Phase Five of the MCU is officially underway with the release of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, starring Paul Rudd. But boy, oh boy! Marvel fans’ expectations about the film were sky-high before its theatrical release. However, critics on the Rotten Tomatoes platform first spoiled the party as they declared the 31st MCU film ‘rotten’. The latest Peyton Reed directional has the same RT score as Eternals (47%). As expected, things have gone haywire at Marvel Studios and among the fans. Yes, there are many reasons behind the movie’s underperformance in terms of critical reception. One of them is its writer, Jeff Loveness!
Prominent for his work in ‘Rick and Morty’ and ‘Saturday Night Live’, Loveness was tapped by Marvel Studios to write Quantumania in late 2020. Then, the studio chose him as the writer of The Kang Dynasty in September last year.
Loveness is facing the wrath of the Marvel fanbase these days, along with Reed’s poor direction and Kevin Feige’s future MCU strategies. Why? Well, the writer could have done a lot better work than what the fans witnessed in theatres worldwide. He failed at taking proper advantage of his characters apart from Kang. In other words, we can say that it was Jonathan Majors’ exceptional performance that made the whole product watchable.
Most of the fans did not like how Loveness handled MODOK in Ant-Man 3. That ugly SOB is also one of the most brilliant minds in the Marvel comics. He is mechanised only for killing. However, Loveness made the evil character a complete joke in Quantumania. It seems like the decision to honour Darren Cross’ arc in the MCU ended up butchering MODOK’s introduction to the superhero franchise.
Additionally, Loveness’ script offered nothing exhilarating or surprising to the fans. The bar of their expectations has risen greatly after Avengers: Endgame. And no one can blame them for that.
Fans are worried about the future of the ‘once-great’ Marvel Cinematic Universe. Hiring writers with no or low feature writing experience is a huge gamble for Marvel. Speaking of gambling, we must remind you that Michael Waldron, another ‘Rick and Morty’ writer, will write Avengers: Secret Wars. Yup, he is the one who wrote ‘Multiverse of Madness’. The Benedict Cumberbatch starrer might have earned nearly $950 million at the global box office. But it was nothing more than fan service.
Will Jeff Loveness carve up The Kang Dynasty’s script as he did in Ant-Man 3? Or should we expect a miracle from the writer’s side? Let’s wait and watch! Stay tuned for more updates.