ScreenCrush: The Podcast! - SECRET INVASION Midseason Review - Is The Show Failing?

Episode Date: July 8, 2023

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Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. You got any more abuse you want to hurt on my way? Hey, welcome back Screen Crush. I'm Ryan Erie. So, are you guys enjoying Secret Invasion? Like, I'm kind of split.

Like, I like it. It's no Loki, but it's, like, way better than Sheehawk. But it doesn't feel like as big as this story should be. Now, a little later, I'm going to be joined by Colton Ogburn and Alicia Grouseau to get their thoughts on this. But first, here's my take. your problem with the show. Okay, well, two things. First of all, the show is not like the comic book. That was an amazing, huge crossover which touched like every title in the Marvel Comics line. Now, the MCU has adapted these same crossover stories, but they do it in a single

movie. Avengers Infinity War was the Infinity Gauntling, Captain America Civil War, adapted the Civil War Comics crossover. You get the idea. Paring down these crossovers into a single movie does work better for this medium, but those movies still felt epic in scale. Secret Invasion does not feel epic in scale, and it should. So in the comics, Secret Invasion was a major, major turning point in the universe. It's when the sins of the Illuminati came back to haunt them. Public faith in heroes fell apart. Norman Osborne was put in charge of the Avengers.

I'm something of an Avenger. Every single superhero was under suspicion of being a scroll. The heroes had to fight off a scroll invasion armada. It was a world war with aliens. The TV show is taking one small story from that crossover, Nick Fury hunting down scroll operatives, and they've gotten rid of like, everything else. And this is following the MCU playbook. They paired down the Infinity trilogy into a character-driven movie where Thanos is the protagonist. Civil War became a character

drama where Steve had to choose between his old ex and a shiny new friend. Wow, Civil War has the same plot as Sweet Home Alabama. Yeah, it sure does. He's about to get the proposal of a lifetime. Sweet Home Civil War. Hey, what's that your drinking there? Why this? Why, this is my daily dietary supplement called AG1. They're the sponsor of this video. So I've been drinking AG1 for about a year, and it's become a very important part of my daily routine. Oh, what's it too? Well, Doug, this is what we call a foundational nutrition drink. See, we're all busy at summertime. We're out doing things. So AG1 is the best way to make sure that I get all the vitamins and minerals that I need throughout the entire day. It has 75 different ingredients,

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8 ounces of water. I like to add in the immune supporting D3 plus K2. You shake and then you're good to go. Plus they have these travel packs which makes it so easy to keep this part as your daily regular routine. Say that is easy. Right? So if you sign up with the link in the description you get a free one year supply of the immune supporting D3 plus K2 and five travel packs with your first purchase. Just click the link in the description to get started on your first purchase of AG1. Now back to secret invasion. I don't have a problem with this story focusing on Nick Fury. And I really have to shout out some positives here. This show is giving us some of the best performances

we've seen in the MCU. This is Sam Jackson at his best, his most nuanced, and Olivia Coleman is chewing through scenery like this is the last role she's ever going to play. Alone at last. Now, shall we do this the easy way or the other way? Hell, the scene with Rodey and Fury is their first meeting on screen, and it does not disappoint.

The reason we wrestled this power from mediocre men who don't look like us was not simply to turn around and hand it to mediocre men. who do. These are two world-class actors just getting to roll through some really strong text. But 95% of this show takes place in small rooms, small sets, or maybe even on the volume. Whereas it should feel big. Instead, it's on Disney Plus. And this is what I really want to talk about. The Disney Plus Marvel shows aren't really delivering like they could be. I mean, look, I love them. I hope they keep making them. And I've liked every show. I just like stories set in the

MCU. I devoured every second of Agents of Shield and flipped out at moments like this. to Lou Murray and star immediately. Three days later. I told you, Shield doesn't negotiate. But you can't deny that as far as budget quality and scale, we're getting diminishing return on these shows. Are you mean by that? Well, let me run through a history of the Marvel Disney Plus shows.

