Good Read on Marvel's Year

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Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the studio’s refutation of the claim that all the films look the same. Its visual and editing aesthetic isn’t just different from the other movies in the universe, it’s very different from the previous film in the franchise. The Winter Soldier also serves as a proof of concept for the Marvel tone, showing that the sense of fun and adventure that had made the previous films popular could still work in a darker, more morally complex story. The Winter Soldier was Marvel throwing down a gauntlet, saying that their films could be more than simply light escapism (but still maintaining plenty of light escapism).

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By launching Guardians - and launching it profitably - Marvel defined two things about itself. One, it isn’t just the Avengers universe. This is something James Gunn has been saying in a lot of interviews, and people have been taking it to mean that the Guardians and the Avengers will never cross over. They will, but the larger thing he’s trying to convey is that Marvel has started building a new wing on their house. It’s attached to the Phase One foundation, but only through one small door (that door being Thanos, a character who the average moviegoer probably missed in The Avengers, as they were already in the parking lot when his cameo happened). The cosmic side of Marvel can be its own thing, only occasionally butting up against the earthbound side. This is familiar to comic readers but is a new concept to general audiences only now getting into the swing of a shared universe. Marvel Studios is already redefining how that shared universe works.

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More importantly, Guardians defined Marvel as a franchise launcher. Again, the relatively unknown quality of the Guardians is key here - every other franchise Marvel launched had, on some base level, name recognition. This time it was simply the Marvel name that people knew. The Avengers was a big moment for Marvel, a billion dollar movie that cemented them in the big players club. Guardians was the movie that defined them as the biggest player in the big players club.

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That scope is enormous, and I haven’t even touched on television, which isn’t really the same guys as Marvel Studios. But if we will mention television the announcement of the Netflix project - four series that will come together in The Defenders - while a riff on Phase One is as important a tonal distinction as Winter Soldier. Marvel has found success with blockbuster heroes, Marvel has found success with cosmic heroes and now Marvel is going to try and find success with street level heroes. There’s a broad diversity of story types here.

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