Marvel movies have a long and rich history, but not all Marvel movies are created equal.
Plenty have veered into unbelievable, dangerously stupid, or outrageous territory, seriously
ticking off fans along the way.
Here in the future, we have ample evidence that casting Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool was
a pretty good idea.
"Good Deadpool!"
Unfortunately, that's about the last good idea that X-Men Origins: Wolverine had when
it came to everyone's favorite fourth-wall-breaking mercenary.
Playing Deadpool as a handsome, mildly sarcastic member of a special ops team in a sleeveless
T-shirt didn't quite line up with the comics, but it's understandable.
The scene where he spins his katanas fast enough to deflect bullets is pretty ridiculous,
but it's not so far past giving a guy unbreakable knives that pop out of his fists that we can't
forgive it.
No, the real problems here came when Deadpool returned at the movie's climax for what might
just be the single worst fight in superhero movie history.
Instead of the wisecracking badass that everyone wanted to see, Origins instead gave us a dollar
store knock-off version of Baraka from Mortal Kombat in a pair of baggy sweatpants, covered
in Sharpie drawings of circuit boards.
They managed to miss the point so badly that they literally took away Deadpool's mouth,
something that's actually pretty important for a guy known for talking all the time.
For both long-time fans and the people who wanted to see something even remotely cool,
this guy was infuriating.
The only good thing to come out of it was watching an infinitely better version of Deadpool,
also played by Ryan Reynolds, shoot this dork in the head about a dozen times at the end
of Deadpool 2.
Spider-Man 3's version of Venom seemed like it was designed to make fans angry.
Rather than standing on its own, the alien costume saga was lumped in as part of a bloated,
confusing mess that also included a sad-sack version of the Sandman and a sudden face turn
by the second Green Goblin on a flying snowboard.
That said, there's only one thing that comes to mind when you think of Spider-Man 3's excesses:
the dance number.
In the context of the film, it actually makes perfect sense: Thanks to the alien symbiote's
influence, Peter Parker has given in to his darkest impulses and become an arrogant jerk.
Since Peter himself is a huge nerd, that manifests as a huge nerd's idea of what a "cool guy"
is like.
He struts through the streets of Manhattan, pointing finger-guns at hot ladies, and punctuates
his sneering with sassy emo hair flips.
The whole point of the sequence is that we're actually supposed to think that Peter's an
off-putting, unlikeable dweeb.
There's a problem with that: it worked too well.
The entire thing went way past the intended comedy and wound up being genuinely annoying.
There are a lot of reasons to not like X-Men 3: The Last Stand, but for fans of the comic,
there's one that sticks out above all others.
Not only is Cyclops, the leader of the X-Men, killed off, but he goes out in the worst possible
way, and the audience didn't even get to see it happen.
The whole setup for this is mopey even by the X-Men's soap opera standards.
Understandably a little depressed after Jean Grey's apparent death at the end of X2: X-Men
United, Scott Summers heads back to the site where she died in order to do some loud, laser-eyed
mourning.
Shockingly, for everyone who doesn't know that coming back from the dead is basically
her entire deal, Jean returns and embraces Scott, who doesn't know that she has been
possessed by the all-powerful, world-shattering Dark Phoenix.
They make out for a minute, Scott's face gets all weird, and then we immediately cut to
Professor X enduring an ice cream headache.
And that's it.
The founding member of the X-Men is done and dusted, presumably exploded to death offscreen.
Looking back on it, it's even weirder, but at the time, it definitely felt like the filmmakers
were punishing James Marsden for taking a role in the Superman movie that was coming
out a month later.
The first Fantastic Four movie sucked, but they still made a sequel, because if you have
a dozen eggs that are about to go bad, you might as well use 'em to make an omelet nobody
wants.
The second time around, audiences were promised the arrival of the Silver Surfer, which should've
been a really big deal.
After all, the Surfer isn't just a fan-favorite character, but he's also the Herald of Galactus,
and his appearance on a planet is quickly followed by the arrival of the unfathomable,
unstoppable Devourer of Worlds.
The original Galactus story that ran in the comics back in 1966 was a groundbreaking,
game-changing masterpiece that established the Fantastic Four as the kind of team that
can deal with the threats that other heroes can barely even imagine.
In the movie, though, it might top the list of the dumbest and most laughable things to
ever appear in a superhero film, and yes, we're including the playground fight from
Daredevil.
Rather than going with the classic depiction of Galactus as a gigantic humanoid decked
out in cosmic armor, the Devourer was…a big hungry cloud.
But it actually gets worse.
In Marvel canon, Galactus isn't actually a humanoid, he's so far beyond our understanding
that every species just interprets him as an incomprehensibly big version of themselves.
So what does it say about us here in the real world that we had to see him as a gigantic
space fart?
In Captain America: The First Avenger, we knew going in that Cap had to wind up being
frozen for a few decades so he could show up to lead the Avengers in the present day.
It's exactly what happens in the comics.
For the film, though, it's not enough for Cap to sacrifice his life to save America
from being bombed by Hydra.
He also has to suffer a very personal loss that turns the whole scene into a weapons-grade
tearjerker.