They were first announced in the spring of 2019 just before Avengers Endgame. Disney was preparing a rival streaming service to compete with Netflix, and Marvel was going to be the crown jewel of this new service. That first announcement included WandaVision, Loki, Falcon the Winter Soldier, Hawkeye, What If, plus most of the face four movies.

Note, though, that all of these shows involve the movie characters on the small screen. Kevin Feige said that they were excited to have a new format to tell stories. I mean, episodic TV is more similar to the comics' original format, so it seemed like a perfect fit, and Wanda Vision fit that format perfectly. You cannot have told that story at any other medium. It had to be a TV show. Falcon the Winter Soldier also looked fantastic. That opening aerial canyon chase could have been in any MCU film.

Sure, the show had its problems. As the excellent channel, Din of Nerds pointed out, they had to rewrite the show to get rid of a plague storyline but still the show retained the big budget feel and then loki which you know like all of you guys i love and loki did match that episodic tv format but think about it for a second if loki had the budget of a movie we would have gotten lots of cool locations as he skipped through time instead we got small locations like in pompey we just like stay in one alley and then we go to like mostly abandoned alien quarries now loki did have its show pieces like the single shot on the dying planet that was filmed in the volume very awesome but for the most part the show did not

break the bank. Well, wait, right about Hawkeye. Hawkeye was like a Shane Black movie. It was perfect for TV. So that was year one, with Disney releasing the streaming shows that they couldn't finish until the pandemic was under control. But then, something happened.

It's been rumored that Disney's new CEO at the time, Bob Chapic, was scrambling to create more Disney Plus content. After all, it was the pandemic. And Disney had, like, no revenue. Andor was greenlit with a ridiculous quarter of a billion dollar budget. And thank God, because that's the best show on Disney Plus. So in this streaming gold rush era, Marvel starts to really ramp up their show,

shows. We had three waves of Disney Plus announcement. The first was in April 2019 that we just talked about. Then, in August of that year, a D23, Marvel announced Moonnight, Sheehawk, Ms. Marvel's Secret Invasion, and the two special presentations. Now, these were the first Disney Plus shows and introduced new characters instead of continuing the stories of the movie characters. Now, all of this was planned out under Bob Eiger in the pre-pandemic pre-Bob Chapic era. But then, just two years later on Disney Plus Day, the really weird wave three of Disney Plus shows was announced. There were animated shows like X-Men 97 and Spider-Man freshman year, but then we also had Echo, Marvel Zombies, and Agatha Coven of Chaos, which was later changed to House of Harkness.

Right, is that? I think it's the other way around. No one cares. And that's my point. Wave 3 was all spinoffs of Disney Plus shows instead of bringing movie characters to the small screen, like what we saw in Wave 1. And they also weren't introducing new characters like Wave 2. This third wave seemed very reactionary, like someone at the top was going, oh, that Agatha song, that went viral, make that show. Now, look, the Agatha show might be great. I love Catherine Hahn and anything. Because I'm smarter and faster. That is not a judgment.

That's just a fact. But like, I didn't walk away from Wanda Vision thirsting for a new Agatha show. I'd rather see a show about sour cream vision or Monica Rambo. And as for those wave two shows, Shehawk, Moonnight, and Ms. Marvel, we really started to see some strength. Like, I don't understand why Moon Knight was a show. That story would have worked way better as a movie.

And Shehawk needed a big movie budget for, like, really obvious reasons. And Miss Marvel at different points was incredible, like the high watermark for an MCU storyline. But then at other times, times the low budget and rust production really showed through. You're right. And now echo is, I'm hearing so bad that the new Disney regime is dumping it out on a single day. So what's going on here?

Yeah, what's going on here? Well, Doug, it's pretty simple. They're overdoing it. Phase four had more hours of programming than phases one through three combined. The studios have been stretched thin, and it's making their stories slide backwards into mid-territori. So many of the phase four and five-fifference, should have been home runs. The Eternals, Ant Man 3, hell, Sean Qi should have already had a sequel out. The first new standalone character of the Multiverse saga and no sequel.

