(No Scans) "What If ...?" Discussion

[cricharddavies]

So it's here.



I thought the first episode was pretty good, if a bit paint by numbers, and what might be the most crucial change to this version of the Marvel Cinematic Universe -- that Colonel Phillips has been taken off the board, and so the character of the Strategic Science Reserve and SHIELD will be different -- is given very little time. Still, it's a good start.

Anyone want to guess the odds that Mr. "do not, can not, will not interfere" is going to end up interfering before the end of the series?

Comments

[stubbleupdate]

[stubbleupdate]

I want to be clear that I'm referring to the buff, tank flipping woman, not the tentacles

[tinygaylaura]

Why not both.gif

[scorntx]

Well...
It played out very like one of the average issues of What If...?
Didn't exactly turn into a major bloodbath where everyone dies horribly to show us things had to happen how they did originally.
Which was good.

Though trying to compress an adaptation of an hour and a bit movie into thirty four minutes does mean a lot of things happen at breakneck speed or just 'cuz, or because it's what happened originally.

The change of Red Skull going from "use the cube as a battery" to "use the cube to summon a tentacle monster" is pretty in keeping with some of the weirder What If...?s though, where once things go off the rails, they really go off the rails. So props for that.

I dunno. Maybe it could've stood to be more spread out?

[cricharddavies]

I was honestly expecting Thanos to show up when the gate opened.

[bruinsfan]

I was expecting Thor or another Asgardian, since the mythology around the Tesseract was all Norse.

[cricharddavies]

That would have made sense too.

[scorntx]

Amora, or Hela, to go with a theme.
(Or heck, a Sylvie.)

[zachbeacon]

Yeah, is it REALLY a What If? if Peter Parker doesn't die horribly?

On the one hand, according to Agents of SHIELD, Hydra's ultimate goal was always to summon a tentacle monster (who was actually a body swapping Inhuman who'd been exiled to ... wherever).

On the other hand, they've been pretty open about how absolutely none of the pre-Disney+ shows count anymore so why still go with that?

On the third hand, the Hydra logo is a freaking tentacle monster so it isn't like they didn't telegraph it.

On the fourth tentacle ... I mean hand ... why wouldn't they try to summon a Hydra instead? Do they just not know what words mean?

[scorntx]

It's not really a What If...? until someone dies horribly.

Given Hydra's plan seemed to be summon a giant tentacle monster with no plan to contain and / or control it... thinking maybe they're just a bunch of idiots.

[zachbeacon]

Hot Take: Fascists are just a bunch of idiots

[scorntx]

Whoa!
Gonna need t' sit down...

[mistersandman]

There was some beautiful action in this episode, even if it was weirdly bloodless for the level of violence depicted.

I'm not crazy about the multiverse as a concept, but I much prefer stories like this to actors from previous Marvel movies appearing in the MCU.

[icon_uk]

The same could be said for "Captain America: The First Avenger" couldn't it?

[mistersandman]

I guess it's been a few years since I saw The First Avenger, I don't remember so many people getting shot. It could also be that I saw the new Suicide Squad just before watching the What If cartoon, so it was a little jarring to see bloodless gunshot wounds.

I'm not really the kind of person who craves gore, there was just some cognitive dissonance seeing "realistic" cartoon violence.

[stubbleupdate]

A bit bloodless, but the bodycount was High

Lots of Nazis getting turned inside out with grenades and machine guns and dying in tank explosions

They could easily have gone Full Daredevil and shown all the compound fractures that Captain Carter was dishing out

[deh_tommy]

Does that really need to have that level of violence? Gratuitous and needless gore really brought down stuff like Harley Quinn in my opinion.

[stubbleupdate]

I'm not advocating for it.

I'm saying that the violence that was not shown was incredible.

Putting a hand grenade into a confined space will tear people to shreds. Ditto having a shell explode inside the barrel of a gun.

Compound fractures like Daredevil and Harley Quinn pale into comparison to the men whose remains can't be collected, let alone identified.

[owlbrigade1]

I'm with you, not everything needs to be Invincible. And even in Invincible it got a bit overused to the point that a couple of big scenes near the end were less impactful because of the previous overuse of the gore.

[tinygaylaura]

You mean the animated show?

That doesn't bother me so much because of the almost Itchy and Scratchy level of cartoonish sillyness to it as compared to stuff like Daredevil season one for example where the way Fisk killed that poor bastard with a car door was genuinely hard to watch

I do agree that I don't really need or want a ton of gore/bloody violence in a story myself. It doesn't bother me if it's there that much except in certain circumstances but it's not something I actively want to see more of either.

