The Avengers structural exercise (pt.2)

[petronia]

Part 1

Coulson vs. Tony Stark 1 / Tony and Pepper 1 (cont.) A second sidebar here: I am not sure the Tony/Pepper relationship evolves in a way that makes sense between IM1, IM2, and here. That's because Tony and Pepper getting together at the end of IM2 doesn't actually fix why they were going off the rails in that movie (in the same sense that Tony dying of palladium poisoning shouldn't have been the reason for his meltdown, it should've been because he wasn't able to cope. Because the IM tone is just that bit more realistic than most superhero movies). In fact, the only archetypal arc that works for Pepper/Tony across the three films is the old-school screwball "comedy of remarriage": in a very real sense, Pepper was married to Tony to begin with. She is his chatelaine. They just had to renegotiate the terms of their marriage (more equality, less unilateral taking of BS, more sex...). I almost think Pepper had further to go, psychologically speaking; my guess is she was de facto acting CEO from the moment Obie bought it, but she couldn't picture any formal forward step from "PA" than "PA who is sleeping with her boss, thanks but no thanks." Whereas for Tony, it was always a matter of a best friend becoming more, and either he turns out to be a bad boyfriend or he doesn't, either she hates him for ruining it or she doesn't.

I could make a sidebar-within-a-sidebar re: how Gwyneth Paltrow infuses at least as much of herself into movie!Pepper as RDJ infuses himself into movie!Tony, it's just that no one thinks about Gwyneth vs. Pepper because the Gwyneth Paltrow persona pisses people off. In the IM1 DVD extras she talked about how her brother read comics so she grew up around them but she didn't read them because... she was a girl. XD

Anyway. Tony/Pepper: uber-cute in The Avengers! Thanks for being a shipper, RDJ! Tony is way more centred here than in the IM movies, not only because of Pepper, but because Pepper and superhero-ing mean he doesn't have to be "Tony Stark" a lot of the time. He's still going to blow off Phil Coulson and SHIELD, though, which is a lot of funny here but only sets up the sad later on. It does turn out that Pepper and Coulson are personally friendly, which is lovely.

EDIT -- Sidebar the third (or fourth?) I keep forgetting to mention actual plot points. In the real world (ha ha), governments would be way more interested in a scaleable arc reactor that can slot into the grid than in the Iron Man, and Stark Industries' P/E ratio would stay rock bottom as long as Tony keeps flying around in the thing. But I like the green energy angle, which was the best idea in that Iron Man anime by a long stretch (I only watched a bit of it because Fujiwara Keiji, of all seiyuu, dubs Robert Downey Jr.'s roles). And yes, in the real world, if Tony were going to proliferate the things for commercial use anywhere, it would be Japan.

LOKI2: more aliens and stuff. Does this go here? The alien stuff is negligeable, anyway, but viewers of Thor will recognize that Loki mentally edited his past in order to justify his actions. He didn't want to be king in Thor; it didn't occur to him until literally 10 minutes before the end of the movie, in the same way that it didn't occur to Pepper she could be CEO until the job was offered to her. Dude is creys and it's all kinds of sad. In general I think Loki hits that coveted movie villain sweet spot, where you go oh man I grok how saddo you are, but you deserved that beating all the same.

The hypnosis spell is interesting: it speaks to whatever could lead you astray without you even knowing it. Makes you wonder what would have happened to Tony, had he been susceptible. ...Plot? They need a chunk of iridium, IIRC.

Captain America vs. Coulson 1 / Black Widow / Bruce Banner. Coulson being a Cap fanboy: bring on the moé. Coulson gets a lot of perceptive statements, as if part of his characterization is that ability to sum up a person in a sentence. People want a bit of old-fashioned to ground them: that redefines the role of Captain America for the 21st century, right there.