Because they're doing too much, they're introducing too much new IP, not bringing the characters together for a team-up film, and the production quality is suffering. Like, look, I loved the Shehawk comic. The show had so many perfect elements in place, but the production budget just killed it. It had too many episodes, rearranged the order of episodes, and then ordered a new ending at the last minute. And then they introduced Scar and World War Hawk in the lamest possible way. This is my son, Scar.

And so all of this brings me to the much delayed show Secret Invasion. We've got the first big episode set piece with the terrorist attack and then a few cameos from supporting characters from the movies. But otherwise, this show feels very low budget compared to what a movie would have been capable of doing. And don't get me wrong, you can have a low-budget spy thriller, like the 70 spy genre was filled with low or mid-budget classics. But this show should feel like a sequel to the Winter Soldier, and it doesn't. It barely even feels like it's in the same universe.

I keep watching it and thinking, there's no reason for this to be a show. The story would have worked better in a movie. The episodic format is stretching the story too thin, like butter over too much bread. Most Disney Plus Marvel shows are like this. Shehawk Moon Knight, it would have been better movies, whereas like the Eternals really should have been a show. Go back to that original announcement when Feigey said that Disney Plus was supposed to offer them exciting new ways to tell these stories.

I don't feel like Marvel has been using Disney Plus in the right way. Look, superhero shows are nothing new. When Wanda Vision debuted, we'd already seen 100. of hours of the C.W. Aroverse shows and several seasons of Agents of Shield. But Wanda Vision was not just a superhero show. It was the MCU on TV. But now, Marvel feels less special. Not because there are too many shows, but because the quality is kind of sliding backwards. Again, Secret Invasion is a really good show, but it would have been a great movie. But that's just what I think. I'm joined here by two of the best. We have Screencrush's own Colton Ogburn and Screen Rant Lead Features

trainer Alicia Grouseau. So I'm really excited to talk to the two of you about this. Alicia, I want to start with you so you know what do you think of secret invasion so far you know i like it i think there are a lot of really good elements and the acting's phenomenal i'm not sure it's quite jelling um fully together so far and i hope it does uh so i feel like there are a lot of really great elements um the acting's phenomenal the chemistry between ben mendelssohn and samuel Jackson is like for me the spine of the show and I think telos I think it's his story even more than nick furies my issue is that the one thing marvel has always done really really well like even when their stories have been in even is character they've always known their characters they've

always nailed their characters this nick fury feels like somebody completely different and I know that's part of the story like I know though you know they're reiterating you're a different man, you're, you know, not the same. I get that. But this almost feels like he had a personality transplant. Like, it's just a very different way of playing it, and I'm not sure it's earned. Just a follow-up, do you think that's in part because we haven't seen any of these things happen to him? We've just heard, you went to your space station, you weren't the same after, instead of actually seeing him come back from the snap and have that moment of realizing, Oh, my God, I'm pointless, and I have no say here.

And it's a lot of telling not showing. Do you think that's the reason why? I think that's why, yeah. I mean, there was that one scene that showed the flashback to him, you know, getting dusted. And then that's about it. But, like, there's none of the backstory. There's none of the backstory with outside of Captain Marvel. There goes one of the cats.

Outside of Captain Marvel. you don't really get a sense that, like, it's hard to believe all of this was happening behind the scenes. Like, oh, okay, Nick Fury's married? That I can believe. Like, elements like that and the scrolls helping to build shield up, we've got a, had a video come out yesterday that was a lot of fun where we talked about Hydra. To me, that is just one of those, like, you can go back in retcon and have a good time with it. But I think you make a strong point about how, you know, this is a few. character, Fury, who we've never been able to see what's going on behind the curtain,

so much so that now it feels like it's a totally different guy. But maybe he's a scroll. He's, that's one, I'm like, is he a scroll? I have a theory about that, but we'll get to that later. But like, he's, he just feels real, like, like, he was always Samuel L. Jackson being Nick Fury. And now it feels like Nick Fury as Samuel L. Jackson. like he's a lot more like lucy-goose and like just vase fair and mean like he does not treat hell as spary like it's just

