The onslaught of Marvel movies and TV shows continued this week as Moon Knight had its season finale and Dr. Strange Multiverse of Madness came out. So their continual dominance of the box office will continue, as well as their prevalence in media conversations. As someone who has come to enjoy the Marvel universe, I was not overly impressed with either of these, and I went into both with high expectations, but they were far from reached.
Multiverse of Madness is about Dr. Strange meeting America Chavez, a girl with the ability to transport herself from one universe to another, and they journey they partake. There is a great and ancient evil after America (why name a character America!?), and to stop the evil they need to acquire the book of Vishanti, which is the counterpart part to the Darkhold. Strange goes to Wanda for help, but he finds out that Wanda has turned into the Scarlet Witch, and she is the one causing the havoc, and that she possesses the Darkhold. Wanda wants to be in a universe where she can be with her kids that are real in another universe. The battle being waged starts to transcend the main universe and starts to spill into others. Wanda tries to chase down America, so she can take her powers, and the only way Wanda can be stopped seems to be is by the Vishanti, but eventually both books become obsolete, and a final battle ensues.
A couple of recent Marvel projects have claimed to be horror based or at least horror adjacent, and they should stop claiming this, because as someone who loves horror greatly, neither this nor Moon Knight live up to this claim. Multiverse of Madness has its moments, but they are fleeting, and I guess horror is subjective, what is scary for some is not for others, but other than a jump scare, which can happen in thrillers and action movies, there is nothing scary occurring. There is the scene where Wanda is chasing people through the Illuminati’s headquarters (yes the illuminati), she is covered in blood, and it is like a slasher sequence where the villain is stalking their prey, and Wanda also dispatches a few heroes in ways that seemed like they would be seen on Amazon’s The Boys instead of a Marvel movie, which was nice for a change. Violent, but not scary. There was also the sequence where Strange came back as a zombie, and had to fight off these demon ghosts, but they were not scary, they seemed more to be poking fun at horror than trying to be scary, but I can see how for preteens going to see the film that this could be scary.
The director of the film was Sam Rami, and if you are familiar with his work, you can clearly tell that he made this film. He was the creator of the Evil Dead universe, and he also directed the Toby McGuire Spiderman. This is an odd way to be able to tell who the director is, but just by looking at the cuts on the heroes, they look very similar to the wounds that are in the Evil Dead movies. Then when Strange comes back as a zombie, it is really evident. In zombie form, he looks very similar to the creations of the demons in Evil Dead. There is something about the decaying flesh and deep gashes that are distinct in his films. Also he likes to use cursed ancient texts to create the evil, and this is piled on top of the weird black ghosts that appear that also go with his over the top depiction of demons as being darkly comedic.
This movie and Moon Knight will be tied in a couple of ways moving forward. One, as mentioned in the horror aspect, but the other is with the introduction of blood and harsher violence. In other Marvel movies, there has been some blood, but it mainly comes in the form of some specks on a hero’s face when fighting the villain, it is never really gory, but in this film, and in Moon Knight, there was some real gore. At one point Wanda was walking around with a massive amount of blood down her face from her victims, and she made a hero’s head basically turn to mush, which was probably disturbing for younger viewers. The scenes in Moon Knight were also unusually violent for Marvel, there was more blood spattering and harsher kills than usual, which is an interesting new lean to take, as it could make it more alienating towards younger audiences due to parental guidance, but I personally think it adds to the film.
Watching this film, I could not bring myself to care about any of the characters. The one I cared about the most was Wanda, and they were not going to let the Scarlet Witch win. The relationship between Strange and America did not work for me, and none of the emotional moments hit. Normally Marvel movies will make you feel something, and they are good at pulling on heart strings, but this one did not do it for me. The only person I felt like that had any emotional pull was Wanda. She just wanted to be with her kids again, and she was willing to do anything possible. The real question is why did Wanda not find the universe where she was dead, and her kids were real, so she would not have to kill another version of herself. That would have made life so much easier. If you think about it, Dr. Strange just hates happiness, and since he cannot be with the girl of his dreams, he wants to prevent others like Wanda from being with the ones they love.
One area in which they could have made the movie better and brought in more of the horror aspect could have been by making the Mount Wundagore more intense. So when Wanda and Wong go to the temple, Wanda finds the spells easily, and she gets an army of monsters that bend to her will without any fight. They should have made it into a temple of doom with trials and tribulations. (About to go slightly nerdy) In Star Wars, when a Jedi is looking for their kyber crystal, they must go into a cave or other place that is going to test them and their will power. In the Clone Wars series when the padawans are in the cave looking for their crystals, the cave uses their weaknesses to hide the crystals and deceive them. This would have worked well in this movie. They could have made it into a temple full of varying Boggarts from Harry Potter, Boggarts were the monsters that appear in the form of a person’s greatest fears. Make Wanda go through a horrific dark maze that really brings the horror elements to life and make her earn the extra power.
Speaking of power, both Strange and Wanda are overly powerful, and it is hard to even describe what their powers are. They both have the power to bend reality, and it seems to make everything crumple to its knees. In the first monster battle in the city, it makes it look like Strange is slightly struggling with the monster, but his power is so strong that he easily could have dispatched with the creature and been done with it within seconds, but that does not make for a good movie. Wanda literally has the power to dominate four heroes at once. In an incredible scene where there are four super humans, Wanda dismantles them in about a minute without blinking. It was an awesome scene, but it really shows how there is no one really on her level in a way, which seems very unfair. When rewatching Wanda Vision recently, I commented to Cam that there is not really a good way to even describe what her superpower is, but she has way too much!
I knew this was going to be a long movie, when the first time I checked my watch feeling like it had to be close to the end of the movie, and it was not even halfway through. This is never a good sign. To compare, I never looked at my watch during the new Batman movie, I was so engrossed in it. I do always love when a genre tries to change itself, so I will always be appreciative of a Marvel movie, or other superhero films trying to do something new to add to the genre, this movie just failed in doing so. Hopefully the next time they try it will be done better. It also seems bad that people in the theaters were cheering more towards things that the movie implicated for the future of the MCU, like cameos, instead of applauding what was actually happening in the movie. It seems like these stories are all interconnected, but they do not seem to have some central goal in mind like Endgame, and I do not know if that is the best thing for the MCU. I gave this movie 2.5 stars, and this may be a little harsh, but I was very disappointed, and this was a long two hours for an MCU film, normally they go by quickly. If you want to see the multiverse done in much better way, go watch Everything Everywhere All at Once and support small cinema.
Other Movies This Week:
Freddy v. Jason: As ridiculous as this movie is, I could not help but love it. Just imagine living in a world where both Freddy and Jason are real entities. Wild! A slashers dream.
The Purge: Very limited and intimate in scope for such a nationwide idea about legalize crime for twelve hours. Incredibly focused on class discrepancies, but it still gave the obligated gore fest in the last twenty minutes.
365 Days: A foreign romance film that is about an incredibly unhealthy relationship. There is no way she should fall in love with him, and this is basically porn for half of the movie, so there is that…
New Rankings:
Dr. Strange Multiverse of Madness: 2.5 Stars
Freddy v. Jason: 2.5 Stars
The Purge: 3.5 Stars
365 Days: 1.5 Stars
Photo By: http://www.impawards.com/2022/doctor_strange_in_the_multiverse_of_madness_ver5.html, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=69573491
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