Current Events > Finally watching What If...? I don't really like it. (Spoilers)

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm on the Doctor Strange episode and so far I'm just not a fan.

I don't like the premise, and each of these "alternate realities" feel really shoehorned, especially Captain Carter. That one's by far the worst, and they chose to lead the series with it. The fact is that she, and many of these characters they're putting the focus on, weren't compelling, interesting, or more than just one-dimensional supporting characters in the first place. You can't really change that in a 25 minute cartoon whose focus is more on the world than it is the people that occupy it.

The writing and dialogue are really bad, and having the original MCU actors be the voice talent doesn't save it. They also shovel in iconic quotes where the either don't belong or where the delivery is awful. The animation is really ugly in some spots. Like they let an AI draw the faces and expressions after watching 30 minutes of Infinity War followed by 5 hours of Disney Kids.

The worst part is that rumor has it that these stories will be canon in the Multiverse of Madness movie, so I feel compelled to finish the series so that I understand the movie. Not to mention that there are cliffhangers and open threads in every episode, so I'm left thinking "great, now there's more shit related to this that I'll have to watch later."

Yeah I was watching the captain carter one, and because it was animated it felt even worse with the whole "characters in marvel movies don't take the life and death stakes seriously".

That's one problem with Marvel, they sometimes put less weight on life and death things than disney movies. It should be a big deal if you kill people or could be killed, but everybody jokes around as if none of it really matters and they are all playing pretend.

Don't undercut your own stakes, take your shit more seriously and it will be better.

tbh they are trained soldiers, death is a very acceptable risk for them.

Episode 7 (Party Thor) is the single worst thing Marvel has ever done in the entirety of the MCU

Dogshit quality writing/dialogue/humor, absolute bottom of the barrel garbage

Akagami_Shanks posted...

tbh they are trained soldiers, death is a very acceptable risk for them.

And?

Just because it's a known risk doesn't mean you treat dying with the same low level of seriousness as losing a game of tag.

Doctor Strange one is amazing though

It worked better in the comics as a concept.

DarthAragorn posted...

Doctor Strange one is amazing though

He doesnt know yet.

joe40001 posted...

And?

Just because it's a known risk doesn't mean you treat dying with the same low level of seriousness as losing a game of tag.

When does this happen? Because every time there's a death in MCU it's been treated with seriousness.

What If is weird.

Like I want to just say its a no stakes cartoon and its just thing to have a bit of fun. Some episodes are quite good and the rest is mediocre to bad, but who caress, right?

But it seems like theyre actually putting their chips down that this shit matters.

Foolish.

Akagami_Shanks posted...

When does this happen? Because every time there's a death in MCU it's been treated with seriousness.

Spoilers for "Black Widow" and "Falcon and the Winter Soldier"
In the recent "Black Widow" movie, they fire rockets and shit and cause an avalanche presumably killing a whole prison full of prisoners/guards, you can assume maybe the prisoners were evil and so it was ok they died, or you can assume the guards were evil because they were holding the dad captive, but you can't assume both were evil. so they kill a bunch of people and are joking like right after. They do this shit all the time and act like the audience is supposed to not notice death unless they underline it.

Like in the Falcon and Winter Soldier show we are supposed to be mad at new Captain America because he killed a dude who had a moment to say "hey don't kill me" even though Falcon killed loads of dudes starting in the opening action sequence.

They just don't take shit seriously often, and I'll have to rewatch it to find it but in one of the early "what if" episodes (maybe the first one) they were REALLY being informal about death and the threat of death so much so that I gave up on the whole series.

I can live with Starlord using quippyness around danger as a defense mechanism because of his personality, but when what are supposed to be serious characters don't treat death or the threat of death seriously, they shouldn't expect anybody to get invested in that show/movie.

SwayM posted...

What If is weird.

Like I want to just say its a no stakes cartoon and its just thing to have a bit of fun. Some episodes are quite good and the rest is mediocre to bad, but who caress, right?

But it seems like theyre actually putting their chips down that this shit matters.

Foolish.

Yeah, they are trying to have their cake and eat it too "it's just a silly cartoon" and also "this is as legit and canon as the star wars animated series."

What they don't realize is that Dave Filloni took Clone Wars and Rebels super seriously. So while it was kid watchable, it respected the narrative, stakes, and universe.

Finished it.

Thoroughly unimpressed with the last few episodes.

The animation was okay in some spots like the big laser fights, but the faces were still by far the worst I've seen from a professional studio. It's like they mocapped people talking but only had five points mapped on the model's face.

The dialogue was still horrible, especially Thor. Like, holy shit they just threw him in the fucking dumpster. The only decent dialogue is from Ta'Chala and that's because he already speaks in platitudes so it's not much different from how he already talks.

I have a lot of gripes with the stories and holes in the logic of the series, and I could list them all here (I almost did before realizing that's pointless). Insert "you're overanalyzing a cartoon here" posts, but if this series is meant to be canonized later then those holes will leak into the rest of the MCU, making it even more convoluted than it already is.

DarthAragorn posted...

Doctor Strange one is amazing though

For real.

I hear it had an extremely low budget and they only had a year or so to rush it out for phase 4, so that's a big reason too.

Look at arcane. Riot money plus 6 years does wonders to quality.

The Doctor Strange episode is just the plot to Puella Magi Madoka Magica >.>

The constant unfunny quips really bring down the show. As much shit as the films get sometimes for being too quippy, What If is far worse.

The Dr. Strange and Party Thor episodes are both A+, excellent stuff, for entirely different reasons. The show can be great when it goes dark and serious, or when it leans hard into its silliness.

There is a lot I could say about the show and about each individual episode but instead of getting into everything I'll just stick to the point that I agree the animation really sucked. I thought it looked uncanny from the initial trailers and I was really hoping it would all look better in context but it was just as bad. Confusing how Disney of all companies can fuck up animation so hard, and with a spinoff for the biggest film series on the planet.

It felt like a bad mcu parody and the power-scalingwas horrendous.

ZMythos posted...

The Doctor Strange episode is just the plot to Puella Magi Madoka Magica >.>

That means less than nothing to someone who doesn't know what that is.

I liked a few of em but they were too short and all felt rushed.

The only one i thought was actually good though was the T'challa as star lord one.

Kinda agree, it was a weak show. The Doctor Strange one is the only episode I truly enjoyed.

If you really don't want to watch the rest of it, all you need to know in case it comes up later is that all the multiverse characters form a Guardians of the Multiverse kind of group and end up sealing away alternate Killmonger and an evil Dr. Strange together, right after dealing with an Ultron that was able to detect the existence of the multiverse and trying to conquer it.

I4NRulez posted...

I liked a few of em but they were too short and all felt rushed.

I liked the show, but this was also my issue. Before it aired, I thought we'd be getting two or three episodes per What If. Captain Carter, for instance, had zero breathing room and would have worked way better as a two-parter.

The best episodes are ones where they didn't have that pacing issue like Party Thor and Dr. Real Strange.

Best MCU show so far.