And the BoardGameCo video, you can watch it here, but head over to his channel and give the video a thumbs up. If it hits 1000 likes, as he said, his wife will do her list as well.

Thanks For Listening

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Comments/Questions

Let me know where I’m wrong on my list and ranking of all the MCU properties. I’m sure that a lot of people will consider it to be off, and let me know how you rank out the Marvel movies and shows. Let’s see where we might have stuff the same or where things might be different.

You can leave your thoughts over on Twitter. You can either you #10MinMarvel or tweet it directly to me @TheScando. There is also a comments section below on the post.

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Thank you all for checking out the podcast. The listenership is growing and that’s because of people subscribing and leaving ratings and reviews. If you have done that, thank you so much. If you are enjoying that, please consider subscribing and leaving a rating and review. You can find the podcast on iTunes, Google Play Music (soon to be YouTube Music), Spotify, and Stitcher.

If you want to get a hold of the podcast, you can leave a comment below. Or you can find me on Twitter, @TheScando, or by using #10MinMarvel. I’m always looking for suggestions of shows to checkout or comics to read or characters that you may want to learn more about.

Thanks for Listening and Rest in Power Chadwick Boseman.

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10 – Avengers: Age of Ultron

This movie is very underrated, I think, when it comes to the MCU films. I think that James Spader does an amazing job as Ultron. Just his cadence and delivery as Ultron works so well. I also like that we get to see Tony Starks biggest flaw really played upon and something that pays off so well in Avengers: Endgame. He’s trying to save everything and everyone and in the end, that doesn’t really work for him in this movie. Plus, we get the best version of Quicksilver to show up in a movie, much better than the X-Men one, and we get the introduction of Wanda and Pietro. This film just builds well and I think while there are some jokes that don’t land, it also has some of the most meaningful interactions between characters. I know some people have an issue with some of that, but I think that it’s great and it plays really well throughout the movie and in the context. A few jokes land a bit flat though.

9 – Spider-Man: Homecoming

Watching this movie again it dropped a little bit on my list because I think that some of the jokes don’t hold together as well as I remember. But with that said, it is still really good. The scenes with Peter and The Vulture both knowing who each other are is a really great scene. It plays off of the awkwardness that you’d have with meeting the parents for the first time, and so to everyone else in the scene that’s what is going on. But for both Peter Parker and The Vulture it’s way more than that. Tom Holland also just does such a great job of being awkward in the films and though he isn’t a high school aged actor, he fits into that way more than any of the previous Spider-Man actors.

8 – Spider-Man: Far From Home

Back to back Spider-Man films, I give the second one a little bit of a nod. While I really like the performance of the Vulture, I think that Mysterio is a better villain in my opinion. I think how he gets close to Peter because Peter was close to Tony is interesting and works well. I know that’s an issue for some people because they want it to be more Spider-Man focused and less about Tony Stark, I think that it’s a good balance of both. I also like it for how it uses or doesn’t use Nick Fury in the film. In terms of Spider-Man himself, I think that we get to see him a bit more in action and as a bit more important to the story versus kind of getting in the way as he was in the first film, or kind of being that B-level player, now he’s an A-level Avenger having gone through and helped in Infinity War and Endgame.

7 – Guardians of the Galaxy

It’s easy to like this one, it has a good blend of humor and action, and while it might be lighter on character development than the second Guardians of the Galaxy film, it still has one. I think in terms of the Marvel movies that really use humor a lot, this one is very good and doesn’t have the jokes fall flat or not stand out as much on multiple viewings. I also like that this is a team-up film but not an Avengers team-up, and in terms of the non-Avengers titles, so Captain America films and Thor: Ragnarok, this does the team-up one of the best of those. I think what really makes this work is how well they cast the main characters in the film. Chris Pratt as Star Lord just works and Bradley Cooper as Rocket is hilarious. While I think you get to dig more into their characters later, you start to see the depth of them and how interesting they are in this film.

6 – Avengers

It’s hard to go wrong with the original Avengers film, not the earliest of the films to grace my Top 10, but definitely worth talking about. We get introduced to Black Widow and Hawkeye, we get a well done Battle of New York where each of them has a chance to shine, and we get some solid humor and solid character interactions. I think that’s the piece that works so well is that it’s very believable that those characters would butt heads repeatedly, especially when meeting. It isn’t a team that comes together because they all immediately mesh, it’s because they need to come together to save the world. And I think that makes the most sense for how you create a team like that, they need the pressure cooker to pull them apart but also bring them back together. It is also nice because this is the first time we get a good Hulk on screen.

