Hey, Wisecrack, Jared here.
It’s no secret that daddy issues are to the Marvel Cinematic Universe what HPV is
to a college campus: Everybody’s got it.
Indeed, paternal drama pops up constantly in these films, from Odin putting Thor in
time out on Earth, to Black Panther traveling to the ancestral plane to yell at his dad,
to Peter Quill confronting his celestial egomaniac of a father.
What’s more, many of the characters are fathers themselves, from Ant-Man to Hawkeye,
and of course, big daddy Thanos.
But father conflicts are perhaps most present and poignant when it comes to Tony Stark.
Not only is he a literal father in Endgame, but he is always struggling with his relationship
with his own father, and acting as a surrogate father to Peter Parker, as seen in Avengers:
Infinity War and Spiderman: Homecoming.
The nuances of Marvel fatherhood have been covered in videos by The Take and Justwrite,
so definitely check those out.
But we think Marvel’s take on fatherhood is undergoing a possible shift, and that this
change occurred somewhere between Endgame and Spiderman Far From Home.
Depictions of fatherhood are starting to get a little more complicated, and we think it
all has something to do with the idea of “projection” - like literal projectors and also emotional
projection.
So welcome to this Wisecrack Edition on Fatherhood in the MCU post-Endgame.
And of course, spoilers ahead for Endgame and Far
from Home.
Alright guys lets do a quick recap of Far From Home, which sees Peter Parker Eurotripping
and hoping to give that spidey-suit a break so he can just be a normal teen.
This plan is derailed when very large, very ugly monsters start popping off all over Venice.
Peter tries to fight them and runs into Mysterio, who seems like a nice-enough dude.
Then the Skrull-version of Nick Fury tracks Peter down to say that Tony left behind a
pair of uber high-tech glasses that need to be gifted to the next leader of the Avengers.
Peter’s like “not it,” and goes back to awkward-flirting with MJ.
Then, he realizes the “right” answer: Give the glasses to his newest friend, Mysterio.
Only turns out Mysterio is actually a disgruntled former employee of Tony’s who made up a
fake sob story about his dead family and invented a projection system that he uses to make everybody
THINK the world is under attack when really it’s just being blown to pieces by drone
technology.
Peter stops him, reclaims the glasses and gets with MJ, so that’s nice.
So how does Spiderman Far from Home perpetuate and evolve the theme of fatherhood?
There are a few dynamics worth mentioning.
Most literally, 1) Peter is missing his father figure, and 2) Mysterio lies about being a
father who lost his children.
Then, less literally 3) The Avengers are without a leader, and people are looking to place
the responsibility on Spiderman's shoulders and 4) Mysterio is trying to fill society’s
paternal void that Tony left behind.
To understand this last point more, we’re going to have to dip into some Sigmund Freud,
because, sorry, the dude is still relevant.
In his book Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud meditates on, among other things, the
origin of religious feelings, which he credits entirely to our childhood longing for a father
figure.
The way he sees it, childhood is a state of inherent helplessness in which we are at the
mercy of adults who parade us around in ridiculous onesies.
Freud identifies helplessness, along with the resulting “longing for the father”
and his protection, as the source of all religious feelings.
He even wrote, “I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father’s
protection” which means he obviously never tried pizza bagels.
As a result, he notes that we pretty much CAN’T imagine God other than “in the figure
of an enormously exalted father,” complete with a white beard and a scowl because you
didn’t clean your room.
Ok so God = Dad.
But according to Freud, there’s more to a father’s role in your psyche, and it has
to do with his theory of the developing mind.
For Freud, human brains develop like this: First you are pure Id, or the base desires
to eat, scream and poop.
Then, as you realize that there are objects outside of you, like your teddy bear, your
spork or your mom’s visa card, you start to develop an ego, or the organizational part
of your brain that does stuff like reason, plan and decide to opt out of parkour.
But there’s one thing left that still has to develop: Your superego.
The superego is, according to Freud, the part of our brain that “retains the character
of the father” that is, it’s the part of us that internalizes our dad’s voice.
We do this because when we’re tiny, our father seems all knowing and generally badass.
Of course, eventually we grow up and realize that our dads make mistakes too and sometimes
randomly send their rabbi hate mail, or is that just me?