Meanwhile, Steve and Natasha are so professionally cordial that one suspects they've worked together before -- or they came to an immediate instinctive agreement to remain in their mutually preferred mode of dry competence. (EDIT -- on watch #3, it's very definitely the latter. Future generations thank you, Peggy, for teaching him how to talk to women - professionally deadly women, anyway.) And then the Hulk was a big honking metaphor for ableism and mental health stigma. XD; Am I the only one unnerved that this action movie got the subtleties effortlessly right? What I mean is, Steve made his mind up about Bruce before they met, and what he decided was that Dr. Bruce "as smart as Steven Hawking" Banner mattered and his condition was none of Steve's business. (Except how Bruce getting gamma-rayed was obscurely the serum's fault, and therefore Steve's.) Because he is Captain America, he is 100% sincere and disarming, and Bruce believes him. But he still sets the Hulk apart as a negative, damage to manage, and not an integral aspect of Bruce himself.

Part 3

Comments

[flamebyrd]

I always figured being king was part of Loki's plan in Thor - start a war, win it, get his father's respect so he'd choose him instead?

Most of Loki's problems seem to come down to envy. I spend a lot time mentally yelling "adopted family is real family" at him, but when it comes down to it the only reason this is actually an issue for him is because he's so envious of Thor.

[petronia]

I've only seen Thor once, but I didn't think Loki had planned all that from the beginning - as far as I could tell, all he wanted to do originally was embarrass Thor on his big day. Then there was fallout, and he kept doubling down on his bad decisions (which is also what he does here, tbh XD;).

If you're talking post- him finding out about his parentage, post- convenient Odinsleep, post- his mom being like "you know that makes you king now," then yeah, that was one plan: eliminate Thor, get the frost giants in, double-cross them for flawless win over Jotunheim and Asgard. The tension in that sequence was that you didn't know whether or not he was going for the double-cross.

If we're talking the family therapy angle, the problem isn't that Loki's adopted, the problem is that he's adopted into a family (heck, a civilization) of people who are psychologically very different from him, and either brushed the difference under the rug or didn't even realize an extra effort was required. Like, maybe his frost giant birth family was entirely comprised of overthinking, passive-aggressive, backstabbing little shits (...though I find this hard to imagine XD), but I bet Loki would have liked that better because at least they would all have grokked each other, Game of Thrones-style. It's no good Odin loving Loki and Thor the same: if you can't recognize a person for who they are you can't validate them. Thor kinda gets him, now, but up until literally five minutes before the end of the other movie he had no idea what was going on in Loki's head, which is a massive failure at being a sibling.

Then there is the fact that dude is, um, actually a frost giant. Like, any real-world situations I could make that a metaphor for, are all pretty awful.

Anyway. Not to get into my IRL family, but I have actually had a lot of fallout in my life that can ultimately be traced to someone who blamed their problems on being adopted into a psychologically isolating (because very different) family. And yes, said person found out they were adopted by accident as a teenager, and voila: instant explanation for why they're isolated and no one understands them. This in lieu of accepting that any issues you have stem from your personality, and therefore you need to work on you (there is no working on the fact that you're adopted, so you're stuck there for the rest of your life). So I am not a Loki fan, but I have thought deeply about this topic and have correspondingly strong opinions on Odin's handling of the issue. XD;

[flamebyrd]

I've only seen Thor once myself (same for all the movies, although at this rate I am going to have to see Avengers again), so. That was just the impression I had - that Loki always wanted the throne! (And yes, I was talking pre-birth-family-revelation.)

Did you watch the deleted scenes? There's one with Loki and Thor just before the ceremony, and I really wanted to slap Thor in it... You're right, he's pretty terrible at being a sibling.

This was a very convincing summary of Loki's issues, and thank you for typing it all out! *sweatdrop* I hadn't thought about it from a... hmm, disaffected teenager? point of view, and it's enlightening. (Loki as Vanyel Ashkevron...) ie. that they need to meet somewhere in the middle before they'll reach peace. (Which is why Thor's pleas to just come home are ineffective, one imagines.)

