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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:She hadn't been a major fixture in any movie for 8 years. Which kind of makes it even weirder by dampening the impact of the death since she has been effectively gone since 2015 and then only appeared in one episode of Secret Invasion While Cobie Smulders wasn't technically Maria Hill, she was a pretty decent part of 2019's Spider Man: Far from Home. She also appeared in an episode of What If? and an episode of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur.
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Jun 22, 2023 16:16
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Everyone posted:While Cobie Smulders wasn't technically Maria Hill, she was a pretty decent part of 2019's Spider Man: Far from Home. She also appeared in an episode of What If? and an episode of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur. I don't think Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur counts as part of the MCU and definitely not to a point where the average person would say, "Yes, I remember Maria Hill. From Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, right?"
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Jun 22, 2023 16:19
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That's kinda my point though, Hill was not a main character, she floated in and out and yea over the past 8 years or so she's mostly appeared in short cameos. So her main function is just as that connective tissue, a comforting presence that makes the MCU feel like this big long ongoing story. The more of those characters you lose the more people will start to check out, at least that's how I feel. So if you're going to do what they did, give her a real storyline and a major role to play in the series and then when you do it you can have it actually mean something.
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Jun 22, 2023 16:24
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Pan Dulce posted:Hell, maybe SLJ too. If this is his performance going forward, It's probably for the best.
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Jun 22, 2023 16:31
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I'd still give 50/50 odds that Talos dies and Clarke becomes the token Skrull.
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Jun 22, 2023 17:04
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live with fruit posted:I'd still give 50/50 odds that Talos dies and Clarke becomes the token Skrull. It kind of seems like Talos wants to die, at least that's what I took away from his fight scene. His wife is dead his daughter was (at that point) MIA, he was alone and depressed. I feel this really could have stood to have had the second episode dropped at the same time.
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Jun 22, 2023 17:28
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Clarke will probably die next episode to motivate Talos lmao
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Jun 22, 2023 17:32
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koolkal posted:Clarke will probably die next episode to motivate Talos lmao her character will die when the bad guys drop a giant freezer unit on her to make sure we all get the point.
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Jun 22, 2023 18:00
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Soonmot posted:It kind of seems like Talos wants to die, at least that's what I took away from his fight scene. His wife is dead his daughter was (at that point) MIA, he was alone and depressed. I feel this really could have stood to have had the second episode dropped at the same time. It's the opposite. Talos doesn't want to die specifically because he wants to fulfill his wife's dying wish and protect his daughter. He's depressed about the situation, but not suicidal. The fight scene was showing how far he would go to save his species/earth by both refusing to kill the terrorist Skrull under any circumstances and being willing to bend his moral code to go there and threaten him in the first place.
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Jun 22, 2023 18:22
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Everyone posted:her character will die when the bad guys drop a giant freezer unit on her to make sure we all get the point. I would love the show if it turned out it was an endless series of deaths, fake out revivals, and motivations. A good length for that would be eight minutes
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Jun 22, 2023 18:51
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I liked how the alien spaceship had Gamer Chairs.
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Jun 22, 2023 18:53
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:It's the opposite. Talos doesn't want to die specifically because he wants to fulfill his wife's dying wish and protect his daughter. He's depressed about the situation, but not suicidal. There also seemed to be a bit of "I'm not too old for this poo poo" going on. Speaking of Talos, where is the guy whose likeness he stole? I don't recall him dying.
