A Teaser to a Teaser to a Teaser

Avengers: Doomsday, the fifth Avengers film in the franchise and the big first part of the conclusion to The Multiverse Saga, is one year away, and Marvel wants you to get hyped. Last May the studio put out a big teaser for the casting for the film, which was really just a row of chairs with actors’ names on them. Before that they hyped up at Comic Con that Robert Downey, Jr. was coming back to the franchise, this time as Doctor Doom (a curious move fans are still debating). But now, with one year to go, Marvel has started the next phase of the hype train: four teaser trailers to try and get people interested in the film.

Is it working? Hard to say. There’s no doubt that The Multiverse Saga was a massive failure for Marvel, between attempting to launch it on the back of a villain, Kang, who (for various reason) then had to be scrapped from the plan, to putting out a bunch of films for heroes that were then just as quickly forgotten about afterwards. Recently Marvel has had a string of failures in theaters, with few, if any, of their films actually even making money, let alone even breaking $500 Mil at the Box Office. It’s a stunning turn for the studio who, just a few years back, couldn’t help but print money with success after success.

Marvel needs this Avengers film to be a success, but largely fans don’t seem that interested. Even these trailers don’t seem to be generating the kinds of buzz that the studio likely expected. Maybe it’s just that fans are tired of Marvel films, but it could also be the teasers themselves. The only way to know is to dive in and see what each of them presents so we can tell if Marvel has found the right solution to their own theatrical doomsday or if this may lead to the first Avengers film that doesn’t feel like a cultural event:

Captain American Will Return…

The first of the four teasers released introduces us back to Captain America, good old Steve Rogers. We see him driving up to his house on his motorcycle as the familiar strains of the Avengers theme song play in the background. He goes in, packs away his Captain America suit, and then picks up his baby that he, presumably, had with Peggy Carter. “Steve Rogers is a dad, and he has something to fight for!” the teaser seems to be telling us. It’s positively straining for us to care. But, well, honestly there’s not much to this teaser to get me interested.

I like Steve Rogers, and I think Chris Evans was fantastic as this version of the character. He was great, and I absolutely loved seeing him whenever he showed up in one of the Marvel Cinematic UniverseWhen it first began in 2008 with a little film called Iron Man no one suspected the empire that would follow. Superhero movies in the past, especially those not featuring either Batman or Superman, were usually terrible. And yet, Iron Man would lead to a long series of successful films, launching the most successful cinema brand in history: the Marvel Cinematic Universe. films. But Steve has already moved on. He got an ending back in Avengers: Endgame, and he passed off his shield. His arc, no matter how you looked at it, was closed. Moreover, we have a new Captain America, Sam Wilson, and I like Anthony Mackie in that role as well. It feels like Marvel is giving shirt shrift to Sam just to trot Steve back out for one more nostalgic ride.

This first teaser really didn’t do much for me, and it seemingly didn’t really get the fans going, either. Top comments on the teaser note that it looks less like a superhero film and more like a Family Insurance commercial, or that Disney is going to keep trotting out Chris Evans to play this role until he’s 90. And yeah, this doesn’t feel like a trailer; it’s commercial nostalgia trying to get us hyped just because an actor we like is returning to a role. I need more than that and this first teaser doesn’t provide it. Maybe the film will justify having Steve return, but this doesn’t get my hype going just yet.

Thor Will Return…

The second teaser focuses on Thor. As we last saw him in Thor: Love and Thunder, the god has adopted a child and is now a father, not a hero. We see him in the woods, praying to Odin, the All Father, for protection and guidance. He had to fight one last battle, defeat one last enemy, but he wants to come back to his daughter so he can be her light and warmth. It’s a touching moment, sure… but it also feels manufactured just to try and make us care about Thor one last time.

Unlike with Steven Rogers, Chris Hemsworth’s Thor has never actually left us. After Avengers: Endgame he got a fourth movie, with the hopes that it would lead to even more adventures for the god of thunder after that. However, most audiences didn’t like Thor: Love and Thunder (even if I thought it was decent enough), and the god has been missing from Marvel storytelling (aside from a few cameos in animated shows) since Phase IV. I don’t think fans are itching for his return. Hell, like with Steve, he got an ending. He has a daughter to look after. He can foster the next generation. This fight is no longer his. The arc is closed.

Trotting Thor out feels a lot like trotting Steve out, trying to play on the nostalgia of a familiar character played by an actor we like. But in the case of Thor I don’t think anyone was asking for one last ride from the god of thunder. This feels like Marvel not really knowing what to do so it shows us one of the only living Avengers still around, desperately hoping we still like him. We do… but we don’t need him. He could stay retired and I think we’d all be happy.

