Weekly MCU Review for 9/10

Another week, and more MCU news!  Not a whole lot of new stuff to talk about, but at least we're getting close to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Luke Cage, and Doctor Strange!  Put some ketchup on your eggs, and catch-up on your Marvel news!

Iron Fist: Asian Heroes and the MCU

Image Courtesy en.wikipedia.org

The question was asked recently if Danny Rand, a.k.a. Iron Fist, should be played by an Asian-American actor because the character’s whiteness is not important but his Americanness is. I admit that my initial reaction was to assume reverse racism: the martial artist has to be Asian. However, as I thought further it occurred to me that this desire actually comes from a group looking for representation. And I can actually relate to that desire; one of the reasons I like Hawkeye so much is because he’s left-handed! While I still worry that the executives who make these decisions might do it more out of an assumption that any Asian hero has to be a martial artist and any martial arts-based hero must be Asian, I can definitely see the desire by Asian and Asian-American Marvel fans for representation. This writer has written a couple articles arguing in favor of just this point. Rather than rehash his arguments (which are quite valid), I want to look at this issue from a different angle: are Asians underrepresented in Marvel Comics, and (related) are there any other options for Asian heroes? After all, I can’t just say “focus on existing Asian heroes” without offering an alternative!

I’m going to come right out and say there really aren’t too many, at least not heroes whose rights Marvel owns. Most of the heroes I found were mutants, with a number of Iron Fist supporting characters thrown in for good measure. There are a few viable options, however, one of whom is strongly rumored to be appearing in an upcoming movie.

All-New, All-Different Marvel: MCU Teams

Image Courtesy www.comicbook.com

Marvel announced last year that they would be completely rebooting their universe following the Secret Wars/Battleworld event.  As part of this reboot they are going to be focusing on some new and altered characters, particularly those whose TV and movie rights are owned by Marvel Studios.  This is leading Marvel to focus its efforts on promoting the Inhumans while downplaying the mutants, as well as to the splitting up of the Fantastic Four, with Human Torch joining the Inhumans and the Thing joining the Guardians of the Galaxy.  So because the All-New, All-Different Marvel is going all-in on Marvel Studios properties, I started to wonder if some of the other characters in the A-N, A-D Marvel might be getting a push for a future movie or TV appearance.  As such, this series will look at all the characters in the All-New, All-Different Marvel lineup whose live-action rights are owned by either Marvel Studios or Sony and who have not appeared in a movie yet.

Some of these are characters I’ve written about in the past, so I will include links to those articles and only provide relatively brief summaries.

If there are any additional characters that you would like to see me cover in this series, let me know in the comments.

This time around I will be talking about those teams which have an equivalent in the MCU or will appear shortly.  This time around there will be quite a few characters who have already appeared in the MCU or will appear soon, so I will just mention them by name.  For the purpose of this article I will be including the Ultimates as an Avengers team because they originated as the Ultimate Universe equivalent of the Avengers (however, this team is just borrowing its name from the Ultimate Universe team).  Also note that I am completely ignoring the X-Men teams because there is just no way for them to appear in the MCU at this time.

San Diego Comic-Con 2015 EXPECTATIONS

Image Courtesy
comic-con.org

Well, San Diego Comic-Con starts tomorrow with a preview tonight.  Unfortunately, Marvel Studios (among others) has elected not to attend this year… I guess they must have learned that I’m not going to be there and planned accordingly!  I can just imagine the Board meeting where it happened:

Kevin Feige:  So, are we agreed?  We’ll bring the whole cast of Ant-Man and show the entire movie in Hall H.  Then we’ll bring out the cast of Captain America: Civil War and let Robert and Chris go a few rounds in an impromptu boxing match, followed by showing the first official trailer to the movie.  And then just for grins we’ll introduce the cast of Avengers: Infinity War!  Hall H will literally explode!

Intern (running in, breathless):  Mr. Feige!  Mr. Feige!  Terrible news:  the MCUReviewer is not going to be at Comic-Con this year.

Feige:  Are you serious?  That’s the whole reason we’ve been going in the first place:  just in case a random blogger who just started a blog this year would be there!

Intern:  Sir…?

Feige:  Well, I guess we’re not going to Comic-Con this year, folks.  Time to pack it in.

Intern:  Seriously?  Because of one random blogger?

Feige:  Are you questioning Feige the Great and Powerful???

Intern:  Umm… don’t you mean something like “The Fantastic Feige,” sir?

Feige:  What?

Intern:  Well, it’s just that “Feige the Great and Powerful” sounds like a Wizard of Oz sequel, but “The Fantastic Feige” sounds like a Marvel property.

Feige:  Didn’t you get the memo?  We are removing the word “fantastic” from our dictionary until the heretics at Fox come to their senses, restore the Fantastic Four rights to their rightful owners, and return to the Universal Church of Truth!

Intern:  Ummm…

Feige:  Silence!

Yeah… because that’s definitely the way it went!  (Attention:  If anyone from Marvel comes across this, it is only intended for humor, not as a reflection of how I think this decision-making process went.  And if this somehow is the way it went… I swear I don’t have a listening device planted in your office behind the poster of the original Avengers team!)

Anyways, Marvel Studios isn’t going to be there, but that doesn’t mean we’re not going to get any Marvel news this weekend.  Marvel TV and Marvel Comics will both be there.  So here are my expectations for Comic-Con—at least on the Marvel side of things.

Weekly MCU Review for 6/27

Another week, and more MCU news!  Habemus Spider-Man!  Oh, and there’s also a ton of news about Marvel Comics post-Secret Wars, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 3, Ant-Man…  There was a lot of news last week!  Put some ketchup on your eggs, and catch-up (*ducks*) on your Marvel news!

A Ms. Marvel TV Series Concept

Image Courtesy comixfactory.blogspot.com

A while back there was a rumor going around that Ridley Scott is very interested in bringing Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, to the small screen in a TV series for ABC.  Recently, El Mayimbe published an article suggesting that Ms. Marvel “is” going to be coming to ABC.  So I decided to help Mr. Scott out by putting together my idea for a Kamala Khan story arc which will establish her as a character and also fit her into the larger MCU.  Specifically, this will position her to be both a recurring member of Skye’s “Secret Warriors” on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and a lynchpin for a whole world of young heroes on her own Ms. Marvel TV series.

The first thing to get out of the way is that Ms. Marvel season 1 will not run a full 22 episodes.  And considering that the show hasn’t been announced yet, I don’t think anyone would be surprised to see a Ms. Marvel series which premiers this TV year not run 22 episodes.  Instead, the season will be 13 episodes (give or take), premiering in January and running alongside Agent Carter for the first 6-8 episodes and alongside Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. for the remainder.  This will give the series enough time to tell Kamala Khan’s origin story, show her fighting a few bad guys, and set things up for her subsequent appearances without getting bogged down with endless side plots and the like.

The theme to be explored in the first season is that of belonging:  what does it mean to be different?  What does it mean to be an outsider?  Is it better to be on the outside of a “good” group or an insider with a “bad” group?