[petronia]

There is definitely a contingent of fans out there who think Loki is basically Vanyel. It makes up for Tom Hiddleston's relatively unpert British derriere, I suppose. XD;;

There is no way Loki can actually go home at this point. They can't really ignore what he did on Midgard, though the possibilities range from "grounded without dinner" to "retribution straight out of Norse myth." He's both unapologetic and untrustworthy, and any punishment will just make him more resentful. The end result is that there are logical directions for Iron Man 3 (Extremis/Mandarin) and Captain America 2 (Winter Soldier), but no one seems to have the slightest idea what Thor 2 is going to be about, least of all me. XD; I saw a dude make a very good case that Marvel should've had the balls to break with comics canon and have Loki die tragically in Thor's arms, which would have been sufficiently operatic for a true Joss finale. Except can Thor even be in a plot that doesn't eventually involve Loki?

Maybe Loki can be conveniently amnesia-ed. Age-regressed. Maybe they can steal Astolat's plot and have Thor die and Loki fetch him back from the underworld.

I watched the deleted scenes once. I should probably see this movie again; it's the only one I hadn't bothered to watch a second time.

[flamebyrd]

Well, obvs he can't go home while still unapologetic, but one would hope that assuming he did have a miraculous change of heart, somebody would be there to point out he's far more valuable as an ally than an enemy. But perhaps this is expecting too much. (Also I seem to keep forgetting that canonically as of end of Avengers he is in Asgard custody.)

I couldn't even imagine how there could be a Thor 1 (although it worked when I saw it) so I am of no help here. XD

[labingi]

Thanks for this perspective on the adoption question and for pointing me to this comment.

[bigbrasskey]

Not a huge fan of Loki either, but character and narrative wise one might also take into account the fact that he was...taught to hate his own species and characterize them as completely inhuman and monstrous and basically irredeemable (Asgard and Odin have some pretty straight-forward imperialist patterns and narratives going on there) sooooo no, I would say that his issues with Thor intertwine with the whole, not compose his psychological issues en masse, considering that his behaviour escalates pretty explicitly from the moment he finds out he's the ~~monster~~ not, say, from the moment Thor is removed from the equation in Asgard leaving the path (more) open.

[flamebyrd]

Yeah, thanks to the discussion with petronia above I've kind of revised this opinion a bit. :)

[bigbrasskey]

My favourite part of discussing, thinking about stuff in new ways. XD

[brooms]

but only sets up the sad later on. It does turn out that Pepper and Coulson are personally friendly, which is lovely.

i was never emotionally invested in coulson, but tony talking to him about lending him a cabin (?) and offering to fly him wherever so he'd spend some time with his cellist lady friend was so sad. tony doesn't seem to make friends very easily.

at least his new buddy bruce got out okay.

i thought the hypnosis spell was supposed to be the soul gem. but if it was, it should have been green and it should have affected tony.

[petronia]

I only caught those lines between Tony and Coulson in rewatch #3. But yes, it's sad... I'm of two minds re: Coulson's death but it really was set up quite carefully.

I wonder what would have happened if Loki had thought of tapping elsewhere than right on the arc reactor. XD;

[sub_divided]

I love this post.

In general I think Loki hits that coveted movie villain sweet spot, where you go oh man I grok how saddo you are, but you deserved that beating all the same.

It's true. Also the comedy of remarriage and "Because he is Captain America, he is 100% sincere and disarming, and Bruce believes him. But he still sets the Hulk apart as a negative, damage to manage, and not an integral aspect of Bruce himself."

Nothing else to say, just that I am enjoying this series.