His promise to meet Peggy Carter for a dance, made while they both know that he's flying
to his death, is heart-wrenching, and, hey, wait a second.
They had autopilot in 1945, right?
And even if they didn't, couldn't he just use his belt to tie down the control stick?
Or just put it in a nose-dive and bail out?
He doesn't even need a parachute!
Even if you weren't wondering that during the scene in question, Cap's final line of
the film is so brutally emotional that we're angry that he didn't figure out a better way
to save the world.
"You gonna be okay?"
"Yeah.
Yeah, I just…I had a date."
Look, we appreciate Steve's heroic sacrifice, but Peggy waited so long and…and…we just
don't know what to do with these emotions!
No one can deny that it would suck to be frozen for decades only to be unfrozen and discover
that everyone you ever cared about is either dead or way, way older than you are.
So can anyone really blame Captain America for trying to move on after the death of former
flame Peggy Carter?
Listen, we like Steve Rogers enough that he probably could've gotten away with it...if
only he hadn't decided to keep it in the family by dating Peggy's niece.
Despite being one of Cap's longest-lasting love interests in the comics, the fact that
Sharon Carter was Peggy Carter's youngest relative gave fans a good reason to be weirded
out by the sudden makeouts in Civil War.
It even turned out that actress Hayley Atwell, who played Peggy, wasn't really cool with
it either.
She told IGN that Peggy would be so angry if she caught Captain America making out with
a woman who was about 70 years younger than he was that she might just become a supervillain
from beyond the grave.
It turned out the fans were definitely on Atwell's side, partly because Steve Rogers
had way more chemistry with Bucky and Sam Wilson than he ever did with Sharon.
At least either of those romances would've made sense.
The infamous "Mandarin twist" of Iron Man 3 was either a piece of brilliant, inspired
comedy...or just writer/director Shane Black's way of telling comic book fans that everything
they've ever loved has been a stupid joke.
"You know who I am.
You don't know where I am.
And you'll never see me coming."
The worst part was that it seemed like they'd been taunting comic book fans with the Mandarin
all along, from the moment a terrorist organization called the "Ten Rings" was mentioned in the
first Iron Man movie.
Fans were primed to see the character who had been Tony Stark's arch-nemesis since 1964,
but then came the big reveal.
"Bloody hell!
Bloody hell!"
"Don't move."
"I'm not moving.
You want something?
Take it.
Although the guns are all fake because the wankers wouldn't trust me with a real one"
"What?"
It turned out that the Mandarin was just a drunk British actor named Trevor who'd been
hired to draw attention away from the real villain.
Saying that this version of the Mandarin was a departure from the comics is putting it
mildly.
While it definitely has plenty of humor, the scene where we find out that Iron Man's greatest
comic book foe is just some dude felt a lot like going to a Batman movie and finding out
that the Joker was a guy with a part-time job at the circus.
Even if it was done well, it's a huge letdown for fans.
"This is the Mandarin?"
"I know, it's, it's, it's embarrassing…"
In Thor, the God of Thunder travels to Earth on the Bifrost, the rainbow bridge that connects
Asgard to the rest of the nine realms.
There, he has a completely chemistry-free romance with Jane Foster, and we're all supposed
to feel super sad when he has to destroy the Bifrost in order to save Jotunheim, which
has the side effect of making sure he'll never see Jane Foster again.
That's not the bit that really outraged fans, though.
That happened in the first Avengers movie when Thor totally just showed up on Earth
without using the Bifrost, making his whole great sacrifice seem like it was never really
a big deal.
"How much dark energy did your father have to muster to conjure you here?
Your precious Earth!"
There's an attempt by Loki to explain the plot-hole, but it just has the effect of making
it clear that the Bifrost was never that important to begin with.
Its destruction was apparently just an excuse for Thor to get out of his relationship with
Jane.
No wonder she dumped him.
"She didn't dump me.
I dumped her, it was a mutual dumping."
The Marvel movies eventually did their best to patch this up, like the scene where we
see Heimdall conjure up some Bifrost magic to send Hulk back to Earth in the opening
of Infinity War.
Still, it's not a whole lot better.
And finding out that the whole thing happens because of random magic weapons, and not the
magical bridge itself, doesn't help much after years having to live with an explanation that's
even worse.
Those horrible last moments of Infinity War can be traced back to a single event, and
it's not any of the parts where Thanos gets his giant purple hands on the Infinity Stones.
Instead, it's one of those scenes that makes you want to chuck your popcorn at the screen
in anger.
Alas, nothing you throw at the screen, no matter how delicious, will ever stop Star
Lord from punching Thanos in the face, thus making it possible for him to escape Mantis'
control and to foil the heroes' plan to take the gauntlet.
Thanks for nothing, Quill.
"Okay, Quill, you gotta cool it right now, you understand?
Don't, don't!
Don't engage, we almost got this off!"
The thing is, it's not a plot hole, or bad writing.
Peter Quill's rage at finding out that Thanos killed Gamora makes perfect sense, so the
fans weren't outraged at the writers or the director.
They were mad at Star-Lord himself, who was pretty much single-handedly responsible for
the movie's upsetting conclusion.
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