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thanksjro · 4 years

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More Than Meets the Eye #19- Ambulon and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

We got a major reveal at the end of last issue, and now it’s time to put the rest of the pieces together so we can finally understand the mystery that is the Ultra Magnus situation.

So back when Magnus’ seemingly lifeless body stole a shuttle, fucked off into space and landed on the moon, Tyrest was there to greet him.

And by “greet him”, I mean punch through the windshield and carry him bridal style, as if he weighed no more than a baby bird, into his moon base.

Pharma did his thing with his crazy new hands, Magnus was saved, and he woke up shortly after his lifesaving operation. Then Tyrest punched Magnus in the face, because fuck the healing process. He’s an engineer, not a doctor, he doesn’t deal with the SOUL and FEELINGS or anything like that.

In the here and now, Rodimus is still trying to comprehend the fact that his SIC isn’t dead, and is also actually another, much smaller guy with a mustache. Minimus Ambus attempts to explain just what the hell is going on, and we get back to our flashback.

After some good old-fashioned face violence, Tyrest showed Magnus around the place, specifically the terminal he’d set up for his on-the-fly, real-time law amending. With how many war crimes the Cybertronian race has committed in the last several million years, I’m sure it was needed.

Dang, wonder who pissed off Big Brother.

Magnus is more concerned about how it is exactly he isn’t dead right now, and also why his boss looks like a swiss cheese party platter.

Turns out that Tyrest isn’t actually mad at Magnus, just disappointed. He went and read his diary while the operation was happening, and in the 18 months that the Knight Quest has been running, Tyrest has deemed the work done to be unsatisfactory. Instead of arresting criminals, Magnus had been handling infractions so minor, most people wouldn’t have even noticed them. Tyrest doesn’t know where he went wrong.

Well, Tyrest, it was probably the anxiety that manifested itself as OCD, because you picked someone without factoring what the end of the war might do to them. Magnus needs structure to flourish, and if he cannot find it, he will make it himself. I mean, look at all this:

No wonder he was struggling on the chaos engine that is the Lost Light.

Still, Tyrest wants nothing to do with someone who’s cracked under the pressure (lack of pressure?) and the deal was that Magnus only got to be Magnus if he did what Tyrest wanted. Tyrest divests him with the literal push of a button.

Good grief, he’s naked!

As Minimus Ambus mourns over the loss of his stature, both literal and position-wise, we get back to the present, in a double-page spread no less, as Minimus tells everyone about the storied history of the Magnus Armor. Ultra Magnus was originally an actual person, but then he died, and Tyrest was kind of bummed out about that, so he decided to make up a lie (lying, while perhaps morally dubious is not illegal, so he’s allowed to do that) that Magnus faked his death, and then built the armor. There were at least a few wearers of the armor prior to Minimus, some of who were even known by the other crew members. Whenever someone got offed, their hand would spasm and press a recall button in their palm, which would bring the Magnus Armor, and the dead body inside, back to Tyrest.

You can tell he’s still real shaken up about losing the Magnus Armor, because he’s truncating his words. Poor guy.

Minimus asks what exactly happened after he got stabbed, seeing as he was too busy dying to really pay attention to the Overlord plot. Rodimus tells him it’s been handled. Brainstorm jumps in, wanting to know about the other things on Minimus’ resume, which leads into Minimus revealing the fact that he is a Point One Percenter, and something known as a Load Bearer. Load Bearers circumvent that niggling little issue that we saw presented in the “Shadowplay” arc, where spark strain due to not being able to handle a different frame type would outright kill you. Minimus doesn’t have that problem.

Tailgate wants to know how exactly it is that Minimus isn’t dead, seeing as he was clearly on his way out prior to his grand theft auto. Tailgate may have a personal interest in that sort of information, what with still being terminal and all.

Everyone’s real handsy this issue.

Minimus lets Tailgate know that Tyrest’s medical equipment is off the hook, and we get a reminder that Tailgate’s got basically a day left to live. Harsh, Roberts.

Back in Minimus’ flashback, Tyrest sort-of apologizes for punching him in the face, and laments on the loss of one of his greatest Enforcers of the Tyrest Accord.

Oh, so you DID know that this was a possibility, and instead of ordering your subordinate to go make that follow-up appointment with the only therapist on Cybertron- which, while being borderline sectioning, would have at least kept Minimus from sending emails to Rodimus about how he was spiraling- you just let it happen. The Vector Sigma pulse wave went all over the galaxy, there’s zero possibility you didn’t hear about the end of the war before Magnus loaded up on the Lost Light and didn’t call for a year and a half.

