Saturday, March 2, 2024

The MCU and Magic

 I almost read a different book than the ones I ended up reading this week; however, I felt a bit iffy in the first twenty pages, so I looked up the synopsis. I realize you’re not supposed to do that, and I feel like whipping myself or something, but looking at the summary, I was like, “...no, we’re not doing that.” I had to scramble to find something more cheerful to read. I ended up picking something completely random.

I’ve been in a dour mood. I don’t know exactly what prompted it; I just know reading about someone going through physical, emotional, and spiritual torture is not something I needed this week.


[On top of everything else, it turned out that my computer needed to update as I started writing this Note.]


Random question: have you guys ever used OneNote?



The Marvel Cinematic Universe and Magic


The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is not very good with magic.


Alright, it’s not terrible, but it’s not great. Despite having the Sorcerer Supreme in its roster, the MCU has struggled with depicting the more magical side of the Marvel universe that it’s adapting into live-action. I suspect a large part of this stems from how Phase One, the base of the entire cinematic universe, built its foundation on a science-fiction setting. The one exception to this might have been Thor, but the first movie makes it clear that the “magic” of the Asgardians is just science that humanity hasn’t quite caught up with yet. There’s nothing supernatural about them. Thor: The Dark World even has Odin make a statement to Loki before the latter’s imprisonment about how they’re not gods, they’re just often mistaken for them.


[This is ignored in Thor: Ragnarok and its follow-up Thor: Love & Thunder, but we’re ignoring those because I’ve only seen one of them and I hated it.]


Marvel’s not the only one bad at this, true. The Black Adam movie has magic, sure, but when it comes to Dr. Fate it kind of acts like the Helmet of Fate is some kind of weird interdimensional artifact and not the host of a Lord of Order, and it has some tricks that anyone can learn if they pick up the helmet. Which, uh, no, that’s not how it’s supposed to work. 


I want to say that one of the producers of the MCU made a statement around Phase Two or so, claiming that everything in the movies could be explained with science (albeit, at times whacky comic book science). Which kind of makes sense around that period! It’s hard to have a universe where everything is science-based, to then turn around and say, “Look at this thing! It’s magic!” It’s a little like the magic microwave in Redshirts. It doesn’t make sense.


I also realize that it’s challenging to introduce magic as magic in a world with superpowers. You can have a sorcerer flinging fireballs, sure, but then your audience is going to wonder, “Wait, how does that make him different from a guy with fire superpowers?” And that’s a fair question. One of the things I liked about Doctor Strange was its focus on dimensions and astral projection–that’s a type of power that’s clearly different from established superpowers. Of course, the problem is that interacting with different dimensions and wielding their energy can also be chalked up to a science-fiction thing, if you try hard enough, which some viewers did. Heck, Agents of SHIELD did it when they showed an android building a portal like one seen in the movie, but with a machine. Shortly afterward, Ghost Rider pops in and straight-up tells someone that Hell is just one of many dimensions that has a stake in what happens on Earth.


I don’t really begrudge the idea of “Magic is science that we don’t understand yet”, at least not entirely; I think it kind of makes sense for Stephen Strange to view it that way, being a doctor by profession. But I don’t like how often it’s popped up. We’ve gotten to this place where in fiction, it’s assumed that you can substitute things in magic for science and the result is still the same. Like UV lights work for sunlight to hurt the Headless Horseman in Sleepy Hollow; even if it’s a cool idea, it seems to miss that the point isn’t that the Horseman is hurt by a certain kind of light, it’s that he can’t stand the daylight. The spiritual dimension to how the magic works is missing.


Magic isn’t supposed to work that way! It’s magic! It needs magic! Magic must defeat magic, as Uncle would say. It’s like in the 2018 God of War, there’s a scene towards the end where a magic ingredient doesn’t make much sense to our heroes, but Mimir explains that Vanir magic is just like that–it works on a different logic than science would.


So yes, the MCU does have magic, and more as the movies go on, but for the most part it still feels not quite right, like real magic. The second Doctor Strange again focuses on interdimensionality, with a villain that was introduced as being mutated by an Infinity Stone (even if WandaVision tells us that it only enhanced her inherent magic). I’m not sure why America Chavez is seemingly recruited to learn magic when her powers don’t seem particularly magical? There’s the Ancestral Plane in Black Panther, which pretty much is mystical, but nobody really talks about it in the film as if it’s unusual because it’s part of their belief system–except Shuri, who plainly doesn’t believe it’s a real thing at all.


The only two examples that come to mind for really good examples of straight-up supernatural things (and I realize that I could be wrong, I haven’t seen everything) are Shang-Chi and the Ten Rings, which has an outright magical realm, and Moon Knight, which is very hard to explain if you don’t assume that the supernatural elements are exactly what they appear to be. Khonsu straight-up alters the sky, something other characters remark on as  impossible if I remember correctly. And that’s why I want to see more of these characters and stories–they’re something completely different than the science-based heroes of the Marvel world thus far.


And random observation: I enjoy the idea that magic exists in space. For whatever reason, a lot of comic book stories don’t want to deal with this (although Young Justice does!), despite there being no reason it shouldn’t. In Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2, one of the Ravagers makes glowing magic sigils like the sorcerers of Kamar-Taj. I want to see more of things like this because if magic really is dimensional energy, people in other parts of the universe should be able to tap into it.


So here is what I think the MCU should do:


-First, feature more heroes and stories that revolve around supernatural happenings. With Marvel’s insanely large catalog of heroes, that shouldn’t be hard. Then have them interact with each other. How does Black Panther interact with someone like Moon Knight and their radically different versions of the afterlife? And how would the sorcerers of Kamar-Taj interact with the people of Ta Lo?


-Have these stories be important to the overall MCU. The ending of Shang Chi implies that the Ten Rings will play a part in an upcoming story arc over more than one movie, but I’m not holding my breath there. I should, though–if the rest of the MCU is forced to accept the existence of magic, with a new Big Bad that’s magically-involved or something, it’d be a good way to make sure it stays as a presence in the cinematic universe.


-Actually deal with the afterlife? Both Moon Knight and Black Panther have versions of the afterlife appear, and I think that should be talked about more? If Black Panther mentions at an Avengers meeting having met ancestors, and then the other characters dig into that, trying to figure out what that means… well, that’d be cool. I’m pretty sure at least one of those characters would try to find a way to bring back a dead loved one.


I want more of this kind of stuff! I’d honestly prefer more DC material on magic, but as they’re kind of in a bigger mess than the MCU right now (which is admittedly saying something), it’d be cool to see Marvel feature magic more heavily in their movies.

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