ScreenCrush: The Podcast! - Thunderbolts* was Released in the Wrong Phase - But Can it Still save the MCU?

Episode Date: May 10, 2025

Thunderbolts Review! itIt feels like every other project Marvel Studios puts out we hear MARVEL IS SO BACK! Shang Chi, Marvel’s Back. No Way Home, Marvel’s Back. WandaVision, Marvel’s Back. Wakanda Forever, Loki, Ms. Marvel, Guardians 3, Deadpool and Wolverine, X-Men 97, Agatha All Along, Daredevil, marvel’s back, marvel’s back, marvel’s back. How many times do they have to be back between their first post-Endgame project in WandaVision, and now with Thunderbolts for us to admit, maybe they never really left. BUT, even if in hindsight we do determine we were too hard on the o’l multiverse saga, that doesn’t change the fact that the PERCEPTION of the MCU has taken a massive hit. And despite Thunderbolts being beloved, I’m afraid it could be too little, too late. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey everybody, Colton here. And with the overwhelmingly positive reception to Marvel Studios' latest film, Thunderbolts, or I guess I should say, the new Avengers, can we finally say Marvel's back? Or maybe the more interesting question would be, did they ever really leave? I mean, it feels like every other project Marvel Studios puts out, and we hear Marvel is so back. Shang-chi, Marvel's back, No Way Home, Marvel's back, WandaVision, Marvel's Back, Wakanda Forever, Loki, Miss Marvel, Guardians 3, Deadpool and Wolverine, X-Men 97, Agatha All Along, Daredevil, Marvel's Back, Marvel's Back, Marvel's Back. How many times do they have to be back between their first post-in-game project in Wondivision and now with Thunderbolts for us to admit that maybe they never really left? But even if, in hindsight, we do determine that maybe we were too hard on the old Multiverse saga, That doesn't change the fact that the perception of the MCU has taken a massive hit.

And despite Thunderbolts being beloved, I'm afraid that it might be too little too late. Now, a little later, I'm going to be joined by my friends Tommy Bechtel and Mike Lawrence to get their thoughts on the new Avengers and the current state of Marvel Studios. And hey, be sure to check out our Thunderbolts with a Z sponsored by Shane Tyre's parody shirt. We have one for every member of the team. We've also got our The Thing and John Carpenter's The Thing poster, the America's As commemorative stamp, the I Hate You 3,000, and many more great Marvel-inspired parody shirts up on our merch store, screencrushmerch.com.

Shopping our merch store is the best way to support our channel so that we can keep making videos just like this one. So, don't get me wrong. The MCU certainly isn't the same as it once was. There have been plenty of clunkers in this saga. I'm looking at you, Secret Invasion. But part of me thinks that no matter how great the post-in-game era ended up being or not being, and I do think in hindsight it's actually probably better than we've given it credit for.

But regardless, the MCU really had nowhere to go but down after reaching the tippity top of the mountain that was Avengers endgame. I mean, even in the comics when they reached the end of a huge ground-shaking crossover event, they reset small and build back up to the next one because that's what makes those crossovers in the comics and in the movie. so great. It is those intimate, character-based stories that make us care about those big events. Without those small beginnings building blocks, you just, I don't know, you get dawn of justice. Why didn't you say that that? And, you know, I remember being nervous before Avengers Endgame even came out about where they were going to take this franchise after that finale. I mean, this is my livelihood after all. But there were ways to continue after In-game and do it successfully.

And it all comes down to pacing and story structure. And I'm not talking about the structure of the movies and shows themselves. That's a whole other very important conversation. But I am talking about the structure of the wider story from a per project basis. And the overarching story that you were telling to build to that endgame level event film. Let me explain. So sure, you were going to have to regroup and start small after the Infinity saga. It was super important for Marvel to build their way back up.

But it seemed like they were in a really big hurry, and you would think that they would have known by having already done this successfully the first time around, and seeing what happened to the DCEU when they tried to race to the finish, they needed to take their time. Marvel really could have crafted that inevitable descent from the heights of endgame and prepped for their gradual reacension instead of rolling down the top of the mountain like Chris Farley and Black Sheep. What in the hell was that all about? They could have saved this entire franchise from ever having its status questioned by doing one simple thing. Not putting the Thunderbolts movie in the wrong fucking phase. Stop! Where are you?