Anyway, so Tyrest’s got a new Enforcer lined up, seeing as he’s going to retire the Magnus Armor after all the shenanigans Minimus got dragged through while wearing it. Let’s see what we’re working with.

I thought we were supposed to have separation of church and state, what the hell?

In the present, Rodimus has questions, mainly about why there are so many people in this prison cell. Minimus admits that he asked to be put in here, to try and prove Rodimus and friends’ innocence on the charge of harboring a criminal, by recording their conversation and proving that they had no idea what SKIDS deal was.

Yep, Skids did a bad, and Tyrest wants him in jail.

Minimus also drops the bomb that everyone else in this cell is going to get he death penalty for that whole “crimes against creation” thing. I mean, all Tyrest has to do is wait for a little while and Tailgate will be dealt with, no sweat.

Minimus pulls a device out of his hip compartment, uses it to disrupt the electro-bars of the cell (it’s cool, he was an undercover cop for this whole thing and can therefore break out of prison without it being a crime), and goes to have a chat with his boss about all the weird new stuff he’s shoved into the Autobot Code in the last year and a half. Rodimus doesn’t really want him to leave, but there’s no time for that, because the cell just got a little more full.

Uh oh, Swerve’s badge has gone missing again. Rung, why don’t you slap yours on his crotch, that way Minimus won’t try to murder him when he gets back?

While this is happening, Whirl and Cyclonus are standing on the rim of a smelting pool, absolutely not having a dick measuring contest.

Luna 1 said Bi Rights.

There’s a structure built over the pool that looks an awful lot like living quarters, but is probably actually a prison that violates the Geneva convention. Whirl suggests they find some weapons and go hog-wild, but Cyclonus is more concerned about finding something. When Whirl asks what in the hell he could possibly be looking for in this sort of crisis, Cyclonus turns into a moody teenager.

Well, at least he’s respecting Tailgate’s wish to keep his looming demise under wraps. Not that Cyclonus tells anyone anything anyway.

Over in the Luna 1 medibay, Ratchet is being subjected to having his very fucking soul threatened with a paring knife. Pharma’s having what probably an inappropriate amount of fun, especially since he’s realized that Ratchet took his goddamn hands after the shitshow that was Delphi.

It turns out that every single piece of tech that Ultra Magnus ever repossessed is floating around on Luna 1, even the stuff that really ought to have been destroyed. This is why they were able to save Magnus from certain death at the start of the issue. Somehow I’m not surprised that Tyrest kept all those toys for himself. Corruption of an authority figure? In my Cybertronian Justice System? It’s more likely than you think.

Some of the little art quirks in MTMTE are added in by Milne- see Brainstorm holding any handgun ever if you’d like an example- but I know for a FACT that Pharma humping Ratchet’s headless body was specified by Roberts.

Ratchet, unimpressed and likely mildly queasy by the display going on before him, proposes that Pharma’s afraid of failure, which is why he hasn’t taken his hands back. Pharma disagrees, and a wager is set to see who the better doctor is- winner gets to keep the hands.

Over with the fly boys, alarms are going off in a deserted building, as Whirl struggles to open a door with his claws. Cyclonus takes over on door duty, and asks why Whirl hasn’t gotten his shit fixed yet.

Whirl’s worried that if he gets help for his trauma, he’s going to lose a huge part of himself as a person, and then where will he be? Of course, he says it in a much more Whirly fashion, full of vitriolic self-blame, but reading between the lines is fun. Whirl fires the “let’s get into each other’s personal issues even though both of us hate talking about ourselves and also each other” missile right back at Cyclonus. He wants to know about Cyclonus’ facial situation.

Cyclonus doesn’t like this question.

Then he gets stabbed with a sword.

Back with the docs, it’s apparently much later, as Ratchet’s just woken up from surgery and has a body again. He gets up from the operating table and finds that Pharma’s gone ahead with setting up their gentleman’s wager.

First Aid seems less than pleased with the current situation. Ambulon’s arms are long as hell in this panel, and he doesn’t seem entirely present in the moment. Maybe he’s practicing Rungian Re-Experience Therapy.

Pharma wants to cut both of the boys in half to see who can put the pieces together back the fastest. Ratchet tries to deescalate the situation, because he’s usually pretty good at it, but Pharma’s set on using his chainsaw attachment on someone today.

