There are few things more annoying than a prequel. Even if
it’s a character that I care about, prequels lack the necessary tension and
drama. Instead of being worried whether or not a character will be able to
survive his or her trial, the outcome is already certain. There’s no reason to
be worried that the character will die or face other drastic consequences.
Black Widow and Scarlett Johansson deserve better than that. Unfortunately, all
signs point to the Black Widow movie as being a prequel. After all, Black Widow
is dead. She traded her soul for the soul stone and that trade was “an
everlasting exchange.”
Why and how would a stone require a soul? In order for the
information on the deal to be transferred to the Red Skull and enforced by the
stone, the stone itself must have a consciousness. It must be a living entity. Unless
Vormir, the stone’s home, is the living entity that guards the stone.
If the stone is a living entity, it is clearly evil. It
desires a living sacrifice in order for others to access its power. That soul
for a soul exchange and the disposition of the stone could be the subject of
the Black Widow movie.
The stone could just require the soul to power it up.
However, other versions of the soul stone have included a soul stone universe
where all the souls that were sacrificed reside. Black Widow could realize she’s
trapped in an alternate universe and work to find and fight her way out,
possibly with the help of Gamora.
It would be an interesting story line to explore and with obstacles that Black Widow would be more than capable of overcoming. Imagine Marvel’s next villain being the Soul Stone Irregularity. Of course, the Black Widow movie doesn’t have to take place in the current MCU at all; the multi-verse and alternate timelines open up so many story telling possibilities.
With Captain America handing his shield to Falcon, one of Marvel’s
next heroes has already been chosen. The question remains: Who is Tony Stark’s
successor? Iron Man is too hot a property to leave languishing because of a
simple death. Here are the top prospects for Marvel’s next Iron Man.
Spider-Man: The trailers for “Spider-Man: Far from Home”
make it seem like the world is looking for a new Iron Man. Peter Parker felt
like Stark was his mentor, and his sense of duty requires that he try to take
up the mantle. Parker invented his web shooters, so he has the engineering
acumen to take up the Stark suit improvement mentality. He also has a suit made
by Stark that he can improve upon and reverse engineer, and his relationship
with Happy would probably give him access to the resources of Stark Industries –
resources his aunt can’t provide.
But making Spider-Man the next Iron Man removes Spider-Man
from the movie scene. It might work for a couple of movies, but ultimately, it
hamstrings the opportunity to make more money from two popular franchises.
Since Sony owns the rights to Spider-Man, Peter Parker is probably not going to
be the next Iron Man. The world may need a new Iron Man, but it won’t be Peter
Parker unless the MCU wants to introduce a live action Miles Morales.
War Machine or Iron Patriot: James Rhodes is the first one on
the scene of Tony Stark’s death. He has an Iron Man inspired suit with more
weapons. Marvel has already proven that it can take second rate properties and
turn them into blockbusters, and Don Cheadle is no chump actor. He could carry
a movie. The only things standing in his way are resources and the ability to
engineer new suits. Rhodes has yet to show his genius side.
Pepper Potts: “We’re going to be okay. You can rest now.”
Pepper Potts to Tony Stark, “Avengers: Endgame.” This statement could be Pepper
taking the mantle from Tony. The “we” she is referring to could be her and her
daughter, or it could be the planet Earth. Pepper may be signaling to Tony that
she is ready to take on the responsibility of the suit. She has a different
demeanor than Tony, but she is adept at managing resources and has the
financial wherewithal to keep improving her Iron Man suit.
Morgan Stark: Sure, Morgan’s only five in “Avengers: Endgame,”
but she could don the suit in as early as nine years (She’s already shown a penchant
for wearing the suit parts). She’d be 14, which is still young, but if she has
inherited the Stark genius and the Stark determination, there’d be nothing that
could stop her. Picture Morgan teaming up with Pepper in Iron Man suits and
imagine what kind of powerful story that could be. It would also give people
time enough to heal from the death of her father while she isn’t healed
herself. Who would she take revenge against?
Harley, the boy from Iron Man 3: At the end of Iron Man 3,
Harley has a dream workshop and a Potato Gun Mark 2. There’s every indication
that Stark kept in touch with his protégé, and Harley is at the funeral. Harley
would likely have the Stark resources, like Peter would, and he has proven he
can build things. If he’s worked hard at it, he may be able to invent and
modify with the best of them.
Robert Downey Jr. from another universe: The multi-verse has
been revealed. Any hero can come back at any time, and they can come back differently.
