Fin: No, criticizing Marvel does not require an apology

This week's notes column includes a possible double feature about the 40th president and the guy who shot him, the real problem with White Dudes for Harris, and does anyone want to host the Oscars?

This week, Oscar-winning actress Jamie Lee Curtis issued a heartfelt apology, vowing to “do better.” 

Did Curtis say something racist? Did she step in it, somehow, about the Middle East? No, she was merely critical of the recent output of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

The “offending” comments took place at Comic-Con at the end of July as part of an interview with MTV (MTV still interviews people? Good for them, I suppose.) The actress was asked what phase of the MCU we’re currently in, and she answered “Bad.” 

There had been a round of tongue-in-cheek “feuding” between Curtis and Marvel in 2022, when she starred in a multiverse movie — Everything Everywhere All at Once — that was much better than anything Marvel has done with the concept. But the “bad” comment seems to have crossed a line, for some reason. 

“My comments about Marvel were stupid and I will do better,” Curtis said in her apology. “I’ve reached out to Kevin Feige and will no longer play in that mud slinging sandbox of competition we call the internet nor will I engage in the toilet paper promotion or game play that is designed for clicks not content.”

The truth is, even before Deadpool & Wolverine crushed the box office last weekend, there’s nothing wrong with being critical of Marvel or the MCU! They can handle it, especially since… the last couple of years of MCU movies have, indeed, been pretty bad. Pointing that out does not, in any way, necessitate the type of language that normally follows the regretful uttering of a racial slur. 

If you disliked a Marvel movie that most people liked… that’s okay. If you liked a Marvel movie that some fans have mobilized against because it was “woke…” that’s okay too! 

Then we get reviews like this one, which argues that “The Fans Deserve Better Than Meta-Blockbusters Like Deadpool & Wolverine.” 

Do they, though? In the last 15-to-20 years, superhero fans have gotten almost everything they’ve ever wanted. Movies have been made about every significant superhero, sometimes many times over. These movies rule popular culture the way nothing else does. What is it that their fans “deserve”? To never, ever be disappointed with a movie?