Ratchet attempts to console his coworkers, saying that their Springer-on-Pova treatment be over soon, and they’ll get a nice lollipop at the end for being such brave little robots.

Then Pharma cuts Ambulon in half, in a way that Ratchet hadn’t accounted for.

We’re gonna need a little more than some bandaids and a kiss to make it feel better for this one. It’s amazing what censorship laws will let you get away with when the blood isn’t red.

Speaking of blood, Cyclonus is more or less okay with being stabbed, because Whirl did him a solid and chopped his assailant in half- lengthways- with a super sweet sword he found in the armory they just opened up. Cyclonus pulls the blade out of his midriff and we finally find out what happened to the Circle of Light.

Back in the prison cell, Perceptor’s been given the job of doctor, even though Rung, Swerve, and Chromedome are all here and at least somewhat closer to being general practice doctors than our science sniper.

Seems like Swerve filled everyone in on the situation on the Lost Light off-panel, which is good, because they’ve been in the dark up to this point.

Chromedome hypothesizes that the reason Skids is a wanted man has to do with that mysterious gun he was holding when he fell out of the sky all the way back in issue #2. This is the point where Skids wakes up from his stabbing and admits that this is probably what happened, even though he still has no recollection of ever stealing the gun or even it existing up until he entered the story, but he apologizes for the trouble anyway.

Shh. Someone’s coming down the corridor. It’s Star Saber, and he’s brought yet another prisoner to stuff in this cell.

And there’s something else. Can you hear it?

Is… is that music?

Are those the beginning synth riffs of “Tainted Love" by Soft Cell?

Over with Minimus, we’re treated to a taste of Tyrest’s personal brand of disinterest, then get a quick run-down of the birds and the bees. The forging process is a little more convoluted than originally implied, needing Primus to send out a pulse wave through Vector Sigma in order for the Hot Spots to be ignited.

Then the pulse waves started to slow down, Nova Prime had a little freak out, and cold construction was invented to prevent the Cybertronian race from becoming an endangered species.

Minimus of course knows all of this, because he, like basically half of the cast of MTMTE, is old as shit. What he DOESN’T know is that cold construction isn’t managed the way that anyone thought that it was, because there was a government coverup going on about the whole thing. You don’t splice sparks to make a new one, you use the Matrix to create new life.

I know, it’s crazy.

Tyrest was on the team that fiddled around with the Matrix until it started spitting out robot zygotes, and he’s now convinced that they bled the Matrix dry. Nobody tell him what happened to the thing after the war ended.

Wait. If the pulse waves have stopped, and the Matrix is busted beyond repair, doesn’t that mean they can’t make any more Transformers? Once they finish up on their stockpile of sparks, that’s it. No more. The Transformers are a protected species now, we’ve got to treat them like giant pandas.

One of his team members stole the Matrix and hid it in the black market, so its strange, mystical baby powers could never be used again. Except someone obviously found it later on, because we have half of it on the Lost Light. Minimus isn’t sure why any of this is actually relevant to the current situation, or why Tyrest feels guilty about pulling a Eugenesis Fulcrum and finding out where babies come from.

Tyrest is convinced that by draining the Matrix, his team somehow corrupted it, and all the sparks made by this corrupted Matrix are straying further and further from Primus. This is why Rodimus and friends have been charged with crimes against creation- some of their party were created in a way that predisposes them to crime. Or so Tyrest thinks.

I thought we were supposed to have separation of church and state, what the hell? This is still the same guy who was appointed as Chief Justice by the space pope because of his levelheadedness, right?

Yes, actually, but this sudden flip in priorities and personality has been induced by the guilt he felt during the Aequitas trials. Tyrest turned to self harm to deal with the weight of it all, and one day tried to go for what in most species would have been a suicide, by drilling with his drill fingers into the spot between his eyes. Instead, he most likely gave himself a lobotomy and became a religious zealot, fully believing that the gods are real, and he can go visit them by using his super-cool space portal.

Outside the moon base, Whirl and Cyclonus have freed the Circle of Light, and everyone’s ready to kick some ass. Both the fly boys have found themselves a Great Sword to play with, further cementing Cyclonus as our replacement Drift. Rodimus will be so thrilled.

Dai Atlas, the leader of the Circle of Light, tells our boys that there used to be a lot more of his group, but a lot of folks ended up being used to build Legislators.