and maybe that's PTSD I don't know it just feels like man there's a whole lot more that we need to see of what happened Nick Fury to for me to like get on board with this character I think you raise a good point about Fury not necessarily feeling like the same person Colton what are your your thoughts on the show so far we're at the mid-season point now. I'm really enjoying it. I mean, I don't know if that's worth anything coming from me. I also really like the Flash, so, but I'm really enjoying it. I've liked most of the Disney Plus Marvel shows. And I would say this one's pretty up there for me. Maybe I'd put Loki above it, and that's about it. I adore Ben Mendelssohn. I think he is carrying this show. He's so great.

like he said his chemistry with Sam Jackson I'm really enjoying that um this series it's different it not just from the other MCU series but the movies as well like the MCU always has humor which I enjoy I love that the MCU incorporates a lot of humor this show is not that funny and it's not like they're trying to be and it's not landing they're not really trying to be they're going for a serious, dark, like, eerie feel for this show. And I'm enjoying that. It feels cinematic. I agree with Ryan. It should be a movie. A lot of the shows they do should have been a movie. I feel like I have that critique just about every time now. And I would agree that, yes, Marvel is stretched thin. But if I take that stuff out of consideration and judge it for what it is, I'm

enjoying the show. So it's interesting that when you look at this in the context of Disney Plus shows as a whole, right? Because when Disney Plus shows started, like I was saying earlier, it seemed like an almost anti-CW universe. It wasn't Marvel and TV like Agents of Shield. It was the MCU and it just happened to be on TV. And since that wonderful first year, you know, I know we were at the time like, oh, Falcon and Winter Soldier seems a little uneven and Hawkeyes is what, you know, we can make nitpicks and complaints. I don't. think you can deny that that 2021 was by far the best year for for marvel streaming colton where are you at on like the overall status of disney plus shows obviously we've scaled back this year

too we're supposed to have like a show a day a show a week but now we've pulled back to like two and a half shows well i i'm glad they're scaling back you know it's it's been confirmed i think fogie has said they're going to be scaling back um i know with bob eiger being back at disney he he also wants to scale back on the amount of tv shows and whatnot And I think that's a good idea. I like getting lots of Marvel shows and movies. I love Marvel. But not to the extent where Kevin Feige becomes stretched thin

and everything starts feeling disconnected and not, you know, well made and just lacking that feel that you get with an MCU project. You know, I remember how it used to be when an MCU movie came out. out, any MCU movie came out, it was an event, you know, just as much as an Avengers film was. Now it's just kind of like, oh yeah, there's another one up on Disney Plus now. So in terms of Disney Plus and making MCU series, what I would like to see them do is not say, oh, we've got this character, let's do a series. I think for them to do a series, the story needs to call for a series. Like, it needs to be a story that could not be done as a film. You know what I mean?

Like Wanda Vision. Yeah, Wanda Vision's a perfect example. Like, there are certain stories that call for a certain link and character development and having, you know, an episodic type thing. But other stories do not. And I think what they're doing is they are not choosing wisely what they make a show and what they make a film. Alicia, do you think that part of that reason for what Colton just said is Disney is going through and maybe making a determination, not based on the story, but on the character, and saying, well, we don't necessarily think a Shehawk movie would do well, or probably more likely if we don't have the rights to a Shehawk movie, Universal does.

Well, we don't know if Moon Knight's a big enough name. So let's make that a series instead of a movie. Do you think that's the determining factor here? Maybe under Chapic, but most of the same. Most of them, I mean, his tenure was so short-lived that most of these were already in motion. I don't think it's as much about brand name. I mean, they made a talking tree and like a raccoon, like, two of the most beloved characters ever. So I don't think, you know, character recognition.

And people forget, too, like when the adventurers first started, Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, they were not Marvel's, like, top tier A-list. Because those belong to all the other studios. Spider-Man. Yeah, there were articles. Like Marvel's B team, you know, that I remember. Yeah, and so I don't think that's the issue. I think the issue is they were trying to, this is going to sound really cynical, but I may have been in this industry for how long, so let's just tell it like it is.

