'Avengers: Doomsday' and That Never-Ending Chair Livestream
On the five-hour livestream that took over my Wednesday and made me extra nostalgic for Marvel and the larger MCU
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Any plans I had for this week’s newsletter have been completely sidelined by an impromptu livestream by Marvel Studios across its social platforms.
I haven’t felt this much excitement about the Marvel Cinematic Universe since the Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2019. Though I watched updates through social media, that event still feels like a total fever dream.
Characters I loved but never really got the chance to be the main characters were suddenly front-running their projects across the big and small screens.
Black Widow, WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Loki felt like the most unreal announcements. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Hawkeye sparked my interest. Eternals and Thor: Love and Thunder sounded exciting. I was reeling from all the joy I felt about those upcoming stories.
I got a little bit of that joy while watching these chairs. Now, let me explain.
This five-hour livestream was a lot. Ten to fifteen minutes between every chair didn’t feel like the most efficient way to do this. My social media timelines were flooded with people, myself included, trying to understand the drawn-out tactic. But, gradually, I noticed my tone starting to change towards the whole thing.
I leaned forward when Sebastian Stan’s (Bucky Barnes/The Winter Soldier) chair was next to Anthony Mackie’s (Sam Wilson/Captain America). They’ve been one of my favorite duos in the MCU since the Captain America: The Winter Soldier press run. From there, I put the video on in the background while I worked on other things because I could really feel those minutes between chairs.
As I wrote, I’d take glances over at the screen, and names like Lewis Pullman (Bob/The Sentry), Danny Ramirez (Joaquín Torres/Falcon), and Winston Duke (M’Baku) made me raise an eyebrow in (affectionate) intrigue.
It wasn’t until Tom Hiddleston’s (Loki) name popped up on the back of a chair that I started to wonder what this movie is about and how it’s going to work.
From seemingly abandoning stories (Where do Moon Knight or Eternals fit?) to using movies and TV shows as cameo-filled (arguably, Deadpool and Wolverine) stepping stones (arguably, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania) to culminating projects like Avengers: Doomsday, I have read plenty of critiques of the MCU lately.
I’m not here to agree or disagree with them in terms of Doomsday. Frankly, I don’t know what this movie is about, and I can’t really decipher it from this first batch of cast members. That’s right; it’s already been confirmed that Marvel isn’t done revealing the cast for this movie. Maybe they’ll switch up the chairs bit next time.
Then again, the livestream pulled 275 million (WOW!) views during its 5+ hours.
It was a unique yet time-consuming way to roll out the cast of Avengers: Doomsday.
Admittedly, I didn’t start to look less at my work and more at the livestream until two very big names appeared on the backs of those chairs — Sir Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellan. It was then that I got very excited and worried about what this movie might be. Their names reminded me why I enjoy Marvel/ the MCU.
Before Robert Downey Jr. appeared on the big screen as Tony Stark/Iron Man in 2008’s Iron Man, which officially launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe that we know today, I became infatuated with Marvel through 2000’s X-Men.