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Now, back to what I was saying. So despite loving Thunderbolts, my biggest complaint with this movie is that it didn't come out sooner. And I don't mean like literally sooner, this 2025 release date is actually fine with me. Marvel has been putting out way too much stuff and honestly they have oversaturated their market. To best serve the story of Thunderbolts, it should have come out before all of these other movies and shows that good or bad were nonetheless a distraction. A simple reshuffling of the mere order at which these exact same projects were released could have saved the MCU from ever falling into the category of mid. What made the MCU so great was its dedication to putting

characters first, and Thunderbolts has done that brilliantly. Bucky, a character who's been in this franchise since phase one, is now in a leadership position and they look up to him and he represents the kind of hero's journey that they are all longing for, breaking from your dark and heinous past, and successfully being perceived as a hero by the public, even winning a congressional seat. Granted, it's not hard for a criminal to get into Congress, but you get my point. Yelena, John Walker, Alexi, Ava, Bob, they all have darker halves that for most of them were explored in previous projects telling a linear story that general audiences could follow project to project had Marvel stayed focused. So, in case you haven't been keeping,

keeping up Thunderbolts is the final film of Phase 5, but what I'm saying is it should have been the capper to Phase 4. And I don't mean that in like an arbitrary way, that labeling of the phases isn't really what matters. But the order in which you tell your overarching story in an interconnected franchise does matter. A lot. So again, I say this movie belongs in Phase 4. You know Phase 4, the phase where all of the characters in this movie were being set up for a desperately wanted and needed team-up movie that we as MCU fans had come to expect and look forward to. But for some reason, Marvel decided early on that it would be a good idea to make a whole other phase of unrelated, sporadic, disconnected projects in between this movie and the

projects that were directly setting it up. I mean, seriously, look back at the trajectory we were on. Elena, Alexi, Valentina, John Walker, Bucky, and even Taskmaster were all set up years ago in phase four within about a two-year span, and Ava Star's ghost was introduced at the tail-in of the Infinity saga with Ant Man and the Wasp. We were going strong. We had post-credit scenes and crossovers happening that were leading us straight into the Thunderbolts. Sure, there was some other unrelated stuff coming out as well. We had No Way Home, Multiverse of Madness, Shang-chi, Eternals, Love and Thunder. My God, that is a lot of stuff. But that's fine. Those can stay. I don't care. I just want to know why in God's name would they do all of this.

this setup, all of this character development, all of these post-credit scene teases for this Thunderbolts team up movie, just to have them sit on a shelf for years while they crank out a whole other phase in between that features none of the Thunderbolts. Okay, Bucky was in Brave New World for like a minute, but seriously, look back at phase five,

the phase that Thunderbolts is the cap or two. None of these characters have had anything to do this entire phase. We haven't seen any of them since like 2022, And that span of time would be unfortunate, yet forgivable, have we not been given like 15 other projects in between? Marvel has released five movies and 11 seasons of television since we last saw any of these characters

or heard a damn thing about any of their stories. This is my job, and even I was having trouble remembering what all they had set up with Valentina and the crossover teases with these characters that they were setting up what feels like it was years ago. This would be like if back in phase one, Marvel made Iron Man Hulk, Captain America, and Thor and then paused to make 15 other unrelated things before making the Avengers. I mean, it is criminal, the disservice that was done here to these characters and the story that was put on hold so that they could crank out all of this unrelated content. Black Widow, Hawkeye, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Wakanda Forever were weaving the thread of this Valentina Allegra character in a villainous Nick Fury type role, placing this team of unlikely heroes.

together and then that all kind of just stopped and was forgotten about and you guys know how there are like those recuts of like different movies and tv series that make the project way better like tofer grace he famously recut the prequels into a more cohesive story there's a great recut of the canobey series that actually makes it watchable i feel like i'm picking on star wars sorry it's not disrespect master it's the truth anyway i'm beginning to wonder if we did like a van recut of the multiverse saga's phases and the release order of these various projects, would the story and the overall reception become better? And I think it's pretty undeniable that it would. Now, here in a second, I want to give my verdict on whether or not Thunderbolts was

to save the MCU. But first, I want to hear from my friends Tommy Bechtled and Mike Lawrence to get their thoughts on Thunderbolts and the impact that this movie will have on the greater MCU. All right. Well, those are just my thoughts. Now I want to get the thoughts of Tommy Bechtold and Mike Lawrence. Guys, I really enjoyed this movie despite my complaints with when it is being released in the overall multiverse saga. Mike, what were your thoughts on Thunderbolts slash New Avengers? Slash the most decent James Gunn movie James Gunn didn't direct. It is hard not to, I even saw the director bring up. It is hard not to compare. It is hard not to compared to this to Suicide Squad and the, I think it is much better than the 2016.