[petronia]

I am leaving you Scott Mendelson's review so as to keep the link somewhere XD it is not only one of the few actually insightful ones (though I like the pure squee ones too), but has an intelligent comments section. Possibly he deletes the ones that are like "HAHA DC UP YRS". http://scottalanmendelson.blogspot.ca/2012/04/review-with-terrific-character.html

[sub_divided]

I guess I disagree with the review because I thought the movie had an emotional climax: Banner being Hulk in a constructive way, Cap'n Amerrca being recognized by the NYPD as a commander on the ground, Iron Man sacrificing himself (though really it's kinda in keeping with his character to go out in the most dramatic way possible so, not so much a character development moment as a "your time to shine" moment), Hawkeye getting to make good after betraying the others, etc. There's no TEAM revelatory moment, but nearly every member of the cast has an INDIVIDUAL revelatory moment.

I do agree there was a bit of sloppy editing re: Loki's staff of doom (though I caught that it was influencing everyone to fight). "The Avengers can't work together" theme is more "the Avengers are distrustful of authority and can't work for SHIELD" - and the movie shows that they are right to think this way - it was never about whether they would individually get along. So I guess I think the unresolved conflict has to do with them working for SHIELD more than working with each other, and the way to resolve that would be to show that while they might not trust the institution, they like and trust the good people who are working there like Fury, Maria Hill, Coulson, BW, Hawkeye, perhaps that scientist dude who was never seen again, etc. Actually this is just reinforcing my feeling that the SHIELD weapons-reveal thing was mishandled because it should have been used to show how Nick Fury is playing the game. (Someone should write that fanfic.)

In other words, "the Avengers can't get along" is a fiction SHIELD uses to justify not wanting these people to team up and, perhaps, represent a threat to SHIELD's monopoly on shady extra-national power. (Which is why Cap'n America working for them is the most ironic thing, but BW and Hawkeye working for them makes perfect sense.)

[petronia]

Yeah, actually if you think about it most of them were working together just fine, to the degree that they knew each other. They meet Thor via face punchings, but that is just. How people get to know each other. In shounen manga, or wuxia novels, or (probably) warrior Asgard. XD Thor isn't really part of the team, but his goals were broadly aligned, so the only ones that were actually butting heads were Tony and Steve.

Nick Fury mishandles the whole thing so badly I started suspecting it was a Xanatos gambit to discredit the "phase 2 weaponry" project (they don't need the weapons if the Avengers can save the world successfully, which was Fury's Plan A - and at the end of the movie, he didn't seem unhappy at all to send the Cube back with Thor). XD; Is that what you meant?

[sub_divided]

Yeah, that's exactly what I mean - that he actually brought the Avengers on board so they could find the weapons and get rid of them, because Nick Fury doesn't like having all that firepower concentrated in one place. He'd rather work with a bunch of "unstable" individuals who can exercise independent judgement than have a bunch of superweapons lying around that can be used by anyone with security clearance.

It's really anti-democratic, in the superhero way, because it assumes that some special people can be trusted with power, but a (representative?) committee can't be. Or maybe he knows something about his bosses that we don't. I dunno, there's a kind of tension in the movie because SHIELD are so shadowy, but their tech and ability to spy on everyone etc. actually helps to defeat the aliens.

Oh! That reminds me: about Treize Kushranada, I thought he was crazy too, until I watched the original Gundam where 9/10 of humanity is wiped out before the series even starts because they live in space stations that can be blown up. The whole Gundam concept from the beginning is a way to limit the amount of damage that's done when very industrialized nations fight each other. I think it makes sense to think of war as a kind of contract where each side agrees to only fight the designated soldiers of the other side with designated weapons, to limit the casualties... using Gundam tech is a way that the GDP/development powers of the two sides can still come into play, because those things are hella expensive to make. It's confused, and Treize is crazy because he's obsessed with earlier eras of combat and "aesthetics" more than winning, but I kind of see GW as being about, like... cycles of forgetting the reason for setting up rules of combat in the first place, going back to more destructive/impersonal forms of fighting, and having to be reminded through atrocity why sometimes it's not rational to be 'rational'. Also like you said, it's more exciting to watch >_>.

I thought I put the thing about Nick Fury in a comment to you somewhere, but maybe it was just at metafilter. I hope they address this Nick Fury/SHIELD thing in the next movie, because I don't think it's really been resolved - who are SHIELD really? (Ironically, I guess this means I agree with the US Pentagon.)

