The MCU Phase 1 – Proving It Could Work
The six films that built the MCU, ranked and reviewed in release order, with scores and craft notes. Phase 1 averages 8.00, the highest of any phase.
Tag: Marvel Cinematic Universe
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is the largest storytelling experiment ever run in public. This tag collects reviews and essays on the MCU: what its interconnected machine does well, where it creaks, and what writers can learn either way.
Film ListThe MCU Phase 6 – The Reset
The reset in progress. Released entries scored, announced entries held as placeholders and filled in as the phase arrives.
Film ListThe MCU Phase 5 – The MCU Pushes the Message
Fourteen projects, an average of 2.62 and a median of 1. The lowest scoring phase in the franchise, examined entry by entry.
Film ListThe MCU Phase 4 – The MCU Becomes the MSHEU
Seventeen projects in two years, scored and reviewed in release order. Phase 4 is where the cinematic universe became a content pipeline.
Film ListThe MCU Phase 2 – Finding the Formula
Iron Man 3 through Ant-Man, in release order with scores and craft notes. Phase 2 found the formula and set both the ceiling and the floor of the franchise.
2020sThe Marvels (2023)
The Marvels is the Captain Marvel sequel that teams up Brie Larson with two female MCU successors. Megan McDonnell, Elissa Karasik and Nia DaCosta wrote it.
2010sIron Man 3 (2013)
Tony Stark hunts a terrorist called the Mandarin while battling PTSD from the Avengers, with Christmas as the season-long backdrop. Iron Man 3 is Shane Black's 2013 American superhero film depicting Tony Stark hunting an apparent terrorist called the Mandarin…
AdaptationThe Blade Trilogy (1998-2004) Review
The Blade trilogy is the foundation document of modern Marvel cinema and one of the most influential American action horror franchises of the past three decades. The franchise adapts Marvel Comics characters created by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan in…
Disney+The Failure Of Stark’s Successors
Tony Stark's death created an institutional vacuum. An essay on how Tony Stark's death in Avengers: Endgame created an institutional vacuum that the various young Avengers framework characters have failed to fill, and what the failure reveals about whether character…
Disney+The Romance Problem
Pepper, Peggy, Jane, Christine: Marvel's love stories keep falling flat. Why the franchise can't do romance, and the two exceptions that show how it's done.
ComedyWhy Marvel Cannot Make A Good Fantastic Four (Until They Did)
Four failed Fantastic Four films in thirty years, then First Steps finally got it right. Why the family kept failing on screen, and what the 2025 film fixed.
Disney+The Disney+ Series Drain
WandaVision, Loki, She-Hulk and a dozen more: how Marvel's Disney+ series spread the franchise thin, turned films into homework and drained the MCU's quality.