Iron Man could return exactly as he was, but what if in his universe, he lost
Pepper and Morgan? How would that make him different? What if the next Iron Man
pits Pepper and Morgan against a Tony Stark bent on taking them to another universe?
Would they go or would he kidnap them?
Robert Downey Jr.’s Iron Man seems to be to popular to leave dead, but Marvel will achieve the most integrity if they don’t bring him back. Except this is a comics universe: No one ever truly dies. Tell us who you think will be the next Iron Man in the comments.
As a vendor, I probably won’t have time to get to any of the panels, but if I could, here’s what I’m looking forward to. Friday is the best day to get on the floor and see what the vendors have to offer. The hall is open from 3 pm to 8 pm, and the only panel I would go to is the Spider-Man panel at 5:30 pm, especially since attendees will get a free Spider-Man comic book!
Saturday Panels
Saturday kicks off with time to cruise the vendor floor. At 11:00 am, “Dude, Where’s My Childhood” panel includes a free G.I. Joe comic book as well as a discussion about cartoons from the 1980s and 1990s. At noon, I would hit the Power Rangers panel with Amy Jo Johnson and Jason David Frank. I saw Frank at Salt Lake Comic Con before the name change, and would love to see the interactions between the two Power Rangers.
At 1 pm, is the Avengers: Infinity panel with a free gift while supplies last; this panel would be hard to pass up. Penguinate’s own Tiny Avenger giveaway is some of the impetus for considering this panel; however, the cultural phenomenon of the worldwide shared experience that is the Avengers is a larger motivating factor. At 2 pm, Daniel Logan and Matthew Wood will be doing a Star Wars panel. Logan is an absolute blast to listen to and watch as he interacts with his Star Wars cohorts. (I saw him at Salt Lake Comic Con as well.)
At 3 pm, the panel of the day belongs to Sean Astin. Samwise
Gamgee is an iconic character, and Astin was a large part of “Stranger Things
2.” His long career is likely to yield several amazing stories. This is the
panel I wouldn’t miss on Saturday.
Rob Liefield has a panel at 4 pm. With the success of Deadpool
and the legend of his creation, this is a chance to settle Deadpool’s origin
story with the creator himself. Each fan gets a gift, too, so bonus! At 5 pm,
there’ll be tips for traveling better and less expensively. We do a lot of
traveling, and this could help us do it better. Trailer Park at 6 pm has some
appeal, but I may just get on the floor and check out more vendors.
Sunday Panels
At noon, Turtles and More might be the first panel for me of
the day. Followed by Asher Angel and Jovan Arman at 1 pm with their Shazam! panel.
Maybe I could even be one of the random fans chosen to win something! At 3 pm,
there’s a panel on the history of comic books that should be interesting.
Afterwards, I would make a couple more passes through the vendors, concentrating
on Artist Alley to make sure I didn’t miss anything.
That’s how I would do things if I were attending Amazing Las
Vegas Comic Con as a fan. What will you be doing? Leave your favorite panel and
activity sessions in the comments below.
If you’re going to Amazing Las Vegas Comic Con, you want to
remember the phrase “Penguinating is the power of positive creativity.” This
phrase is the key to getting a tiny Avenger figure from the Kinder Egg
collection. The first three people that say this phrase on Friday to us at the Penguinate
table (B91) will get a tiny Avenger.
These tiny Avengers come in their original yellow capsule
packaging. Possible Avengers include Groot, Black Panther, and Captain America.
They come with instructions for building and games that can be played using
them.
“Avengers: Endgame” is one of the biggest movies of the year.
Celebrate the ending of Phase Three with a tiny Avenger. While most of the
Avengers are tiny, Ant-Man is life-sized. So, stop by the Penguinate table
(B91), say “Penguinating is the power of positive creativity,” and claim your
prize.
If you happen to win more than one Avenger and get a double
on Saturday or Sunday, you may trade your tiny Avenger for another. Only one Avenger
per person per day. Offer good while supplies last. We look forward to seeing
you at Amazing Las Vegas Comic Con 2019.
With just one more day to go, I wanted to highlight a couple of great things at our table. First, if you know the secret pass phrase and you are one of the first two people to say it at the Penguinate table (A1), you could win a tiny Avenger!
Brian C. Baer will be signing copies of his books from 10:30 to 11:30. Come by and get your copies of “How He-Man Mastered the Universe” and “Bad Publicity.” You might even be able to get him to sign a free chapbook. (Free is a very good price.)
We’re excited that Lucky found a home with a nice family.
Our other penguins are waiting for you to take them home. Come join us for the
fun at Lilac City Comicon 2019!