Hm. I’m sure that’ll never be brought up again, and won’t paint future events in a much darker light. Nope. Absolutely not.

Cyclonus thinks that they need to get a move on, because if that sort of horrific shit can happen to the Circle of Light, it can also happen to Tailgate and the others. He does specifically name Tailgate in his dialogue, but it’s not like he actually cares about the guy, right? Feelings are for nerds.

Then the Legislators show up and it’s party time.

Wonder how that’s going to work out for you, Whirl.

Back with Tyrest, it’s revealed that Tyrest’s plan has a small snag- only people completely absolved of their guilt can go to Cyberutopia to hang out with Primus and the gang, and Tyrest is feeling awful guilty. Not about his weird space-eugenics thing, but about inventing cold construction. Now, how in the world is he going to handle this?

By committing a genocide.

Minimus is, understandably, not a fan of this plan. Tyrest had anticipated that the Universal Killswitch wouldn’t be universally appreciated, and has some of the new law come into play.

And that’s a series wrap on Minimus Ambus! Let’s give him a hand, folks!

#transformers #jro #jro punches me in the face #mtmte #remain in light #issue 19 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

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medproish · 6 years

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As someone who’s criticized the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the prospect of sitting through a 31-hour marathon of these movies was daunting, to say the least. But I knew that the ordeal would be a prime (if very stupid) opportunity to raise some money for a good cause. So this week, I joined a few hundred diehard Marvel fans for an Infinity War of our own.

Would the experience break me? Would it force me to see the light and embrace my inner Marvel fanboy? Would I understand why the hell I’m supposed to care about Bucky?

This is my diary of my 31-hour trip to Thanos.

Wednesday, April 25th

1:15pm: I arrive at the AMC 25 in Times Square, the Stark Tower of multiplexes. Fresh from an emergency supply run to the Duane Reade across the street, I have a large box of granola bars; an even larger bigger box of painkillers; a giant can of sugar-free Red Bull; an iPhone charger; a sleep mask for “Captain America: Civil War;” and a few precious memories of the outside world.

I feel relatively well prepared, at least until I spot a man going up the escalator with a suitcase.

1:25pm: A long line forms as they wait to take our tickets. People tentatively introduce themselves. Many — perhaps even most — are decked out in some form of Marvel paraphernalia, and we’re all about to get some more of it: Every marathon attendee receives an Avengers pin, a plastic-sealed poster, and a shiny badge that must be worn around our necks at all times, to ensure everyone feels the proper level of embarrassment.

1:28pm: Good news: AMC 25 has several theaters decked out with leather recliners, perfect for sleeping! Bad news: Our marathon isn’t playing in one of them, because it’s organized by some of the world’s most twisted sadists.

Read More:‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Review: A Decade of Marvel Movies Collide in One Epic Showdown After Another

Auditorium #17, our home for the next 31 hours, is about as comfortable as an episode of “Nathan for You.” Seats are stiff, legroom is nonexistent, and the cushions are made out of the most fart-absorbent material in the galaxy. It’s like sitting in the last row of a 31-hour flight that never leaves the ground.

1:30pm: Lights go down at 1:30pm sharp (all movies started exactly on time, the marathon scheduled down to the minute so that “Infinity War” can begin at 6pm the following night and AMC can clear the room in time for a 9pm show). The crowd cheers.

People also cheered when the Titanic set sail.

“Iron Man”

1:32pm: “Iron Man” is so old that it takes place in a world where Maxim is still a thing.

1:36pm: Tony Stark is introduced through the lens of his attitude towards weapons and power — his lucrative belief that fear and violence are the surest means toward peace. “It’s an imperfect world, but it’s the only one we got,” he caws. “I guarantee you the day weapons are no longer needed to keep the peace, I’ll start making bricks and beams for baby hospitals.” As one character points out a few minutes later, the first MCU movie has a mass murderer for a hero.

1:40pm: It’s amazing how fully formed Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark was right out of the gate. The quick-tongued arrogance, the withering sarcasm, the poisoned moral righteousness — “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” has a lot of blood on its hands.

1:50pm: The kind-hearted Yinsen dies after imploring Stark not to “waste his life.” Everyone seated for this 31-hour marathon of Marvel movies begins to shift in their seats.

1:55pm: Agent Coulson makes his first appearance and the crowd explodes as if Bruce Springsteen and Beyoncé dropped in for an impromptu jam. Hooray for middle management!