I think it pales in comparison to James Gunn's 2021. And it even has the guardians feel of the scrappy people that come together. We shouldn't be a team, but we're a team. So I liked it. I think what saves it is the performances. I think Pew is fantastic. Oh, God. Not as good as her uncle Pepe Le.

But she's awesome. Harbor, again, ghost doesn't exist when Harbors on screen because he's eating all the scenery she could phase through. He put it on the poster. He's having a blast. Viola Davis is better than Julia Louise Dreyfus in this exact same role. But she's fun. I just think, yeah, the, you know, the void stuff, like that made me feel a little bit like

enchantress that the most powerful member of your team is also the villain of your team but it was well done and I thought that actor Bill Pullman's son did a good job my big thing about this movie and I haven't seen anyone

else say this is the whole thing they keep mentioning is we're all killers right or is Ned Flanders would say we're all murdered earlier's but all of the Avengers are killers iron man had so many you know kills in that first movie let alone all the people that died because of his arms deals thor has been battling for thousands of years Hulk wakes up on dead people you know black widows killed

as much if not more than elena uh taps a soldier and hawkeye you know even before he was ron he was a soldier So this idea that the original Avengers are these pure, nice characters, and these are the scumbags who can't get over the murders they've had. It's like, no, you guys are amateurs next to the Avengers in terms of the amount of people you've killed. So the movie in that sense is a false premise to me. Mike, you're not watching enough screen crush. I just said this in yesterday's video. No, but really, I completely agree with you. I was making the point that I think this whole beef they're setting up between Sam and Bucky is I think we're probably going to hear Sam say something insensitive like the new Avengers cannot be a team of killers and then I did a little bit of a fan fiction moment where I'm like, Bucky's going to say, man, Tony was a killer, Hulk's a killer, Thor's killer, Black Widow went to the same red room, Steve and I did stuff we weren't proud of when we were in the military. I think you're making a fantastic point there.

killed the franchise. She's a cinematic universe destroyer. Tommy. Oh, and also, I, Mike, to your point about Florence Pugh, that where has she been? They have a powerhouse here that could have totally carried this franchise post-in-game. She was in the Rocks, WWE movie, fighting with my family. Yeah. Don't worry, darling.

They just binched her. That's right. Yeah. She makes this movie. I completely agree. Tommy, what did you think of Thunderbolts, New Adventures? Yeah, I, you know, I echo a lot of these sentiments. I mean, I think this movie kind of, you know, is a long-awaited answer to that question, right?

And that's kind of what a lot of the shortcomings of the MCU have been, is we've been, if we've introduced and introduced and introduced and introduced and introduced and not followed up. So we're finally getting that follow-up. I very much enjoyed this movie, as I've said, on other videos. but I, yeah, I think fundamentally they kill off probably the most dangerous person, which would be Taskmaster, like immediately.

Like, right, she's the one that was like, kind of, she probably was the one that was continuing to do the most bad. And, like, they were like, all right, well, we'll give her one line in a death. At least they let her take her Tony Starkified mask off for a second. So Ogo Kirolenko gets one second of actual screen time before the stunt double went in and did the heavy lifting. But I...

You've talked about this movie. that much that you can pronounce that actress's name correctly. Listen, I'm just a big Kirillenko head. What can I say? You haven't seen Tommy's tattoo. Yeah, you know, I'm a member of an old agarkey. You can master all the tasks. It's topical, it's hot, the kids are loving it.

Everyone loves my tattoos. I, yeah, I'm a big fan. I thought this movie was great. was great. Julie Louis Dreyfus, I think, is so over the top as veil, but it works. Because it makes the unbelievable thing she does slightly more, like, believable because the character is so outrageous. Like, in the end, luring them into the press conference is like, to me, it's like, aren't they all a little smarter than that to follow someone through a hole in the fence? It's like, no, they're so blinded by how, like, how wrong this woman has been to them. They're like, get her. And then they just end up having to, you know, smile at a press conference.

