Pretty much this, Marvel can definitely still become bigger though.
With the new AAA games and if the new shows are good that'll do a lot.
Has the MCU surpassed the Star Wars saga?
- Thread starter YolkFolk
- Start date
Pretty much this, Marvel can definitely still become bigger though.
With the new AAA games and if the new shows are good that'll do a lot.
It's not like Star Wars has never been "surpassed" for popularity at any singular point in time.
E.T. was more popular than ESB and ROTJ.
Titanic was a bigger deal than Episode I. Pop culture wise probably The Matrix too.
LOTR, Pirates, and Raimi Spider-Man films took turns being more popular than Star Wars in the 2000-2005 era.
The Force Awakens brought the brand back to king of the hill after a pretty length absence, but I think once the nostalgia buzz wore off, Star Wars settled back into more or less where it's been since post Episode I frenzy -- popular but not some untouchable force of nature.
So something like MCU being more popular for this time isn't terribly shocking, other movie franchises have done it before.
Star Wars has great longevity though, we'll see if MCU is still a big deal in 15 years.
E.T. was more popular than ESB and ROTJ.
Titanic was a bigger deal than Episode I. Pop culture wise probably The Matrix too.
LOTR, Pirates, and Raimi Spider-Man films took turns being more popular than Star Wars in the 2000-2005 era.
The Force Awakens brought the brand back to king of the hill after a pretty length absence, but I think once the nostalgia buzz wore off, Star Wars settled back into more or less where it's been since post Episode I frenzy -- popular but not some untouchable force of nature.
So something like MCU being more popular for this time isn't terribly shocking, other movie franchises have done it before.
Star Wars has great longevity though, we'll see if MCU is still a big deal in 15 years.
Mcu has more senergy especially worldwide. Millions of people in china/ india know what ironman is yet couldn't even probably name Yoda or hell even darth Vader if they saw a picture
Also Mcu can do a million different stories in so many different genrres where star wars is just stuck to sci-fi is probably it's biggest bottleneck
Also Mcu can do a million different stories in so many different genrres where star wars is just stuck to sci-fi is probably it's biggest bottleneck
Disagree here. It's not like "sci-fi" is some squarely fenced off genre of film, you can do many different things within sci-fi. Star Wars is nothing like 2001: A Space Odyssey, which is nothing like Alien, which is nothing like Blade Runner, which is nothing like The War of the Worlds, etc. A compelling argument could even be made that most, if not all, of the MCU is also science fiction as every single film in the MCU deals with sci-fi concepts (suits that make a man stronger, vast galactic societies, magic stones from space, etc.).
If anything bottlenecks Star Wars and the MCU, it's Disney's complete reluctance to do anything interesting or daring with the concepts its been handed. With Star Wars this is very noticable, especially with how they responded to the things The Last Jedi did, but it's also there with the MCU. Even though the MCU dares a little more than current Star Wars, no MCU film really dares to make any radical changes. I mean, I keep seeing people say that the MCU can do stories in 'many different genres', but right now there's not a single MCU film that cannot be described as a 'comedic action blockbuster'.
To me Star Wars has more magic/nostalgia associated with it. But a lot of that is, again, my childhood association. I rarely get excited about media these days so though I'm an MCU fan it doesn't get in my gut in the same way that Star Wars has.
It's tricky. On their own, the MCU films need way more time to "cook" in the public conciousness compared to Star Wars. It's also never been allowed to sit, since there's always another movie coming out. But at the same time, the characters themselves have mostly existed since before Star Wars, and while it's only been a few of them, some were cultural touchstones in their own right.
In terms of overall quality, star wars had the prequel movies.
Consequently it has now been surpassed by the MCU, the smurfs, the 8th season of the office, are you being served and the second half of the Saw Saga.
It is now barely better than the DCU.
I grew up with Star Wars, I lived Star Wars, I wanted to be in Star Wars. I still haven't seen the most recent movie, because I haven't bothered, because every other movie they have made recently has been totally shit and I still have some self-respect.
Even the recent x-men movie which they didn't even bother to make part of it all had a ... I don't know, the train bit was ok? At least it was something.
Consequently it has now been surpassed by the MCU, the smurfs, the 8th season of the office, are you being served and the second half of the Saw Saga.
It is now barely better than the DCU.
I grew up with Star Wars, I lived Star Wars, I wanted to be in Star Wars. I still haven't seen the most recent movie, because I haven't bothered, because every other movie they have made recently has been totally shit and I still have some self-respect.
Even the recent x-men movie which they didn't even bother to make part of it all had a ... I don't know, the train bit was ok? At least it was something.