They're trying to get a more diverse and younger audience to Disney Plus. And I think it's great. I think absolutely we need stories. Like, I loved Ms. Marvel. Like, Amon Villani is a revelation. Like, she's amazing in the role. I thought Moon Night was fantastic, but I think the problem is when you've spent 10 plus years with this handful of characters, like the original Avengers that you love, and now they're trying to introduce all of these new characters all at once, there's no, there's not been time to really, like, connect with them. And even, you know, in Secret Invasion, like two characters we've seen the most, you know, like Maria Hill and Everett Ross, like, you know.

And then the one character that we did get introduced to, we barely got to know her and she may be dead. She may not be dead. Like, it's very hard, I think, now they've, they've kind of written themselves into a corner because they're trying to. trying to cater to a much wider audience, which is necessary, but it's been making it really, really hard to create these universally beloved characters that everybody rooted for when there's like dozens and dozens and dozens of new characters being introduced. Yeah, like, where's my Shang Chi sequel? I keep thinking about Shang Chi. I'm probably going to do a video on this, but Shang Chi is the original, I believe up to now, the only movie that's introduced a new original character that's not like a sequel

or a team film like The Eternals, right? So we got this guy, and in the old MCU, when it was so few movies, you know, we would have had something by now. And a Shang Chi 2, a team up, something like that. But he's just out there. He's been there for, hell, if we don't see him till Secret Wars or Kang Dynasty, God only knows when we'll get a chance to see him. Now, you know, there's rumors that Brave New World's going to address the lack of the Avengers,

and we've got a video coming up about that. But it does feel like there's this lack of connectivity. And the Disney Plus shows, in theory, are a great way to create that. connectivity. You know, we could have, you could pay an actor to stop in for an episode of a show. The production time is a lot shorter on TV shows. You don't have to worry about distribution. Like it should be this wonderful connective tissue, kind of like what Agents of Shield was for a couple months in 2014, you know, when, when her soldier happened. Do you are, Alicia, are you getting that from these Disney Plus shows now, or do they almost feel obligatory for you?

they feel obligatory again it's hard i i really do enjoy and have loved some of the the disney plus shows not all of them feel necessary to me or like colton said not necessary as series you know episodic series when they could be movies um i think part of the problem too is i can't imagine the work that went into building up the threads and all these storylines to culminate in Infinity War and Endgame. Like that, to me, I still don't think we give Marvel enough credit for just even pulling that off.

But now they're trying to tell these separate stories that aren't as connected to the MCU, but now it kind of feels like, okay, well, where are we going with this? Like, this is great, but we watched these movies because we loved the team together. where's the team who's coming together like what's you know um we don't really see these characters interacting anymore like the first time we'll really see any new characters interacting will be the marvels when we see miss marvel and monica rambo interact with carol danvers they're just doing too much all at the same time i think it's right for them to slow down and focus on doing fewer things.

I just hope they're focusing on the right things. Like, again, to me, I'm enjoying Secret Invasion. I don't see why we needed it. It could very much have its place. I can't get past that it feels like a bigger story than we're seeing. You know, why they added this flimsy excuse in the first episode about not calling in superheroes to help out. And it's a stupid excuse. Like, well, okay.

So he said, I don't want people, I don't want people to think the heroes are scrolls. What would happen is the scrolls would become one of these heroes, and they'd have to be like, hey, there are scrolls on Earth. People already know scrolls of Earth, right? Oh, you mean like the comics? Yeah, like, you mean. Right, right, right. But couldn't they do that anyway? What does them coming in have to do with it? If they want to emulate an Avenger, they can emulate an Avenger.

