The rise of the Marvel universe

The studio that once struggled to make a decent superhero movie against the might of DC's Superman and Batman franchises now dominates the box office. Find out how Marvel is taking over Hollywood, one character at a time

In the new movie Captain America: Civil War, Marvel superheroes fight what could be their most powerful enemy: each other. But whoever emerges victorious, the studio behind the films is already the ultimate winner.
Over the past decade or so, Marvel Studios, which makes movies about superheroes such as Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor, has emerged as a massive force at the multiplex. Films about Marvel characters are the most bankable in Hollywood today, as the studio produces one box-office success after another. Marvel films perform well, not just in the US, but also around the world, a crucial component in today's marketplace.
Marvel has released 12 movies in its "cinematic universe" - each grossing more than $100 million in the US and most being fairly well-received by film critics. "We've never seen anything like this in terms of a similar brand dominating the movie industry the way Marvel has," says Thomas Schatz, author and media professor at The University of Texas at Austin.
Mark Evan Schwartz, associate professor of screenwriting at Loyola Marymount University, agrees. "This level of success, of there being such a hugely populated universe that continues both to surprise and to raise curiosity toward, is phenomenal. I think it's quite extraordinary."
Hollywood has seen many successful franchises before. So what makes Marvel different? First, a bit of history. Marvel Studios is, of course, named after Marvel Comics, the company at which such now-globally recognised characters as Iron Man and Captain America were created.
In decades past, Marvel allowed studios such as Twentieth Century Fox and Sony to make movies based on their characters. (It's a complicated story and those studios still have the rights to some of them.) But in 2008, Marvel released the first self-financed of its movies, the Robert Downey Jr. film Iron Man.
The movie became a smash hit, with critics praising Downey's performance and fans enjoying his take on the character. The film became the second-highest-grossing movie of the year. "An awful lot of this is the fact that Iron Man was such a good movie," Mr. Schatz says. "I think Iron Man is the foundation in many ways of this entire thing."
After Iron Man (and 2008's The Incredible Hulk), Marvel began to differ in its strategy from most other Hollywood franchises. The studio didn't just produce the Iron Man series, it began to create movies based on the various other characters living in Tony Stark's world.
While the James Bond movies, for example, centre on the British spy and the Harry Potter films follow the adventures of the boy wizard, Marvel Studios released an Iron Man sequel, but then made movies about other people living in the same fictional universe. Following the Iron Man sequel, Marvel's next releases centred on Norse god Thor (Chris Hemsworth) with a 2011 movie of the same name and a World War II soldier named Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) with 2011's Captain America: The First Avenger. It would be like Warner Bros. releasing the first two movies about Harry Potter and then following it with a film centring only on Ron Weasley.
In a sense, Marvel was just being true to its roots. Comic book stories often work like this, with, say, Ant-Man aiding Iron Man. And so the movies are designed with this thinking, too, with a character perhaps popping up in one hero's movie before appearing in their own. Almost every Avenger got their own movie and was introduced to audiences before all the characters came together onscreen for 2012's The Avengers, for example.
Schatz says this approach has been seen before - for example, Universal horror films would include their characters encountering one another, as with 1943's Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man. "But no one has done it with anywhere near the efficiency of Marvel," he says.
The Marvel empire also extends into TV, where, among others, ABC's programmes Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter and Netflix's Jessica Jones are based on Marvel characters. And plenty more is on the way for both mediums. Marvel has announced release dates for films through 2019, with some apparently telling the story of characters moviegoers know (2018's The Avengers: Infinity War) as well as new ones (2019's Captain Marvel).
What does the success of films about superheroes fighting off villains tell us about audiences today? "One of the really interesting things about all of this stuff is the post-9/11 dimension and the extent to which we've increasingly decided to see the world in these very strict, reductive moral terms in terms of good and evil," Schatz says.
In the latest Captain America movie (which has already made more than $200 million overseas), the characters wrestle with moral issues that resonate today: accountability when the Avengers's acts lead to collateral damage. And what role should governments play in these cases?
Part of Marvel's success, Mr. Schwartz says, lies in that the moviemakers make it easy for viewers to keep track of the many characters through visual cues (different-coloured uniforms) and good screenwriting. Moviegoers know Iron Man, in his red-and-gold suit and with his wisecracking banter, will respond differently from Captain America in his mostly-blue-and-silver outfit and who wears his 1940s good-guy morality on his sleeve.
Meanwhile, Schatz notes that films released by Marvel Studios all have a distinct tongue-in-cheek tone. "Even in the comic books, [Marvel] began to create an ethos and what has become for the studio a house style," he says. "Very much of that is about self-conscious comedy. The best movies - and Iron Man is a great example - are fun and funny."
Has Marvel's success been without problems? Marvel has come under fire for its portrayal of female characters, and about a lack of female superheroes. Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow, for example, who appeared in the 2015 film Avengers: Age of Ultron, among others, was panned by some. Sara Stewart of the website IndieWire wrote of the movie, "Did we really need Natasha to have a mini-breakdown over the fact that she can't have children? Haven't we gotten to a point where the one lonely female superhero in our current landscape can just pursue the business of avenging without having to bemoan not being a mother?" Meanwhile, Avengers star Mark Ruffalo also tweeted about a lack of items for sale based on Ms Johansson's character.
The first movie in the Marvel cinematic universe with a female character getting top billing is set to be 2019's Captain Marvel, but it will be preceded by more than 10 years of male-led films. Evangeline Lilly's Wasp character will reportedly star in a 2018 movie, but her character's name will be alongside Paul Rudd's Ant-Man for the movie Ant-Man and the Wasp.
But even with such flaws, Schatz says, "Marvel has figured out how to systematically reproduce this stuff. And they're going to keep doing it as long as it holds up."
Other studios seem to be trying to use this formula to achieve success. Some saw Warner Bros.' Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which was released earlier this year, as Warner Bros.' attempt to use the "cinematic universe" formula with the characters created by DC Comics, which has long been Marvel's chief rival in the comics game. Warner Bros. has announced a movie about Wonder Woman, who appeared in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, as well as films about the Flash and Aquaman.
Movie fans can see the evidence of Marvel's "cinematic universe" approach in the plans for the Star Wars films, which will include a movie about all-new characters (not, say, Luke or Leia) titled Rogue One this December, and the Harry Potter movies. A new film set in the Potter universe but centring on a different character, titled Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, will come out this November.
"We're watching the movie and television industries along with comic books and other cultural forms rethink the way popular storytelling is constructed," Schatz says.
- Christian Science Monitor

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