Just finished the series finale. Gotta say, Kevin Fiege nailed it once again. They did everything they needed to in the last episode without going too far, and left some hints as to where it's all going without being too obvious.
WandaVision
- Thread starter Crazyhole
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I thought the finale was a bit of a letdown. But, all in all, I thought it was a strong Marvel one-time series.
I think one of the problems with this last one was that the two stars of the show had teased there'd be a 'special appearance' in the last episode which turned out to be a bit of a troll.
I think one of the problems with this last one was that the two stars of the show had teased there'd be a 'special appearance' in the last episode which turned out to be a bit of a troll.
I'm glad they didn't. That's what makes the MCU so much better than Star Wars. They don't have to rely on fan service, they just have great scripts and character development. I suppose you could kind of say that the scarlet witch is sort of the surprise character, but we all already knew who Wanda was.
The Filoni Star Wars stuff is great. The rest was a case study in why you keep your social Justice causes out of your epic movie franchise.
I always find it odd when people turn up their noses at "fan service" like we witnessed this past season of The Mandalorian.
Why WOULDN'T you want to get viewers excited by fan favorites?
As long as their appearance makes sense and they're used in a logical way, go for it. We're talking Saturday afternoon matinee stuff, not Oscar contenders.
I'm not saying it's always a bad thing, I just find it funny that people were mad at Dr Strange not showing up, or introducing Mephisto in the last episode. We already know that wanda and Dr strange are both going to be in the next movie so it didn't seem necessary to me to do it right away. It would have been lazy writing to introduce a character like Mephisto in the series finale but the fan boys insisted that must have been what should have happened.
Not ME. Mephisto? Yep, lazy writing! Dr. Strange? You're right. They're teaming up soon anyway.
But a surprise appearance of John Krasinski as Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four? Now THAT would have been different!!!
Watched it again tonight. On second viewing, I agree with your assessment. Very well done.
I'll admit, I do think they left two things hanging out there that bug me. Senor Scratchy, and the person in witness protection that led Woo to look into things. It'll be hard in future movies to clean those up without it feeling forced.
I watch way too many of those doggone Youtube shows about Wandavision which throw out all kinds of conspiracy theories and behind-the-scenes villains. This series turned out to be WAY more straight-forward than anyone gave them credit for. You're right about a few dangling plot threads though.
Of course, the way Marvel plays around, they could get answered in the upcoming Doctor Strange movie.
Now that I think about it, it would have been kind of fun if the person Monica knew, who sent the rover thing to get into the hex would have been named "Reed" or "Ben". A slight nod to the fantastic four without it being too egregious.Not ME. Mephisto? Yep, lazy writing! Dr. Strange? You're right. They're teaming up soon anyway.
But a surprise appearance of John Krasinski as Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four? Now THAT would have been different!!!
Speaking of plot holes, it seems a bit odd that we never learned the identity of the astrophysicist Monica mentioned which set off a flurry of speculation from the Youtuber world.
Truth is, I had convinced myself that we were going to get a scene similar to the Nick Fury cameo and mention of the 'Avengers Initiative' from the end credits of Marvel's first Iron Man movie. This one would introduce fans to the coming of The Fantastic Four with a Reed Richards cameo. To be fair to Marvel, I think this notion of a cameo got blown WAY out of proportion in the minds of fans because of what The Mandalorian did last December with Luke Skywalker.
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That's who I'm talking about. Her aerospace engineer friend. I was saying it would have been cool if she had referred to that friend as "Reed", or "Ben". That could have been a fun little tease without actually having the cameo, where people would think he needs to play a role in the series.
I really enjoyed the Mandalorian for the most part, but I do have a couple of issues with it:
Every episode was basically the same as the last. Mando has to land somewhere and then gets hired to do a job. If baby Yoda wasn't so dang cute, the whole series would have been a flop. They hit a pinnacle when Boba Fett shows up. THAT is a great use of fan service. But then, following it up with Skywalker was just a huge eye roll moment for me. I felt like it messed up the timeline a little bit and the CGI took away from what could have been a more natural-feeling moment. It could have been literally any other Jedi, and all they needed to say was something like "Master Skywalker sent me".
