I don't know about the "political" part, but as a parent to young kids, I'm a bit frustrated that they mix up the age ratings throughout the Marvel franchise.
Eternals has a scene with two characters having sex on a beach. Spider Man Homecoming has a gag where Ned says he's watching porn on his laptop. In She Hulk, a key plot point is she's filmed having sex and the video is then broadcast.
If they want to make Marvel for teens and older, then by all means. But they clearly market the franchise to the under-10 crowd, and the content above was not subtle. It wasn't written to go over the little ones' heads... it's in their face.
I'm always surprised that a smidge of sex, that would probably completely fly over the head of a child anyway, is more concerning than the glorified extreme non-stop violence of these films.
Be that as it may, the violence is inherently part of every single Marvel movie. Parents who object to violence in movies would know to not show them to their kids.
But the sexual content is unexpected and random. She Hulk is "hulk for girls"... and one episode is about revenge porn. As a parent, that's pretty awkward.
Note that my complaint isn't about movies having sexual content. It's that 95% of Marvel movies don't have overtly sexual references, and then a couple suddenly do, within the same sub-franchise. The right way to go is like Jessica Jones (on Netflix), which was a Marvel series but it was very clearly marketed for adults.
She-Hulk is “hulk for everyone” and is also clearly targeted at adults. This is clear because it’s rated TV-14 but sets the tone pretty early that it’s not a children focused show.
That the protagonist is a woman doesn’t mean it’s for girls btw.
If you’re looking for a more child focused Marvel series with a female protagonist, Ms.Marvel would be it.
The Marvel episodic content is (with the exception of Falcon and the Winter Soldier) is a lot more diverse in style content than the films, and unapologetically so. This is where Marvel is experimenting and providing a more varied range of content.
> That the protagonist is a woman doesn’t mean it’s for girls btw.
Yeah, I didn't really mean that the show is "for girls", but just that here was a new female-protagonist show. Ms. Marvel was fantastic, by the way (for many reasons).
I didn't notice the TV-14 on She Hulk at first, but did catch on pretty quick that the series leaned more mature. Still, the Avengers movies dropped all the overt sexual references after Iron Man 2 and became more "kiddie-friendly", so I find it odd (and frustrating) to have the maturity level vary within the same set of characters. That is my problem. In the other mega-franchise brands (Star Wars, Pixar, Disney) you know the maturity and sensibility to expect.
Why would you expect the same set of characters to be one dimensional? And you’re not concerned with your kids being exposed to violence but you are concerned with them being exposed to sexual innuendo?
I think really the big thing is that the films are very high budget and therefore Disney/Marvel are scared to do anything in the least offensive because they want the most return. So it’s not so much intentionally kid friendly as just as vanilla as can be for safety.
Streaming/episodic is much lower budget so they take more risks to try and bring in a different set of audiences that their films weren’t pulling in. My wife for example doesn’t care at all for the films, but really got into Wandavision and She-Hulk because the premise was more interesting to her.
I think the safety of the films might also disappear soon too as China and a few other countries recently rebuffed them. Marvel has tried very hard for years to be very China friendly because it’s a huge market, but recently with Shang-Chi they got blocked. So now they’ve stopped pandering to a more conservative market.
Coincidentally the big up and coming market is progressive youths and I think you’ll see a lot more topics that speak to them (or at least what a Disney exec thinks does). I don’t think Disney gives a crap about being progressive for the morality of it, but after they’ve had a pretty bad few years at the hands of conservatives (China, Florida gay rights etc), they’re now realizing this progressive market is ripe for the picking.
I think She-Hulks tone comes firmly from that pivot. So I suspect what is traditionally seen as child friendly values will see a down turn in their big projects.
That said, media is both a reflection of us and we are a reflection of it. So I think what topics will be considered child friendly will also change dramatically over the next few years.
Well it’s certainly not for boys, unless boys like being considered incompetent idiots who can never understand why they’re toxic. At least that’s true of every straight male character in the show.
I really doubt it. Source: I was a kid. Sex scenes definitely did not fly over. It was something I did not understand and somehow affected my behaviour more than violence between robots.
> If they want to make Marvel for teens and older, then by all means. But they clearly market the franchise to the under-10 crowd, ...
TBH I'm a little confused by this claim, why do you think any of the marvel movies or shows are targeted to kids younger than 10? I'm pretty sure basically every MCU movie has a PG-13 rating, which is definitely a deliberate choice they made. Certainly the ratings are just a suggestion, but I don't feel like they're making any attempt at targeting kids younger than 10, they have completely separate shows like Spidey that target that demographic and (AFAIK) have nothing to do with the MCU.
Like I mentioned there's other ways for kids to learn about these characters. Until just a few years ago there was both an Avengers animated series, a GOTG animated series, and various other series all targeted at kids. Any kids who watched those shows would know all the Marvel characters without needing to watch any of the MCU films.