2pm: Dum-E, the fire-extinguishing robot in Tony’s lab, earns the MCU’s first deep laugh. Honestly, this little guy might be the reason Terrence Howard was fired. I picture Kevin Feige at the premiere and being all: “Is it just me, or does that droid whose face is an empty metal tube give the second-best performance in the whole movie?”

“Iron Man”

2:40pm: By today’s Marvel standards, this movie is mumblecore: 70 minutes in, and the biggest action sequence is Iron Man dominating a rabble of terrorists. It’s almost quaint.

3:15pm: Stane is a useless villain (anticipating a franchise full of useless villains), but I like the half-assed final fight because Stark — in his battle against an Iron Man prototype — is effectively fighting his former self. So many MCU heroes are defined by their struggle to reconcile the people they were with the people they’re empowered to become.

3:45pm: What a nice little movie about a powerful man who learns that the world might be a better place without weapons of war on the streets.

3:40pm: There’s a 30-minute break between each film, but most people stick around for the post-credit scenes. I am not most people. I need coffee and I need it now.

3:42pm: The lady at concessions stand tells me, “The coffee machine has decided to stop working.” This is the bad place.

“The Incredible Hulk”

3:45pm: Wait, I just Googled it and it turns out that Maxim is still a thing! That’s insane.

4:00pm: “The Incredible Hulk” begins before anyone can figure out why they’re forcing us to watch it.

4:13pm: Did Edward Norton accidentally kill Stan Lee?

4:20pm: CRASH! You know those plastic-covered posters they gave us on the way in? They’re now sticking out from underneath everyone’s seat, turning the narrow aisles of this cramped room into a veritable slip-and-slide. Not that I’m complaining: Someone falling on their ass is easily the most entertaining thing that will happen for the next two hours.

Read More:‘Avengers: Infinity War’ World Premiere: Marvel Celebrates 10 Years of Films With Star-Studded Red Carpet

4:35pm: I like how Norton’s take on the Hulk was pretty much: What if a guy with no discerniblepersonality did everything in his power to avoid growing one?

5:25pm: Watching two hideous CG blobs clobber each other across the streets of Harlem, it occurs to me that “The Incredible Hulk” might be more of a DC movie than it is a Marvel one.

5:42pm: There’s a giant “Tully” stand in the lobby. At the moment, my big plan for the night is to knock it down and sleep inside of it.

“Thor”

6:15pm: “Thor” starts, and the theater is half-empty. It’s like revisiting “The Incredible Hulk” made a roomful of Marvel obsessives question some of their life choices.

6:40pm: I snap awake after my body involuntarily shuts down. Thanks to the rigid structure of all these origin stories, it’s all too easy to reorient myself.

7pm: That Loki sure loves genocide, huh?

8:05pm: It’s pretty remarkable that the MCU survived “Thor” and “The Incredible Hulk,” and that “Iron Man,” Chris Hemsworth, and the promise of the Avengers was enough until this franchise found its legs. Of course, it was a more innocent time.

8:10pm: You can condition people to sit through the credits, or you can play some awful new Foo Fighters song over the credits. To do both is probably in violation of the Geneva Convention.

8:12pm: Three movies down, and Tony Stark’s fire-extinguisher robot is still by far the best character in the MCU. Fingers crossed for a standalone movie in Phase V.

8:30pm: Standing in line for chicken tenders, the only source of protein on AMC’s menu. I meet a woman who drove up from Maryland for the marathon. The teenage girl behind me frets about finding time to do her homework. (“Maybe during ‘Guardians of the Galaxy?’” she asks a friend.) There are whispers that someone flew in all the way from Utah.

8:42pm: Survival instincts start to kick in. People get territorial over power outlets. A kid with fluffy blond hair loudly contemplates if this is the right time to pop an Adderall (“It’s extended-release,” he explains to no one in particular). It occurs to me that 24 hours from now I will still be sitting here watching spandex men fight computer people.

“Captain America: The First Avenger”

9:07pm: “Captain America: The First Avenger” is a few minutes old, but it’s clear that the MCU has found its groove.

9:15pm: “I can do this all day,” Steve Rogers says to the bully who’s beating him up behind a movie theater. Too soon, Steve.

9:24pm: Steve Rogers is injected with a super serum; I eat an entire box of Red Vines. Two great Americans with unstable chemicals swirling around our veins.

