Marvel’s Hottest Directors Think You’re An Idiot 

By Chris Snellgrove
| Published 12 seconds ago

For the most part, I’m a big fan of the Russo Brothers. Some of their non-Marvel work has been pretty lackluster (like The Gray Man and The Electric State), but they still deserve kudos for bringing us superhero cinema like Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame. Before that, they also directed some of the best episodes of Community, arguably the greatest sitcom ever made. So, for all my misgivings about modern Marvel, I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard they’d be directing Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars. If anybody could breathe life back into this franchise, it’s going to be the guys behind the last two MCU projects anyone cared about.

However, my respect for these guys really went down a few notches when they made a recent appearance at SXSW London. The two were hosting a headline session called “Building Artistic Universes Without Borders,” and it didn’t take them long to start talking about their upcoming Marvel movie. At this point, Joe Russo made a startling statement: “We are back to phase zero. This is starting over from scratch. We want to make sure everybody feels like this isn’t leaning on anything from the past.” With respect to this acclaimed creator, this quote makes me want to ask a simple question of the Russos: just how stupid do you think fans really are?

You And The Cap’n Make It Happen

Obviously, the Russos aren’t going to spill too many beans about the upcoming film Avengers: Doomsday. Anthony Russo admitted that he and his bro were “exhausted” after Avengers: Endgame came out because there was a seven-year push to get that film off the ground. They were eager to move on and do new things, but writer Stephen McFeely gave them an unspecified “creative idea that reignited [the project], and I can’t talk about that creative idea, because it’s the basis for Doomsday, but that [idea] all of a sudden broke the skies open for us, and we saw all new kinds of possibilities with that idea.”

That’s when Joe Russo chimed in about Doomsday being a way to go “back to phase zero” and “[start] over from scratch. We want to make sure everybody feels like this isn’t leaning on anything from the past.” When he said this, it felt a bit like I was having a stroke. While we won’t know what McFeely’s cool idea is until Doomsday hits theaters this December, it’s clear that the Russos’ upcoming MCU film is leaning on things from the past in every possible way. For example, the movie is bringing back Chris Evans’ Captain America in a shameless attempt to put butts in seats.

He’s Gonna Take You Back To The Past

Robert Downey Jr. is returning, too, but instead of playing Iron Man, he will inexplicably be playing Doctor Doom. His return is even more shameless, and this is the second time Marvel Studios had to deliver dump trucks of cash to get Downey back after his contract ran out. Ironically, we were going to have a fresher villain in the form of Jonathan Majors’ Kang, but Marvel needed to replace Majors after he was convicted of assault and harassment. Downey may very well dazzle in this role, but it’s wild to hear the Russos say they aren’t “leaning on anything from the past” while bringing back the man who kickstarted the MCU in 2008. 

That also extends to the growing army of cameos in Avengers: Doomsday. So far, we know that we’ll see heavy-hitting MCU legacy actors like Chris Hemsworth, Sebastian Stan, and Tom Hiddleston. We’ll also be getting Thunderbolts actors like Wyatt Russell and David Harbour, some standalone heroes we haven’t seen in a hot minute (like Simu Liu and Letitia Wright), and all of the Fantastic Four actors (including Pedro Pascal). Perhaps most excitingly, we’ll see the return of classic X-Men actors like Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, and Hugh Jackman. 

Making The Fans See Red

Believe it or not, that’s just a tiny fraction of the returning Marvel actors that we know about. Obviously, the prospect of seeing so many heroes onscreen is exciting; it’s the cinematic equivalent of just dumping out the entire toy box and having madcap crossover adventures. But by definition, jamming as many returning MCU characters into a film as humanly possible is the opposite of “starting over from scratch,” a statement made by one of Marvel’s most successful directors as he gets back on the horse for one last ride into a superhero sunset.

Ironically, this empty attempt to market Avengers: Doomsday to the masses has made me more anxious about the film than ever before. If the Russos have something to say, they can just say it instead of making vagueposting statements that sound like lazy AI slop. Furthermore, they can promote their blockbuster film without outright lying to us and saying that a film built on endless legacy character cameos and made by returning Marvel directors “isn’t leaning on anything from the past.” Clearly, these guys think their fans are idiots, which leaves us with a depressing question: if this is how dumb they think the audience is, just how incredibly stupid will the movie actually be?