Jennifer Aniston isn’t too thrilled with the dominance of Marvel Cinematic Universe films. The former FRIENDS star is gearing up for her small screen return in Apple TV+ series, The Morning Show. She plays Alex Levy - a veteran anchor who struggles to keep her job of 15 years following the sex scandal that ousted his partner. Boasting a star-studded cast of Steve Carrell, Reese Witherspoon, Gugu Mbatha-Raw and Billy Cudrup, the series is set to be available for streaming next month.
With the swift rise of streaming services, much has been said about movie stars dabbling with small screen projects. Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, and Amy Adams, have made the switch with Homecoming, Big Little Lies and Sharp Objects, respectively. And while Aniston had her first real start in TV, she’s made the successful transition to films, having made several big screen projects over the last years. When asked why she decided to return to her roots with The Morning Show, the actress’ says it has something to do with the quality of work that’s now on the small screen, and intriguingly the dominance of Marvel films in theaters.
Speaking with Variety as she promotes the nearing release of The Morning Show, Aniston (whose ex-husband Justin Theroux wrote Iron Man 2) got candid on her return to TV. Citing the influx of quality content now coming out especially with the boom of streaming services as her main motivating factor, the actress also points the sheer number of Marvel films coming out and how it pretty much has a stronghold of the majority of box office.
Aniston’s comments arrive shortly after veteran director Martin Scorsese dubbed the MCU as “not cinema.” The Irishman helmer admitted that he simply cannot get on board with the franchise since its films “isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.” The comments drew varying opinions from fans and people from the industry alike. James Gunn, Joss Whedon and Samuel L. Jackson all responded to Scorsese’s comments respecting his thoughts on the matter but also make a case on why the Marvel films and comic book movies in general shouldn’t be flippantly dismissed.
“It wasn’t until the last couple of years when these streaming services were just sort of exploding with this amount of quality that I actually started to think, “Wow, that’s better than what I just did.” And then you’re seeing what’s available out there and it’s just diminishing and diminishing in terms of, it’s big Marvel movies. Or things that I’m not just asked to do or really that interested in living in a green screen.”
If Aniston thinks there’s already too much Marvel content at this point, things are about to get worse considering the arrival of Disney+ shows connected to the Marvel Cinematic Universe like The Falcon and The Winter Soldier, WandaVision, Loki and Hawkeye. Things won’t slow down on the big screen either with four films slated to come out in 2021 - which means that there may be new content from the universe every two weeks. Admittedly, that sounds a lot and the studio is risking oversaturation at this point considering the number of projects they have in the pipeline. Then again, from a business perspective, one can’t really blame them as they’re simply making the most of their time as the most popular franchise today.
More: Robert Downey Jr. Brushes Off Martin Scorsese’s Marvel Movie Criticism
Source: Variety
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