TV #26 of 2018: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., season 5 The finale of this season is outstanding, especially for the closure on Coulson and Fitz’s respective character arcs, but I’m not as sold on some of the episodes that get us there. Although the season has clearly been written with the knowledge that it might …
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Movie #8 of 2018: Doctor Strange (2016) I watched and reviewed this movie last year, and my thoughts are about the same: I’m still happy with my decision to wait until Doctor Strange was on Netflix to watch it (so as to hurt box office returns in protest of the casting). But having now finally …
Movie #2 of 2018: Black Panther (2018) Easily my favorite thing that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has done to date – and I’ve seen all the movies but Spider-Man: Homecoming, as well as every episode of every MCU show. This one tops them all thanks to its rich worldbuilding, complex characterizations & relationships, and the …
TV #6 of 2018: Marvel’s Luke Cage, season 1 This show starts off so strongly, following in Daredevil’s footsteps of presenting a superhero spin on urban crime dramas like The Wire. But the villain of the back half of the series is never very well established, and the season really suffers for it, especially in …
TV #5 of 2018: Marvel’s The Punisher, season 1 I don’t care much for either the beginning or end of this show (which seem to tell us little we didn’t already know about the character), but the middle section is surprisingly solid. I’m also really impressed with Ben Barnes’s acting and accent work — I …
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TV #2 of 2018: Marvel’s Runaways, season 1 I had high hopes for this one throughout the first few episodes, but it definitely ended up as one of those Marvel projects with better acting than writing. I understand it deviates a lot from the source material too, which is even more frustrating – I hate …
Movie #19 of 2017: Thor: Ragnarok (2017) By far the best Thor movie, and one of the better Marvel Cinematic Universe movies overall. Lots of humor, neat worldbuilding, and actual character growth for Thor and Loki! It could have done better by its female characters, but all in all it was a fun ride and …
TV #44 of 2017: Marvel’s Inhumans, season 1 Oh, my god. This show was so awful that it retroactively makes Iron Fist look pretty decent by comparison. We’re never given any reason to care about the characters or their situation, the villains have no clear motivation at all, and the plot basically spins its wheels …
TV #34 of 2017: Marvel’s The Defenders, season 1 Plotwise, this show is basically just another season of Daredevil. Yes, he’s teaming up with some superfriends, but the main character arc is Matt’s, and the most important returning characters / concepts come primarily from his show (with Iron Fist as a distant second). There are …
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TV #33 of 2017: Marvel’s Jessica Jones, season 1 My wife and I watched/rewatched this season respectively before binge-watching the new Defenders season with friends. It remains a really great examination of male privilege and rape culture, using the heightened storytelling language of superpowers to explore those issues. Like the best of the fantasy genre, …
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