[owlbrigade1]

As a fan, I wish they'd jumped in with one of the more What-Ifier What Ifs, but that is as someone who is already onboard with the concept. I think this was a good one to provide a stepping stone the more casual fans and non fans. Takes familiar concepts and puts a twist on them without risking losing people. It is a good bait and hook. I found it watchable enough though, hopefully now the concept is explained they can start pushing things. My only real complaint is that they needed to include Steve at all, past the opening scene. I would have preferred that they either did kill him or just left him behind. That is just me though. I don't think he really added anything to the story beyond being the stepping off point.

[lucean]

I actually really agree on the Steve aspect and actually think that forcing him into the story is what made it average. They start tackling the prejudices Carter would face as a woman in that era, but then it suddenly switched to be about if Steve would still be a hero even without the super-serum and even give him that stupid Iron Man stuff.

As a consequence it is trying to tell two thematically very different What-If stories in 30 minutes, which results in a pretty episode, but one that doesn't really hit any emotional beats.

[owlbrigade1]

Yeah, it is trying to be What If, Captain Carter and also What If Steve Rogers was Iron Man in the Forties(!). It is too much for one episode.

[lucean]

It also hit me now amusingly that one of the reasons why it ended up feeling so disjointed for me is that after initially touching how Peggy has to claim that mantle of a front line war hero despite being a woman before having Steve hijack the story about how he truly is the hero. It was one of those things that I struggle with understanding the reasoning for it.

[owlbrigade1]

It is like whoever the showrunner is can't step away from the same sexism they are supposedly criticising themselves to have a female hero stand on her own merits. They just had to make sure a man got to have a hero moment in there too. I was a little irritated by that, that despite super soldier Peggy they still needed to make her need a man's help. Just commit to your premise, Marvel.

Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed it, but it had its flaws.

[tinygaylaura]

"Peggy Carter will show the world that a woman can be a hero as long as a man is there to support her and help her out!"

[owlbrigade1]

Dude, spoilers.

Does sound cool if it happens though.

[deh_tommy]

Sorry, I just presumed based on the toys coming out.

[tcampbell1000]

Hayley Atwell and Agent Peggy Carter are two of my favorite MCU things, and the animators did a lovely job. They really captured the superhuman physicality that was given to Steve in the movies: Peggy is one hell of a fighter in this. Nice work as well from Sebastian Stan and not-Chris-Evans Josh Keaton.

Some of the story echoes were kind of dumb and forced, especially Howard Stark inventing a proto-Iron Man suit 60 years early and Peggy traveling 70 years into the future because why not. I really just wanted to spend a little more time with the intensely appealing main characters, but every time I started to enjoy the alternate Peggy-Steve romance, Marvel dropped another reference to remind me of its other story at the expense of this one. YES, MARVEL, I GET IT. I KNOW THE PROMISE OF THE DANCE IS JUST LIKE IN THOSE MOVIES I WATCHED. God, get out of your own WAY, here.

That's the issue with What If in a nutshell: Marvel always loves itself a little more than it loves the idea of truly infinite possibility. The less time it spends congratulating itself on stories it's already written, the happier I am. (Conversely, the Red Skull subversion was great.)

And for God's sake, Marvel, you can let your love interests kiss once without interrupting it with slapstick. It's okay! Boys haven't thought that kissing girls was gross since the 1970s or so! Nobody will mind! (Casting "playboy Howard Stark" as the clueless trampler of intimacy seems a little self-contradictory: I don't think Hugh Hefner was running around the Playboy mansion interrupting any tender moments. I guess it would've been even worse to make it Bucky, though that would've thrown some raw meat to the Stucky shippers.)

Ah, but it's easy to focus too much on the gripes. I'm glad to see Hayley got the chance to record this. I'm glad to see Marvel admit its skittishness about ass-kicking heroines was largely unfounded. And I'm just glad to see this, period, because while the style takes a minute or two to get used to, once you do, it looks freakin' amazing. Looking forward to the rest of the series, though I'll have to make sure my wife doesn't get anywhere near the zombie episode.

[stubbleupdate]

I was a bit annoyed that a) the kiss was interrupted and b) it wasn't Peggy putting Steve up against a wall, with his legs dangling.



I think I need the number of a fanartist

Also, Stan sounded like he was seeing his lines for the first time when he was recording them.

[tcampbell1000]

Yeah, that's a commission worth commissioning!

