The studio’s golden box office aura has been dented, but chief architect Kevin Feige isn’t scrapping his years-long cinematic universe plan, just refining it: “They’re not going to give up,” says an insider.
And people seriously underestimate the simplest reason: poor execution. Phase 4 just had so many movies that weren't good. The writing was bad, a couple characters or moments would be what you expect, but the overall product was just shoddy.
I think you could say that about almost every single Please 4 movie except Guardians 3. There was just a massive drop in quality.
Shang-Chi, Spider-Man NWH, and Doctor Strange MoM were all great and Phase 4. Unfortunately Black Widow, Eternals, and Thor L&T were also Phase 4 and are some of the lowest rated movies in the MCU.
I mean there are A LOT of excellent directors out there. The issue is giving them the freedom to direct.
Look at The Eternals. Chloé Zhao coming fresh off of Nomadland is an odd choice for a Marvel film director.
I don't think Marvel made a mistake giving Chloé a chance, I think that's how we can get some really great films.
However what we got in the end didn't feel that special. Kit Harringtons character didn't have much to do. All the other characters didn't get much screen time as it was.
What Marvel has done historically has worked, but I think they need to rethink things a bit going forward.
Sam Raimi is actually a good example of this. Doctor Strange was still largely a standard Marvel film, but no question it was also a Sam Raimi film.
She-Hulk was the biggest f-you to the audience. That uncanny valley CGI just screamed, "eat this you ignorant morons, we know you'll love it and we don't even need to try!"