Furiosa: a Mad Max Saga

"Do You Have What It Takes To Make It Epic?"

or

"Bigger. Stronger. Faster. Further."

Dr. George Miller is fast approaching the age of 80 years old, and whereas most film directors lucky enough to be working at that age have a tendency to make their films slower-paced and more contemplative in nature the older they get, he has gone the opposite direction (and faster!) making movies more expansive and more energetic the more he works. 

 

Not only that, Miller's movies are getting denser—as in having more depth (rather than merely being stupid, which they most certainly are not). There are sub-texts (that aren't merely superficial call-backs to other movies, but to Myth and literature), amazing images (that sometimes recall the after-image of a Fritz Lang or of William Wyler religious epics), a sumptuousness of detail—in environments, costuming, machines—that can't be contained by mere budgets, and a pace that has only gotten faster and more daring as the years have gone on, while also NOT depriving any essential information for an audience to understand exactly what is happening. 

George Miller, at 79, is still showing young turk wannabe directors not only how to make movies (and good ones!), but leaving them in his considerable cloud of dust as he out-paces and out-flanks them.

Now, after a jaw-dropping return to making live action movies (after a 17 year absence—during which he made two "Happy Feet" animated features) with his Mad Max: Fury Road (big hit!) and Three Thousand Years of Longing (no one saw it), he's back to his Australian dystopia with a prequel to Fury Road called Furiosa: a Mad Max Saga, relating the origin story of Charlize Theron's amazon fury-imperator (now played by Anya Taylor-Joy). 

Set in five chapters (1. The Poles of Possibilities; 2. Lessons from the Wasteland; 3. The Stowaway; 4. Homeward; 5. Beyond Vengeance), it tells the story of Furiosa's abduction as a child from "The Green Place of Many Mothers", kept as a trophy by the Wasteland biker-warlord, Dr. Dementus (Chris Hemsworth—in a performance somewhere between a Bond villain and a mad Peter O'Toole), her trade to the Citadel to become a bride of Immortan Joe (now played by Lachy Hulme), and her escape to hide in plain sight as a Citadel worker.

Her ultimate goal is to return to "The Green Place" (we learned what became of that in Fury Road) but, for the purposes of this movie, she is concerned with vengeance against Dementus as the off-kilter boss-wannabe had killed her mother, who had come after the bikers in an attempt to get Furiosa back. And to do that, she must first shed her disguise and become mobile—which she does in "The Stowaway" section (which is one big chase sequence), gaining access to Dementus' "War Rig" and assisting its driver Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke) to ward off pirate attacks in its supply efforts across The Wasteland.

What we've got here is a feminist version of The Searchers, where the kidnap-victim takes it upon herself to free herself from her captors, rather than waiting around for someone else to do it (hard to do as her only known relative was her mother). And along the way, we learn how Furiosa gained her "mad" skills, and how she managed to lose her left arm (and its significance to her quest).

Furiosa has all the hallmarks of a "Mad Max" movie—despite having only one shot of "Max" (Jacob Tomuri) in the entire thing. It careens, it propels, it defies expectations—except to pump adrenaline and amaze in how it builds its world out of spare parts (Dementus drives a chariot pulled by three motorcycles)—and does the vast majority of it using practical effects (a few of the explosions and other bits of business are augmented by CGI) and some of the most daredevil-ish stuntmen on the planet.

But, Miller is pushing the film-making illusions, as well. There's always been a bit of under-cranking (the act of filming at a lower frame-rate to make the action appear faster on the screen) in the "Mad Max" films, but here Miller takes it even farther. If Fury Road was a "10" in that department, Miller risks taking it to "12." There's always the danger of making things look cartoonish that way, but Miller, at this point, doesn't seem to care. There are parts of Furiosa that feel like you're watching it dosed on Ambien, so hyper-kinetic is the result, and the effect is unnerving. But, it works subjectively, despite the objections of some purists.