[juniper6]

Also, Stan sounded like he was seeing his lines for the first time when he was recording them.

He can do so much with just his eyes and his posture—voice acting doesn’t really play to his strengths.

[bruinsfan]

I pretty much echo everything you said. I really wanted to love this, and I did love the animation, but the story just didn't do that much for me.

[cainofdreaming]

S.C.R. and they couldn't think of a way to add A and P at the end? Shame on you Marvel people.

[iamrman]

Peggy Carter was already a queen, but this episode... I think I need to lie down.

[stubbleupdate]

[iamrman]

Oh, myyy...

[cricharddavies]

Whatever else can be said about it, it's incredibly well-animated.

[beyondthefringe]

What I took away from this is that the world would have been MORE AWESOME if we'd gotten Captain Carter and Steve the Hydra-Stomper fighting in World War 2, instead of Captain America alone. The montage where they're fighting, especially in the air? Yeeeeah.

[stubbleupdate]

That was really well done.

[icon_uk]

Enjoyed that, though slightly confused by the Watcher's voice, then realised I'd been confused and had been expecting Jeffrey Coombs, rather than Jeffrey Wright!

[deh_tommy]

Oh man, Jeffery Combs would be a great Watcher.

[tinygaylaura]

I would love that casting :)

[crabby_lioness]

The animation looks like somebody's been watching Rooster Teeth. I have no complaints.

The story was a bit rushed. I liked the bits we had, but it needed more connective tissue.

Was that supposed to be the Black Knight's sword?

[zachbeacon]

It’s weird watching an MCU project that just exists to tell a story and not set up another MCU thing. Like, I assume we’re never seeing this version of Peggy again; as fun as an MCU Exiles would be, I think they ought to do something with the X-Men first. I suppose they could be setting up the Watchers before their next movie appearance (the GotG stuff was more of an Easter Egg anyway).

I liked a lot about it.

I liked the general dynamic of Peggy, Steve, Howard, Bucky, and the Howling Commandos. It’s very different but also very familiar. I especially liked that they gave Steve something to do because I assumed he was going to die in the first scene.

I was less enthusiastic about some of the performances. There’s a reason screen actor and voice actor are different jobs. I normally love Dominic Cooper as Howard Stark but he’s downright manic here; I feel like he was told this was a cartoon and he thought he was going to have to match energy with Bugs Bunny.

Also, I know we won’t get an answer but, assuming the Nick Fury who saved Peggy was with SHIELD, who created the organization in Peggy’s place? Howard? Steve? How would future MCU events play out with Peggy in Steve’s place? Would she be partners with Agent 13 instead of Falcon and would that prevent her from becoming the Power Broker? As much as she likes Bucky, I can’t see anyone but Steve fighting so hard to save the Winter Soldier*. Would she sign the accords?

*Unless this universe’s Winter Soldier is Steve.

[cricharddavies]

I assume we’re never seeing this version of Peggy again;

1:13 in the following trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es_-lh6muyU

There's some evidence that these various alternate universes will be crossing over in later episodes of the series.

[scorntx]

Well, given Howard helped create SHIELD in the regular timeline, presumably he and Steve did it here.
Though hopefully this time around, Steve's presence means they were smart enough not to hire the head scientist of the guy they'd just spent the war fighting against, giving him the chance to take them over from the inside.
(Assuming Steve didn't die of Plot Disease, or any of the other ailments he already had, in the intervening years.)

Would Peggy be as willing as Steve to forgive Wanda and Pietro during AOU? Or as willing to stay with the Avengers in the first place? (*angry muttering about WS and AOU's characterisation of Steve*)
Given the accords are a result of a vast chain of events involving Hydra, would they even have occurred at all?
(... though, ah, maybe best not to follow all of that line of thought.)

[zachbeacon]

I mean in the 616 they had the Registration Act ready to go and were just looking for an excuse so that probably colors my thinking of the MCU Accords. Maybe they wouldn't be a thing if Wanda's powers died on the vine (or whatever Agatha's line was).

Even without a Winter Soldier, I feel like someone would have been hired to kill Tony's parents. Maybe someone from the Red Room.

But yeah, even if we assume some events are constant, Steve and Peggy have too big an individual impact on the MCU for things to be the same if they swap places. The show really only focuses on which flag the person punching Red Skull is wearing. The change would be a MUCH bigger deal down the line and it ends before they can get to exploring it..

I think I'm starting to understand why so many What If? comics end with "rocks fall, everybody dies"