Eternals (2021)

  Tyler's been wanting to watch this since it dropped on Disney+ last week.  It feels slightly out of phase, since we had seen No Way Home first, but they don't connect at all.  In fact, Eternals feels like an entirely new phase of the MCU with zero crossover.

The Celestials have sent ten Eternals to protect Earth from Deviants.  Remaining untouched by time, they have become figures of legend, but it has been much harder to stay apart from humanity.  Sersi (Gemma Chan) works as a high school teacher and has a human boyfriend (Kit Harrington).  Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry) got married.  Druig (Barry Keoghan), well, Druig started a cult in the Amazon but that's a different story.  Anyway, Sersi is doing just fine until her ex-boyfriend Ikaris (Richard Madden) shows up, along with a new breed of Deviant which has killed the Eternals' leader, Ajak (Salma Hayek).  Ikaris wants to rally the team but Sersi is chosen to lead.  Unsure of her role, her skills, and even her feelings, Sersi has to step up into the lead in order to save the earth.

The movie is visually stunning but there was always going to be a problem having to introduce ten brand new characters.  It's big and weird and opens a whole lot of new storylines, which is great.  It also sets up the next Big Bad, I think.  Beyond Kang the Conqueror, I think the next one is Galactus.  (As a side note, why are all the MCU villains coded purple?  Thanos was purple, Kang's magic is purple, Galactus is purple.  They're going to fuck around and make Phase 5's villain Grimace.)  There is a mid-credits scene which has strong Guardians of the Galaxy vibes, and a post-credits scene which sends everything in an entirely new direction.  Hopefully, the next Eternals movie can just go even bigger and weirder without having to spend a lot of time on set up.  It's currently streaming on Disney+.