Marvel TV Shows Prove Studio Movies Don’t Actually Need Those Huge Budgets
Since Marvel has risen to power, the company has been grinding out movie after movie with no expense spared.
Sure, some of the movies that had multi-million-dollar budgets did pay off – for instance, Avengers: Endgame is currently the second highest-grossing movie of all time and Avengers: Infinity War ranks sixth on this list. Brilliant, isn't it?
Marvel has admittedly mastered the blockbuster genre in their universe and knows what their fans want in a movie like that. However, as the MCU has grown over time, their movies (even with huge budgets) have started to seem a little repetitive.
What is even more worrisome is that for these new Marvel movies it is getting harder and harder to break even in terms of profitability.
Let's take Ant Man 3. It has a $200 million budget and will need to triple it to become even a little bit profitable. To add insult to injury, many fans are dissatisfied with how the movie has turned out.
People wanted a plot-driven personal story focused on father/daughter relationship struggles, and what did they get? Another blockbustery CGI fest.
Though most still enjoyed it, the question is "How long will people be entertained for by such genre-typical movies?"
Other fans support the idea of smaller-budget movies, arguing that Marvel TV series are known to have done well on a minimal budget.
However, some shows went downhill after the first season or got spoiled (in some fans' opinion) by too huge of a finale.
Many TV series and franchises suffer from the same thing. If you are successful enough to last several seasons or movies, you start to come up with "the worst villain" or "the most life-changing battle" every season or movie, and that sort of loses value in your viewers' eyes.
So far, Marvel has managed to find their way out but will they continue to be this clever and/or lucky in the future? For how long?
Personally, we do not mind if Marvel starts making smaller and more personal stories with less special effects in addition to their usual mind-blowing blockbusters.
The more quality cinema, the better!