In terms of quality from recent output, certainly.
This is a really good way of putting it.
This is a really good way of putting it.
being a huge fan of both, the mindshare for both franchises is very high but obvs with the derailment of Star Wars with EPISODE VIII and EPISODE IX, I don't mind saying that ofc the MCU is a bigger deal. they have a roadmap on where they want their stories to go which keeps fan engaged in their content whereas in the Star Wars side of things only The Mandalorian and animated tv shows like Rebels and Clone Wars have and had that road map
This is the best Star Wars take I've ever read.
Though to answer the question, RoS was a disaster and the MCU has been super consistently praised. So if we're talking cultural clout alone, MCU wins by a mile
SW will always have a more special place in my heart. But I totally disagree. the Star Wars universe is extremely limited. Which is something that has become obvious in every movie past the OT. The Mandalorian is really the only SW media that feels fresh while also being entertaining to watch that has come out in this millennium. While the MCU has way more unique and interesting characters and worlds. And we have still barely scratched the surface of the source material.
Star Wars can only tell the same story in different ways.
I think this is very much an issue with how Star Wars has been handled, not an inherent issue with Star Wars as a franchise. Star Wars having no source material technically opens it up for way more possibilities than the MCU. With the MCU, there will always be the issue of 'source material' when it comes to the writer's freedom and when the writer takes his freedom it's either met with hostility or (sooner or later) overruled by Marvel. Just look at the response of comic book fans to the X-Men films or the response to what Iron Man 3 did with The Mandarin (which caused Marvel to go 'No no, there's actually a real Mandarin' in a short just to calm people down).
Now, Star Wars definitely has it's fair share of this, just look at The Last Jedi and the counterresponse in Rise of Skywalker. However, it's not something inherent with Star Wars, it's just that George Lucas and now Disney are seemingly completely incapable of really thinking further than their previously established characters and storylines. The Mandalorian, as you mentioned, is a tiny step in the right direction, but still buckles under the weight of nostalgia pandering.
That said, if you look beyond the scope of films & tv, you can easily see the potential of Star Wars. Games like Knights of the Old Republic 2 or Jedi Outcast or books like the Thrawn Trilogy tell completely new stories that are nothing like the movies and don't resort to unneccessary nostalgia pandering. I just wish the creative forces behind the films and tv would dare to do something like this. The only thing that comes close is the Clone Wars tv series, but that still uses the known characters to tell their stories.
However, as soon as Star Wars can break free from the nostalgia, writers could technically do whatever they wanted, complete freedom. However, knowing Disney they will never allow writers to do that.
I disagree, the different planets and alien species of SW feel a lot more unique to me than the MCU, and there's lots of room for them to keep expanding on things
Of course it has. Star Wars peaked with the original trilogy, and apart from the Clone Wars series (and The Last Jedi, because yeah, I'm that kind of star wars fan), nothing has reached or come close to its level. Especially the level of the first two films.
And more importantly... even Thor 2: The Dark World AKA the weakest MCU movie, doesn't hold a candle to the star wars prequels or The Rise of Skywalker, in terms of sheer awfulness. The worst you can say about Thor 2 is that it's completely forgettable, utterly wasted Christopher Eccleston in order to give more screentime to pointless side-plots focusing on the human characters, and has a weak script with jarring tonal whiplash. Most of which was clearly the product of significant executive meddling, given the film burned through three separate directors before Ike Perlmutter and the Marvel Creative Committee finally found one that was willing to be their stooge.
Meanwhile, the four star wars films I mentioned are all VERY memorable... for the absolute worst reasons. There is not a single character in the MCU that is half as offensive as Jar Jar Binks, Watto, or Nute Gunray, nor a single "romance" as awful as Reylo in TROS. And that's just a couple of examples.
And more importantly... even Thor 2: The Dark World AKA the weakest MCU movie, doesn't hold a candle to the star wars prequels or The Rise of Skywalker, in terms of sheer awfulness. The worst you can say about Thor 2 is that it's completely forgettable, utterly wasted Christopher Eccleston in order to give more screentime to pointless side-plots focusing on the human characters, and has a weak script with jarring tonal whiplash. Most of which was clearly the product of significant executive meddling, given the film burned through three separate directors before Ike Perlmutter and the Marvel Creative Committee finally found one that was willing to be their stooge.
Meanwhile, the four star wars films I mentioned are all VERY memorable... for the absolute worst reasons. There is not a single character in the MCU that is half as offensive as Jar Jar Binks, Watto, or Nute Gunray, nor a single "romance" as awful as Reylo in TROS. And that's just a couple of examples.