5 – Doctor Strange

Probably the shocker of the list, though Age of Ultron might have shocked some as well, but I really like Doctor Strange. A little bit of a spoiler for the list, but I like it for a lot of the same reasons that I like the next movie on the list, Iron Man. Both of these films have a villain who isn’t really the villain. Sure, Dormammu is a bad guy and Kaecilius is a bad guy, but the movie is about Stephen Strange coming to terms with himself not being who he thought he was and not being able to be as selfish. I think one way that this differs from Iron Man is that Strange is technically doing something that is good already, he is saving lives, but he’s doing it for his own selfish reasons. He has to find a way to let go of that before he can truly understand his real calling. I also like Wong in the film and even Baron Mordo and The Ancient One. I think they all play off of each other well, and especially Mordo and Strange have some good interactions.

4 – Iron Man

As I teased, Iron Man is up next. For being the original MCU film, this really hold up well. I like that it teases something that we’re eventually going to get a payoff for with the Ten Rings in Shang-Chi, probably not intentional at that point. But I like how it’s a pretty straight forward story of Iron Man and about how he has to overcome some obstacles but one of them is coming to terms with that he and what his company have done and the fact that they are profiting off of war and death. The opening with the capture and building of the armor just works so well, as well, and while Obediah Stane is underwhelming as a villain, it’s again less about him as a villain and more about Tony Stark having to overcome his own past and overcome what is happening to him. Shows a bit of the age of the film in some of the effects and things like that, but they did a good job and holds up well for overall.

3 – Thor: Ragnarok

I’ve talked about team-ups and humor, and in terms of a non-Avengers team-up, this film does it best, and in terms of humor, this film is again probably the best. I think that the jokes just land well and the team-up works. All of that for this over the top techno colored film, it still manages to have heart to it. I think that Skurge who is currently traveling with the Asguardians of the Galaxy in the comics, has a nice arc in terms of character and Heimdall is given more to do and work with in this film, which is great because Idris Elba is great. There’s just so much that works because we have the Hulk start to realize that there are things that can hurt him, we have Banner hiding away or more so Hulk taking control and just the changing and growing dynamic of the relationship between Thor and Loki. Plus we get Valkyrie who is awesome.

2 – Avengers: Endgame

I don’t think there will be much surprise for the two that top this list, maybe just some question about the order, but for me Endgame is #2. The reason for that is that the ending doesn’t really stick with you the way that it does in Infinity War. It pulls a little bit of a Return of the King in terms of how many endings it kind of has, but it feels right still to send off all of those characters the way that they did. It also does a really good job of bringing the heroes back together again. I like how they use time travel, I like how they use Ant-Man, and I think the whole thing just makes an odd amount of sense. But really, this film is about closure and passing of the torch for Captain America, and for Iron Man, finally being able to know that he saved everyone and that he did the right thing which is what he’s been trying to do, for better or worse – it’s worse – throughout all of the films, he’s always trying to redeem himself for what started in Iron Man with him finding out that his company sold weapons to the enemy.

1 – Avengers: Infinity War

Finally, we have Infinity War as my #1 film. I think so much of this works because we get to see into Thanos brain, and we get to see how he thinks he’s doing the right thing. Now, there are massive issues with his plan, though less absurd then trying to impress Death like in the comics, but he believes in it, and he believes that what he’s doing is the right thing and a good thing. And we get to see the start of the Avengers coming back together. I like that it isn’t them fully back together in mindset, that doesn’t come until much later in Endgame, but we get to see all the main players come together to do battle again, and this film has some epic battles, which I think Endgame is lacking in some ways, as it’s more of a very entertaining heist film. Finally, I like it that they don’t win, sure, they might win in the end, but here, they don’t win and they don’t just barely lose, they lose so much and, again, we get to see the fallout from everything that was lost in this film in Endgame.

So, that’s my list, I’m sure for a lot of people films like Winter Soldier or Civil War would make the list, and probably some like Age of Ultron and Doctor Strange would be off the list. It’s okay to have your flawed opinion, but I am curious to know how other people would put their top 10, any major surprises that would make your list from how the films are generally seen?

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

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Thank you for checking out my podcast, I hope that you are enjoying it. If you are please consider leaving a rating and review on where ever you get the podcast from. Those help more people find the podcast and join into the 10 Minute Marvel community. The podcast is on iTunes, Google Play Music, Spotify, and Stitcher.

If you have questions, comments, suggestions for the podcast or you want to remind me that most people do like Captain America: Civil War, you can leave a comment below. Or you can find me on Twitter @TheScando or by using #10MinMarvel.

I’ll see you next time.

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

Email us at nerdologists@gmail.com
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Who is the Taskmaster? I talk about the newest Black Widow teaser trailer as well as break down the characters powers and some of their uses in the comics. Plus, there’s Eternals news, when does it fit in the timeline?