Beyond that, many of those things are also collectables, so a lot of that stuff is not _just_ for kids. But kids who know the characters will enjoy them even if they don't specifically know the MCU versions.
> No f-bombs in the films, no blood, no sex, etc
I agree to an extent, but you basically just listed the requirements for a PG-13 movie, not whether a movie is for ages younger than 10. They definitely earn a PG-13 rating, many of them have (sometimes less than subtle) sex jokes, a few have brief sex scenes, they do have some blood and a few gruesome character deaths (for kids), and all of them have a fair amount of swearing (much more than I'd let my young daughter watch). I feel like you've just equated anything that's not R rated as "targeting kids 10 and under", ignoring the middle area that is PG-13.
> Merchandise targeted at little ones. Toys, costumes, Lego…
You might be shocked that there are action figures for a mass murdering vigilante (The Punisher), a homicidal maniac (Joker), a guy who literally killed dozens of kids (Darth Vader), etc
What political sermon? Do you just mean the diversity of the cast and crew, or did you find something in the story itself that sent a more coherent political message than, "If your boss tells you to blow up the world, say no."
Well, he just introduces rudimentary technology to ancient humans and then stands back for thousands of years to watch it evolve.
He feels guilty that the chain of technological progress eventually leads to Hiroshima, but I don't think everybody would agree that it's his responsibility.
You should watch she-hulk. That show is something, Disney is not just wasting money, they are burning bridges along with the rest of the real estate that they bought.
That’s quite subjective. I thought She-Hulk was pretty entertaining, and actually really clever and subversive in its writing. You may however not be the target demographic for it, which is fine, but it’s important to note it isn’t just firing into a void for no reason.
Ditto, it ranks as one of the best Marvel series in my book - it's different, just like Wandavision was different - more light hearted, but still poignant. A lot of subtext that is spot on. The lead actor (Tatiana) was awesome. The ending was a bit too odd to match the rest of the show, but I enjoyed it. I loved their take on the crossover superhero they included!
Personally I am not the right demographic for marvel movies, period. My marvel viewing experience is driven by my kids. However, it is very hard for me to envision large group of people(let alone a whole demographic) that could truly enjoy latest marvel if those shows/films were not backed by established characters/franchise
I’d say most people in my social circle liked it. I’m not sure what we have in common given we’re a fairly even mix of genders and ethnicities but I’d say we’re all fairly progressive (not saying you’re not, just postulating about ourselves) and enjoyed having fresh content. Many of us are tired of the usual marvel action affairs.
What we all seemed to like about the show was that it was lighthearted and funny, without overly dour world ending scenarios. It was clearly written with women involved because a lot of the humour was both targeted and different, which as a guy, I enjoyed because there were a ton of really great subversions of traditional male tropes in writing.
You realize that none of the marvel characters besides Hulk were household names before the MCU? Marvel characters again aside from Hulk were never household names like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman.
Eternals was in production since 2018. Its filming was mostly complete by February 2020, when Chapek took over. It’s also Marvel and under Feige’s purview.
“The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe” is a story about talking magical animals, and is for kids. And therefore obviously has no hidden motives behind the story.
Does a sermon instantly make it bad? Is Captain America: Winter Soldier a sermon? To me its a pretty clear stance against drone strikes and general over-securitizing(?) Of society, and I thought that was fantastic movie and message.
Let's go further back to any of the old Disney films, came from fables, moral tales of old. In fact what piece of media outside of the most boring and bland ever
are not a tale to learn, think or expand your thoughts? Is that not a sermon?
I think it does when it's "in your face" like the latest movies. It feels like a kind of propaganda that I'm not interested in. I just want to enjoy my time and watch a f*** good and entertaining movie not a jehovah witness sermon or a diversity soup.
> Hopefully Disney will cut the political sermon from the next movies. I've just watched "Eternals" and couldn't believe it's a Disney movie.
I'm not sure why you expect Iger to do that, he is 100% responsible for Disney movies and animations cultural shift and decided that one group of people are the audience they want to focus on and pander to, probably because it makes them more money than the alternative. Purely a profit driven decision. This is just the way it is, at the end of the day, money talks.
Chapek is no different, but "optics" were against him as he mishandled the PR aspect of the pandering.
That kind of preachiness is there to stay, at least until there is yet another cultural paradigm shift.
Eternals has a scene with two characters having sex on a beach. Spider Man Homecoming has a gag where Ned says he's watching porn on his laptop. In She Hulk, a key plot point is she's filmed having sex and the video is then broadcast.
If they want to make Marvel for teens and older, then by all means. But they clearly market the franchise to the under-10 crowd, and the content above was not subtle. It wasn't written to go over the little ones' heads... it's in their face.