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Jun 22, 2023 18:54
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live with fruit posted:There also seemed to be a bit of "I'm not too old for this poo poo" going on. Still haven't finished the episode but if you're talking about the Russian guy at the start, he's probably living his life in Russia. Skrulls don't have to kill to to shapeshift. Though now I want this show to reveal that Melissa McCarthy is a Skrull and the Identity Thief movie was semi-autobiographical.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:09
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koolkal posted:Clarke will probably die next episode to motivate Talos lmao Don't threaten us with a good time.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:12
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Everyone posted:Still haven't finished the episode but if you're talking about the Russian guy at the start, he's probably living his life in Russia. Skrulls don't have to kill to to shapeshift. Though now I want this show to reveal that Melissa McCarthy is a Skrull and the Identity Thief movie was semi-autobiographical. I mean Fury's boss or whatever from Captain Marvel.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:24
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live with fruit posted:I mean Fury's boss or whatever from Captain Marvel. I'd assume he's either retired or dead. That was 30 years ago in universe.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:25
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This episode of Secret Invasion is why I maintain a 4-episode rule on shows. It's a show, not a movie, so the plot may take a few episodes to find its feet and get moving. Hell, I wasn't super into Andor through two eps, but episode 3 absolutely got me hooked. Agents of SHIELD treaded water for drat near the entire first season until Turn, Turn, Turn, and then it was loving great up until roughly the framework season. Anyhow, this episode left me with a lot of mixed feelings. I'll spoiler my thoughts just in case... -- Overall, this was super predictable and paint-by-numbers spy stuff. My wife figured out that Emilia Clarke was Gaia in about 10 seconds after they showed her, and then I realized "oh they're probably going to kill Maria or Talos" to establish something resembling stakes, and that Gaia wasn't going to flip - yet. Basically every twist felt super telegraphed. -- Killing Hill, and yes, I believe she's really dead until they explicitly bring her back, felt cheap and I hated it. Someone else already said it, but you can't feel much for a character death when the MCU never let that character really live in the first place. We learned more about Phil Coulson in 10 minutes of The Avengers in 2012 than we ever did about Maria Hill away from super-spying, so it felt very empty. -- The tone of this show, so far, is really weird. That could have just been the direction for this episode alone, signaling a transition into a new era or something (I'm being generous here), but having a few quips here are there with this seriousness we're supposed to feel, along with a score that doesn't really go with it just made the whole thing feel off. -- There were several moments that felt like cost-cutting measures, which is something I've never come to expect from Marvel Studios. The Skrulls only shapeshift when they're conveniently removing or putting on headwear that covers their entire head, and "oh we all get to live in our own skin" except for when we're named characters to evade detection from everyone. Like, what? Also, the intro, sure the AI thing is loving bullshit, but moreover, it just looked very ugly. -- Olivia Colman's character is also interesting for all the wrong reasons. So she's another of the seemingly infinite number of people in the MCU now that just sort of know everything happening everywhere all the time, with eyes and ears everywhere... but she totally misses Fury's planting of a bug? That just felt sloppy and convenient... unless of course she turns out to be a Skrull and the actual smart version who would have caught it is captured. -- Also, since the timeline is all over the drat place post-Endgame, when is this show happening relative to other stuff we've seen? I really can't tell. We've established enough things that not calling in some real heavies with powers who could wreck this branch of Skrulls really makes no sense whatsoever. You've got the nascent Thunderbolts (at least 4 or 5 members established already), Wakanda's Dora Milaje (who apparently go all over the place to do poo poo), the new Captain America/Falcon/Winter Soldier combo... like, if you're the Earth-bound agents who've been following this stuff for a while and you know there's some rogue Skrulls causing problems, it seems really weird that they believe just calling Fury down would be enough to even begin to sort it out. Especially when you have a certified Skrull-killing superweapon in Danvers you could also bring in. But I'm leaving this thread here in case they do actually offer a reasonable explanation later for why that didn't happen already. Overall, I am definitely going to watch this entire show. Especially since I plan on seeing The Marvels when it comes out. If this were say, 2014-15, I'd have 100% faith that the MCU had this roadmapped and there would be a worthy payoff. However, it's 2023, and after a really uneven torrent of content since 2021, I don't have that same faith. BUT! The talent attached to this show may bring it around the bend. Not a great episode, but I'm going to wait until we've got more of a critical mass of episodes to determine if I think the whole of it is good or bad. For now, one episode deep, I'm underwhelmed and hoping for the best.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:40
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Doronin posted:This episode of Secret Invasion is why I maintain a 4-episode rule on shows. It's a show, not a movie, so the plot may take a few episodes to find its feet and get moving.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:47
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This reminds me of David Chase (or some other famous show creator) going on a rant about how the cottage industry of episodic TV reviews is dumb and doesn't understand the art form and how you wouldn't review the first ten minutes of a movie.Doronin posted:-- Olivia Colman's character is also interesting for all the wrong reasons. So she's another of the seemingly infinite number of people in the MCU now that just sort of know everything happening everywhere all the time, with eyes and ears everywhere... but she totally misses Fury's planting of a bug? That just felt sloppy and convenient... unless of course she turns out to be a Skrull and the actual smart version who would have caught it is captured. Considering how Fury and company weren't able to stop what they got from her, I'm guessing she wanted them to hear it. She's either working with the Skrulls or using Fury/SABRE for something. Given how Oscar winners typically fare in MCU stuff, she's probably the big bad and gonna die at the end. live with fruit fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Jun 22, 2023 |
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Jun 22, 2023 19:53
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I think the "4 Episode Rule" (which I've seen other places than here) is a crutch and showrunners and writers today mostly suck at writing episodic entertainment.