Anyway, we’ll often turn to religion as we seek to replace our flesh and blood father
with a sort of cosmic father that still retains all the dope qualities of our real dad.
Besides God, we can also project our superego onto any group of people or individual leader…
whether of the state, of a political party, or of a superhero team.
Which brings us back to Marvel.
Now, we see Thanos taking it upon himself to fulfill the role Freud describes as paternal
in Infinity War and Endgame.
Dude’s followers are literally called the “children of Thanos,” -- and Ebony Maw
actually says that EVERYONE is his child, even in death.
"For even in death, you have become children of Thanos."
What’s more, we see him take a break from conquering a planet in order to adopt Gomorrah
as a surrogate daughter.
But most starkly, Thanos takes up the mantle of celestial father when he makes a decision
on behalf of the whole effing universe: that half of life should be destroyed because he
knows best.
“If life is left uncheck life will cease to exist, it needs correction.”
“You don’t know that!”
“I’m the only one who knows that.”
Here, we see Thanos choosing to fulfill the father role, or the superego, for a universe
he genuinely thinks needs him.
Through Thanos, the series shows us a majorly flawed but powerful paternal/God figure.
What’s more, it furthers a theme omnipresent in the series: sons paying for the sins of
their fathers.
Many Marvel heroes are essentially sons of villains or, at least, coping with their fathers’
failures.
T’Challa has to deal with the fallout of his father’s mistakes.
Star Lord has to stop his dad from taking over the universe.
Iron Man has to grow up to be better than his dad, and Thor has to confront his dad’s
seedy history of conquest.
Thanos is the logical conclusion to this motif: He’s destroying half of humanity and leaving
his "children" behind to pick up the pieces.
Then there’s Tony Stark, who, as we previously noted, had an interesting father/son relationships
with both his own father and surrogate son, Peter Parker, and indeed, with the entire
Avengers, of whom he was largely considered to be the leader.
Tony actually acts as a sort of shadow to Thanos.
In Civil War, he seeks to grant the government power over the Avengers through the Sokovia
Accords.
In Endgame, he regrets not “building a suit of armor around the world” to save everyone
from Thanos.
"What we needed was a suit of armor around the world.
Remember that?"
Eventually, he even sacrifices himself for all of humanity, a move that’s pretty damn
protective.
All of these acts imply that he knows what’s best for humanity, though he does it in a
way that is far more benevolent than the overbearing, destruction-happy father figure that is Thanos.
Tony’s paternalism is even made literal in Endgame when he actually has a daughter.
But now, Tony is dead and phase 3 of the franchise has ended.
Are we seeing a subsequent shift in the way the theme of fatherhood manifests?
Tony’s death leaves the Avengers, and the world at large, reeling, without a father
figure to unite them.
Unquestionably, there seems to be a real need for this father figure - evidenced by everyone’s
clear desire to see Tony replaced, and fast.
People start by harassing Spiderman who, as Tony’s mentee and not obviously a 16-year-old,
seems like the logical replacement.
The central plotline of this film - what to do with those damn glasses, is really about
finding the next father-figure for the Avengers.
Without a father figure to look to, Peter seems lost and directionless.
Hence his relief at discovering Mysterio, with whom he immediately forms a close connection.
He and Mysterio develop a sort of father/son relationship, broing out at bars and fighting
fake elementals together.
Mysterio even offers Peter advice.
"You're not a jerk for wanting a normal life."
This relationship is unmistakably parental, and consistent with Peter’s enduring urge
to be protected by a father figure.
If it seems like Mysterio is starting to replace Tony as Peter’s metaphorical dad, things
are about to get a lot more literal: Indeed, because of his trust in and genuine affection
for Mysterio, Peter decides that he should be the new head of the Avengers, and thereby
assume both roles Tony left unfulfilled.
But Peter quickly realizes that he made an oopsie because Mysterio turns out to be a
grade-A scumbag who is actually manipulating high-tech projections to make people think
that they’re under attack, while simultaneously blowing their cities to smithereens via an
army of drones.
Fittingly, part of his elaborate scheme includes telling a lie about being a father, and losing
his entire family to these elementals on a different version of Earth.