It's also one of the most "in-your-face" movies in my memory, with quite a few shots that literally zoom in to characters' faces and might cause your foot to instinctively stamp on an imaginary brake pedal (there's one that propels into a face as it explodes in the last frame!). It is dizzying and quite the rush, all the more so because Miller is a director who keeps you aware of where things are and where they relate to the camera. There is nothing scatter-shot about what he does; the only hap-hazardness is what he has happen on-screen.

It's great. Wonderful story-telling. But, it's not for the sensitive—"sequences of strong violence and grisly images" and all that—but apocalyptic dystopias rarely are. And Furiosa is a nice little dervish-y spin on the Mad Max Universe and a fresh take on its tropes.

 

Miller's got another story ready to film out of this Fury Road saga. It'll probably be even more dynamic. Miller, approaching 80, isn't one to slow down.

Oh, by the way, I guested on the Furiosa episode of The Lambcast podcast, and it's out now. Check it out.

Thor: Love and Thunder

Another Classic Thor Adventure

or

Maybe It's 1 Out of 4  (Are You Not Underwhelmed?!)

Taika Waititi performed something of a miracle with Thor: Ragnarok, taking the moribund Marvel "Thor" series and injecting it with some of the humor that Joss Whedon injected into the character for the Avengers series. One wonders why it was taken so seriously in the first place as Thor was always the twee-est of the Marvel super-heroes, usually sticking out like a sore thumb in group adventures, but serving a purpose as that publisher's "Superman" with powers and abilities far above those of the mortal men (and women) in their "Avengers" line-up. Thor wasn't a king, wasn't a scientist, wasn't even rich...he was an other-dimensional God, who you wondered why he spent so much time hanging around in New York, when there were bigger cosmic fish to fry with the lightning of the Gods.

 

In Thor: Love and Thunder (again directed by Waititi), we find Thor (Chris Hemsworth), post-Infinity War, has gone through a lot of changes—and not just in his ability to quip. Asgard has been destroyed, he has lost both his Father and Mother and his adopted brother Loki. His people have been scattered, but localized to a sanctuary on Earth under the governorship of ally Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson, who comes into her own as a comic actress), and he's been hanging out with the Guardians of the Galaxy (Chris Pratt, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillan—she has one line and gets a laugh out of it—Pom Klementieff, Sean Gunn, and Groot and Rocket all make cameo appearances for a very short time, Zoe Saldana out busy Avatar-ing) and getting back in shape after his "Fat Thor" Endgame depression.

That should make Hemsworth-bod fans happy, but Thor is not. He's doing a lot of meditating, getting his hero-mojo back, but still not himself balance-wise. Oh, he's still bloviating ("What a classic Thor adventure! Hurrah!" he says after a battle) and acting like the Big Asgardian on Campus, but he's overcompensating, treating the Guardians as if they were Minions, and being a few coulombs short of a full lightning blast. Oh, he's great at knocking down enemies like ten-pins, but there's usually some collateral damage.

Thor's disturbing lack of faith is reflected in his latest enemy, Gorr (Christian Bale), who, after, the last remnants of his family dies on his barren planet—despite his pleas to his deity—finds said deity in an oasis, oblivious to his pain, and Gorr kills him with the Necrosword and vows to kill all gods. He targets New Asgard and the warrior Sif (Jaimie Alexander is back! Yay!) warns Thor of the attack and he and Korg (Taika Waititi) travel there with two screaming goats (don't ask) and the Bifrost-inducing Stormbreaker he's now carrying. They team up with Valkyrie to defeat Gorr and his shadow-creatures, but find they have a new ally. 