9:35pm: I love that Captain America has a comic book written about him before he becomes a superhero — the identity comes first, and Steve Rogers is forced to live up to it. The U.S.O. tour sequence is an inspired way of expediting character development. Joe Johnson rules.

Read More:Avengers Experience: The Russo Brothers Offer an ‘Infinity War’ Set Visit as an Indiegogo Reward

10:04pm: For the first time in my life, I actually hear a Wilhelm scream. Is it possible that sitting through nine consecutive hours of Marvel movies has somehow sharpened my senses? Or is the smell in here so rank, my eyes so dry, my tastebuds so defeated, and my touch so unused that my ears are picking up the slack?

10:05pm: I break into another box of Red Vines.

10:30pm: Maybe it’s the Stockholm Syndrome talking, but this movie is phenomenal. It’s playing like gangbusters; listening to this audience, you’d think everyone in the room was seeing it for the very first time.

11:04pm: “I had a date.” Oh good, I can still feel things — I haven’t quite gone full Gollum yet. Hands down the best ending of any superhero movie this side of “Spider-Man 2.”

“The Avengers”

11:30pm: “The Avengers” starts. It’s so weird to watch this movie without commercial breaks.

Thursday, April 26th

12:20am: Tony Stark invokes “a terrible privilege.” With great power comes great responsibility. This is the heart and soul of the MCU: human(oid) weapons fighting for peace, and trying to pave the way toward a world that doesn’t need them in it. It’s a matter that subsequent movies will confuse as they try to pick it clean.

12:40am: Agent Coulson’s death was sad when I first saw it in 2012, but now that I know the character was demoted to network TV, it’s devastating.

12:45am: Nick Fury motivates the Avengers by showing them the bloodied Captain America trading cards that were in Coulson’s jacket when he died, only for Maria Hill to reveal that the cards were in Coulson’s locker. Which, if I’m following this, means that Fury went to Coulson’s locker, took out the cards, and … slathered them in blood he found dripping from one of his freshly slaughtered colleagues on the airship? Or, being a true professional, did he go back to Coulson’s body and dunk the cards in the chest wound that killed him? Either way, I think this dude might be a bit more damaged than we’ve been led to believe.

1:10am: Harry Dean Stanton!! The crowd goes wild, and — for the first time — I’m cheering right along with them. Maybe these are my people.

1:40am: The Chitauri definitely voted for Trump. [I don’t know what prompted me to write this down in my notes, but I’m gonna roll with it]

1:30am: The Battle of New York is still the most fluid, operatic, and flat-out spectacular action setpiece in this entire franchise, and nothing else comes close. It’s no wonder the rest of the MCU is so hung up on it.

1:55am: Enter Thanos. Or, the purple concept art that would become Thanos. Our first glimpse of the MCU’s big bad reminds me of the shots we see of Gollum in “The Fellowship of the Ring,” when a movie is forced to introduce a CG character before its franchise has figured out what it’s going to look like. That’s Hollywood, baby!

2:05am: The rest of the theater is closed for the night, leaving us to roam the towering multiplex at our leisure. There are sleeping bodies strewn about the building, some on inflatable mattresses but most lying on the floor.

2:09am: I head to one of the auditoriums I know has recliner chairs (there are perks to being a film critic who’s spent a lot of time in this building over the years). I make a little bed for myself, but it’s so creepy listening to the pre-show in an empty room — Meghan Trainor songs mixed in with chirpy popcorn propaganda from Maria Menounos. It’s even creepier when the music abruptly shuts off.

2:50am: I head back into the theater about 40 minutes into “Guardians of the Galaxy,” hoping that all the flashing lights and smooth ’70s tunes of Peter Quill’s maiden voyage might lull me to sleep.

“Guardians of the Galaxy”

2:52am: They don’t.

3:13am: Every Benicio del Toro performance is 50 percent more fun once you realize that he’s playing himself.

3:30am: Alien John C. Reilly says “I don’t believe anyone is 100 percent a dick.” Maybe it’s the fact that it’s the middle of the night, but this feels like a profound statement that could be applied to the entire MCU.

4:30am: Nothing says “carpe diem” quite like a 4:30am “Age of Ultron” screening.

“Age of Ultron”

4:31am: Captain America throws a motorcycle at someone.

4:45am: There’s a seductive ASMR vibe to the scene where Ultron becomes conscious and starts chatting with Jarvis. I immediately pass out.

5:40am: Jarvis is an Irish lady now.

