Am I feeling excited about the Fantastic Four because the new trailer looks good? Or because the idea of Galactus, the Devourer of Worlds doesn’t sound so bad right now?

This was fun! Interesting characters and stories, and that gets it a lot of credit. Not a lot of it holds up to close scrutiny, though—character motivations don’t always make sense, and plot explanations can feel unsatisfying. Glad to have tried it, though.

I tried the first episode of Agatha All Along with my spouse, and we both agreed we needed a refresher on this series. I think this is one of the best entries in the MCU—certainly for TV. The premise is weird and is committed to it; it’s comic book-y but mostly in a fun way; it explores deep questions alongside action and humor; and it’s willing to show how scary superpowers are.

I came for the Ms. Marvel, and this delivered! She’s a great character, and it was fun to see her in this movie. There were also lots of weird-but-fun bits that I enjoyed. There are plenty of things about the movie that didn’t work for me, but it’s no less dumb than most Marvel movies, and I have no interest in feeding what I understand is a bunch of hating on the movie.

I loved the first Black Panther and am kind of bummed to be disappointed by the sequel. Obviously, Chadwick Boseman’s tragic passing made this movie an uphill battle to begin with, and its wrestling with that loss within the movie is one of its strongest parts. There are also other individual parts of the movie that are really interesting on their own: international intrigue with strong Françafrique overtones! Riri Williams! turning a goofy 1940s comic book character concept into something compelling and decolonial!

Marvel, I get that WandaVision is intended to be trippy and demonstrate Wanda’s reality warping powers, but unraveling my world by using a song that I’m only just now learning is the basis for the Skyline Chili jingle was a step too far.

Going to see Endgame tonight, and it occurred to me earlier today that the first Avengers came out when I was still in college, and this one came out at the tail end of my second semester as an assistant professor.