The Quicksilver 'Controversy' Will End In A Dry Fart
I do not understand why people are making such a big deal out of this.
By imadick -
May 28, 2013 04:05 AM EST
Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch
It's been somewhat big news the past few days. So you all probably
know about it all already. But I'll summarize it a bit up here anyways
for the sake of context and self-contained-ness.
Several years ago Marvel was in bad shape business-wise and sold several of its superhero properties to anybody willing to buy for whatever price. One of these properties (the X-Men) ended up with the Fox movie studio. Fox shamelessly abused what it had bought off Marvel (X-Men 1-3, and XMO-Wolverine are all unwatchably bad) for a full decade before finally showing it some respect in the form of X-Men First Class. Which is objectively one of the best superhero films of all time, despite complaints from some silly fans who can't tell the difference between "bad movie" and "unfaithful adaptations".
Now the thing is that the somewhat commercial success, but more importantly the absolute critical success, of X-Men First Class has finally breathed some life into a dying franchise and instilled it with some respect from critics and fans that it desperately needed (i.e. it acted like the Batman Begins of the franchise). Fox has been given a shot at absolute redemption with their next proper X-Men film: Days of Future Past (which could be their The Dark Knight -though, they probably have no real shot at any Oscars or billion dollar grosses).
In the meantime, Marvel Studios has managed to regain the rights to a lot of its dispersed characters and slowly built itself up as a behemoth of a franchise with the success of Phase One films (Iron Man 1-2, Captain America, Hulk, and Thor) leading up to the worldwide phenomenon The Avengers.
Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch: Uncomfortably close
The problem arises now with the use of the characters Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, who are both X-Men characters and Avengers characters. The wonky copyright stuff with them is that both Fox and Marvel can use these characters, however, any mutant related references are owned by Fox, and any Avengers related references are owned by Marvel.
Marvel pretty much called gunshot on them by kind-of-sort-of announcing that they'll be using the characters in Avengers 2. And then Fox, being the shitty company that it is, has decided to shed any facade of ethics and give Quicksilver a public golden shower by announcing that the dweeby-looking Evan Peters has been added last-minute into Days of Future Past as Quicksilver for an unnecessary tacked-on role in the film, for the sole purpose of marking their territory.
Cold War Ensues!!
Or Does It?!
No it doesn't.
Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch engage in incest, as Wolverine pulls a Peeping Tom and masturbates in the bushes
As I described above, Marvel Studios has become a powerhouse in not just the superhero business, but in the movie business period. This was further solidified by the awful Iron Man 3 managing to cross the billion dollar mark and becoming the 5th highest grossing movie of all time trailing the grand Harry Potter finale and the behemoth Avengers itself (it most likely won't overtake them). On the other hand, Fox has run its X-Men franchise into the ground, with First Class' critical success giving them a shot at second life. But in terms of box office, First Class was no Avengers. Wolverine will probably do disappointing business since it looks shitty and rote.
This territory marking gesture by Fox will be utterly meaningless in the long run. Because the cold hard facts are that (1) not many people care about X-Men anymore. (2) Days of Future Past will probably be in the same vein as the atrocious non-First Class X-Men films, since it will be director by the master of blandness, Bryan Singer (latest film: soulless Jack The Giant Slayer). Not to mention the fact that (3) shitty Wolverine film will damage the brand a little more before Days of Future Past can have a chance to fix what is already broken. All of this, while (4) Marvel is a box office monster machine that is at the forefront of most moviegoing public's mind.
Days of Future Past will use Quicksilver.
Nobody will notice or remember this Quicksilver.
Avengers 2 will use Quicksilver and will break all the box office records that you didn't even know could be broken.
Everyone will notice and remember this Quicksilver.
So no need for any attempts at coalescing universes on Marvel's part. They will just do their own different Quicksilver, and this Days of Future Past problem will go away automatically. So yeah, this will pretty much be one of those occasions where the 'ignore it till it goes away' approach will work.
Sorry to anybody hoping for a Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western-style climactic showdown between competing rivals. This is more like a gang of popular jocks (Marvel) beating up a scrawny loser cripple (Fox) and then giving him a wedgie.
Anyways, Cheers
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