Post #7: A Liberal Feminist Perspective of Marvel’s “Endgame”

Fist a quick note, this analysis will be limited strictly to the characters who make appearances in Endgame and their actions taken within that movie.

The marvel cinematic universe has dominated pop culture since the release of Iron Man in 2008. With Iron Man as the grandfather of all the heroes that have graced the big screen, followed in quick succession by the other two pillars of the MCU being Captain America and Thor. Missing from this foundation of heroes is any powerful female representation. But that was all 2008 so what about in 2020 are things any better for the inclusion of women superheros in what has been a heavily male dominated culture scene?

In 2019 Avengers: Endgame came to theaters. This served as the cap-stone to the interwoven heroes’ journey that fans had been following for years. In this movie there were great moments of both female solidarity and power. Such as show here: https://youtu.be/L7Y0ucw7bGk

This moment fills the first requirement when conducting a liberal feminist perspective, it has included women in a male dominated space not just as lamp posts but as equals who are integral to the plot. So far so good for the MCU. However, the idea becomes more nuanced as the analysis becomes more detailed. The women shown in the clip are some of the most powerful characters both inside the comics and in the movies. For example, Scarlet Witch in the comics rewrote reality itself because she’s just that damn strong. Captain Marvel in the movies is one of the strongest characters around with the combat prowess to boot. Essentially beating out the big three (Iron Man, Thor, Captain America) in any sort of competition. So again it would seem that the feminist perspective is satisfied. However, despite all their power one has to look at what they actually accomplished withing the plot to decide if this could be truly counted as feminist inclusion.

Starting with Black Widow one of the earliest female characters introduced in the entire MCU, her role through the film is to recruit Hawkeye back to the good guys after he goes and does some depression murder. Then she is the sacrificial lamb that is used to motivate several of the heroes is the final fight against Thanos. Like trying to save all of the universe isn’t enough of a motivator but whatever, she has a purpose but it is definitely not a feminist one. Instead she fulfills the role of murdered lover that is used to finally  make the male hero break his morale code and fight harder to beat the big bad. This trope is as old as time and was definitely seen here.

Following her is Pepper Potts, who generally speaking up until this movie was strictly Tony’s love interest and not even considered a hero. She was turned into the hero “Rescue” with a suit of armor for this movie but beside knocking out some low tier baddies and being in the all female hero shot doesn’t actually do much. Her inclusion in the “power shot” in all honesty was probably a ploy to add more bodies on the screen. She hadn’t been a hero before and had no inclination of becoming one until about 45 minutes earlier in the same movie. Her inclusion is of course welcome but the fact remains she is critically under-developed as a hero within the cinematic universe.

Pepper’s juxtaposition is of course Captain Marvel herself. This character is the only female hero to receive her own solo movie and fully develop her background before Endgame. Remember, despite being a founding member of the Avengers Black Widow is only now getting her own solo movie and it is really just filling the time gap between Infinity War and Endgame. So this origin movie that she has leads directly to her death chronologically. Captain Marvel though has a lot of mileage left to go as a character and the writers have left the universe wide open for her to develop. Within Endgame they even used her to her full extent. Essentially, without her the fight would have been lost from the start. She is the cavalry the Avengers needed to swing the tide into their favor. Captain Marvel is absolutely a feminist icon and should be recognized for that. However, this cannot be said for the rest of her MCU counterparts.

With Captain Marvel being the only female character that is put to use in the plot that does something other than die or look pretty she remains the sole leg this film has to stand on as a piece of feminist art. As the MCU has aged and matured they have begun to incorporate more characters of color as well as women into integral roles. This does not mean we should be content with how things currently sit within the world’s largest movie franchise. The MCU has a long way to go before its’ movies start getting the same praise as classics like Alien (1979) and League of their Own (1992) or even their direct competitors like Wonder Woman (2017). In short, Endgame is a start to what could perhaps be an amazing feminist legacy but one good character does not mean that they can throw the rest off a cliff.