"The strongest of them all, the one that destroyed my earth.
It's the one that took my family."
His heroism, like the supposed perfection of your father, is literally an illusion.
Peter is appropriately bummed.
"You lied to me.
And I trusted you."
That doesn’t mean that Mysterio was acting out of some random destructive urge, or the
desire to own a cool pair of specs.
He’s more interesting than that.
We get some insight into what’s going on beneath that fishbowl when Mysterio tries
to kill Peter.
"I created Mysterio to give the world someone to believe in."
Basically, Mysterio recognizes that Tony functioned as a kind of superego for the world.
With Tony gone, he sees a way to fill that void, specifically by creating a make-believe
threat and then defeating said threat through elaborate green smoke throwing.
He made those crazy-ass projections because he wanted to give the people someone to project
their fears and hopes and beliefs onto.
He wanted... to be their daddy.
Sorry.
Couldn’t resist.
So, is Mysterio right?
Does the world need a superego to look up to?
Or is the film saying that this kind of figure is largely illusory to begin with?
Indeed, illusion and deception is one of the primary themes of the film, from Happy pretending
not to date Aunt May, to MJ pretending that she’s only interested in Peter because she
thinks he’s Spiderman.
Even Peter is not immune to illusions, donning a fake Spiderman suit so that his classmates
don’t figure him out.
Then, obviously, there’s Mysterio who trafficks in illusions, inventing his half-baked superhero
status from scratch.
Oh, and also all the literal illusions.
This overarching theme, and particularly the way it interacts with fatherhood, makes us
think that there may be a shift in the way the MCU will approach fatherhood as it enters
phase 4.
Because perhaps, there’s one more illusion to consider: Tony Stark’s legacy.
Indeed, Tony has never been more heroic than in death, as first exemplified in this dramatically
corny Powerpoint presentation.
But the film complicates this notion when it reveals that all of the “bad guys”
are former employees who found Tony evil, incompetent, or condescending.
"To the man who brought us all together, our former boss TOnry Stark.
The jester king, literally wrapped in wealth and technology that he was obviously unfit
to weild."
There are other issues with Tony’s legacy, from the villains he made out of Vulture and
Ultron to his legacy as an arms dealer to him siding with the government in Civil War.
Perhaps Happy puts it best Nobody could live up to Tony, not even Tony.”
emphasizing the extent to which the myth is often greater than the man.
On top of that, by having Peter’s new “father figure” turn out to be a big old fake, Marvel
calls into question a central premise of the film.
It asks if what the world really needs is a new Tony Stark, particularly if the real
Tony had his fair share of flaws.
So what’s the world’s highest-grossing
franchise to do?
Marvel could repeat the similar themes and tropes of previous films, or it could pivot
towards an entirely new disposition towards father figures.
In one important scene near the end of the film, we see signs that the franchise could
go either way.
Peter is gearing up for his final battle with Mysterio when Happy gives him that look, the
subtext being of “Wow, he’s reminding me of Tony.”
So, is Peter going to be just like Tony?
Is he going to inherit the same complexities of father/son relationships we’ve seen thus
far in the MCU?
Or is this an indication of progress, that he, as well as the rest of the Marvel canon,
will move past the myth of the father as our collective superego?
One quick note - And it wouldn’t be Wisecrack if we didn’t get a little meta so indulge
us - We think it’s worth mentioning that there’s actually another layer to this drama,
specifically having to do with the recently resolved fight Sony and Marvel had over the
IP rights to Spiderman.
With the threat of Sony permanently stealing Spiderman from the Avengers, fans felt betrayed,
almost like they were losing their superhero leader, and they didn’t know how to orient
themselves to that version of reality.
Sound familiar?
On some level, Spiderman’s own crisis was also just lived out amongst his loyal fans.
So as you can see, there’s potentially a lot going on when Peter dons those glasses,
and it poses some major questions about the future of the franchise.
So what do you guys think: Will Peter rise and become the teen dad that the Avengers
so badly want?
Or will Marvel evolve past its depiction of paternal figures as the ultimate protectors?
Let us know what you think in the comments.
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And as always, thanks for watching guys.
Peace