It's Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), Thor's ex, who has assumed the role of Thor because...well, long story—and flashback—short...she has Mjolnir, Thor's old broken hammer, which is no longer broken (because Thor asked it to protect her—presumably when he wasn't using it) and it's power is keeping her alive despite her having Stage 4 cancer (we find all this out in a flashback that also involves Kat Dennings and Stellan Skarsgård, despite them not showing up in the IMDB cast list!). They are able to defeat Gorr, but his dementors (sorry, wrong franchise, but same idea!) steal all the kids from New Asgard, leaving nothing but Old Asgardians to fret about the children at school-board meetings.

The two Thor's, Val and Korg decide to go to the home of the Gods, Omnipotence City—this is said with a straight face—to warn the Gods and try to recruit them to battle Gorr, and petition Zeus (Russell Crowe, who is clearly having a great time and using a florid Greek accent) to help in the cause. But, as any philosophy student will tell you, Gods don't listen very good. Zeus knows all about the Necrosword and how powerful it is, but he totally dismisses any danger...he's Zeus, what's gonna happen to him?...but, does drop the plot-point that Gorr has to reach the special effect of Eternity before he can accomplish his goal. But, that'll never happen, so what's the big deal. Zeus clearly never read Chekhov.*

Because at the end, Gorr very easily does the impossible and finds his way to the special effect of Eternity where, seeing the sacrificial way that love can display itself, decides...to change his mind (in another example of so many times in this movie, where they should have thought of this first—but then, there wouldn't be a movie). There's not an awful lot of story here, just a lot of strategies and actions that don't work before a resolution is found...and found very conveniently.

It's hard to take it all seriously, when so much of it is spent being done with so much jocularity. It reminded me of (of all things) Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, which spent so much time trying to recreate the "funny" of Star Trek IV that characters were no longer acting like themselves in order to get the most transient of laughs. Laughs come out of character, rather going out of character to make them. As a result, despite the call-backs and fan-service and getting "the old gang back together" everybody recognizable is no longer acting recognizably. Not that the grave way everybody was acting in the first two "Thor" movies is desirable—it certainly wasn't to me!—but to go as far as this movie does to prod a laugh out of every conceivable situation, is just reaching too far.

And as much as I love what Taika Waititi does with movies, he should be discouraged from making sequels. His movies should take stale material and make them fresh, rather than repeat them and just make them stale again.

* "Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there."

Men in Black International

MIBI. MIBI Not.
or
"...Some Next-Level Shit Going On"

The economics of the "Men in Black" series required some sort of re-boot; if they'd gone with previous stars, they'd have had to save on a cosmically scoped series by restricting their location work to Will Smith's voluminous trailer.

Besides, the series needed it. The "Men in Black" organization in the previous three films had a galaxy-wide perspective, but we never got to know anybody but the two leads, that film's chief antagonist, and the organization's leader, which it it feel like director Barry Sonnenfeld's perspective-warping visual-joke-tags. It was seriously about time to expand the series' event horizons and give it a little breadth. That they've done with Men in Black International by introducing a new recruit. Call her Molly (the charming Tessa Thompson), but she's agent M in MIB (Do they have only 26 agents?? Then they can't even get a decent group-rate insurance discount!), whose encounter with an alien (and the actions of the MIB organization during it) inspires her to become an agent with the super-secret agency as an adult. She's farmed out—by MIB head O (Emma Thompson, the only past cast to return—at least they're keeping the best)—to the foreign exchange to learn the ropes of alien wrangling and memory wiping.

O sends her to the London office where she meets former agent T (Liam Neeson) who has become the head of the department—he's now referred to as High-T (so precious).** He pairs her with Agent H (Chris Hemsworth), his former partner on a Paris mission to intercept and neutralize a group of aliens called "The Hive." H is well-regarded in the organization, but he is a kind of a Bondish Man in Black with a sloppy work ethic and walks around like he's coated in black teflon.  

