Wow. Color me shocked, 3.5 readers. I think Marvel has its very first flop on its hands.
BQB here with a review of The Eternals.
At the outset, I think this movie suffers from the same problem as The Fantastic Four. Too many characters without enough time to explain who they are and what they are doing. At least with the Fab 4 there are only four but here there are like a dozen so throughout the movie you’re like, “Wait? Who is that again? Whoa! Who is that?”
The plot? A race of immortal beings was sent to Earth thousands of years ago, tasked with saving humanity from the deviants – i.e. giant space monsters who like to eat humans. They have been given strict instructions to keep a low profile and blend in and under no circumstances can they interfere with the affairs of man, thus explaining why they never helped the Avengers battle this villain or that one and so on. For some reason, they are allowed to help humans with technological advances but they have to take a powder when humans use that tech to slaughter each other because humans will never learn how to be good unless they first make the mistake of being bad.
So, alright. A movie about immortal beings who spend eternity in the shadows, doing illuminati stuff to advance the world. Sounds interesting but then, um…I don’t know. There’s um….some frigging giant space man in space that they talk to and they start fighting each other over whether they should save the humans from themselves and um I get confused but I think the giant space man who I guess is their boss intends to blow up the planet and harvest it for its energy or some such nonsense and the immortals have to decide if they should save the humans from their space man boss and OW! I think I had a brain aneurysm from thinking too much.
Seriously. Holy shit. Therein lies the rub. Comic book movies shouldn’t require anyone to think this much. I’m not saying there isn’t room for thinking, but when I need to bring a flowchart and a slide rule into the theater just to keep track of who everyone is and what they are doing, blech. Fahgeddaboudit.
It has its moments. Kumail Nanjiani brings needed levity as an immortal who is in love with himself, having spent the past 100 years as a Bollywood movie star.
But then again, it has its strange moments…like, for example, why is Angelina Jolie, the hottest woman in the world, relegated to a bit part? I guess because she’s playing the hottest immortal but still. Kinda feels like this movie might be beneath her.
STATUS: Wow, I can’t believe I’m doing this but this is the first Marvel film I’m going to rank as…NOT SHELF WORTHY! To quote The Critic, “It stinks.” It really does. There are moments toward the end where it teases a forthcoming sequel and this is the first time when I’m like, “Nah. That’s OK. Don’t bother.” It’s also the first Marvel film that I wouldn’t bother watching again when it hits streaming.
I mean, there’s a lot of visual beauty to it and it’s very epic as it takes us through thousands of years, showing us what the immortals did through various periods of human history but um…honestly the plot is so convoluted I’m still not sure what it’s about.
We’ve entered Marvel’s scraping the bottom of the barrel phase. No more Captain America, Iron Man, Thor or Hulk. Now it’s those characters that only the real hardcore deep diving nerds know about. Shang Chi kicked it off and was pretty decent but I’m not sure where Marvel goes from here because if the Eternals are part of the big ensemble that will eventually be recruited to fight off the next big bad…I mean, I’m not going to pay to sleep through another movie so…
Yawn.
Bookshelf Battle 