I just want to thank you all for listening to the podcast. If you are enjoying it, please consider leaving a rating and/or review. We are on iTunes, Google Play Music, Spotify, and Stitcher, you can find links to those in the top right corner of the page. Those reviews help more people find the podcast and join the 10 Minute Marvel community.

If you want to get a hold of me, you can find me on Twitter @TheScando or by using #10MinMarvel. I’m always interested to hear from fans of the podcast as well as to get suggestions for new topics that I can cover on the show.

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

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Getting into comics can be intimidating. It seems like once a year there is a news story of Action Comics #1 selling for some absurd amount, and there are hundreds, or more likely thousands, of different issues for different characters. Where do you start with someone like Spider-Man?

Fortunately, there are some good ways to keep your wallet from being completely destroyed while you dive in to comics. The first option is, instead of getting single issues, to get trade paperbacks. Trade paperbacks (TPB from here on out) are collections of different comics that often comprise a story arc or part of a longer story arc. You can use these story arcs to decide what to buy without buying TPBs, as well. You just need to spend a little time to figure out when a new arc is starting in a comic. You might have to wait a few weeks, but about every six months a new story arc will start in a lot of comics. Finally, both Marvel and DC do world events. These events generally have tie-ins to different characters and different stories, but it is something that is world-shaking (or possibly world-destroying) for all of the characters, and no one is left unaffected. I will caution that these, too, are often underwhelming. There will be good character development and build-up, and then they just fall flat in the end as this completely impossible challenge is tripped up by something that is odd or overpowered and never seen again in the comic book world because it would break it. I personally would recommend TPBs over this type of comic. You can research online to find out some of the popular ones, or go into your local comic book store, and they will be able to give you suggestions, and if they don’t have it, they will gladly order it for you.

What if you don’t even know what type of book to start with?

That’s another good question, because at least for Marvel and DC, there tend to be two different types of comic books. The first is a solo book. That would be something like Spider-Man, where he is generally off doing his own thing. He might run across Wolverine once in a while, but generally it is Spider-Man dealing with Spider-Man’s problems. There are other times, though, where you will want to read about Spider-Man in a group; these group books will often have a leader to the team, which the story might focus on a bit more, but will have a strong cast of supporting characters. For this type, DC has Justice League, and while Superman and Batman will probably be most often in the spotlight, they do spend time telling stories about the other characters. These ensemble casts are a good way to get introduced to lesser characters as well. Would you pick up a book about Martian Manhunter off the shelves? Probably not. But you’d read about him in Justice League and might find out that you like him. That is how I figured out in Marvel’s universe that I really like Doctor Strange. Doctor Strange isn’t a character I’d pick out otherwise, but seeing him in The Avengers and seeing his powers made me want to pick up more books about him.

What would you recommend?

That’s a great question that I can’t really go into that much detail on, as I haven’t been picking up books at all recently. So much of picking out a good comic book series to read is trial and error at the beginning. Different writers write characters in unexpected ways; sometimes that is good, and sometimes it doesn’t work. It’s the same for artists — certain artists have certain styles. Now, that might work for you, or it might not. If the art isn’t the style you are expecting, it might distract you and take you out of the story. So instead of recommending series or characters, I’m going to recommend a few different writers.

Scott Snyder – Snyder has been writing Detective Comics, which is the main Batman line. His style of writing leads to more in-depth stories, and it doesn’t hurt that he’s on a title that a lot of people are going to enjoy. Along with that, he wrote a fair amount of American Vampire, which isn’t a superhero comic, but is very good. American Vampire also had Stephen King as a writer for a little bit.

Jim Lee – He wrote Aquaman for a while, and might still be writing it; I’m not sure. However, I really liked his Aquaman story, and the fact that he took the time to take a character who is a punchline way too often and make him into a better developed character.

Brian Michael Bendis – He’s probably my favorite writer out of all of these. He’s one who is working for Marvel and is high up in Marvel so directs many of the storylines that run throughout the whole universe. One of the things that I really like about him is that he is very wordy for a comic book writer. That isn’t to say that he writes description when pictures could do, but he writes dialogue better than most writers of comic books, and his storylines are fantastic. I’d recommend his non-superhero comic, Powers, greatly (but be warned, it is for a mature audience).

So there you have a starting point with comics, all without getting into the Marvel v DC debate. What comic books are you reading? Or, who is a superhero you want to read about?

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The new issue of Empire is as a kind of Mason-Dixon line for Captain America: Civil War, standing between the two sets of new foes with arms outstretched, saying “guys, guys…” in a placatory voice. Amongst the no-stone-left-unturned coverage in the Civil War cover story is a first look proper at Frank Grillo’s Crossbones. We’ve had Red Skull, now meet the other half of HYDRA’s un-jolly roger.

http://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/captain-america-civil-war-crossbones/