One of the most tiresome trends in modern movies is when quote-unquote real directors are asked about the MCU. Martin Scorsese is just a fairly nice old man who loves movies, and he said Marvel movies are more like a rollercoaster. I mean, jeez. Get over it. He's right. Pre-pandemic, I had seen every MCU movie since Iron Man 2 in the theatre in the first week of its opening. I love the MCU, but they're more predictable and formulaic than your typical piece of cinema.
They're still good, though. I watch a lot of movies - at the time of writing it is the afternoon of January 19th and I've seen 29 this year - and the MCU is my all-time favourite series, so as tiresome as it is hearing reporters ask Scorsese or PTA or Villeneuve if they'd like a free dunk on the MCU, it's also tiresome to see them dismissed as trash. They're popcorn flicks, but they're the best popcorn flicks ever. That's why I've decided to go through the MCU and match up each movie with a piece of quote-unquote real cinema. Two birds, one stone. On one hand, it shows the MCU has more variety than given credit for and might make doubters appreciate what it does well, and on the other, it gives MCU fans a jumping off point into films they might ordinarily have not watched or even heard of.
We're going to do this once a week for every MCU movie, and if you're still with us by the end we'll jump into the TV series, the DCEU, or some other superhero movies. Either that or no one will read these, and we'll can them around the time of the first Avengers movie. Whatever works.
There won't be too many hard rules here. I'll try to stick with movies I think Scorsese might agree are 'cinema', but otherwise it'll just be a movie that gives off the same vibes. Might be plot, main character, cinematography, themes... just vibes, man. First off, the movie that began the MCU in the first place - 2008's Iron Man. If you like Iron Man, try Logan's Run.
Logan’s Run premiered in 1976, and even though I’m comparing it to Iron Man, the best shorthand is that it’s like the Justin Timberlake movie In Time. It’s about a society of relative paradise, with the notable catch that you die when you turn 30. Technical𓆏ly you get the chance to be reborn, but as our hero Logan discovers, no one actually gets reborn. They just die.
On a technical level, there are a lot of similarities. It looks schlocky by today’s standards, but a lot of filmmaking tricks around holograms and other💯 ‘70s sci-fi staples come from Logan’s Run. Likewise, Iron Man influenced what would become the standard style of superhero movie in the MCU and beyond, picking up on the influence of X-Men and Spider-Man. To suggest you might enjoy two movies because both had differing techniques that other films later used is a little thin t💙hough, but thankfully the two have more in common than that.
Iron Man is ultimately about Tony Stark finding his place in the world, and coming to terms with his old role as an🎃 arms dealer. In Logan’s Run, Logan is a Sandman - it’s his job to kill people who try to escape from the ritual of rebirth. Not everyone takes the whole being reborn thing on faith, so some run. As he realises how the system works, he comes to regret his actions, and just like Stark, endeavors to change things. This sets him on a collision course with his partner, just as Stark’s change of heart forever changes his relationship with Stane.
A primary theme in Logan’s Run is the danger of hedonism. As people only live to the age of 30, it is a society of perpetual youth, and as such the characters all dress and behave with sexual freedom and often ambiguity. Michael York plays Logan as a very different type of charismatic charmer from Robert Downey Jnr’s Tony Stark, but the two share a magnetism, a sense ꦫof reckless aꦇbandon that crystallises into deeper feelings, Stark for Pepper and Logan for Jenny, his companion in his journey to find the truth.
There are no robot fights in the sky, but again, by ‘70s standards there are some pretty decent sci-fi sequences, and some gorgeous shots. Cinematography is one of the MCU’s weaker elements, but the creativity around Tony’s suit assembly has always been one of the better uses of green screen and ping pong balls. Logan’s Run isn’t the most obvious movie to connect to Iron Man, but it is the movie with the closest vibes to Iron Man, and that’s really what we’re ꦿgoing for here.
An easier pick would have been a movie with robots - with iron men. RoboCop shares something of a political commentary, but on the whole the two films are very different in their themes and tones, while beyond the whole robot deal I don’t see much connection with Metropolis, The Terminator, or Ghost in the Shell. They’re all great movies, but they’re not I🎀ron Man, not in the way Logan’s Run is. Check back next week for The Incredible Hulk, everyone’s favourite MCU film that’s bound to see this column become gloriously popular overnight.