About Cap'n America and Tony Stark butting heads, I now wonder if it's because, in his over-preparatory zeal, RDJ and/or Joss Whedon read all the Avengers backissues where this is the main conflict within the group. You mentioned the one where Iron Man turns into a woman and marries Cap'n America on tumblr, right?

It's awesome how ScarJo becomes the center of every group interview. That's a charismatic person.

[petronia]

(I am, like, finally answering comments! Amazing etc.)

I guess, if you accept the premise of this universe, then who knows how democratically SEELE Fury's council bosses were chosen, yanno? Certainly there was no referendum on whether to nuke Manhattan. XD; I think the point is that ultimately once you get to a high enough level of power, regardless of how you got there (election, skience rays...) personal relationships start mattering again, and Fury's pretty confident of his ability to ride herd on the Avengers, because it's worked out thus far. At the same time, they don't answer to him/SHIELD unconditionally; the switch isn't just in his hand. It's a sort of ad hoc system of checks and balances. These powered dudes would still be out there regardless of whether some organization were trying to give them structure.

[petronia]

That being said, though, I do think it's 1) confusing and 2) kind of a copout for there to be conflict between the Avengers on the Helicarrier because Loki's staff made it so, rather than because of character development. Like, Tony and Steve don't argue except in the proximity of the staff, so does that mean they wouldn't have argued at all otherwise? (When they're in action they not only work as a team, they work as a team remarkably well for two people who've just met.) Except, isn't Tony supposed to be immune to the effect of the staff? So does that mean that Steve and everyone else wouldn't have lost their tempers but for the influence of the staff, but Tony is just naturally a dick?

...

...Actually that is sadly plausible. XD; But it feels like fanwank rather than something you're supposed to get out of the movie.

[sub_divided]

Maybe the staff just amplifies what's already there. Maybe it was even good in a way, because normally everyone except Tony would have been repressing their natural annoyance, anger, distrust, etc and been adult and professional. And so, because they would have been guarded, it would have taken ages for them to really talk and/or to work through their issues, so that they could bond afterward. Maybe Loki did them a favor! Maybe this is why Tony Stark/RDJ prods people in the first place, because he doesn't have the patience for "niceties".

[labingi]

Here belatedly via your directing me back to this post. :)

Interesting that Loki hits the villain sweet spot for you. He doesn't for me. I like the tension you note between "saddo" and deserving to get his ass kicked, but for me the "saddo" is just immature to come off as formidable in any interesting way. I keep feeling like I'm looking at an emo 13 year old who just happens to be superpowered.

I think I like this formula when it's played all the way up at tragic (anti-)hero level. The example that comes to my Gungrave-obsessed mind is Harry MacDowell, who is emotionally wounded yet a mass murderer utterly deserving of his giant fall. But while Harry is deeply flawed and deeply blind and immature on many levels (hence his villainy), he's also intelligent, insightful, likable, and a very able leader in other ways. Aside from raw power and a certain raw courage, I don't see any of that in Loki, and it leaves me bored.

[petronia]

Yes, it's a quirk -- for some reason, the villains I find most entertaining qua villains are basically shitty self-delusional little kids who're competent but think they're masterminds. The ones who dig themselves into holes and create escalating situations, overthinking and doubling down on risky bets, while kidding themselves that they're completely in control. XD; Lelouch, Light, Loki (why do they all start with L?). I dislike it when it's the purported hero that has this kind of arc, but when it's the villain it allows me to... gleefully lack sympathy while still being entertained by the clusterfuck. I think. But at the same time I have this weird kind of instinctive liking for the personality type itself, villainy aside -- how incredibly hard they work to complexify their own lives.

The ones I like with more grandeur are the true masterminds who turn out to have been operating on some sort of basic, childlike, irrational ideal. But I don't perceive them as villains, really, though I may agree they need to be defeated.