One of the most prominent back and forths that we have in movie culture today is the ever-escalating divide between the tonal gap between the movies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and that of the DC Cinematic Universe. In short, Marvel makes movies that aren’t afraid to be fun (and a little goofy) and DC makes movies that are super serious, gritty and grounded. This is the perception.
The reality is somewhere in the middle. Marvel has made movies with real stakes and delivered characters that are a lot of fun, often in the same movies. Their advantage, at least thus far, has been a good balance. This is something that DC’s braintrust seems to be resisting, though we’ll know a lot more in the spring when Batman v Superman hits theaters. The reason why it seems as if Marvel is doing a better job is because we’ve got a lot more evidence of what they can do. After 12 movies, we’ve come to expect that Marvel will give us heroes in which we can invest, stories that interesting and a good mix of humor and serious action.
One of the concerns that a fan of the MCU might have had after seeing the first trailer for Captain America: Civil War would be along these lines: there isn’t much balance to it. It’s very serious.
It’s a legitimate concern, but one born out of a limited amount of information. In an appearance at Brazil’s Comic Con Experience (via Comic Book Movie), co-director Anthony Russo explained that not everyone in the movie will be hyper-serious all the time: …not all the characters in the movie have the same investment in the conflict. There are certain characters that come into the story a little later who don’t have the same baggage that the Avengers have in terms of what’s going on in the film. So they don’t have as much darkness to deal with in the film, so they can be a little lighter and more fun. I think the movie has a healthy balance between very serious, interesting and very surprising storytelling, and sort of light, fun wits and humor.”
He added that “characters like Spider-Man and Ant-Man enter the story a little later” and deliver some lighter moments. As per usual, a little balance goes a long way.
The directors also explained a bit more of the tone of Civil War in the new featurette below, courtesy of EW.
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