The Problem With Marvel's Phase Four Writing
Marvel Studios’ last two big-screen releases, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Thor: Love and Thunder, have highlighted a prevalent issue in Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Both Multiverse of Madness and Love and Thunder were praised for their stunning visuals, committed performances, and memorable use of music, like Doctor Strange’s musical note fight and Thor’s Guns ‘N’ Roses needle-drops. In fact, the MCU’s two most recent movies have been acclaimed by critics for just about every aspect except their writing.
These two less-than-stellar screenplays suffer from the same problem that could permeate throughout the rest of Phase Four. Multiverse of Madness was written by Loki creator Michael Waldron, while Love and Thunder was written by director Taika Waititi in collaboration with Jennifer Kaytin Robinson. Both scripts are let down by disjointed pacing, tonal inconsistency, and on-the-nose expository dialogue ignoring the crucial “show, don’t tell” rule of storytelling.
One MCU Movie Has Already Set The Entire Tone For Phase 4
That’s because they don’t follow the compass of a single cohesive storyline. Instead, both movies took a wish list of ideas, characters, and plot elements and crammed them into a perfunctory narrative as opposed to coming up with a core story and building the ideas around that. Multiverse of Madness is jam-packed with disconnected plotlines: America Chavez’s origin story, Wanda’s transformation into the Scarlet Witch, the introduction of the Illuminati. The actual backbone of Strange’s arc – his quest to find true happiness – is hastily tagged on in a couple of lines of dialogue. By the end of the movie, this mechanical plot thread has no real resolution.
Love and Thunder
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