First off, I’m thrilled to be speaking at Sunrise Australia in Sydney (30 April - 1 May). Earlybird tickets are now on sale. Here’s what I’m going to be talking about:
I’ve been rewatching the first phases of the Marvel Cinematic Universe this week, partly because there’s a new Captain America movie out, but mostly because a new trailer for Thunderbolts dropped, and Yelena Belova and Bucky Barnes are really the only MCU characters I still care about.
But rewatching the Infinity Saga (the twenty-two movies through to Avengers:End Game), I’m remembering how much I did care for a while, and how unusual that was. I never read comics as a kid, the only version of Superman I ever warmed to was Smallville (before Chloe wound up in a real-life cult and went to prison), and I only ever really watched action movies on planes.
But, like so many things in my life, I was sucked in by transformative fans who took to the MCU like ducks to water, and I fell in love with the characters through the gifs, and the art and the fic.
If all of this passed you by, or you also just find superheroes a bit of a snooze, you might enjoy my rollicking ride through 21 movies in ten minutes: Everything you need to know about the MCU before Avengers:End Game.
These guys certainly did:
When I first talked about the MCU at Webstock way back in 2019, the reactionary response from these sorts of fans was already everywhere. Complaining about Black Panther before it was released, whining about Captain Marvel being the strongest Avenger despite being a woman, and on and on.
But now this sort of nonsense has become foundational to conservative politics in America. Kat Tenbarge (who has gone independent this month with Spitfire News, mercifully not on substack) recently shared this excerpt from the Hollywood Reporter profile of Ben Shapiro:
All of this is anathema to where comics actually came from. The golden age of comics, built largely by Jewish writers and illustrators (the Pulitzer-winning Kavalier and Clay is a great read on this era) through to Stan Lee’s insistence on diversity and representation in the original Marvel universe as early as the 1960s. None of it would have appealed to Shapiro and his ilk.
The MCU, from its outset has been deeply political - but in 2025 its politics seem increasingly muddled. Fans like me, exhausted by sheer volume, bored by endless franchise IP, and tired of the comicbookguys, are giving it away. Even Harry Styles’ very short-lived appearance isn’t enough to hold my attention (and that’s saying something).
Anyway, they’re gonna keep making Marvel movies until the heat-death of the universe, whether we like it or not.
I’ll stick to watching Captain America save the love of his life Bucky Barnes in Winter Soldier whenever I need a fix.
This great story about queuing to try and get a ticket to see Paul McCartney play a show that might or might not be happening. (paywall, but consider paying for great independent media where you can)
When the staff, certified with Macca's face on a badge, handed me a blue raffle ticket, I felt like Sully landing in the Hudson; in the moment, it sincerely felt like my life's greatest accomplishment.
A collection of incredibly useful tiny tools on the web, which I found because it includes my LEGO Streetscaper, but bias aside there is some fab stuff in here: find the closest panda to you (and what they’re called!), count characters in a paragraph, create emoji, generate blackout poetry, find a useful arrow, and more.
Somebody set the BBC shipping forecast to lofi beats. Because, why not? (via Web Curios)
