Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (No Spoilers)

 What can you expect from one of the top tier titles of the Marvel Disney cinematic universe? Not much as it turns out.

A note which could account for my disdain for this movie:

* The version I seen was the no frills, traditional screen - almost 4:3. So although the format did appear to be widescreen, there were black bars on the top and bottom, it seemed to have been somewhat cropped and zoomed in. Could this be a limitation of the hardware display or a ploy to usher more people into the much more technologically superior and larger IMAX, and what have you, screens?

Notwithstanding that, this movie seems half baked from the get go with what seems to be a redeeming up-tilt a quarter ways in, which then surely ebbs back into a dull doldrum. At times the footage seemed to be pre-production quality. Unnervingly realistic looking, no post-processing overlays  or effects, every little lighting or color correction, just raw footage straight from the camera.

You'd often see this type of material on DVD/Blu-ray features which include previously cut scenes, which for obvious reasons would not have the polish and post processing done as that's just a waste of time and resources.

The overall cinematic imagery is woeful. The scenes seem to be almost first run throughs to probably get the lighting and sounding rigs set up properly. With cramped, zoomed in shots and awkward angles, composition seems to have not even been given an afterthought. This is especially perturbing when dramatic scenes have a tight, closed in focus on the actors face which only draws attention to the tepid dialogue. Mired into this is the equally dismal visual effects which was flat, poorly choreographed, lacked any dynamism and seemed gratuitously added to lengthen the run time.

The peppering of apropos jokes and jibs that Marvel uses to great effect in its other movies falls flat in this screeching, slow train car of a movie. The comedic timing, if any, is off  and seems to be arbitrarily interspersed within the lackluster dialogue. Another movie which had this same issue was Captain Marvel.

The narrative has a tenuous, bumpy flow, with a plot that seems to have been strung together and improvised on the spot. This has all the makings of a made for TV movie by an outsourced, off-shore firm who've never worked with the intellectual property, nor the genre. Or even a made for TV show with all it's episodes glued together to make a full length feature film - Chimerascope if you will.

The movie is barely one dimensional in terms of its narrative, story and character development as well as, visuals and imagery. Ironic as the core theme is about the multiverse.

Cons - Weak script, poor, editing, mediocre character and plot development at best, C grade cinematics and direction.

Pros - Got me out of the house, when it ended. 

Captain Marvel

Captain Marvel, another surefire gem in Marvel Studios crown? No spoilers but typically I recommend people watch a movie first before reading anything about it. All in all somewhat rough around the edges but still a good movie to watch. I'd give it a 2.75 out of 5.

The early part of the movie has jokes that fall flat, character interactions that come off more awkward cringe rather than awkward ha ha - surely feels like b-roll material that was hastily patched together. One visual gag where Ver (aka Captain Marvel) asks for Fury's pager seems poorly executed and shot, almost as if the other actor was oblivious or forgot to read the script. Some of the jokes and setups are blase mostly by the way they are telegraphed that a person can almost anticipate what would happen, if not, quote exactly what will be said.

The niggles do tend to lessen as the movie progresses and seems to somewhat even form an enjoyable little turn of storytelling which redeems the title. However, the laissez faire treatment of the main character's development leaves a lot to be desired. Particularly when characters who have almost no recollection of their past or when thrust into a completely alien, and potentially hostile environment, conducting themselves in a completely relaxed and jovial manner is beyond me. Then again Ver seems to have been jovial by nature from the early scenes so this could be more easily overlooked than say the likes of Cable in DeadPool 2.

Another gripe is the relatively little showcased in terms of the character's mythology, demeanor and not to mention power scaling. A little more development of how the powers manifested, pseudo-scientific explanation and tribulations as Ver would have questioned, struggled and come to grips with her new world would have made this a more solid piece. Instead we see someone who instantly reneges her hitherto training and conditioning, while combating a species that has the ability to assume a person down to the DNA level, and almost immediately strikes up a rapport with an alien agent. Captain Marvel truly deserves a better build up than this movie allows. Especially since she is bound to play a very pivotal role in the overall continuum.

It's a shame that titles such as these are just seen as stop gaps, or worse, money grabs as people are clearly enamored with anything Marvel and even a bad showing will still be lapped up and often overlooked. They are very relevant for the Marvel movie canon as most people would not be privy to the larger Marvel universe and story line except for the movies.

Most of this could be chalked up to Marvel probably focusing more on the main course - Avengers Endgame. The result of which could be less resources being spent on this movie.

It's happened before with Thor Ragnarok being delectably under cooked and being the lead up to Avengers Infinity War which was a much better orchestrated and performed piece. If history is anything to go by, this bodes well for the next Marvel release - Avengers Endgame.