Audiences Don’t Want That ‘Old Marvel Feeling’

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It’s no secret that Marvel Studios has had a rough go of it for the past few years. Since 2019, when the Infinity Saga wrapped up with Avengers: Endgame, the once-impervious blockbuster-generating studio has struggled on nearly every front. From box office flops to legal troubles to streaming mandates to abysmal reviews, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been subjected to a lot. However, with two gargantuan Avengers sequels on the horizon, Marvel is betting big that their brand is about to be on the uptick. Some recent comments from Captain America himself, Anthony Mackie, reflect precisely that. When asked about the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday, Mackie said:

Obviously, this is what Marvel and its overlords at Disney are banking on audiences wanting to hear. But this might not be the ace-in-the-hole that many parties involved seem to think it is. From getting Robert Downey Jr. to return in the villainous role of Doctor Doom, to recruiting the Russo Brothers to once again come back and helm these new Avengers films, it’s clear that Marvel is attempting to utilize nostalgia to conjure the same kind of financial, critical, and cultural success that they previously had. Perhaps more than anything else, Mackie’s comments reflect the mentality of the currently in-production film set for Avengers: Doomsday: play the hits, give the people what they want. But that isn’t what audiences want anymore, is it?

Why Marvel Fell Off After Endgame

From 2008 to 2019, Marvel Studios tightened its chokehold on both audiences and pop culture at large. From Iron Man to The Avengers to Captain America: Civil War, the studio endeared audiences to characters over the course of a decade-plus and reaped the benefits of this established sense of loyalty. The audiences’ relationships with these characters were so rich that Marvel was able to market Avengers: Infinity War as ‘the final chapter,’ and then turn around and do it again a year later with Avengers: Endgame, to even bigger success.

However, Endgame really was a final chapter in many ways. It closed out the story of several of the most prominent characters, and seemed to establish a new status quo for the next saga to explore in its own way. In conjunction with the deliberate finality of the film, it was also laden with an even greater sense of closure thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. Lockdowns and delays led the franchise to go from releasing three films a year to releasing no projects at all for the whole of 2020.

Marvel had done a great job of conditioning audiences up to this point to see the movies, stay for the post-credit scenes, anticipate the next installment, etc. But this hiatus broke the cycle, and it wasn’t so easy for them to get people back in. It also didn’t help matters that their first projects back after that hiatus were a duo of less-than-well-received films (Black Widow and Eternals) and an onslaught of Disney-mandated streaming series. These shows got steadily worse and consistently felt underdeveloped.

Marvel Struggles to Find Its Footing

Marvel’s problems persisted as they forged ahead. Even mainline entries such as Thor: Love and Thunder and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness received much more divisive receptions from fans and critics than previous entries ever had. Yet, in the midst of these troubles, a single film performed exceptionally well: Spider-Man: No Way Home. The web-slinging threequel mined nostalgia, bringing back beloved actors from prior entries and continuities and engaging in some of the most overt ‘hold for applause’ filmmaking of all time.

As new projects continued to struggle, Marvel found a safe harbor in the form of Spider-Man: No Way Home’s nostalgia. It was safe, it was familiar, and it was lucrative. A few years later, Marvel Studios produced Deadpool & Wolverine, which followed a similar formula and, once again, became one of the biggest successes the studio had seen in years.

While all of these troubles were going on, Marvel was also involved in legal controversies. Jonathan Majors (the actor they went all in on to play multiple versions of the supervillain Kang) was accused and convicted of assault. As a result, the Disney-backed studio was left with little choice but to sever ties with the actor. It would have been possible to recast Kang and carry forward with the plan as was, which had threads that were being sewn across multiple new movies and TV shows, but Marvel instead opted to take the opportunity to pivot hard.

A Return to the Familiar

Suddenly, a new slate was announced. The Russo Brothers were back, and Robert Downey Jr. was trotted out at Comic-Con, announcing his return to the franchise as the new big-bad, Doctor Doom. All of this was indicative of what had become Marvel’s MO: cut ties with the new stuff that people weren’t responding to, and rely on the established successes.

However, it’s critical to note that in the intervening years, pop culture has moved on. When the MCU was at the height of its power, there were numerous different superhero franchises also enjoying the benefits of success. Heck, in 2019, an Aquaman movie made one billion dollars. Audiences were rabid for superhero content in any form. But in 2025, the state of blockbusters and cinema in general will be very different from what it was in 2019.

To attain such success once more, what Marvel needs is to push forward and embrace change. Rather than shrinking away from the projects and characters that weren’t immediately beloved by audiences, they should have embraced them and given them a chance to blossom. The first Iron Man movie wasn’t a billion-dollar hit; it took time to get there. There needed to be a grace period for these new characters if they were ever going to have a chance to succeed. However, under the guidance of Disney, Marvel was apparently unwilling to do this. Instead, they pivoted to nostalgia tactics that have worked in the short term but are undermining them in the long term.

So when Anthony Mackie says that Avengers: Doomsday is aiming for that “old Marvel feeling,” it’s no real surprise, but it is also at the cost of any potential for anything fresh and new. Marvel has gone running into the arms of easy, temporarily lucrative familiarity instead of putting in the work to sew new seeds, and audiences will ultimately suffer because of it.

“}]] We need new stuff, y’all.  Read More