene of how she describes part of her life in the red room to Banner. And how she, because of that, feels like more of a monster than the Hulk.
Which you describe as being missable even though it's like five minutes long. How long do you blink for?
I honestly think you need to take a deeper analysis of Black Widow's character because you seem to have only seen the surface level. And clunge onto the idea she's only supposed to be eye candy, even though she plays a pivotal role in every movie she is in. Without her the day doesn't get save multiple times over.
And this is why I hated her movie because it takes all those great qualities, including her sezuality, and throws them away for stereotypical MCU sludge hero.
And that brings me to my final point that: it's fine that they sexualized her because 1. They made it make sense for the character
2. She is more than just that
There are plenty of examples in media of character that are just sexualized to be sexualized. Black Widow from at least Avengers to Endgame is not one of them. She was sexualized along with being her own character with her own morals, goals, and abilities.
I don't know, i thing natasha was great, but wanda going full villain in the first oportunity wasn't. The original script where she is slowly tempted and only in the third act she falls would be better. Would be more tragic and understandable, sice we would see her bright side troughout the movie and how she feels about her loss, at the end, she finally loses her cool when is closer then ever to retrieves it's family
You described captain marvel as masculine and i think that furthered the confusion on her disconnect with her audience.
Lol and then they always end up in baby tank tops or tight leather...I think you should send your subscribers olives as a thank you 😋
Hahaha, I'll do a Mr. Beast style giveaway when I hit a million. "subscribe to get your olives"
@@gregowen2022 already am...good job 👏
Ironically, as horny as the Japanese are, they still write women better than Hollywood does. If anyone has read chainsaw-man part 2 you know exactly what I mean.
Definitely true. I'm watching anime right now to try and see why everyone likes it so much(and do a video). Yes, the milkers are massive, but they still write the women as actual people. What a concept!
Even more ironic, female being mangaka is more acceptable than working in comic industry in USA
@@gregowen2022 "Definitely true. I'm watching anime right now to try and see why everyone likes it so much(and do a video). Yes, the milkers are massive, but they still write the women as actual people. What a concept!"
Mate we had fictional women as real defined & interesting characters for literally decades.
We only had to stop writing women as characters when feminists got sand in their vaginas about women being written as flawed, at which point female character had to either become entirely replaceable, or become over the top perfect mary sues who could kill like 900 guys without breaking a sweat.
The epitome of the Galbrush Paradox in action. Now there's a topic for your next video, the Galbrush Paradox & how capitulating to woke assholes every demand has turned female characters from the nuanced characters we had in the 1970, thru early 2000's, in to nothing but walking talking 2 dimensional boredom.
@@gregowen2022most of the industry is still make but people complain about the sexism
"smooth as butter'' 🤣🤣you get your like sir...
Let us not forget that Natasha didn’t get a funeral either 😂
I didn't even notice that part! She was done so wrong
It's interesting hearing all the whispers about movies getting pushed back and re-shoots and stuff like that. It's clear that, even though this really started in Phase 3, that the woke pedal to the medal in Phase 4 really blew up in their face. These characters, especially the female characters, have no depth, no character arc. There's nothing appealing about their characters. There's no reason to root for them. There's no challenge to overcome - other than some artificial challenges that they make sound more serious than they are. (See: She-Hulk gets cat called and that makes her able to control the Hulk powers 'infinitely better' than Bruce). They took a very, very simple premise that the best comics have run with for decades (flawed character, challenges and tragedies to overcome, growth, hero) and turned it into a platform for every cause or belief they have - whether it is in any way related to the character or not. I can only hope that when the compared/contrasted movies that WERE successful the last few years to the movies and shows they made, they'll have an 'ah hah!' moment and change course. If characters like Carol Danvers and Jennifer Walters were written better, Disney would still be riding that cash cow with no end in sight.
Yeah, the forced conversion to an all female MCU is not going well. The method they used is also why. Thanos' ashes hadn't floated to the ground before they were shoving these new female versions of the older characters at us. We were never given a reason to like them, we were just told to
There is nothing woke about phase 4. Men still dominate. Shang Chi is a male and will get a sequel. The Eternals had too many characters in it but it was mostly male. Love and Thunder revolved around Thor. Spiderman was about Spiderman. MOM had a woman going crazy. Once you get past The Marvels, the movies largely revolve around men. Women still get shortchanged in the MCU. There is nothing to complain about.