5:50am: Captain America says a naughty word, and Nick Fury replies: “You kiss your mother with that mouth?” Which, like … dude, if anyone is aware that Captain America’s mom has been dead for 100 years, it’s you. That’s just insensitive.

“Captain America: Civil War”

Walt Disney Studios

7:30am: “Captain America: Civil War” begins. We’re technically watching it, but it would be more accurate to say that the movie is just sort of happening, indifferent to our presence. I think about Quentin Tarantino’s comment about digital projection being like “watching TV in public.” Celluloid is harder to ignore, but the real difference is the passivity. We’re waiting this thing out like a rainstorm.

7:45am: Why is this a Captain America movie, anyway? There are more Avengers than there were in “The Avengers!” Poor Steve. It’s like being ignored at your own birthday party.

7:50am: Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve hit rock bottom. This movie is the worst. I think that’s because it should be the best. Here’s a film that forces the various Avengers to confront their conflicting ideas about power and its proper application, but refuses to dramatize their disagreements. Instead, it’s lots of blank philosophizing interrupted by poorly choreographed fight scenes.

On the other hand, at least someone with power is putting real thought into America’s foreign policy.

8:18am: Dreaming up a supercut of moments in the MCU when there’s no music playing — it’d be about 25 seconds long. I’ve been trying to put my finger on the sameness of these films, how such a grab-bag of candy can taste like the dominant flavor, and the wall-to-wall scoring is a major factor. The movies were always going to blur together by this point of the marathon, but our current fugue state is enhanced by the sense that we’ve been listening to one long, sustained note since we got here.

9:45am: I’m sitting outside an early-morning screening of “A Quiet Place” and using the jump-scares to jolt myself awake. So that’s where we’re at right now.

9:49am: I’ve been holding on to a can of sugar-free Red Bull for the last 26 hours, saving it for my most desperate and pathetic moment like that bottle of 1961 Château Cheval Blanc Paul Giamatti drinks out of a styrofoam cup at the end of “Sideways.” Cheers.

10:00am: Time for Tim Burton’s “Inception!” Wait, no, sorry [squints at notes], “Doctor Strange.”

“Doctor Strange”

10:20am: One of the things I like about this movie is how it hones in on one of the ideas binding this entire franchise together: That our perspective on the world is the sum of our own experience, and our empathy for the experiences of others. A character whose path runs parallel to Tony Stark, Stephen Strange is a self-centered prig who learns that the universe contains realities separate from his own. Only by internalizing that is he able to use his powers for good.

10:45: “Shamballa” is the wi-fi password. Still funny! Also, I’d say somewhere between 85 to 95 percent of the jokes in the MCU hinge on humanizing superhuman characters. Every punchline amounts to “Superheroes: They’re just like us!” But hey, it works.

11:05: “We never lose our demons, Mordo. We only learn to live above them.” No one is 100 percent dick, and no one is 100 percent hero. It’s why Doctor Strange and Iron Man are such compelling characters, though they both grow tiresomee: They’re always at war with themselves, even when they’re saving the world.

11:50am: “Doctor Strange” is in the books, and the books are in some old Tibetan library or something. It’s hard to watch a movie about the meaning of time when you’re nearly 24 hours into a marathon that has stripped time of all meaning.

11:54am: Sitting on a throne of granola bar wrappers like a mad king looking over a ruined world, I experience a profound epiphany:

11:57am: People are sleeping in the aisles, absorbing the MCU through osmosis. Where we’re going, we don’t need fire safety codes.

11:59am: I don’t think a single AMC employee has so much as popped their head in here since the marathon began. It’s “The Lord of the Flies” in theater 17, and they’re just gonna let it happen. Send in a HazMat team when it’s over and let them deal with it.

12:32pm: They’ve scheduled a lunch break, but most people are too broken to venture into Times Square. The younger ones only remember the outside world through the stories the elders tell around the ICEE machine (the one that a kindly AMC employee left on and unattended all night long).

12:51pm: “Spider-Man: Homecoming” time. Someone cheers at the first appearance of Murph, the bodega cat.

“Spider-Man: Homecoming”

12:52pm: The guy at the bodega says that Aunt May is hot.

12:55pm: The kid from “The Grand Budapest Hotel” said “Penis Parker” and I laughed.