Well, here's the thing. Yeah, exactly. Like, the Avenger should be in it. Okay. Like, I keep thinking Sheehawk should be in the show. you know like they might be leaning that way though okay because the voice on the phone was that rody that was rody okay i'm like that's 100% that's rody so right is he a scrawl is he not a scroll is she a double agent working for rody who's good and sure is it a scroll pretending to be

rody over the phone yeah and it's it's a lot of like yeah there's just a lot of stuff that it feels like I like that Marble is trying to give more free reign and kind of be more creative like I love that. I love that they're getting weird but it just feels like it's almost too much now. Like did we really need Ant Man 3 to introduce like the Kang version

of Kang? Well I like I want to say I'm enjoying everything just about that they're putting out. The problem is what they used to be able to do was they put out something good that then built, yeah, and they would build upon one another. Now it's like, okay, they do this good thing,

and then there's this other good thing over here, and it's just, like, linear. Like, it's all staying on the same level. There's one post-credit scene that, like, links them together that you have to see. Like, you didn't have to watch six episodes, but you had to watch this one specific scene. Yeah, and like, yeah.

Of course, you know, we watch it all. We enjoy it all. Yeah. But general audiences, they're, shows and their movies are not marketing one another like they used to. I still think, though, like, maybe this is my comic book bias. When I look at Secret Invasion, I think, imagine if Secret Invasion would have been done in an Avengers movie.

And you would have had Tony Stark, Captain America. Like, imagine seeing those guys dealing with the scroll invasion threat. That's a better story than the personal spy drama we're currently getting. The Winter Soldier is a better, is a personal spy drama. that's better than the one we're currently getting. I mean, imagine, like, Cap and Black Widow sitting across from one another and trying to figure out, are you my friend that I've been friends with for how many years and that we've, you know, or Natasha and Clint, like, one of them might be a scroll.

Like, that is, that's such stakes to me. Or like in the comics, Linda Cardalini Mockingbird. Yeah, or like, as opposed to like, oh, Everett Ross was a scroll. Okay. And then it goes nowhere. Yeah. And he'll probably not be a scroll at the end of the series. Yeah. By Everett Ross, I guess. By Maria Hill, I guess. Right. This story should be... Thanks for your service.

Yeah. This story should be earth-shattering, and it's probably not going to be. It's going to be contained to this series, and that's it. It is not going to have the ramifications that secret invasion should have. Yeah. Like, this is truly... I think that's part of it, too. And Ryan, you mentioned earlier that it feels like the stake should be bigger. And I think that's part of it where, like, it keeps telling us things instead of showing us things.

It keeps telling us this is a world and it keeps telling us this is a huge event. But it's like, but you're not showing us that. You're not showing us why, you know, that the scrolls have gotten to the highest levels of power, except for that one random scene where it's like, well, yeah, of course the Fox News stand in is like a scroll. like yeah we basically every single face we saw on television was a scroll for later oh yeah oh Tucker Carlson you know wannabe is a scraw right right um so you know like it's just very it feels so intimate I was thinking about I was like man really the only characters we've gotten or what like Fury Talos Gaya she'll be back she will I think she will and then

What's her name? And then the... Oh, so good. She's great. I love Olivia Coleman. But like, there just aren't many... She's so good in this. And Olivia Coleman,

Academy Award winner Olivia Coleman on this show. Like, this should be blockbusters. But they're all very... But even within the show, they're all very disconnected. The only two characters you really see together are Furin Talos and, you know, and Gaia together with a couple of people.

But, like, not even... It's not even like the Winter Soldier where it was like Cap and Black Widow were like... together, you know, throughout the whole thing. Like, they're very separate and it just doesn't, I just don't know. It's like just the scope and the stakes just aren't matching up with the story. See, I think you hit the key word there, which is scope, right?

I keep bringing up, oh, it should have been a movie. But why say that? You get less time with a movie. I think it should have been a movie because the scope is bigger. The scale is bigger and the budget's bigger. When I talked earlier about Wanda Vision and Falcon, like the opening Canyon Chase and Falcon the Winter Soldier, that looks expensive. Like that belongs in a movie. It's exhilarating. I think we're seeing a scaling back of budgets, more stuff filmed in the volume, and it just feels smaller.