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Jun 22, 2023 19:55
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mutata posted:I think the "4 Episode Rule" (which I've seen other places than here) is a crutch and showrunners and writers today mostly suck at writing episodic entertainment. Movies generally last 2 hours.
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Jun 22, 2023 20:37
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Doronin posted:This episode of Secret Invasion is why I maintain a 4-episode rule on shows. It's a show, not a movie, so the plot may take a few episodes to find its feet and get moving. Hell, I wasn't super into Andor through two eps, but episode 3 absolutely got me hooked. Agents of SHIELD treaded water for drat near the entire first season until Turn, Turn, Turn, and then it was loving great up until roughly the framework season. I agree with all of this except it's clearly the 3 episode rule!
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Jun 22, 2023 20:53
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mutata posted:I think the "4 Episode Rule" (which I've seen other places than here) is a crutch and showrunners and writers today mostly suck at writing episodic entertainment. The 4 episode rule works for 12+ episode seasons where a show may take a few episodes to set things up and find its footing (but does anyone even make seasons of more than 10 episodes anymore?). Can't really do a 4 episode rule on a 6 episode season - especially not something set in the MCU which is using tons of established characters.
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Jun 22, 2023 20:54
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live with fruit posted:The irony is that now that she's dead, as well as Talos' wife off screen (I guess they're supposed to be parallel fridgings), there's less tension that anyone else major will die. That's just what they want you to think! In episode 3 Fury gets got by a mutant hyperintelligent shark out of nowhere, making this series an all-timer  e: Doronin posted:Agents of SHIELD treaded water for drat near the entire first season until Turn, Turn, Turn, and then it was loving great up until roughly the framework season. Been watching AoS with my parents because it's something we can all agree is at least decent. We're in the AI Matrix right now and yeah, poo poo sucks. Super Deuce posted:While I try to not judge the entire show based on the first episode, if a show takes 4 hours for the plot to be slightly interesting, they're doing something wrong. With a 20 episode season maybe, but with Marvel's 6-8 ep structure they really don't have that kind of time to waste. Takes No Damage fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Jun 22, 2023 |
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Jun 22, 2023 20:56
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Takes No Damage posted:With a 20 episode season maybe, but with Marvel's 6-8 ep structure they really don't have that kind of time to waste. Absolutely. A 20 episode season is a completely different animal.
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Jun 22, 2023 21:16
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koolkal posted:I agree with all of this except it's clearly the 3 episode rule! That's what I use, too. One episode to see what a show is about, two to see where it is going, three to see if they can sustain it. Of course with a six episode MCU mini I'm compelled to watch the whole thing just because of interwoven plot threads to the bigger narrative, and eh it's 45 minutes a week and a thing to watch while eating lunch, it's not a huge commitment. The 3 episode rule is really about deciding if you want to get invested in a few seasons of longform TV where watching it is basically giving up a week of your time on this planet. The issues I had with episode 1 of Secret Invasion isn't tied to "what is it about?" or "where they going with this?" but that it was shoddily made. Nothing feels prestige TV, and the story could start getting really good in the next couple of episodes and it's still going to require overlooking the CW level production values. And I say this as the guy who likes The Lost World, Black Widow, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and who thinks The Eternals was one of the best Phase 4 movies overall. When I'm watching this going "feels a bit c-list" then it's bad news. They even make a big deal of pointing out in universe that Fury is now living on a space station, with massive resources, and yet in the episode it's one old man with a pistol, a bug, a pair of glasses, and two friends with stunt doubles. I miss the Fury that shows up with a goddamn stolen Helicarrier tbh.