So, you know, we've all been there. Well, you know, you both make just such great points about this great cast and what they did with this movie. And it just makes me all the more angry that they pretty much kneecapped this film by not delaying it or anything. They always had the plan to release it at the end of face five. They always had the plan to do all of this other shit before they got to Thunderbolts. And I just, I don't know why. Even as somebody who it's my job to talk about this stuff, I was struggling to remember. I was like, okay, and what happened in the post-credit scene of Black Widow? And then she recruited Walker, like in Captain America and Winter Soldier, right? And then, oh, there was something in Hawkeye with Yelena. It just, they completely abandoned

that storyline, it feels like. And I think they're going to come to regret that. I think you have to look at the movies, the way that you look at the comics more so in the sense that when a new writer takes over, they play with the stuff they like and they ignore the stuff they don't. Yeah. This illusion that comics have been so connected and faithful to continuity is not true. Yeah. People have been putting their babies over other people's babies for years. in comics and it's like i mean you look at this movie right and and like i said because of the performances and stuff like that i was able to enjoy it like if i look at those things if i ask

myself where is shield if i ask myself well who is the president now that ross isn't there right i can just keep doing that yeah and um and and and and and i don't think like these these movies weren't made to tell the most complex story ever these movies were made to make money And at the end of the day, if you're entertained, that's what matters. I mean, I think when we get so in our heads about all of that stuff, I mean, they've had so many political figures and liaisons, right? Where's Maria Hill? I mean, no Nick Fury's in space, but there's all these other politicians and stuff, you know? And if you really look deep into it, then none of it makes sense.

I think Maria Hill's dead. have to just to enjoy it for for for what it is i think and um and i and i think this movie does a good job of that at times like i even though i do have that this does feel like the suicide squad bias i was able to look past that when i'm in the theater watching the movie yeah of course yeah Tommy what do you think about that did am i being too hard on the fact that they put this movie out what I would say like way way too late and I don't know why that was ever the plan or do you think that general audiences are can they keep up with it all I just feel like Marvel has put out just way way way too much stuff to tell this I think that's exactly it

that's exactly it it's impossible to put out all of this content with all of these different characters and then keep them kind of in the conversation continuously like shang she is just like been gone for half a decade now we're just we're like well we know that simuloo luckily is you know for better or for worse kind of ubiquitous in the hollywood conversation you know he's in the Barbie movie so we remember that actor but like other than that it's kind of like well now we have the announcement that he's going to be in doomsday but so we know that we're getting him then right like that's other than that we're kind of like that that entire subset of the MCU has been completely forgotten. So, yeah, I don't think what you're saying is

unjustified at all. I think it's, it's just kind of, this is, I hesitate to make a sports analogy. I won't get it, but this is, so this will go over, this will generate a lot of hatred, but it's like when teams overspend on their rosters and they go over the salary cap, they then have a few years where they have to use those players, like, or they have to like fill in the like the gaps and they end up not being able to put out as good of a product for the following years it feels to me like marvel at a problem where they introduced all of these projects and they weren't all as interconnected as the earlier phases and now they have to play with these pieces but they're like oh this guy who we haven't seen in three Marvel projects

is suddenly coming back and he's going to get serious reps on this team you're going to have to remember what a contributor he was to the team four years ago And it's hard for a viewer when we have so much content now outside of just the MCU. I mean, on Disney Plus alone, there's Star Wars, there's Marvel, there's Disney Studios, there's anything that goes on Hulu or FX. Like they are competing for Brain Space with 10X what people had to compete with even a decade ago. So it really is a tough, tough challenge. And I think it feels to us who spend so much time focusing on it,

if even we are struggling with the placement of the project like imagine what the average MCU viewer is struggling with it just kind of goes and sees these movies recreation yeah and there's the retcon too that like everything from iron man to end game was perfect and it wasn't of course there was a lot of filler uh we didn't love all those movies he's thor too no iron man too was generally kind of reviled by marvel fans yeah even you know it's like when i started doing a watch along with my family around the time of COVID, I was like, yeah, we can skip an Incredible Hulk. We can do this, we do that. But you won't recognize the Hulk anyway, if you watch it. Yeah, sure. Wait, that's a different guy. And then, and then Brave New World comes

out, and you have to know so much about the Incredible Hulk. So much. And to bring up Brave New World in comparison of this, like, if you're asking me if this came out too late, I would say yes, in the sense that this should have come out at first instead of Brave New World because I think the momentum would have been much stronger. I think Brave New World felt more like a TV show than a movie. Yes. And I think it lowered the standard of, there's things in that I like. I love those whole subplot with Isaiah. I say subplot because it does get pushed back, but I like Sam and Isaiah's relationship in that movie, there are things I like in there. But at the end of the day, when the dud comes out first and then this has to follow it, I think it kind of tarnishes it a little

