Is it Endgame for the Marvel Cinematic Universe?
The Inquiry
BBC
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 15 June 2023
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In 2009 Disney bought Marvel studios and helped transform the company into a movie making powerhouse that brought a new world of superhero stories to the silver screen, called The Marvel Cinematic Universe. Since then the franchise has generated over $30 billion dollars in profit, released 32 films and has even made its way onto the small screen… And it’s not slowing down any time soon. Before the end of next year we can expect Captain America, Thunderbolts, The Marvels and Blade in cinema’s and Daredevil, Agatha: Coven of Chaos and Iron heart streaming on Disney Plus. But glitchy graphics in recent projects like, ‘She-Hulk’ and patchy plots in ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp Quantomania’ have left fans and film critics wondering if marvels conveyor belt of content has led to it losing its magic. So this week were asking ‘Is it Endgame for the Marvel Cinematic Universe?’
Contributors: Dr Mathew J. Smith Radford University in Virginia. Lisa Laman Writer and film critic at The Spool, Collider and Looper. Prof Spencer Harrison International business school INSEAD Jonathon Sim - Film journalist and movie critic at Comingsoon.net Presenter: Charmaine Cozier Producer: Anoushka Mutanda-Dougherty Editor: Tara McDermott Researcher: Bisi Adebayo Broadcast Co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Inquiry, I'm Sharma Encosia, each week one question for expert witnesses |
| 0:07.8 | and an answer. |
| 0:10.5 | February 2023, Planet Earth, Scotland is under attack. |
| 0:16.8 | Also known as Ant-Man, he can change size and communicate with insects, but I can't |
| 0:21.6 | save him now. |
| 0:22.6 | He's not alone. |
| 0:24.6 | Fellow superheroes Thor and She-Hulk are also targets, but the attack isn't physical, |
| 0:30.0 | it's a public backlash. |
| 0:33.4 | Critics are circling. |
| 0:35.7 | Behind the character assassinations are two formidable groups, film reviewers and most |
| 0:40.8 | potent of all, unimpressed, die hard fans. |
| 0:44.8 | So this week we're asking, is it endgame for the Marvel Cinematic Universe? |
| 0:53.6 | Not one. |
| 0:54.6 | It all starts with Superman. |
| 0:56.6 | There's never a dull moment in a Marvel comic. |
| 0:59.3 | There's always a sense of movement, of action, of forward momentum in the storytelling. |
| 1:09.3 | My name is Matthew Smith and I serve as the Dean of the College of Humanities and Behavioral |
| 1:13.8 | Sciences at Radford University in Virginia. |
| 1:20.5 | And you're also a comic book collector. |
| 1:22.9 | This is true, so I have been collecting comics since the mid 1970s and I own over 18,000 |
| 1:29.2 | individual comic book magazines. |
| 1:33.0 | The first superhero really is Superman, who debuted in 1938, is a creation of two young |
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