The plot—such as it is—involves a version of the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, who, with his dying exhalation entrusts M with a cosmic McGuffin that can be transformed into a powerful weapon capable of creating a Grand Canyon in any state without benefit of a a large river and millions of years. There could be details detailed that would expand the synopsis, but, they're exceptionally un-clever and we've seen them before. Aliens invade, assume human form, are looking for something with a power far greater than its tiny size would indicate, and...oh, yes, they're helped by an alien who has suffered at the hands of the invaders. This isn't writing, this is word-processing and the Ctrl, C, and V keys are getting a bit worn.

And that's it. This is going to be a very short review for a movie that doesn't deserve any more scrutiny, merely due to its lack of effort. Hemsworth and Thompson were delightful together in Thor: Ragnarok and they are not throughout this one, although Thompson tries mightily hard. They just don't seem to mesh, probably because Hemsworth's H isn't hamstrung and is allowed to lord it over the obviously more competent M, which rankles and flies in the face of what worked in the Marvel film. 

Or, it just might be that that film's director, Taiki Waititi, had a better sense of how to keep the two actors bouncing off each other, than this film's F. Gary Gray** does (although his work here is a fair imitation of Sonnenfeld's loopy roller-coaster ride that threatens to go off the rails at any second) and that seems to extend to the rest of the cast, including Rebecca Ferguson, who's great in the "Mission: Impossible" films, but is utterly charmless here.

Capitalizing on past glories in MIBI

In a Universe of ideas and the expectation that science-fiction might go somewhere where no writer has gone before, why would anyone settle for this re-tread that doesn't even try hard to do something new or think a little differently. Geez, they couldn't even try to do a compare and contrast with the American version, the film being based in Europe and all? But, no, that might be doing something beyond anyone's scope, micro-or tele. Hey, guys, maybe bring back Linda Fiorentino's Agent L from the first movie? I mean...anything?

I don't think the franchise could stand another one like this: been there, zapped that.

Ya really didn't like it, huh?

* Hey, maybe they could do a cross-over with Taken, and this time, his daughter could be abducted by aliens—c'mon, it's as believable as the LAST one.

** Gray tried to leave the project, supposedly, as the film suffered from Studio "regime-Change" confusion, and its producer Walter Parkes re-wrote the script that Thompson and Hemsworth signed up for, and he even directed parts of it. Geez, maybe the next movie should have a race of incompetent aliens trying make sense of an invasion plot when their leader dies.

Just look here and let's forget it ever happened.

Avengers: Endgame

It's (Marvel) Clobbering Time
or
"Get Back What We Lost—Keep What I Got (Would Be Nice)—And Not Die Trying"

Dr. Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) said (in Avengers: Infinity War) that he had gone forward in time to see the outcome of the Avengers' battle with Thanos and that he saw 14,000,605 outcomes in which they lost and only one in which they survived.

When Marvel announced that their Avengers: Endgame would be just over 3 hours long, I thought, "Geez, do they have to show us ALL of them? Can't we just see the one?"

It turns out the one is enough to fill those 3 hours, but along with the idea of solving the problem of Thanos' grand scheme of culling 50% of the Universe's population—which takes relatively little time—it also has to reward movie-goers who have stayed through every frame of past Marvel Studios' films (starting with Iron Man in 2008) to give them what they want. 

Fan service takes a lot of time, it turns out.

There's a lot of that. "Fan service," I mean. There's a lot of call-backs, reflections, echoes, and cameo's—lots of cameo's—from past Marvel movies that they re-visit to give you that warm feeling that you're being rewarded for your recognition and thanked for your support throughout the whole, slow dissemination of the Thanos/"Infinity Stones" storyline.

And it has been a slow dissemination. My sister needed to know what movies to see in order to follow Endgame and I replied that she needed to see the Avengers series and the Captain America movies as essential (in this order: Captain America: The First Avenger, The Avengers, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, The Avengers: The Age of Ultron, Captain America: Civil War, and finally The Avengers: Infinity War), but if she wanted "electives," then the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie and Dr. Strange (maybe Captain Marvel, but not really). And that is as close to spoilers as I'm going to vault. This movie, in particular, needs a bit of background to fully appreciate it.

