Overall, I personally think that there were some good ideas in Phase 4, but a lot of them fell flat on their faces or fizzled out in execution.
I liked Hawkeye, but felt like it needed more episodes. The deleted scenes would have added a lot more to the investment the story wanted us to feel in characters like Kate and Echo, and would have given more impact to Kingpin's presence rather than waiting until episode 5 to reveal him for shock value.
Loki had a lot of interesting concepts, but I remember watching The Avengers not long after that, and one of my first thoughts was "this... really doesn't seem like this is the same Loki we're talking about", and it's somewhat wild to think Lightning McQueen having an intervention would make Loki an even better person than his character development throughout the movies, and I think it would have made sense for him to try to play along and try to get an edge over the TVA and such.
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier introduced the idea of seeing how the world adjusted to the snap and to the blip, but it felt like an anti-racism PSA more often than not, plot twists were telegraphed as heck, and I cringed when Sam said Karli wasn't a terrorist. Honestly, John Walker and Zemo were my favorite parts of the show, and they were supposed to be portrayed as, I don't wanna say "bad guys", but not the characters the show wanted you to care about as much.
Moon Knight was cool, and Oscar Isaac did phenomenal with the role, but it didn't feel violent enough for a Moon Knight series, and I think it would have worked so much better for the character if the show had vibes similar to Daredevil or The Punisher in terms of choreography and violence.
Moon Knight be killin' dudes.
I liked Shang-Chi, but the dragons at the end kind of just.... came out of nowhere. That was the weakest part of the film for me.
From what I heard of Black Widow, they full on changed Taskmaster's gender (which, OK, do you, I guess, MCU? They kind of did that with Flag Smasher, too, but I digress) which isn't really as big of a deal as what I'm gonna mention next. They also seemed to remove a lot of Taskmaster's personality, which... why? Like, Taskmaster in the comics cracks a lot of jokes, and the idea of the character that can copy any skill and retain it at the cost of long-term memories really could have been fleshed out in a film which has the overarching theme of the importance of family.
Also, why were they not on Natasha's case for her teaming up with Yelena, who caused an avalanche over a prison, after the Sokovia Accords, which were specifically addressing instances of collateral damage caused by Avengers and their shenanigans?
Didn't watch Ms. Marvel. Someone who hates the MCU and is a Muslim and someone who likes content put out by the MCU both told me to skip the show, so I followed their advice lol. I will say that I felt from the jump that changing the origin of Kamala Khan's powers was not the move. At all.
Regarding Thor: Love and Thunder (what this thread is actually about lol), I felt from the beginning that Gorr the God Butcher wouldn't be a fit for the more comedic Thor we'd been getting at this point. I was right, especially since every single source I've seen review the movie said the comedy was played up to the point where nothing was taken seriously, and that a lot of the jokes didn't even land. I've also consistently heard people say Gorr was the best part about the movie, yet he had far too little screen time, and that Gorr the God Butcher didn't really butcher any gods aside from the opening scene. In the comics, Gorr was sadistic in the way that he tortured gods before killing them as a means of payback for all the years of neglect he had received from the gods, and in nearly accomplishing his goal to eradicate all the gods, he was somewhat turning into a type of tyrannical god himself, one that tortured and took pleasure in the pain of gods rather than mortals. They could have had more opportunity to show that sadistic side of Gorr by having him kill gods, or the subtle hypocrisy slipping in as the film progresses, or even take him in a different direction entirely that the fans would have enjoyed, but instead of doing that, he ended up kidnapping more children than he did butchering of gods, all while not having enough screen time when he was the best part about the movie.
Spider-Man: No Way Home was phenomenal. It managed to use nostalgia to further the story, not to replace or mask the absence of a story. I've heard someone say that that Homecoming was Peter with responsibility but without power- hence him feeling he was nothing without the suit- and that Far From Home was Peter with the power but not the responsibility- something that can be seen by Peter trying to have a normal field trip/vacation- and finally, No Way Home is where both are put together, with Aunt May telling him (with the actual quote from the original comic) "with great power, there must also come great responsibility". I also like how both the Raimi Spider-Man and Amazing Spider-Man gave advice that would be represented with their actions later in the film: Peter 2 (Raimi Spider-Man) talks about revenge not being satisfying, and steps in front of Peter 1 to keep him from killing the Green Goblin, and Peter 3 talks about his grief and rage after losing Gwen, and he gets his redemption and keeps Peter 1 from suffering that grief by saving MJ. And I love how Peter has gone back to basics at the end of the film. Honestly, the suit at the end is the best Spider-Man suit out of every suit I've seen in a Spider-Man live-action film. I watched a video by Browntable, talking about hype culture ruining the MCU to hear his take, and one of the things he mentioned about the film was that when there was a reference such as "You know, I'm something of a scientist myself" or the appearances of the other Spider-Men with the Sling Rings, there were pauses you'd barely notice in a theater, but seem like they're waiting for fans to applaud when you rewatch it on your own later. Personally, I don't mind, but I hope the MCU doesn't start relying on or abusing nostalgia and guest cameos too much.
Other movies I had just lost interest in (e.g. Multiverse of Madness, WandaVision), and others I just wasn't interested in (e.g. Eternals).