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Jun 22, 2023 21:18
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The fight scenes were very generic. Two people doing flips around one another has gotten old.
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Jun 22, 2023 21:23
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Super Deuce posted:Absolutely. A 20 episode season is a completely different animal. I'm beginning to suspect they looked at BBC seasons and saw how high quality a lot of them are with such low ep counts, but didn't realize it was because they were putting more time/effort into each episode. Looking back, a lot of MarvelTV shows feels like little clips of a larger season, with the episodes we get casually plodding along like they've got all the time in the world until they just end. They need to up the pace, True Detective that poo poo, chop chop let's move it. e: Parkingtigers posted:thinks The Eternals was one of the best Phase 4 movies overall. A movie that actually could have been a 6 ep show, then maybe we'd have time to give a poo poo about the 12 new characters we just met. Takes No Damage fucked around with this message at 21:32 on Jun 22, 2023 |
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Jun 22, 2023 21:29
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Was it just me or did this episode look.... cheap? Hard to explain but it feels slapdash and just Not Quite Right. Happy that Cobie Smulders hopefully gets more to do away from the MCU. I'm sure she still made some drat fine money, but Marvel notoriously underpays their actors unless you're at the top of the ticket.
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Jun 22, 2023 21:46
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Firebert posted:I do have concerns that the antagonists so far are incredibly 2d evil and stupid. who's idea was it to have a show based on "Remember Nick Fury? That guy who seemed so powerful and would show up to do something crazy? Well now he's old and makes mistakes and people die. Have fun!"
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Jun 22, 2023 21:47
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koolkal posted:I agree with all of this except it's clearly the 3 episode rule! TyrantWD posted:The 4 episode rule works for 12+ episode seasons where a show may take a few episodes to set things up and find its footing (but does anyone even make seasons of more than 10 episodes anymore?). Can't really do a 4 episode rule on a 6 episode season - especially not something set in the MCU which is using tons of established characters. Yeah, I should have clarified how I'm choosing to evaluate this show. I said 4-episode rule then named off two shows with 10 or more episodes as examples. Except with this show that's 60% of the entirety of it. So in this case, I think we'll know what we're getting after the next one. Parkingtigers posted:That's what I use, too. One episode to see what a show is about, two to see where it is going, three to see if they can sustain it. Of course with a six episode MCU mini I'm compelled to watch the whole thing just because of interwoven plot threads to the bigger narrative, and eh it's 45 minutes a week and a thing to watch while eating lunch, it's not a huge commitment. The 3 episode rule is really about deciding if you want to get invested in a few seasons of longform TV where watching it is basically giving up a week of your time on this planet. I couldn't agree with you more. Yes. This was literally the second time since Marvel Studios rolled out Iron Man in 2008 where I took notice of the production values because they were so abnormally low. Granted, the first instance was the epically lovely Inhumans (this show is already better than that, at least). However, it's going to take a hell of a story to keep me fully engaged. It's one thing when something like Doctor Who has sketchy CGI, but it's Doctor Who so it's just part of the charm so you almost always overlook it. But this is Marvel Studios... nothing coming out of there should look bad. The bar is way too high for what we saw so far. Takes No Damage posted:I'm beginning to suspect they looked at BBC seasons and saw how high quality a lot of them are with such low ep counts, but didn't realize it was because they were putting more time/effort into each episode. Looking back, a lot of MarvelTV shows feels like little clips of a larger season, with the episodes we get casually plodding along like they've got all the time in the world until they just end. They need to up the pace, True Detective that poo poo, chop chop let's move it. Yes. Pacing was already a big issue with the majority of the MCU shows where, as you said, they go bobbing along until they make a really rushed conclusion. I'm really hoping episode 2 picks up the pace, but considering we're 16% of the way through it already and we barely get through an introduction to the larger plot, I'm already suspicious that it's going to have the same pacing problems.