Colton, when you talk about how this show doesn't feel like it's going to affect anything else, I think that's because it's filmed in single small rooms, notwithstanding the bomb. the set piece in episode one that I talked about earlier, which all the Disney Plus shows seem to have like that episode one set piece. We're just like I think you'll at least you talked about Ms. Marvel, right? Great show. Beautifully. She's great. Everybody's great.

And they integrated the text messages and the art direction design. And then you get that really cheap stuff. And they dropped it. With the Jen and the portal and her going oh, you're right. And walking in like terrible, terrible like very obviously we ran out of time and money, so let's make Shehawk look like a Sims

character. We're getting a lot of that, and it's just making the stories feel small, and they shouldn't be. They should be events. I think what you and Colton said have crystallized something for me, and it's that secret evasion is trying to do

the tone and the feel of Winter Soldier, but the scope of an Avengers movie, and those two things don't match, because the Winter Soldier was a paranoid, 70s-style thriller. And it was really about, like, just a couple of people on the run, you know, and chasing down one guy. This is a whole, like, globe-spanning huge scope, but it's set in these, like, claustrophobic,

these small settings, like train cars. And I think the biggest set we had was, like, the big open market with the explosion. But, like, it's train cars. It's small, like, factory, like, freezer, you know, meat lockers. and it's supposed to be adding that sense of paranoia. But it's not really, like the pieces around it aren't really like the music of Winter Soldier. Like the Winter Soldier's theme is still one of the creepiest, eriest themes. I don't really feel that with like the trappings around this.

Like it's trying to be a paranoid thriller, but it can't be that intense and intimate because of the story it's telling. So those two things, the story and the tone just aren't like matching up for me, I think. Well, and the other thing that the scope of a film provides with the runtime of a film, you are forced to focus on your story. Like you mentioned with the shows, like they're running out of time and doing all this other. That's just filler at a certain point. It's just not needed filler. a movie you were confined to maybe like two and a half hours max to tell your story and that

confinement helps you cut out the fat whereas instead if you have a TV show I mean this is only six episodes and I'm worried that they're still going to feel like they need to stretch the story more than it needs to be yep like don't get wrong I love and I don't want it to slip into CW territory like I don't love Olivia or I love Olivia Coleman but I how could her character not have just been Val, like the Contessa? And you replace her with Contessa, and we get more of her. They do essentially the same exact thing. She actually has ties to Everett Ross, and we get to see more of her development

for the upcoming Thunderbolts movie or whatever project she pops up in next. And don't me wrong, again, I love Olivia Coleman, but she's yet another new character that it's like, okay, well, if we never see her again after this series, like, okay, like, that's fine, you know? I don't know. I'd like to, I mean, she's a glorious umbrage of the NCU. I'd love this leader again.

I think, like, I think she fulfills the same role that another newer character could have fulfilled. And we actually, like, had her story more built out, you know? So. You're not wrong. Yeah, I agree. All right, well, guys, I'm going to have to wrap it up there, which is a shame because I'm very much enjoying this conversation.

Colton Ogburn, where can the people find you? You can find me on Twitter for now. Colton Ogburn and videos here on ScreenCrush. And Colton's currently shopping for a blue sky invite. If any of you out there have one, Alicia Grouseau, where can the people find you? Well, Twitter, for now, we'll see. I'm actually at Alicia Grosso. I'm on Blue Sky now.

Colton, I will give you an invite if I can find one. And basically all the normal ones, Instagram, Twitter, spoutable now, too, all underneath my name, Alicia Grosso. Fantastic. And I got to recommend both of these people for follows, both for their opinions on film, and Alicia's always posting amazing pictures of her cats, which I cannot recommend highly enough to all of you out there, cat lovers or no. But we want to hear from all of you guys. What do you think about this? You can add any of us on all those social media platforms we just mentioned or talk to us in the comments below. Hey, if it's your first time here, welcome to the channel. Thanks for watching all the way of the end. Make sure you subscribe and smash that bell so you don't miss a thing. For Screen Crush, I'm Ryan Erie.