I ended up with a couple of doubles of these Avengers
figures from Kinder Eggs in Russia. All you have to do is be the first person
to come to my table and say “Penguinating is the power of positive creativity.”
That means if you’re a VIP at Lilac City Comicon, you have an advantage over
others because you get early entry into Lilac City Comicon 2019.
These figures come in their original yellow container with
safety card and information card describing how to put them together. The
figures you win won’t be revealed until you choose one of the yellow
containers. Fully assembled, the figures and their spheres measure just over an
inch tall.
If you’re not the first person to say, “Penguinating is the
power of positive creativity,” you’ll still get a sticker or chapbook while
supplies last. Stop by our table, check out our cosplaying penguins and books,
and say the secret words! We look forward to seeing you at Lilac City Comicon
2019.
This article contains spoilers for “Avengers: Endgame.” If
you haven’t seen it, yet, seriously? You haven’t seen it, yet? Okay, well,
since things on the Internet are forever and this could be read sometime in the
future, if you haven’t seen it yet, book mark this page and come back to it. If
you have seen “Endgame” then continue on after the trailer.
There is a certain segment of the movie going (and general)
population whose trigger word is “feminism.” They came out against
“Ghostbusters,” so hard that Leslie Jones had to delete her Twitter account.
They’ve joined forces to harass “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” star Kelly Marie
Tran into leaving social media.
The problem is so bad that when Rotten Tomatoes recognized
campaigns to sink “Captain Marvel” “Black Panther” and “Star Wars: Episode IX”
through bad reviews before the films were released, it changed its policy for
reviewing films and only allowed people to review films after they had been
released. That same anti-“Captain Marvel” campaign was addressed by “Shazam!”
star Zachary Levi in a class act social media post about how those actions
actually hurt fandoms. People can like both films.
All of this plays into one amazing scene in “Avengers: Endgame.” All of the women on the battlefield during the confrontation with Thanos and his army come together on the screen to relieve Spider-Man and keep the gauntlet away from Thanos. It’s a glorious scene and sequence.
My first thought was “OMG! They did it. I can’t believe they
did it. It’s amazing.” My second thought was “OMG! They did it. I can’t believe
they did it. The trolls are going to be talking about this scene and deriding
the movie because of it.” And they did come out to comment, which is
unfortunate because one of the comments was a ridiculous “It’s not even
realistic that all these women could get together on a chaotic battlefield to
make this scene work.”
Let’s just take this comment at face value. “It’s not
realistic…” This battle is literally about one thing: Getting the Infinity
Gauntlet and keeping it away from Thanos. That’s all this battle is about. It’s
not about killing the army on Thanos’ side. It’s not about counting bodies.
It’s not about anything but Thanos and the gauntlet. Every eye in that battle,
especially on the Avengers side, should be on that gauntlet and where it is at
all times. Yes, you don’t want to get taken out by one of Thanos’ minions, but
you also don’t want to get taken out by a second snap. So, when the women heard
Spider-Man was in trouble, they all gathered to protect the him and the
gauntlet.
Now, let’s move on to the more important point: “It’s not
realistic…” We are talking about a movie where a rage monster merged with a
genius and became a green, hulking scientist with little penchant for smashing
things. This movie also featured an Asgardian getting a beer belly, half the
beings in the universe having been snapped away, and stones holding sway over
space, time, souls, reality, mind and power. Women were riding winged horses.
Aliens were coming out of there spaceships. A man had grown to the size of skyscraper.
A majority of the main cast had traveled through time, and many of the rest of
them were resurrected after being dead for five years. Yes, it’s not realistic.
It’s a comic book movie.
And let’s examine one more point: Comic team-ups are the
best, especially for those who are less interested in comics. As a kid, I
didn’t have a lot of money for comic books, so when I did buy them, they were
either really cheap and secondhand or they were a comic that included a
team-up. The return of almost the entire 11 years of Marvel superheroes at the
beginning of the battle was powerful. Having the women team-up in the middle of
the battle was also powerful. It was that moment of awe and wonder. They were
both fan services, just for different types of fans.
For anyone who would criticize this scene, it’s important to
realize what the scene really is and why you’re reacting to it negatively.
Chances are, if you dig deep enough, you’ll find that you don’t like its
implications of change at a cultural level. It does represent a shift in the
status quo, and there’s no going back, no matter how much you fight, whine,
complain and troll. What you should realize, though, is this shift is going to
make it possible for your favorite comic book characters to survive. As more
people enjoy the movies, the profits will funnel to the Marvel division of
Disney and they will keep the comic books themselves on the shelves.