The X-Men Will Return…

Now here’s a curious one, but I would argue not curious in a good way. In the third teaser we come into the ruins of Xavier’s School for Gifted students (which we know because we pass over a sign for the school), while Magneto, as played by Sir Ian McKellen, narrates about fate and duty and all the stuff he’d lecture about. Then we see him and Charles, as played by Patrick Stewart, exchange a smile, realize it’s time for one last ride, all before the scene cuts to Cyclops, as played by James Marsden, take off his goggles on the battlefield and give out a massive eye blast. And, well, that’s it. That’s all we know.

This is curious for a couple of reasons. First, these are the oldest versions of these characters we have in the X-MenLaunched in 1963 and written by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the X-Men featured heroes distinctly different from those featured in the pages of DC Comics. Mutants who didn't ask for their powers (and very often didn't want them), these heroes, who constantly fought against humans who didn't want "muties" around, served as metaphors for oppression and racism. Their powerful stories would form this group into one of the most recognizable superhero teams in comics (and a successful series of movies as well). film series. It’s the familiar characters we saw play these guys for years before a new generation took over (making films people didn’t like as much). Every few years one of them gets trotted out before they swear, up and down, they’re retiring from the role. We’ve been saying goodbye to these characters for years, in X-Men: Days of Future Past, in Logan, in Deadpool & Wolverine. We just keep getting one last ride for the X-Men cinematic universe.

And here, Marvel is doing it again. But it feels really weird, and really pretty crass, when we consider that these aren’t even MCU characters. Marvel isn’t just playing on nostalgia for characters we like, they’re playing on nostalgia for versions of these characters they didn’t even create. Sure, we like Charles Xavier and Magneto, Cyclops, and who knows what other members of the team are going to show up, but Marvel doesn’t have anything except nostalgia in this teaser to justify bringing them out again. And to devote one of their four key teasers for their upcoming film, when they have heroes we haven’t seen in a while that we might like to have back (Shang-Chi, the Thunderbolts, Ms. Marvel) it feels kind of gross to, instead, put in Fox’s X-Men instead. This teaser, more than any other in the set, feels especially desperate. It makes me actively dread the film when it should be building real hype.

The Wakandans and the Fantastic Four Will Return…

Now this is the one teaser of the set I actually legitimately liked. We open with a shot of Shuri, princess of Wakanda and the current Black Panther, walking across a desert to, we assume, discuss political matters with Namor, king of Talokan. Shuri is very serious, steadfast looking and ready for anything. When she and her contingent, which includes M’Baku, stop walking they’re met not by the Talokan king, as the previous shot led us to believe, but Ben Grimm of the Fantastic Four instead, and they share a tiny bit of amusing dialogue. It’s quick, it’s zippy, and it does what it needs to do.

The reason I liked this teaser, among all the others, was because it at least looked forward and not behind. While I didn’t much care for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Shuri is the current incarnation of the hero and she’s part of the new generation of Avengers. Seeing her share the crown with M’Baku is cool, too, not just because he’s a great character but also because it shows that she, and Wakanda, are growing and changing. It adds a real spark to see that this little section of the Marvel universe is moving forward.

And then to have them dodge expectations and meet up with the Fantastic Four (or, at least, one of the members) to then share some quippy dialogue, well, it worked. It felt like Marvel as we actually enjoyed them. New heroes, meeting each other, finding common ground against a new threat. That’s what we came to the movies for. It says that marvel has its eye ready for the future, not the past, and isn’t just trying to nostalgia-bait us into seeing this film for one last ride.

In Summary

I’m left feeling mixed about these trailers. On the one hand I do like all the actors they’re bringing back. It’s nice to see familiar faces and while I bitch about nostalgia bait, I’m sure that when the movie plays I’ll cheer for the actors I like. But at the same time, only one of these teasers actually promised something new. Only one of them said that Marvel has anything new to say about its universe other than, “you liked The Avengers, right? And the X-Men? Wouldn’t you like to have them all back?” That teaser is great, and we should have gotten more of them.

I understand Marvel wants to hype up their new film, and when all their recent movies have underperformed they feel like the only thing they have left is nostalgia for a period when their films were cultural events. But the MCU, when it started, understood that it had to build the characters we were just meeting so that we could get hyped for their crossover. That MCU still feels like it’s dead because three of these teasers aren’t about building something new but playing to what we liked before. MCU has a nostalgia problem (and they’ve had it for a few years now) and these teasers do almost nothing to shake that feeling.

If not for the Wakanda teaser I’d write these off entirely. Still, this doesn’t feel much better than that weird stream of all the chairs we got months ago. Marvel is looking backwards, and it doesn’t speak well for the fate of the franchise, now or in the future, when they can’t look towards the future. We’ll just have to see how it all plays out.