When talking about the state of the Western film industry, there is no elephant in the room bigger than the colossus currently crushing the market that is the Marvel Cinematic Universe, known colloquially as the M.C.U..

What began as a hilariously far-fetched plan back before 2008 to create a consistent set of film series, all sharing the same continuity across different writers, directors and crews out of a comic book company’s B-list characters, has since destroyed all expectations that were originally set out for it. Admittedly, had they gotten as far as a handful of films without the whole project falling apart in an embarrassing mess that would have also exceeded expectations. However, the unprecedented level of success this series has is worthy of examination.

To say that these films came out at the right time is true, but also does their creators an incredible disservice. Lots of films came out at the same time and not all of them have achieved anything close to what Marvel has done. What did make Marvel’s movie universe work so well? I believe that part of it came down to what could be seen as its hardest starting point; their lack of A-list characters. With the possible exception of the Hulk, none of the characters Marvel had the film rights to were household names you could expect every man, woman, child and pet to know of. The likes of Spider-man, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four were all locked away with other studios, who had all conveniently recently soured their name in films with their less than stellar sequels. With Spider-Man 3, X-Men: The Last Stand and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer all failing to please due to the common mistake films make of being awful, these well known characters were not doing so well in the public eye. Another entry for one of these would be a poor way to start off a multi-branching story, but a more-or-less unknown character like Iron Man had no prior expectations.

Marvel brought something brand-new to the table of comic-book movies, with a crowd-pleasing, well put together blockbuster that paid a faithful tribute to the character’s origins. A lot of Iron Man seemed to set out to break the rules for superhero films, mostly in the protagonist. Tony Stark is not exactly heroic in the traditional sense. He is self-absorbed and has to be captured by terrorists to start to see the consequences of his family weapons-dealing business and retains his arrogance and recklessness for about 11 years of films after this. Yet his wit is likable and he does take the first steps to undoing his negligence. The big rule-break came at the end though, when Tony announces to the world that he is Iron Man. It may seem like nothing now, but this was a big deal at the time, and really made it seem like Marvel was going to shake up the superhero formula. Continuing this success, the first Captain America and Thor films may not be as of high quality as Iron Man, but they still brought fresh characters into the mix and by then rumours that they were bringing all of their characters together for a team-up film brought audiences in anyway. Then it happened. In 2012 The Avengers was released, became a roaring success and Marvel cemented their brand and the cinematic universe was born. A realm of storytelling possibilities unparalleled in its potential was ready to be used, and it was used well.

I will also argue that while the series’ success is in part due to the quality of their films and decisions made regarding how they were to build them, Marvel were helped immensely by the age of the internet. Around the time that these films were rolling out, online content creating was really hitting its stride. Social media was in full swing with Facebook and Twitter opening the floodgates for everyone to have a presence online (for better or much much worse…), which would help for spreading news about these films and their cast. The big one however, was Youtube. Online video creation would be the biggest advantage for Marvel, and many other film studios, as hundreds upon thousands of channels would be created over the course of this cinematic universe’s lifespan, where nerds would discuss, parody and build excitement for new installments. Internet series like Screen Junkies’ Honest Trailers, Everything Wrong with…, Mr Sunday Movies, MatPat’s Film Theory and Screw Attack’s Death Battle just to name a handful would turn their fans into MCU fans by creating supporting content at no cost to Marvel or Disney.

While these films have mostly been high-achieving both commercially and critically, apart from a few unimpressive misfires, they have in more recent years drawn criticism from many angles. Veteran director Martin Scorsese gave one that particularly stood out, partly due to it being played out in the media long enough for it to be annoying, where he said the films were, “not cinema,” and compared them to theme parks instead. As is inevitable with these sort of statements, the world took one look at this and decided that Mr Scorsese believed these films were a blight on the planet and confirmed everyone’s worst nightmare that entertainment is being dumbed-down, no original work will ever be produced again and art itself is at risk of dying out! None of this is likely true, comic-book based superhero films are just what is popular at the moment and eventually audiences will move on to liking something else, and then the next generation of cynics will complain about that and the cycle will keep repeating itself. Until of course cinema actually dies out from something completely unrelated like a world war or pandemic.

That is probably why many fans of Marvel found found Scorsese’s comments so egregious. He is a very well respected director and figurehead of the industry, so his opinion obviously carries a lot of sway. But expecting Scorsese to like superhero films is similar to expecting a shark to enjoy a salad. He, unlike today’s teenagers and young adults who make up the majority of Marvel’s audience, did not grow up in the time when superhero films were the most popular form of cinema. His generation liked their type of film and this one likes another. What he likely meant, is that the Marvel films are not cinema to him, which is a perfectly fair point. No one has to like anything just because it’s popular and any piece of art can be criticised as long as the criticism is valid and can be justified. They are different from what Scorsese and many others understood to be films growing up and during their professional life. In so many ways is he correct. When I watch any film made by Disney, I cannot help but feel slightly cynical over some of the choices made and how much of it is down to making the company more money, not just in ticket sales but also through merchandise. For example, in Spider-Man: Far From Home why did Peter Parker have three different suits? Was it to represent his character progression and him building the final one himself shows that he is stepping out of Iron Man’s shadow to become a hero in is own right? Or was it so Disney and Sony could sell more bloody Pop Vinyls? I have no way of proving which is true, but the fact that the latter is there at the back of my mind is slightly ruining these films for me and likely for many others as well. In other generations this was likely still present, but it was at least less obvious. As we move into later and later capitalism, we begin to become more aware of how pervasive business is in every aspect of our lives and when it comes to take over art in the way that it does here, people understandably become very upset.

I find it very difficult to summarise my thoughts on this series, partly because it has not yet finished and shows no signs of doing so. Black Widow is being released this summer and Disney will soon start releasing TV shows on its streaming service that are directly connected to the cinematic universe, furthering widening its scope. Overall, I do still find the series enjoyable and look forward to future installments. I remember my inner child grinning during the final battle of Avengers: Endgame where I got to see characters I could all name fight through an alien horde, and the number 3000 has a new significance for me, yet I cannot help but think the series must end one way or another. As mentioned, criticism is increasing and I think it will only be so long before the whole thing crumbles under its weight. Not everyone will have the time or patience to keep up with all the TV shows and films, and the novelty of the shared universe will wear off once someone else manages to do it successfully (DC may have a second attempt coming up).

That being said, part of me does want it to end. The MCU is one big story, and a story needs an ending. While unlimited sequels and spin-offs sound appealing, the only way this ends positively for Marvel is if they end it on their own terms. If the series had finished with Endgame, it would likely be fondly remembered as a landmark in film history. If they prolong it, eventually people will get bored and move on to something else or they will make series of bad entries that destroy the public’s faith in the series (see literally every other film franchise). Essentially, I want it to stop so that I can remember it fondly. For it to stay great forever, it needs to end.