But, I can say the movie picks up at a singular moment for one of the Avengers after the "Finger-snap Heard 'Round the Universe." The one Avenger we didn't see in Infinity War—Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) has his little dust-up, and it sets him on a path of retribution and vengeance that attracts the attention of the remaining Avengers, although they stay out of it and away from him for the time being. There are other issues to take care of. Nebula (Karen Gillan) and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) are marooned in space after leaving Titan following their disastrous encounter with Thanos, who is still out there...somewhere. And—lest we forget—Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) is still trapped in "the quantum realm."

And that...is all I will say about that.

I will, however say, that it goes in a completely different direction than I thought it would, thinking that Captain Marvel would play more of a role—she doesn't, but manages to be efficiently useful when the Deus' are Machina'd. Core Avengers are utilized with special emphasis on The Big Three: Downey's Iron Man, Chris Hemsworth's Thor and Chris Evans' Captain America. They are given considerably more screen-time to complete their character arcs.

And there actually are character arcs (which is why the movie ballooned to such a length). I'd groused that Infinity War was all desperate action, with little emotional resonance to it, save for the actual culling of the Universe at Thanos' left hand. Here, the emphasis is on that resonance and it gives all the actors a chance to strut their stuff rather than just furrowing their brows and assuming the position. It also separates itself from the Marvel Comic Universe by taking those characters places they just wouldn't and couldn't in the comics. I liked that.

And as good as all these performances are, I thought the acting kudo's should go to Jeremy Renner, who must serve as the audience's emotional touchstone, starting with the very first scene and to almost the very end. He is quite amazing in this.

If the movie suffers, it is from too many endings, all in the service of character, which is a worthy thing to do, especially in a superhero movie.

"Okay, how many of you have never been in space? Raise your hand."

Also, Endgame is a different Marvel movie as it is more reflective and nostalgic, looking back, rather than facing forward ("true believers") and serving as a launching point for the next one, it is a completion. For that reason, you have no need to sit through the entire end credits. There is no teaser, no preview, no dangling thread. I only wish I knew that before I sat through the entire thing.

I have quibbles—I always do. There's the "too many endings" issue, a large continuity problem, the disparate fire-power issue, a few cute lines that land with a thud (and are repeated), and Thor's hammer. I have an issue with Thor's hammer. But, that's probably just me.

"Hey, Cap, do you read me?...Cap, it's Sam, can you hear me?...On your left."

It's well-done with a lot of fine grace-notes, and a climax that is, frankly, thrilling to behold. It's quite an experience...and very, very satisfying.

Avengers: Infinity War

Getting the Stones
or
Playing the Marvel "Whose Contracts Are Up?" Game
or
"You're So Daaaark. Are You Sure You're Not from the DC Universe?"

Avengers: Infinity War is a bit brilliant in concept and a rather neat wrap-up to the first ten years of Marvel Universe movies. Directed by the Russo brothers who did the last two Captain America movies, it's a mash-up of characters and tropes from the various franchises, mixing and matching and trying to make combinations work, so much so that the directors are rather at a disadvantage in that they have to keep all the balls in the air rather than doing anything stylistically interesting. It has all the "by-the-numbers" feel of the first couple of Thor movies and the latter Iron Man films. From a directing standpoint, it's a big green-screen movie where folks have to do things fast and things don't linger much. There's very little "down" time to contemplate events. That's a big disservice if you're trying to create any sort of emotional resonance.

And, if you're a "tru-fan" of certain characters, don't expect to come away too happy walking out of the movie (but, then, a sequel will be coming out next year, so don't buy too many black clothes). But then, the DCMU killed off Superman and brought him back in the space of two movies (didn't do much for his career, though).