Thank you for this. I have been so pissed by the treatment of Wanda I haven't been able to bring myself to watch any more MCU. I am female with bipolar disorder, what I saw in WandaVision was a depressed woman with powers losing control and being able o litterly live in her fantasy. Wanda is someone in dire need of therapy, and an intervention. My husband is of the opinion that because most of the original avengers are dead or retired there is no one to do this role. But this misses the fact that there are TWO scorcer Supremes who's main job is to what out for and interven when magic is used inappropriately. Both Wong and Strange failed Wanda, but hey it's the dark holds fault and the fact she was week, not that others didn't do thier jobs and get the woman who had such a mental health breakdown that she mindcontrold an entire town accidently. If I am drowning and yelling for help is it my fault or the fault of the people on shore watch doing nothing if I die?
It seems to me that Hollywood and especially Disney only knows one story when it comes to character who is or feels betrayed - revenge. Revenge is the most immature and childish response to betrayal. There is healing and regaining trust. Not everyone is betraying friend, not everyone is a hopeless victim who turns into a psychotic monster when betrayed. There is forgiveness. Even animals can realize that, why not Disney?
I think it depends on the directors/writers how badly it's done. The Russos seemed to have a lot more respect for Black Widow and Johansson herself than Whedon or Favreau did. I hated her in Iron Man 2, liked her better in Avengers, and actually cared about her in Winter Soldier.
Yea. It’s not like make marvel hero’s get sexualized. Is there any Thor movie Hemsworth has kept his shirt on throughout? I thought his interview about how to dehydrate for shirtless day was interesting.
I watched multiverse of madness in cinema with my friends and we burst out laughing at multiple points.
Well in the comic books Scarlett Witch went back and forth from hero to villain and whatnot. And also in the books she did just snap and go psycho and kill billions of people so it's actually not a wrong take on the character
Do you realize comics and movies are not the same continuity?
:/
it doesn't matter how sexualized you make a woman if she's a horrible person who's really annoying and you wouldn't want to be around even if they're super physically attractive, but it's worse now because, not just in disney, but in general, media is making women physically unattractive, but also extremely unlikable.
If you’re looking for a break from that, there’s a great webcomic called The Cursed Princess Club. The main character is Gwen, the third princess of the Pastel kingdom. She’s unattractive, but likable. She bakes pies, loves possums, and is extremely kind. But her kindness is a fault. Not in the sense that kindness itself is a flaw, rather she gives it to everyone freely, but when her sense of self asks for some, she doesn’t let it have a lick of the spoon.
@@Queen1001N look up the series "schooled in magic" by christopher g. nuttall, a likable character. watch rings of power, or she hulk for ugly characters that may be physically attractive.
I am staring directly where you said I would, how did you know?
To be fair, Wanda's arc in the comics is that she's pretty unstable
T&A sure, it is like a comic book come to life and rightly so. Girls are super athletic, powerful and sexy, dudes are buff, cool and sexy too. We all either want to be like them or with them. From the pages of a comic book to the silver screen. For BW I dont mind, for SW it was dumb.
Shit well your not wrong. Alot of the black widow stuff makes sense to me because she is supposed to be the femme fatale type but youre not wrong saying none of it lead to anything which I didnt notice til you pointed it out. I was actually pretty excited for black widow because by that time I finally cared about her character but then the move got delayed and I stopped watching marvel but I couldnt believe they didnt give us the Budapest stuff with her and Clint once I finally heard about the movie
All the female characters in the Infinity Saga (minus Shuri & Captain Marvel) were awesome.
Okay, I really like this analysis. I'll admit I actually love at least two of the characters you identified as examples, but this is very much a serious issue with the MCU and with a lot of other recent content. And I'm speaking as someone on the far left here. It really frustrates me to see the causes I advocate for getting co-opted by huge corporations that didn't give a single crap about marginalized people until they realized that they could make more money by pretending to.
Honestly, I think Endgame is the perfect example of this pseudo-feminism. They have five significant female characters who survive the snap. Out of those five, well…Captain Marvel, Okoye, and Valkyrie are sidelined for vague reasons and miss the entire main plot of the movie. Then Black Widow gets killed off (though of course only Tony gets a big funeral), and Nebula gets captured and replaced by an evil duplicate, and she's been given so little connection with the main team that literally nobody notices the change.
I think Nebula's actually my go-to character to look at here. She was given an interesting villain-to-hero arc and one hell of a compelling backstory, and out of all the heroes she had the most compelling connection with Thanos. He was her main villain-he hurt her more than he hurt anyone else, she'd spent her whole life dealing with the impact he'd left on her, and she was seeking catharsis against him. And she never got that catharsis because that'd mean taking glory away from Tony and Thor. Defeating the big bad is a privilege reserved for the guys, so she doesn't get to actually get to defeat her villain, even though it felt like that was what her entire arc was building up to. (Plus, I gotta say, it's pretty screwed up that the writers tried to paint Thanos as sympathetic after all that he was established as having done to her.) So ultimately, if her arc doesn't culminate with her finally getting to decisively strike back against Thanos, Nebula's overall role in the MCU is just to repeatedly suffer so that Thanos is seen as more threatening. No group shot of all the female characters can negate how awful that is.