Truth be told, The Mandalorian is my favorite TV show and after being a disgruntled and disillusioned SW fan since the original trilogy, it caused me to fall in love with Star Wars again.
I agree the CGI to de-age Mark Hamill was a bit wonky but I would argue that giving Luke his moment (after the way the character was treated in The Last Jedi) was something that SW fans around the world treasured.
Star Wars was never intended to be high-brow stuff. It's meant to be fun, Saturday Matinee, serial-style entertainment -- and I would argue that Disney+ is actually a better forum for SW than feature films are.
Can't disagree about the Disney+ point. It's a venue that they can introduce new characters and create a backstory much more effectively than they've done in the movies (for which they get an F-).
Youtubers covering the show had a field day guessing 'the true identity' of Herb.
Lol, of course they did. All I know is he was a unique character based on things he said and did in the series, so there's probably more to him than just being a resident of Westview.Youtubers covering the show had a field day guessing 'the true identity' of Herb.
It just seems to me that if it was anything more than a red herring that they would have revealed who he was in the series rather than beyond it.
I would agree, but something about his comments in the Halloween episode and in the finale seem odd. Like Agatha, Herb wasn't totally under the illusion that Wanda had created. Somehow he had broken through it while everyone else was still captive. Who are the youtubers saying he is?
Oh geez, lol. I could have seen senor scratchy maybe being mephisto, but Herb?
I watched the first episode of falcon and the winter soldier today. This series looks like it's going to be even better.I'm just the messenger.
I said the same thing to my brother. That may be the best opening scene in the entire MCU. That being said, I'm actually more impressed with what they are doing with Bucky's storyline.
Right or wrong, you do get the feeling with Marvel that these guys know what they're doing. If episode one is any indication, we should be in for a fun ride.
Absolutely. I'm just glad that this series doesn't look like there should be speculation on some new unknown villain like we had with wandavision. When I saw Batroc in the opening scene I knew this was going to be an extension of already interesting storylines, not an attempt to create new ones.
I'm going to be most interested in finding out the backstory to bucky and the old Asian dude. The way they set it up seems like it's obvious who killed his son but I'm willing to bet that isn't the case.
I'm sensing a New Captain America 'hated-to-loved' redemption arc. I guess we need to let it play out but it doesn't thrill me.
It seems like they are setting everybody up to be a villain somehow. With only a couple of heroes, I don't know how they are going to make this work. And I'm cool with the racial justice overtones, but they laid it on awfully thick in that episode.
After episode 3 being pretty disjointed, episode 4 was really really well done. Still not sure how they are going to pull all of this together with just 2 episodes left, but I'm starting to see how some open ended storylines can be used later.
Disjointed is a good word for it.
Don't get me wrong, the show doesn't suck, but IMHO neither Wandavision or Falcon Soldier has been anywhere near what Jon Favreau has done with Disney's Star Wars TV franchise with The Mandalorian.
It seems like they just threw darts to see what characters to include and hit the bullseye way too often, lol.
Episode 5 was pretty good IMO. The Isaiah Bradley scene was a little over the top, but besides that I'd say they did a good job. Closed out some characters, kept the most important parts of the storyline going, introduced a new character in a way that wasn't really a distraction, and set the foundation for the last episode.
Sebastion Stan is a way better actor than I realized before this series. I could see him winning an Emmy for it.
Sebastion Stan is a way better actor than I realized before this series. I could see him winning an Emmy for it.
In my mind, this episode should have been one of the first in this limited series rather than one of the last. I would have liked to see the Bucky and Falcon team-up much earlier (they've got great chemistry together.) More importantly, it would have given the series a more clear narrative thrust if the show's theme had been more clearly stated from the get-go instead of beating around the bush with it. Having the audience hit with Bradley's comments at the beginning of the series -- “They will never let a Black man be Captain America. And even if they did, no self-respecting Black man would ever wanna be.” -- would have given the show more emotional power instead of feeling herky-jerky which left me wondering from episode to episode what the heck the show was trying to do.
Don't expect to be blown away by the final episode. It isn't terrible, but the way they cleaned up a couple of plotlines was either lazy writing or they made a big change halfway through. If I had to sum up the whole series I would say that it had great acting, some awesome storylines, but subpar writing.
