Eternals-An Honest Review

Anonymous

2021-2022 Issue 3

This article will contain some minor spoilers for Eternals, Avengers: Infinity War, as well as Avengers: Endgame, so read at your own risk if you have not watched these movies.

Originally having been planned for a November 2020 release, Marvel’s Eternals is finally in theatres after a year-long delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, fans of the popular film franchise seemed to be slightly disappointed with the newest installment when it hit theatres on November 5, 2021. What are some of the gripes that fans had with this movie, and should you still go to see it?

First of all, you need to understand the background of this movie. It centers around the Eternals, a group of immortal warriors sent from their planet, Olympia, to protect Planet Earth from the Deviants, giant man-eating monsters that plague the earth. After successfully wiping out the Deviants, they settled down and started living among the humans. Thousands of years passed, and in the present day, they are faced with a calamity that threatens to destroy Earth, and the Eternals must reunite to protect the planet they have grown to love.

I’ll talk about the parts I liked in this movie before diving into some of the major criticisms that fans had. First of all, this movie might have the most diverse cast out of any Marvel movie to date. Sersi, played by Gemma Chan, is the second ever lead in the Marvel franchise portrayed by an Asian actor. Phastos, played by Brian Tyree Henry, is the MCU’s first openly gay black character, having settled down with his husband and child. Makkari, played by hearing-impaired actress Lauren Ridloff, is deaf and communicates with the rest of the Eternals using ASL (American Sign Language). Overall, without analyzing too far into the plot and themes of the film, it is an enjoyable, action-packed film, just like any other movie you would expect from the Marvel franchise, with beautiful visuals, good character dynamics and plot twists that you’ll never see coming.

Now, onto the criticisms that many fans (and I) had. This movie was by far the most ambitious movie timeline-wise in the multi-million film franchise, spanning not only multiple galaxies but also exploring the very beginning of the world in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Which begs the question: If the Eternals are such powerful beings who have been living on Earth ever since the beginning of humanity, why didn’t they help out when you know, fifty percent of the entire population was snapped out of existence? It was explained in the movie that the Eternals were not permitted to help out in situations where Deviants were not involved because technology needed to develop so the ancient being inside of Earth could grow and be born (seems kind of out of the blue, I know), but having half of the population disappear in one night just seems counter-productive, does it not? My question is why they weren’t tasked with helping the Avengers regain the half of the population that were lost in The Blip, or even when the Avengers were fighting against Thanos in the later half of Avengers: Endgame, when his goal was to eradicate humanity as a whole instead of just erasing half of it.

This blatant plot hole is the least of the problems that this film has going on. There were also some scenes that just felt wrong from a cultural standpoint, and were never really expanded on or given closure to. One of the characters, Druig, has the power of mind control. When the Eternals reunite to stop the emergence of the Celestial Tiamut, we discover that he has been putting the Indigenous peoples of the Amazon under his mind control for generations. The film moves on before the audience can quite think about the negative implications of this scene, not bringing up this particular action again for the rest of the movie.

While this film is praised for the diversity of its characters, one scene in particular was questionable on the writers’ part, especially considering the character it involves is the MCU’s first openly gay black male lead. Phastos, the Eternals’ weapons and technology inventor, is part of the reason why technology on Earth has developed so far, having helped the humans invent technology that would benefit their lives. Unfortunately, one of these pieces of technology that he helped invent was the atom bomb, and is shown in the film kneeling amidst the rubble in Hiroshima, Japan after the nuclear bombing of 1945, a devastating attack that killed over 70,000 people. While he is not the one who personally ordered the bomb attack, and is shown to be in despair over the devastation from his invention, it does seem a bit tasteless to push the blame of the United States’ still fairly recent war crime against Japan onto a character whom many people may see themselves represented in.

So, should you still watch this movie despite the criticisms many fans and critics alike had? I think that the decision is ultimately up to each individual person. If you are a die-hard Marvel fan and have your sights dead-set on watching all the movies, then of course you should go see it. If you are new to the Marvel franchise, then this may not be the movie for you, since it is filled with callbacks and references to previous movies. Not to mention, there are minor spoilers within the film that could potentially ruin your experience for the films that come before it. Eternals, in all its essence, is a Marvel movie. So perhaps it is not fair to judge it on the level of director Chloé Zhao’s other films such as critically-acclaimed, Oscar-winning Nomadland. At the end of the day, it’s a superhero movie with decent representation, enjoyable action scenes, and beautiful visuals and costume design.