Well, they, they completely kneecapped Brave New World with Falcon and Winter Soldier, I think, because Falcon and Winter Soldier was what the story of the first Sam Wilson Captain America movie should have been. But instead, they, you know, they did the TV show first. Mike, you took the words right out of my mouth regarding like the infinity saga. There were plenty of clunkers in the infinity saga. And so I think I'd be interested to see if you took the infinity saga and the multiverse saga and you put, you know, you separated the good ones and the bad ones. I wonder if there's like a, you know, an equation that could be had that says, look, in terms of ratios, in terms of percentages, there's the same percentage of shit content in the multiverse saga as there is the

infinity saga, the Multiverse saga is just way bigger. So I think you make a really good point there. But the thing is like, and I've done stand up for almost 20 years, the thing in entertainment, especially in live performance, your opener and your closer have to be very strong. And Iron Man was a phenomenal opener. And Endgame was a great closer. And people remember what they first saw and what they left on and if there was enough decent stuff in between then it was wonderful and now we're trying to judge all this new stuff based on that and i i think in some ways it's unfair to the new stuff i think you really do have to judge these things uh based on a case by case basis no offense the screen crush in its entire identity in the last year or so but this idea of is the mc u you know ruined

Can this movie save the MCU? It's just clickbait because it's like, let's just judge the, sorry about your business model, but let's just judge. I just work here. I know. Ryan just has a garret. I love Ryan, but like. Kill switch. No, but it's interesting when I read the comments, people will say, and I agree with these specific YouTube comments, not the ones that say I'm an unfunny piece of garbage, although I do.

agree with those too um but but the ones that say like can we stop judging like can we everything's you know doom and gloom or this is the best thing ever like this is a very good movie it is not a phenomenal movie it is not a horrible movie it's a very good movie and sometimes that's enough i agree yeah well it used to it used to be and i think like just a you know i've i think that kind of what has happened is almost more so kind of citizen reviewers have started to make every movie all or nothing yeah like it's the discourse online has totally become like is this movie the death now of this franchise or is this movie the you know donated kidney that's going to resuscitate this like dying franchise and it's it's like every single piece of online discourse outside of even youtube channels i mean like you could have just a simple tweet being like wow thunderbolt was really great. MCU is back in form and it will preside like underneath the comment section of the tweet will be people responding to it being like MCU's been dead for 10 years these things

were bad or MCU never died and how dare you say that and everything basically to get engagement now on tweets on Instagram posts on anything you have to put stakes to it like it needs to have this like and I get I do understand that but it gets exhausted well yeah we're no longer writers we're the newsies right we're all about it extra extra emcee you dead and we are the kings of new york mike i've always said that and i was gonna say well with our boy christian bail uh you make a good anyway you make you both make a good point that it it makes it hard to have an honest conversation like i i can't tell you the amount of times that i have been called a marvel disney hater Yes.

Oh, I give a negative review of every single thing that Marvel puts out. Oh, this is shocker. Colton said something negative about Marvel. And then I get the exact same amount of comments saying the exact opposite thing. I'm a shill. All I do is praise Marvel. I'm like, people just hear what they want to hear, I think, but you make a good point. Mike, when we were hopping on waiting for Tommy, who was late as usual and he needs to get back to work here soon.

I do have to get back. My break is almost up, Colton. you're going to get me fired from this place. Mike, you were, you weren't too happy. He works for the Detroit Tigers. I'm the manager. Yeah, he's the, he's the George Costanza of comic book commentary. He was asleep under his desk.

But you weren't too happy about the, uh, the title change. So I wanted to get your thoughts on that. I didn't like the title change because one, I think it was too early and it wreaks of corporate desperation. So you mean the reveal, like after the first weekend? The reveal, yeah. I mean, look, like this movie did decently, you know, percentage-wise, it did about as well as sinners, but did not get any of the criticism sinners got.

By the way, go see sinners. Oh, sinners is phenomenal, yeah. But, you know, that movie, like, I thought, I think overperformed for what it was and got these negative, you know, criticisms. And this movie, I think, underperformed a little bit. bit and it's got nothing but positives but I think based on the way Marvel is acting it seems like they didn't think it did that well because I don't think you've changed the name of your movie three days in if you're super confident about how it's doing and I also think that

this is just an overall thought and this is something I think that they used to do really well that they don't anymore and maybe it is more a part of the culture and the way things are now but i really believe that spoilers when when you announce things and you just give everything away i i don't think we should know that dr doom is even coming yet let alone who's playing him let alone every actor that's in doomsday the fact that they announced actors from this movie in doomsday and in the ff that i know that there's no stakes in this movie or that movie because of that but also think yeah like the discovery we got to see nick fury we got to see that version of Thanos at the end of Avengers that poor actor who thought he's like I'm gonna be the next big

film I'm Thanos yeah hear me roar he's like honey open your copy of Iron Man 55 that's my first appearance but the idea that we now leak everything and that the companies are doing it Like, that's the worst thing. It used to be like, hey, fans don't spoil things. Like, I think the reveal of the new Avengers in this movie is an important plot point. And it's an important character moment. It is Contessa's defining moment in this movie because the whole time you're thinking, oh, man, she's done. Everyone's trying to get her, and they finally prove she's corrupt.