If you love Marvel comics, you should be grateful for
everyone who saw “Avengers: Endgame” regardless of their politics and the fan
service paid to them. Instead of wasting your time trolling, step into the
light of a new day and find your power for positive transformation – like Bruce
Banner and the Hulk. Maybe, you’ll even realize that scene wasn’t a fan
service, it was a way to troll the trolls.
I got fed up with the MSM who decided it was okay to post
reviews, articles and spoiler photos on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and
throughout the opening weekend of “Avengers: Endgame” because it hadn’t been
released everywhere, and I had no choice but to look at the headlines (and thus
read them) and possibly learn spoilers, which sucks! Thanos demanded their
silence, and the stars pleaded their case not to ruin the Endgame. Main stream
media went ahead and did so anyway. So, this review has been consciously
published two weeks after the Russian release date as a nose thumbing to the
unbelievers who think you won’t like, comment or share an “Avengers: Endgame”
review after it’s been in the theaters for a little bit.
I have more faith in you, true believer, and I believe that you will like, comment and share this review because you don’t want future movies to be spoiled by fast, first and spoiler MSM. Of course, that means I should write a damn good spoiler-free review… I’m not sure I have that in me… Well, if I can’t protect the sanctity of the spoiler-free review, I might as well avenge it.
First of all, you have to hand it to the people in charge of
the marketing campaign; they didn’t give anything away in the trailers. It’s amazing
that they were able to mine the first 30 minutes and come up with interesting
trailers that kept the movie under wraps.
Starting with Hawkeye was essential. Hawkeye is the easiest way for the average person to engage in a film full of superheroes who are super smart, super strong and generally just fantastic. Showing him at home with his family at the moment of the snap, reminds everyone what’s at stake.
The end battle scene was beautiful, and war shouldn’t be
beautiful. It wasn’t the first battle scene of the movie, but it was the least
surprising. Still, it brought up all the feels, and somehow didn’t feel like a
copout. Maybe because it had been set up over the course for several movies,
maybe because the main characters all get their spot in the limelight, maybe
because it was just so well done… whatever the reason, that battle was cinematic
eye candy for this generation.
The best reveal also had the best character change. The
women stand up and out in battle. But where “Avengers: Endgame” excels is where
every Marvel movie has excelled when they’ve done it right – in the characters.
This story is a character-driven narrative built on special effects rather than
special effects with some plot things thrown in. Maybe it’s time to revisit the
Endgame again and find out what you missed.
Sock it to those major media outlets that posted spoiler-y
reviews, headlines and photos proclaiming the knowledge of what that last scene
for the Hulk meant or for Iron Man of for Captain America, or who was that lone
kid, or where did Captain Marvel go, or why the “Back to the Future” time
theory won’t work for Endgame, all of which couldn’t be avoided because they
showed up in Yahoo! News feeds, twitter feeds, Facebook timelines and other social
media. Share this post with your friends and show the media that you can be
trusted to click on their Avengers articles even a couple weeks after the movie
debuts.
As “Avengers: Endgame” prepares to fall short of the domestic
box office total of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” we should ask who has the
better movie fans. Are Star Wars fans better than Marvel fans?
The fact that “The Wandering Earth debuted in February and
had the highest IMAX gross, which was then beaten by Avengers, creates an
interest in seeing the movie. Endgame could gross more in China than “The
Wandering Earth” and creating an even greater interest in seeing the Chinese
film. If it was that good, it must be worth seeing, and for those who want to
be able to say anything intelligent about the heavyweight duel overseas, they’ll
have to find a way to see ‘The Wandering Earth” and find out what made it such
a huge hit in China. In steps Netflix to fill the gap.
By promoting it as something people can see, Netflix is
effectively able to use the free advertising generated by the comparison
between “The Wandering Earth” and Endgame to get views of a Chinese film most
wouldn’t ordinarily even find to watch much less consider. If Netflix or other
streaming services begin to capitalize on the comparisons that go on with box
office incomes, we could see a slew of international films gaining steam first
through streaming. Once Americans get used to seeing foreign films with
subtitles, there’ll be no stopping the influx of new and better films.
Even if those foreign film studios are as mired in sequel-itis
as U.S. studios are, the stories and concepts will be new and more original to
U.S. audiences. That’s good for storytelling and creativity because foreign
films can introduce different ideas and viewpoints into American culture. For
now, Netflix gains with having “The Wandering Earth” available to stream, and
having one more way to create buzz through using another studios success.
Penguinate! Positive Creativity 