So, if you've been watching ANY of the Marvel Universe movies since...oh...Captain America: The First Avenger, when "the Tesseract" was introduced, you might be familiar with what Avengers: Infinity War is all about—you certainly are more "in-the-know" if you've stuck around, patiently (or obsessively) for all the post-movie previews jammed into the credits. That "Tesseract" contains one of six sacred stones of power—in this case, the "space" stone—and it's been curated in the "Thor" world of Asgard. There are five others, most of which have been tossed into the Marvel Movie Universe: the "mind" stone—formerly in Loki's scepter—merged with the super-android Vision (in Avengers: Age of Ultron); the green "time" stone (also known as "The Eye of Agamotto") provides Dr. Strange his time-warping powers; the "reality" stone (also known as "The Aether") showed up in Thor: The Dark World and has since been possessed by Benicio Del Toro's "Collector";  and the "power" stone was what Thanos was trying to get in the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie. There's a sixth stone—the "soul" stone (which might actually be the "Sly and the Family" stone) which we haven't seen yet, but it has been searched for by The Guardians' Gamora (Zoe Saldana), who also happens to be the daughter of Thanos (now played by Josh Brolin).

So...okay. More recently Asgard was destroyed (in Thor: Ragnarok) and all the Asgardians were being ferried to a new home on the Asgardian Ark (along with The Hulk—Mark Ruffalo, again—and Valkyrie)* By the time we've suffered through the brand new ultra-long Marvel Studios 10th Anniversary logo, we are aware that the ship is in distress.

Boy, howdy. Thanos has attacked the ship and torn it to shreds, looking for "the Tesseract" and after several confrontations with principal Asgardians and The Hulk (who all have their heads handed to them), he gets it and pops it into his little "Infinity Gauntlet," the most prominent one-gloved fashion statement since Michael Jackson left the planet. A couple of key Thor-mates are dispatched, but not before Hulk is sent spinning back to Earth.

Where he lands...smack-dab in New York (all things in the Marvel Universe lead to New York) in the middle of the Sanctum Santorum of Dr. Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), where he warns that Thanos is bad (real bad) and probably headed for Earth. Better get Tony Stark, Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) because...well, Robert Downey Jr.'s in all of these movies. Besides, what is Nick Fury (Samuel Jackson) going to do?** Glare at it? Only a few minutes behind Hulk—just enough time for Stark and Strange to eye each other and be mutually snarky (they're both the same guy, frankly, just in different fields), Thanos' bagel-ship arrives in New York creating havoc, and attracting the attention of Spider-man (Tom Holland)—his "Spidey-sense" is portrayed by the hairs on his arms standing on end—to escape a field-trip and join the fray.

"I don't know what it is, but it sure is bi...well, wait, it looks like a piston ring"

Thanos' troops kidnap Dr. Strange (he has one of the stones) and Spidey and iron-Man go to the rescue, and decidedly un-hulky Banner contacts Captain America (Chris Evans)...because Stark and Rogers had their falling-out in Civil War. Cap, Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Falcon (Anthony Mackie) go to Scotland to help ward off attacks on the other stone-wilder, Vision (Paul Bettany) who is keeping a low profile with the Scarlet Witch (Elisabeth Olson).

Meanwhile, in space, the Guardians of the Galaxy (aw c'mon-you know all of them, do I have to put them ALL in here?***) hear a distress signal from the Asgardian Ark, and when they get there, run smack-dab into Thor (Chris Hemsworth), who has seen what Thanos can do and is determined to stop him from stealing the reality stone from "The Collector," in his "Knowhere"-land, but is determined to get a Thanos-sword to kill him. He recruits Rocket and Groot to take him to the planet Nidavellir, where his own hammer was once created. The other Guardians decide to travel to Knowhere to scout out what's happening to the stone (the answer: nothing good).