and then that moment of the press conference and everything, that is a really big part of this film. And now you've taken the win out of those sales. Not to mention they lifted their own gag from Falcon and Winter Soldiers, which ends on a title card change to Captain America and Winter Soldier. It's literally the same thing they did for that. And they're like, look. Right.

It's like, movies can change, guys. They can change their title. I also, I thought that, thought the revelations of the doomsday casting announcements really hurt this movie because anyone going in looking i guess they would have been disappointed with the film but like it took away any suspense of this being a suicide side squad style movie i mean like they basically told us taskmaster was dead with the trailers but then once we saw that all of these actors are going to be in doomsday it's like well they're not dying because that marvel marvel won't commit to variance like

even though this is a multiverse saga it's like did you guys see that show that show in the trailer where they're all in Avengers Tower, and for the trailer, they, like, put Taskmaster in. No, that's great. I didn't even notice that. But it's like, it is like, I want, it'll be interesting to see in the years to come how that role changed because in early promotion, she's just in the team where they're in the bullet thing where they're all laying on the bullets, her name is in the promos. And by the end of it, the trailer's listing the five names and her name's not there.

You're like, oh, that can't be good. that could be good and i think a top five bungling of a great comic book character to the screen and and that's what's interesting too when fans like complain about gender and everything it is not the gender thing that is the issue here it's the character taskmaster is really funny taskmaster can go joke for joke with deadpool yeah that's master's like one of my favorite characters in the Marvel comics because he's basically like, yeah, I kind of just do this for money

and I don't give a shit. Like, that aspect of the character is completely gone. And even like, I didn't love the end credit sequence in this movie because, I mean, I know I already saw Doomsday announcement, but now I especially know the Fantastic Four is fine. Right.

And I like the illusion of thinking they're in peril, even if they're not. Yeah, I don't know that they're universe. is fine, though. I don't know. How amazing would it be, though, if that ship lands. All of their trinkets at home are gone. Dude, if that ship lands and only Herbie gets out, that would be awesome.

Well, guys, this is a really great conversation. You two are two of my faves. Tommy, Mike, thank you so much for joining me. And now I want to share with everybody my thoughts, my verdict on whether or not and I'm playing into Mike's entire criticism here, Can the new adventures save the MCU? Okay, so for me, what made the MCU grade was two things. Each movie was its own, well-made, well-crafted story that could stand on its own,

but it also tied into an episodic, grander story that was carefully crafted by Kevin Feige, essentially acting as a showrunner, but for a cinematic universe. But that was lost in the multiverse saga, and it feels like they just threw a bunch of shit against the wall, hoping that it would stick. and I think that that could be responsible for the MCU being in the volatile state that it is in. I mean, if you look back at the Multiverse saga and all of its projects and you put each one into a thumbs up or thumbs down category, I don't know about you guys, but for me, most of them are going to go in that thumbs up side. The only truly awful project for me in this saga, I think, was Secret Invasion,

and a lot of the projects in this saga were at that same level of greatness that we would expect out of the Infinity Saga. And sure, there were more projects this saga that are more in the vein of like an Iron Man 2 or a Thor of the Dark World. Not bad, but not great, but they're still better than a lot of the slop that usually hits our screens. And I think, had these stories simply been told in a cohesive order that didn't feel so haphazard and disjointed, it would have better served the saga as a whole, and it would have set Thunderbolts up to be an even more successful movie. But having said all of that, the fans and the general audiences do seem to be forgiving of these missteps, and they are very happy with Thunderbolts, me included, and very excited for the Fantastic Four and Avengers Doomsday. So let me know your thoughts on all of this down in the comments below,

or you can find me on our Discord link in the description. If you're new here, be sure to subscribe, smash that bell so you get notified every time we upload a new video. For Screen Crush, I'm Colton Ogburn. I'm going to be. I'm going to be able to be.