# In the MCU, what is a god? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [June 19, 2021, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634 "2021-06-19T16:01:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/21 "2021-06-19T18:54:05Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > The closest things to actual gods in the MCU are the Eternals, who cannot die and can wield the Infinity Stones without protection and wipe out entire worlds and populations. I think you mean Celestials. While the Eternals cannot die, they don’t wipe out entire worlds or anything like that. Well, unless the new movie says Thanos was one, like in the comics. Speaking of, they’re certainly initially playing at being Gods, despite what the trailer voiceover says about never interfering: [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWfjJ6bOy7w) ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/22 "2021-06-19T19:48:42Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I think you mean Celestials. I stand mostly corrected, although it is clear that [Celestials can be killed](https://youtu.be/g3AUoLp0G1A). Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/23 "2021-06-19T20:39:38Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > but we don’t know what they actually are If you read the comics, you know that TVA agents are all clones of Mark Gruenwald, a Marvel Comics writer and executive editor tasked with maintaining continuity in the increasingly complex Marvel Universe. Doing so, entailed wrangling multiple alternate universes and timelines into a reasonably coherent framework. As a tribute, the creators of the TVA fashioned all agents in the likeness of Gruenwald. It’s no accident that Owen Wilson was cast in the role of Mobius. Mark Gruenwald: [![](https://comicvine.gamespot.com/a/uploads/scale_small/0/1867/1006526-wizard_65_146.jpg) ](https://comicvine.gamespot.com/a/uploads/scale_small/0/1867/1006526-wizard_65_146.jpg) ETA: Sorry that was off-topic. I thought I was in the Loki thread. But in a way, the real gods of the Marvel Universe are the artists, writers, and editors who created this stuff. Odin doesn’t have anything on Stan Lee or Jack Kirby. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/24 "2021-06-19T21:01:24Z")
Knowhere _is_ the severed head of a Celestial, but maybe the Celestial got better 🙂 However, in the MCU, Ego was called a Celestial, and he definitely _was_ killed. ---
**Author:** ![LauderdaleFort](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/977dab/32.png) [@LauderdaleFort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LauderdaleFort)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/25 "2021-06-19T21:37:01Z")
Nooo, it adds to my very small knowledge of the MCU. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/26 "2021-06-19T23:45:36Z")
> [@LauderdaleFort](#): > > I only watched the first Thor movie and don’t really care much about the superhero genre. I recommend you remedy this by at least watching the first _Iron Man_ movie, and seeing if that piques your continuing interest. The MCU is certainly full of comic book superheroics, but the multiple styles and genres also include comedy, drama, romance, espionage, war, and more, so they may not be as bad as you think. They’re all on Disney+ (aside from the _Spider-Man_ films) so it’s no cost to you except time. ---
**Author:** ![LauderdaleFort](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/977dab/32.png) [@LauderdaleFort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LauderdaleFort)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/27 "2021-06-20T00:11:47Z")
I have Disney+ and watched a couple of minutes here and there. I watched Civil War and it did nothing for me. The plot holes and the one-on-one massive battles where you know nothing is really going to happen and “gods” figthing alongside a person with a Glock. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/28 "2021-06-20T00:30:08Z")
> [@LauderdaleFort](#): > > I watched Civil War and it did nothing for me. The point is to watch them in order so you are invested in the character journeys. Catching out of context glimpses is not giving them a fair assessment, so that’s why I suggested start at the start, like most of us did. But whatever, you can do what you want. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/29 "2021-06-20T00:52:07Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > But in a way, the real gods of the Marvel Universe are the artists, writers, and editors who created this stuff. [Literally.](https://puzzledpagan.com/2015/12/26/that-time-the-fantastic-four-went-to-heaven/) ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/30 "2021-06-20T00:53:54Z")
That’s one of my favorite stories. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/31 "2021-06-20T00:59:03Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > > [@LauderdaleFort](#): > > > > I only watched the first Thor movie and don’t really care much about the superhero genre. > > I recommend you remedy this by at least watching the first _Iron Man_ movie, and seeing if that piques your continuing interest. The MCU is certainly full of comic book superheroics, but the multiple styles and genres also include comedy, drama, romance, espionage, war, and more, so they may not be as bad as you think. Marvel Studios actually made a smart decision early on by taking their characters and setting them in films that, while utilizing “superhero” tropes, were actually of a wide array of different genres with very flawed characters and organic interpersonal conflicts. The criticism has often been leavied that the films (at least, the origin stories) follow a well-defined template; and this is absolutely true (If you map out the plot beats in _Iron Man_, _Thor_, _Ant-Man_, and _Dr. Strange_, they are pretty much exactly the same plot) but they’ve done a good job of giving the characters distinctive motivations and character arcs that extend beyond their individual films. _Iron Man_, for instance, is the “Inventor vs. the World” plot more comparable to [_The Man in the White Suit_](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt00044876/) than a vengeance fantasy or altruistic protector; _Captain America: The First Avenger_ is homage to pulp serials (the naive jingoism of which it mocks in the “Man With A Plan” bond-promoting sequence); and the first _Thor_ film is actually an alien in human society, _a la_ something like [_Starman_](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088172/). Subsequent films have gone even deeper into genre tropes and implicit references with _Ant-Man_ being a heist film, _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_ a conspiratorial thriller along the lines of [_The Parallax View_](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071970/) or [_Three Days of The Condor_](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073802/), and _Guardians of the Galaxy_ a space opera adventure. It also helps that the villains in most of the films are really secondary to the main conflict, primarily existing to instigate internal conflicts between or within the protagonists; in, say, _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_, the real conflict isn’t Steve Rogers versus Alexander Pierce; it is that Rogers has to come to terms with the fact that his increasingly fragile patriotism has been taken advantage of by people undermining the very institutions he was made to protect, and that are the essence of his motivations. His real conflict is with himself, and of course with the tension between serving a higher purpose (protecting freedom despite personal cost) and fealty to his life-long friend who has been converted into a Hydra super-assassin. The ostensible genre may be ‘superhero’ but the layers of motivations and conflicts are as deep as anything in _The Godfather_ or _King Lear_, and (in my opinion) at least as compelling. It is easy to be dismissive of ‘superhero’ movies as being trival and superficial because many of them are, and Marvel has had a few underwhelming films slip through (the lackluster _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ and forgettable _Thor: The Dark World_ rank at the bottom) but they’ve largely done a good job of transcending genre conventions by consciously extending their films into other genres and taking risks on writers and directors who would do something other than make a generic superhero movie. The result is films that, despite the structural similarities noted above, don’t feel like watching the same film made over and over again like so many sequel franchises. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![dorvann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df705f/32.png) [@dorvann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorvann)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/32 "2021-06-20T02:08:35Z")
I know in the comic books most of Loki’s powers come from his mastery of sorcery(i.e. magic) and have nothing to do with his Frost Giant heritage. I am not sure if this is so in the movies. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/33 "2021-06-20T02:12:31Z")
I believe it is. In one of the Thor films (I think it was _The Dark World_), it’s mentioned that Frigga, his adoptive mother, taught him magic. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/34 "2021-06-20T02:57:00Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > They’re all on Disney+ (aside from the _Spider-Man_ films) Why not the Spider-Man films? ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/35 "2021-06-20T02:59:47Z")
They’re still owned by Sony, not Disney. Marvel co-produces, and after much negotiating has license to use the character in limited ways, but distribution remains with Sony. That may change in the future, if rumours are true. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/36 "2021-06-20T03:07:16Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Why not the Spider-Man films? Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group and Pascal Pictures own the distribution rights for the cinematic depictions of Spider-Man (although Marvel owns the merchandising rights, which are worth far more than the film distribution revenues themselves). Ditto for Universal Studios and standalone Hulk movies, although Marvel still has the rights to use the Hulk character in team-up films (which is the in-joke in _Thor: Ragnarok_ about joining “The Revengers”). > [@GuanoLad](#): > > That may change in the future, if rumours are true. Amy Pascal will never, ever give up the Spider-Man rights that she somehow retained personal rights to, and without her concurrence neither can Sony regardless of how badly their “Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters (SPUMC)“ tanks. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/37 "2021-06-20T03:11:06Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > They’re still owned by Sony, not Disney. Marvel co-produces, and after much negotiating has license to use the character in limited ways, but distribution remains with Sony. Said negotiation was what led to the Tom Holland version of Spider-Man appearing in several Avengers films (and Tony Stark, Happy Hogan, and Pepper Potts appearing in Holland’s Spider-Man films). However, the prior iterations of Spider-Man (played by Tobey Maguire, then Andrew Garfield) were their own thing, and were created prior to that negotiation between Sony and Disney; those films are now considered to be part of the “Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters.” However (spoiler for the next Spider-Man film): Alfred Molina and Jamie Foxx are said to be reprising their roles from the earlier Sony films (as Doctor Octopus and Electro, respectively) in the upcoming _Spider-Man: No Way Home_, and there have been rumors that Maguire and Garfield might appear, possibly as alternate-timeline versions of Spider-Man. ---
**Author:** ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/38 "2021-06-20T04:11:02Z")
I’d sit this one out cap, these guys come from legend - they are basically gods - There’s only one god ma’am, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t dress like that. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/39 "2021-06-20T04:14:14Z")
@simster: that’s one of my very favorite lines from that film, and it’s perfect Steve Rogers. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634/40 "2021-06-20T04:14:31Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Amy Pascal will never, ever give up the Spider-Man rights that she somehow retained personal rights to, and without her concurrence neither can Sony regardless of how badly their “Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters (SPUMC)“ tanks. Until Disney buys Sony. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-the-mcu-what-is-a-god/944634.md?page=3)