We criticize the things we care about because we want them to do better. So when I say that in the decade that has passed since Captain America: Civil War, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has largely failed its female fans, please note that I am doing it out of love for a franchise I enjoy and care about deeply.
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On certain corners of the internet, certain men (not all, you’re welcome) have dubbed latter phases of the MCU the “M-She-U” for a perceived overindulgence of inclusive storytelling. Frankly, I wish I lived in their reality. From my perspective, the MCU has done an overall pretty bad job supporting and representing women on screen. From Marvel the corny and mockable lady team-up moment in Avengers: Endgame, to dropping new and old female characters like hotcakes and not standing by actresses and women directors who receive vitriol, it has been a rough decade. And forget about romance!
Black Widow felt like too little, too late.
Let me be 100 percent clear: I enjoy the 2021 film Black Widow quite a bit. The tone was refreshing and felt like reading a Black Widow comic. The opening credits sequence was rad. It introduced Florence Pugh’s Yelena Belova, who is about as perfect as MCU casting and characters get.
But the MCU should not have dragged its feet giving Scarlet Johansson a solo film. Black Widow should have been made and released after Captain America: Civil War when it takes place. I can’t deny that since the movie takes place out of continuity, as Natasha Romanov had already died in the current timeline of the MCU, it was more of a consolation prize than a victory.
Speaking of female characters dying…
Spoilers for, IDK, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The last few years have been brutal. Pretty much every major and several supporting female characters from early phases have been taken off the board, especially in the ten years since Civil War. Gamora died in Avengers: Infinity War. Nat obviously died in Avengers: Endgame. As far as we know, Wanda died in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. An alternate universe version (or variant) of Peggy Carter, who died in Captain America: Civil War, got got in Multiverse of Madness. So did a variant of Maria Rambeau, whose sacred timeline version died during on WandaVision. Ajak died in Eternals. Jane Foster got superpowers and died in Thor: Love and Thunder. Sorry to bring up Secret Invasion, but Maria Hill died in the first episode. Aunt May died in Spider-Man: Far From Home. Taskmaster died in Thunderbolts*. Agatha Harkness died in Agatha All Along.
Even Black Panther: Wakanda Forever killed off Queen Ramonda. My question is, did this not start to feel like overkill at any point at Marvel Studios HQ? (Maybe it did, actually. When even Sue Storm died in Fantastic Four: First Steps, she was revived by her infant son.)
I am well aware that Iron Man died in Avengers: Endgame too. Vision died, infamously, in Avengers: Infinity War. I know that Steve Rogers dipped to ruin the perfect ending of Agent Carter season 2 live out his suburban dreams in an AU 1950s at the end of Endgame too. I know that Loki is a tree. We’ve lost many male characters over the years as well. This isn’t a competition. But Chris Evans, Paul Bettany, Tom Hiddleston, and Robert Downey Jr. remain gainfully employed by the MCU.
Do we even need to get into The Marvels and/or She-Hulk?
It’s hard for me to even talk about what happened there. A film that was funny, colorful, and character-driven in all the ways I want from Marvel Studios was practically dead on arrival. Certain so-called fans made up their minds that it was terrible before it was released. It did not help that Marvel Studios too eagerly threw director Nia DaCosta under the bus. We haven’t seen those very good characters since.
She-Hulk: Attorney At Law received some ridicule online as well, as did a handful of other projects that tried their darndest to reflect the diversity that has been in Marvel comics for decades on screen. It’s not lost on me that Chloe Zhao’s Eternals, a superhero team with excellent gender parity, has been more or less dropped and discarded by the Powers That Be. Ironheart and Echo were dropped on Disney+ with minimal fanfare. It’s laughable to think that the MCU is catering too hard to women. They’re barely trying.
They made Blake Lively, in a Deadpool and Wolverine cameo, make a meta joke about everything sucking after Endgame. Reader, I think that hurt most of all. First of all, don’t involve her in this! She’s got enough going on. Second of all, it’s not true. Since Endgame, the MCU has made a lot of really good movies and shows. There have been, to my mind, as many interesting choices as awkward misses. But because of public perception, my occasionally high opinion comes across as a hot take.
The reported cast of Avengers: Doomsday is a sausage fest.
Of the twenty-seven cast members revealed in the infamous chair gimmick, only six are women: Vanessa Kirby, Leticia Wright, Florence Pugh, Hannah John-Kamen, and Rebecca Romijn. Where are all the female heroes?! Why is this movie so overwhelmingly male? It’s exhausting. To be fair, Hayley Atwell is almost certainly in the movie too. But she didn’t get a chair. Chris Evans was also not on that initial list. So the ratio remains the same. They would need to add like seventeen female characters to the cast, and no more men, to have it even at 50% male to female.
The sad thing is that I could easily name more than seventeen female characters in the MCU who aren’t in the cast of the movie without breaking a sweat. Not to go all “binders full of women” on the MCU, but they totally exist.
Just for the sake of exercise: Captain Marvel, Kamala Khan, Monica and that one Maria Rambeau variant, She-Hulk, a Wanda Maximoff variant, Agatha Harkness’ ghost, Agatha Harkness’ girlfriend Rio, Miss America Chavez, Kate Bishop, Jessica Jones, Rogue, Storm, Jean Grey, Xu Xialing, Pepper Potts, Wasp, Cassie Lang, Nebula, Mantis, Darcy Lewis, Okoye, and Ironheart. I could keep going! I didn’t even name a single Eternal! Justice for Sersi and Makkari!
It feels as though the folks at Marvel Studios learned all of the wrong lessons and are taking the safe (read: cisgendered, male, white) route going forward. Boo, boring!
Maybe they’ll do better. It would be great to not mourn any more female superheroes, hear them make weird problematic metaphors about motherhood written by men, or get female empowerment keys jangled in front of me. Fingers crossed that I don’t have to suffer another “woman too powerful, goes crazy” storyline á la Wanda and Jean Grey. I would love to hope. I love all of the characters in the MCU. I want to stick with their stories. But if they don’t care about me, is it really worth it? Do I owe them my hope, after all these years? I honestly don’t know.
(featured image: Marvel Studios)
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