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Jun 22, 2023 21:59
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Narcissus1916 posted:Was it just me or did this episode look.... cheap? Hard to explain but it feels slapdash and just Not Quite Right. I felt this way when the camera repeatedly cut away from the Skrull transformation scenes. I get that shows want to save some money sometimes, but if it makes me think "They did this specific thing to reduce costs." it feels cheap. Also yeah, the combat scenes were kind of dire and uninspired.
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Jun 22, 2023 22:04
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Takes No Damage posted:Been watching AoS with my parents because it's something we can all agree is at least decent. We're in the AI Matrix right now and yeah, poo poo sucks. Yep. I think that means you're in the back half of season... 4? The LMD plot wasn't bad, but then it just got real dumb after that. But I remember the final season not being bad, but you have a bunch of weird Kree space poo poo to get through and a really asinine alternate timeline plot in season 6. Actually, depending on how they take Secret Invasion I might actually go back and rewatch the LMD storyline on AoS to see which show did a better job at, for the most part, the same general "it could be anybody!" plot.
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Jun 22, 2023 22:10
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Doronin posted:Yes. Pacing was already a big issue with the majority of the MCU shows where, as you said, they go bobbing along until they make a really rushed conclusion. I wish it were limited to MCU shows. Season 3 of Picard could, and should, have been cut down to a maximum of 90 minutes.
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Jun 22, 2023 22:53
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I'm behind on marvel shows and movies but have any of them yet addressed the city-sized baby that emerged from the ocean that one time?
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Jun 22, 2023 23:47
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^^^ Think it was mentioned in passing once? In Wakanda Forever or something? Basically no. Something I just thought of, an actual cool use for the AI opening would have been to make a unique one for each episode. That way they could have put Smulders in the opening for ep1 and her getting got would have been more of a surprise at least. Doronin posted:Yep. I think that means you're in the back half of season... 4? The LMD plot wasn't bad, but then it just got real dumb after that. But I remember the final season not being bad, but you have a bunch of weird Kree space poo poo to get through and a really asinine alternate timeline plot in season 6. Yep, looks like 419 is the next one up. Everything was cool with the Marvel Necronomicon giving people who saw it supervillain mind poisoning. Replacing the cast with robots started to get a bit Mission: Impossible CGI Mask-y. Now that they're fully in a MMORPG If You Die In The Video Game You Die In Real Life I'm just  Like, the first thing Daisy sees walking into work is some ~virtual~ Hydra agents beating a ~virtual~ inhuman and she's like 'oh no I have to help him' NO YOU DON'T THEY AREN'T REAL 
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Jun 22, 2023 23:50
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Takes No Damage posted:^^^ There's an Easter egg in She-Hulk. And the rumors are that it'll be addressed in Captain America 4.
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Jun 23, 2023 00:05
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Takes No Damage posted:Something I just thought of, an actual cool use for the AI opening would have been to make a unique one for each episode. Secret Invasion has an AI-driven opening sequence where everyone looks like disgusting indistinct wobbly blobs. With no closing credits. if was different for each episode how would I know? This blob wobbles to the left, last episode's blob wobbled to the right
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Jun 23, 2023 01:21
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Sivart13 posted:if was different for each episode how would I know? This blob wobbles to the left, last episode's blob wobbled to the right I meant give it a completely different prompt, not just run off 6 variants of the same thing. Imagining a perfect world where AI wasn't butts, they could feature different characters and locations based on each episode, completely different color schemes or shapes or whatever. Hell, just feed it each episode's script and broadcast whatever comes out. A real shoot for the moon, land among the stars type of deal.
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Jun 23, 2023 01:57
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Takes No Damage posted:I meant give it a completely different prompt, not just run off 6 variants of the same thing. maybe I'm extra salty because we're also watching Silo which has an interminable Prestige TV Intro that isn't as far as I know AI generated but may as well be, in that it's just a bunch of pointless CG renderings juxtaposed if you're gonna have an intro that's over a minute long but doesn't even have a coffee mug overflowing with Adam Scotts please reconsider I invite the marvel execs to observe some good intro content from another marvel show: 
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Jun 23, 2023 02:28
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