Shit, I didn't even notice the Nebula angle! This is really good stuff.
There wasn't going to be a part 3 to this series, but now.....
@@gregowen2022 Oh heck, I'm incredibly glad you liked my comments this much!
If you're thinking of continuing the series, another interesting character to look at could be the Wasp. In the comics, the Wasp (Janet van Dyne) is honestly one of the best characters among the Avengers, but in the movies they replaced her with Hope, who's one of the flattest characters I've ever seen. The MCU still has Janet, but she doesn't get to be a hero, most likely because Marvel doesn't have the guts to actually have a middle-aged woman as an Avenger. I'd personally love seeing Scott and Janet as a multi-generational hero duo-it'd be so much fun. But it'll never happen because Marvel is trying desperately to make Hope happen even though there's absolutely nothing to her character. It's kinda impressive that they saw one of the best female characters Marvel comics had to offer and decided to make *this* instead.
@@evelynivy6124 The problem with Hope is the bad writing. She did a great job in what was supposed to be the final scene when she and Scott faced being trapped in the QR. I would also like to see Janet as Wasp as well because they would make a great duo with Scott.
The MCU's Infinty Saga is mostly based on Marvel Comics _The Infinty Gauntlet._ In that story Nebula is the key character that causes Thanos' defeat.
Or a combo like Wanda
Wanda'a power is to change reality at her whim. The color red is just a side effect.
Or sometimes they do both
This is the best video about marvel women I've seen in awhile.
I really appreciate you watching!
they didnt get everyone cough asoka cough
not YET. We will see what Kathleen Kennedy does to her on the way out the door
To be fair at least those old Disney characters had arcs
Wanda was not a bad character but she did go down the wrong path. She was in love with Vision, but when Vision had her destroy the mind stone that was in his head she was very sad, but then when thanos used the time stone to reverse so he can get the last stone, that means Vision's death was all for nothing, so she went through grief, and she created a place called the Hex where she and vision could be together again, She realized she had to destroy the Hex and free the townspeople of Westview. In muiltverse of madness she was a villain, but she was just trying to have a family.
I would have gone the House of M route with Wanda. Get used one last time before she things the world would be better off without her.
Where’s part 1? Your link only goes to Netflix.
That's odd. I'll look into it.
ruclips.net/video/z3TUPtYZU4E/видео.html should work
being a medicore looking guy i wish i was "just being very attractive eye candy" tbh. women complain about being h0t is insane to me
im terrfied what FEIGE IS gonna do with jessica jones
Honestly Natasha was my favorite female character from the mcu. I like how they did her character over the years up until the end. Mainly because she wasn't portrayed as a hero who trumps her fellow men superheroes. She knows her role in the group and sticks with what she does best. I love that about her character. Everyone after her can eat dirt
Agree that was the best thing about Black Widow and Hawkeye. They were not super powered and knew it. Part of their entire arc was knowing they could not do what the superpowered people can do but had their own skills.
What makes it even weirder is that Simba, and Nala are related.
No they aren't, where did you get this from?
@@freddiesolis8531 Who was her father then?
Honestly I don’t think they did a bad job with Wanda so far. Wandavision was about her dealing with her grief over vision. She was never able to get over him and so she tried to use the dark hold to make a perfect world for herself. I don’t see how people think how she acted the way she did in the doctor strange movie. She was already acting pretty crazy In wandavision. Holding awhole town against their will
you do know that black widow is in the comic books right? she's been a staple member of The Avengers since the 60s
I'm pretty sure she went batshit in the comics, so, they were somewhat following her "actual" story arc, but yes, she was paper thin and not well-written.
Tbh the MCU kind SUCKS at writing side character heroes. I mean look at Hawkeye, Rhodey and Falcon. They don't have ANY character progression whatsoever. Its just their base character traits carrying them this ENTIRE TIME💀
Its not till there shows(and a bit earlier for Hawkeye with the whole rushed Ronin arc) that we see some development...even if we dont agree with the changes. Rhodey has yet to have gotten his
Hey I have the exact same Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy ^__^
Such a classic!
I'm not sure if this is an attack on women. I think they just suck at writing in general.
Yes cuz she so dependent unlike others
My smashing the like button is entirely dependent on your ability to slide that into the video. 😂
Lmao. Nah. I oversaw all of this, thanks for bringing my mind to it.
The topless scene for Steve makes sense but not Thor. Whats the point of showing him half naked? It neither moves the plot forward or his character.