Back on Earth...in the States...Cap, Widow, Falcon, Banner, Vision, Witch, and Rhodey (Don Cheadle) join forces in dissing Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt) and travel to Wakanda, the kingdom of Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman) where they hope the advanced technology there can be used to remove the "mind" stone from Vision without killing him. Then, they can destroy the stone to prevent Thanos from achieving the ultimate power he craves...in order to "balance" the Universe.

Okay, so the entire Marvel Universe (with the exception of Ant-Man and Hawkeye) is spaced out around the movie, in little cluster-groups, trying to prevent Thanos' plan, which, so far doesn't look too promising for half the Universe. Thanos, it seems, is a bit of an environmental extremist as well as a sociopath. He believes that the Universe is limited in resources and can only support half the life that exists—he never sights any charts or field-studies, he just believes it. And so, his ultimate goal is to eliminate half of all life...with the snap of his fingers, and with all six sacred stones providing the bling in his "Infinity Gauntlet" he is capable of doing just such a thing.

Bad Thanos. VERY bad Thanos.

Which is where Avengers: Infinity War gets very interesting.

In these super-hero movies, there is the interesting dynamic between antagonists. You have heroes and villains splitting the attention of the viewer. It used to be that there would be an even match in the combatants, but that has changed as the number of these films have exploded.

The villain here, Thanos, is obsessed with balance, and the writers (here, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, who wrote the Captain America films and the lackluster Thor: The Dark World) of the superhero genre surely must sympathize, trying to create a challenge without overshadowing the challenged. It always seems the Joker gains more attention in the Batman movies—whether it's Jack Nicholson or Heath Ledger— When the villain is well-known, there's always that danger.  But, of late, especially as franchises get deeper in digits that the villains become more anonymous—Iron Man 3 tossed away a major villain, The Mandarin, as a joke, and one is hard-pressed to remember the villains of Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World or Captain America: Civil War, who came across as arrogant tall poppies in need of being cut down as quickly as possible.

But, in Infinity War, you can say that the heroes are given short-shrift, while the emphasis is on its hulking, committed villain, indeed of all the many characters in the film, he is the one filling the most screen-time. And, given that, he is the only one—so far—who has much of a story-arc. A villain in the mold of Richard III or MacBeth (with just a touch of Lear), his is the journey with the most interest and the most surprises. Rather than a mega-god of great power and not much else (see Justice League's Steppenwolf), his titan seeks his ultimate goal of culling the Universe, and triumphs—a lot—but also suffers—quite a bit. To win, he must lose, and his tragedy is that he chooses to throw away all that he cares about in seeking the power he craves and  the burden that he, alone, sees the need to take on.

He also seems to get some of the best lines in the film, which is tough to do in an Avengers movie. He's complex, smart, and maybe right, but wholly devoid of second-thought and emboldened by hubris. He's quite recognizable, and as portrayed by Josh Brolin, commands screen-attention, no matter how many stars in spandex vie for center-stage. It's the first time I can recall in a Marvel movie where the villain has upstaged the heroes.

Upstaging them is the least of his crimes. By the end, one wonders what one can do to solve the puzzle and undo the damage—if the intent is to undo it at all. Only the surety that money talks in Hollywood tells me that once the second still untitled movie comes along, things will be set right in their proper proportions. And there are certainly hints of what will happen, with unfulfilled story-promise and character relations featured prominently amidst the maelstrom. There are a couple well-used formulas (instead of "fourteen million six hundred and five") that might reverse things if I recall my comics past, and a gauntlet-ful of key characters that seem underutilized this go-'round that will probably come to the fore.

But, it's a very good, very enjoyable, if unsettling little entry, where one actually feels the stakes are high. 

And one hasn't felt that in the presence of the Marvel Universe in a very long time.

* First asterisk: And by now, your "Spidey-sense" should be tingling that this is a complicated movie. It is.

** I'll tell ya (SPOILER ALERT): He doesn't show up until the movie's credit tag.

*** Okay Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, David Bautista, Pom Klementioff, and the voices of Bradley Cooper and Vin Diesel.