NOTE ABOUT INFINITY WAR SPOILERS:
I realize that many people don’t consider anything that’s been shown in the trailers to be a Spoiler. I have made a great and, thus far, successful effort to not see any of the Infinity War trailers. I immediately hit MUTE on my T.V. and walk out of the room when a commercial comes on. I have, several times over the past year, walked out of movie theaters to wait in the lobby until the trailer has finished (for any movie I’ve seen that I thought might have the trailer, I have sat near the aisle so I could easily get up an walk out as soon as the trailer starts).
So, if you feel like you want to say something like, “Since we know that *** is going to happen in Infinity War, it would be good to re-watch…” PLEASE use spoiler tags.
On to the subject of the Thread…
I like the idea of doing a full MCU marathon before a new MCU movie but, damn, there’s a lot of them now! I think the last time I managed a full MCU marathon before a new movie’s release was for the second Avengers movie. I attempted it before Civil War but I just didn’t have enough evenings free, enough light work days to manage 2 movies in one night, or enough free time on my days off.
And it definitely isn’t going to happen for me over the next week.
Still, I want to try to do some kind of marathon because it’s nice to sink into the overall narrative arc and refresh anything from previous films that may get called back on. What do the big MCU fans among you think would make for the best abbreviated marathon? I’m thinking:
The Avengers (could skip, not because it’s not important but because I’ve pretty much got it memorized by this point.) Winter Soldier Age of Ultron Guardians of the Galaxy (out of order, I know) Civil War Doctor Strange (I don’t know how important he’ll be in the new movie but this is the one for which I’ve done the fewest repeat viewings so I could stand a refresher) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Ragnaraok Black Panther (Still in theaters, and I’ve got Movie Pass!)
Anyone who can count can see I’ll have to have at least a couple two movies days/evenings if I’m going to manage even this abbreviated list over the next week.
I might switch out the first Avengers movie for Iron Man 3. Like I said, I’ve pretty much got the first Avengers movie memorized and I feel like, for the new movie, it’ll be especially good to be well locked on to Tony Stark’s overall narrative arc.
This isn’t a bad idea. There are a few I haven’t seen yet, and I don’t know if there will be aspects of the storyline that I won’t pick up through context.
I haven’t seen either of the Thor sequels. I liked the first one well enough. But Thor’s always been one of those characters that never really hooked me into reading his comic, and that extended to the films, too.
I also haven’t seen the Black Panther film yet. But I plan to remedy that probably Monday. I tried to watch “Ragnarok” through a bootleg site (I know that’s frowned upon by some), but it was in Portuguese with no subtitles, so I didn’t make it very far into it.
My wife and I did the marathon last year up through Civil War, then watched Doctor Strange when it showed up on Netflix. Still have not seen Ragnarok, Homecoming, or Black Panther, and I have not yet decided if I should try to squeeze those in before Infinity War comes out.
Ragnarok would probably be worth watching since it’s a different, more enjoyable, tone than the other Thor flicks (which I was also lukewarm on) and because Thor has a couple significant things happen to him that I’m sure will be reflected in the upcoming movie.
Homecoming was fun and Keaton does a bang-up job as the villain but I don’t know if it’s required viewing to keep up with events. Worth watching on its own merits, just probably won’t leave any Infinity Wars holes if you miss it.
I think Civil War, Black Panther, and Ragnarok are the most important to watch, just to set up the “Where are they now?” Homecoming less so, just to set up the current relationship between Peter and Tony.
Since this is Infinity War, these are the movies to set up the Infinity Stones/Thanos:
Guardians of the Galaxy
Thor: The Dark World
Avengers
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Doctor Strange
I thought I was in the same situation, but this thread made me realize I also haven’t seen The Dark World yet. sigh
I’m planning to see Infinity War next weekend: I should be able to catch up on the Thor and Spider-Man flicks before then, but I can’t see getting to Black Panther in time.
Homecoming you can safely wait on, but Ragnarok has a lot of important changes for Thor and friends, and Black Panther introduces a lot of characters who look to be getting some decent screentime in the new movie, so might want to see those.
Eh, it forces people like me to see it at the theater… and spend that extra money. By “people like me,” I mean people who aren’t that into Black Panther and would probably have waited until it came out at home to see it. But since I didn’t know how essential it would be to Infinity War understanding, I went to the theater and coughed up the money. Sure, BP was a huge box office success, but I wonder how much of that was people who planned on seeing Infinity War, but weren’t that into the Black Panther character/backstory.
OP has a good list if you’re going by ones that set up the plot, though I think GotG2 is the most expendable. Presumably the post credits Adam Warlock stinger won’t be relevant to IW. If the events in the sequel set up the return to earth in IW, it’s not clear how yet, whereas they are explicitly going to earth in Ragnarok.
You could add some of the origin story movies if you really wanted to but then that lengthens your list considerably. As GotG are the most obscure property before the movies, maybe that first one is worth the watch?
Superdude Thor 2 is one of the weaker MCU movies (along with Iron Man 2), but Ragnarok is great fun. If they decide to kill off characters I hope Korg is okay!
My thinking would be one movie from each franchise. So far, the only multi-movie franchises are GotG, Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor (plus the Avengers-as-a-whole movies).
For GotG, I’d go with the first one, both because it’s better, and because it has an Infinity Stone. But other than that, neither one looks to be specifically relevant; more a matter of scene-setting that either one would suffice for.
For Iron Man, maybe the second one? The first is probably the best of the three, but it’s a bit outdated by now: Tony’s had a lot of character development since then. 3 would be even more character development, but I’m not sure it’s necessary, because he also features heavily in…
Captain America: Civil War is clearly necessary. It’s got almost everyone in it, including the most recent appearance for several characters, and also ties directly to Black Panther and Doctor Strange. You might also include another Captain America movie, just because they’re all quite good, but the other two aren’t necessary the way that Civil War is.
Thor, definitely go with Ragnarok. A lot of important things happen in it. The Dark World has an Infinity Stone, but that’s the only connection, and the only important thing to happen in it is re-capped in Ragnarok, anyway.
And then add Black Panther and Doctor Strange, and maybe Ant Man and Spider-Man.
My thought was that Thor 1-2, men of Iron, Ants, and Spiders, etc make good movies but they’re pretty standalone so as far as the Infinity War goes they’re not relevant. The upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp is apparently before the IW events despite coming out after.
Come to think of it, add the first Captain America, too. There’s some speculation that you don’t want to hear about which means that it might be very relevant.
Incidentally, am I the only one struck by just how many Infinity Stones were kept on Earth long-term? It’s like everyone said “Hm, what’s the most inconspicuous place where I could hide this?”, and everyone came up with the same answer.
That means Earth is kinda like the smallest uninteresting number: conspicuous because it is so supremely inconspicuous. By extension, there thus are no inconspicuous places in the universe. So where the hell should you keep an infinity stone? Might as well go with Earth…
Only two, unless that’s where the Soul Stone is. And the Tesseract was probably on Asgard until Viking times…a thousand years seems like a lot to mortal humans, but who knows how significant that is to folks like Thanos or the Collector or Odin?
And is Kamar-Taj fully on Earth, or is it essentially inter-dimensional, with access from Earth?