2021 is almost here and if there’s one thing it’s bound to bring back is Marvel Studios’ plethora of MCU content after one and a half years since Spider-Man: Far From Home released. While all of 2021’s planned Marvel offering was pretty much known to the public, Disney’s Investor Day event saw another batch of MCU productions announced all the way up to 2023.
When Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk kickstarted the MCU in 2008, Marvel fans then had to wait another two years for Iron Man 2 and even longer for Thor, a stark contrast from the four to five films already scheduled for 2021 and 2022, which this time around will be joined by at least 9 miniseries over that time span. Though that long dry spell of Marvel-less theaters may have been enough to have the most cynic MCU fan hyped for Black Widow, Disney’s long-term vision does beg to ask, can there ever be too much Marvel content?
The question poses an interesting dilemma, one that may not interest those who echo Martin Scorsese’s views on the superhero movie genre, but that still remains a puzzling matter for die-hard Marvel fans who won’t hold back on their criticism on the MCU’s many colors.
It’s an undeniable truth that Disney+ plays a leading role in this grand Marvel scheme. Ever since the service launched in 2019, Disney had an uphill task of filling its streaming service with desirable content that would drive more users to their platform, with its Star Wars and Marvel properties at the helm. During its first year, Disney+ was happily carried by the company’s classics, as well as a slew of 11 years of superhero content, but times are changing for Disney.
Currently sitting at around 73.7 million subscribers, Disney+ is basically riding on the shoulders of The Mandalorian and old movies. Even if Soul turned out to be an unforeseeable critical success, that film was not even supposed to go straight to streaming, instead being passed on as a Christmas present of sorts from Disney to its subscribers. With slightly over a third of Netflix’s worldwide 195 million subscribers, Disney+ is well on its way to go toe-to-toe against the competition and it’s just getting started.
Starting on January 15, the service will be home to WandaVision, which will then be followed by The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, What If…?, Ms. Marvel, Hawkeye; while worldwide cinemas will get to run Black Widow, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Eternals and Spider-Man 3. Suffice to say, 2021 and beyond will be complete opposites of 2020, offering something Marvel-flavored to watch at practically any given point of the year, but is that even a good thing?
Entertainment, like most competitive domains, is a business where a small part of what is actually produced tends to grab most of the attention, critical praise, and commercial revenue. Disney certainly won’t have to worry too much about revenue and attention, profitability and mass appeal are not problems that concern the MCU nor Disney+, but can they sustain the same quality across all their productions without tiring audiences?
Oddly enough, this is something Netflix already experienced when they ambitiously launched their own six-pack of Marvel shows. Sure, by now Loki is no Iron Fist, but Netflix actually enjoyed a great time with Daredevil until slowly the company decided (business reasons aside) to fizzle out all of The Defenders as they passed on to Disney’s hands with decreasing ratings.
Though Disney is indeed doing the right thing by pushing as many Marvel productions as quickly as it can afford to, by doing so they risk devaluing their prized MCU due to overexposure. Even in a world where people apparently can’t get enough of the Avengers, Kevin Feige himself must know that The Falcon and the Winter Soldier or Hawkeye (the most memed Avenger) can hardly match the popularity of Spider-Man.
The MCU is undergoing some changes as it enters Phase Four, one where mainstream audiences will continue to be introduced to a new cast of heroes and villains that for years have remained hidden in the pages of Marvel Comics. Though this requires a fair amount of exposition for all those new themes and faces, it’s possible it might create a divide between must-watch MCU productions and merely passable ones.
This is of course a double-edged sword. While the proliferation of Marvel content opens the door for intriguing unique shows like WandaVision or Secret Invasion, it’s also a potential cliff some other characters could fall from to never return in the way audiences once knew them when they were merely secondary players to other superheroes with more mass appeal.
Throughout the years, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has put out its fair share of “lemons.” It’s natural and simply not fair to judge all Marvel films equally, there’s a reason why the Avengers can quadruple Ant-Man’s earning at the box office or why Black Panther can get nominated for Best Picture. Whatever the case, the MCU’s Phase Four is likely to teach Disney a few lessons on how to make the best and most out of their beloved superheroes in healthy doses people will actually consume.
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