12:59pm: Those hilarious instructional videos are enough to make “Homecoming” a better Captain America movie than “Civil War” ever was. I’m not sure if there’s a stronger testament to MCU’s world building: Not only does it milk laughs from our collective understanding of Captain America’s character, it also articulates how the Avengers function in their culture.

1:10pm: Tony says Aunt May is hot.

1:12pm: Tony says Aunt May is hot, but with different words.

1:16pm: A waiter gives Aunt May some free larb because he thinks she’s hot.

1:25pm: Tony is legit about to dump Pepper Potts, abandon the Avengers, and start a new life with Aunt May.

1:30pm: If Marvel hired Nancy Meyers to make a straight-up romantic-comedy about Aunt May looking for love (and maybe finding some danger), it could single-handedly save the genre.

2:20pm: I’m impressed and delighted by how the fictional technology tracks across the various stories. The turbines in the Vulture’s wing suit recall the flying aircraft carrier from “The Avengers,” the reactor cores that power his guns connect to Tony Stark’s Arc Reactors, and someone — I can’t remember who — fires a gun with a corrugated barrel that looks like the Destroyer from “Thor.”

2:50pm: The last five seconds of “Homecoming” are perfect.

3:10pm: I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and it’s very purple. Everyone is buzzing. All that’s standing between us and “Infinity War” is “Black Panther,” and we’re about to watch the movie as it was truly meant to be seen: In a boiling cauldron of farts.

“Black Panther”

3:26pm: T’Challa namechecks Zemo, and I am outraged that fucking ZEMO is momentarily invoked in a future Best Picture nominee.

3:50pm: Klaue’s mixtape is real, and I want to hear it.

3:52pm: “Guns. So primitive.” Okoye gets it.

4:15pm: As if the need for better representation wasn’t obvious enough, watching 12 of these movies in a row really hammers it home. That’s true for race, and it’s very true for gender. Nearing the 29th hour of the marathon, it’s impossible to ignore that I’ve mostly been staring at various white dudes named Chris — even the team-up movies push everyone else to the side. It’s not a matter of being woke; hell, I’m barely conscious right now, and I still can’t unsee it. “Captain Marvel” can’t get here soon enough.

5:50pm: An unseen AMC employee has abandoned a cardboard box outside the theater. We tear it open, wondering aloud about what treasure might wait for us inside: “Infinity War” swag? Signed Thanos autographs? Tear-stained letters from the partners and children waiting for us back home?

It’s 3D glasses. A box full of 3D glasses. It’s like the first scene of “2001,” fits of anger and confusion before our hard cut to space. After 29 consecutive hours of eye-straining insanity, this seems like a cruel joke. At least, I hope it was a cruel joke, because if anyone at AMC thought we wanted this, those people understand their customers even less than I thought.

5:57pm: It’s pandemonium in theater 17. Almost everyone who was there at the start came back for the end. A big guy up front commands our attention and requests everyone stay quiet for the Stan Lee cameo so that “we can hear what the old man has to say.” There are shouts of agreement.

5:58pm: This happens:

memories. pic.twitter.com/LH3t6NC6oW

— david ehrlich (@davidehrlich) April 27, 2018

6:00pm: “Avengers: Infinity War” starts. Well, not the movie, but five minutes of corporate branded content. The glasses were not a joke. They’re a cookbook. Soylent Green is made out of people, etc.

6:05pm: It starts for real this time. Except the 3D isn’t working. It’s like the last 30 minutes of “mother!” in here. I see my entire life flash before my eyes, and it looks an awful lot like a supercut of Marvel movies.

6:07pm: It’s fixed! The shouting stops in time for Thanos’ first line. I start wishing that the 3D would break again.

6:19pm: Stan Lee gets his cameo. People yell at the top of their lungs.

6:25pm: It occurs to me that the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe is the story of Tony Stark trying to figure out faster and faster ways of getting dressed.

6:50pm: “After 11 years and 19 movies, let’s end it by stranding all the characters together in nondescript pockets of outer space so they can joke about Kevin Bacon and shoot lights at each other for three hours.” The bigger these movies get, the smaller they feel.

8:55pm: “Infinity War” is pretty much everything I don’t like about superhero movies, wadded into one epic bore. All the same, there’s no denying that I watched it with the right crowd. When you see the film, you’ll know what I mean.

9:01pm: And just like that, I’m on the A train home.

Did the experience enhance my appreciation of the MCU? Hard to say. On the one hand, it definitely clarified the thematic conversation between them, however garbled it gets. It also forced me to awe at the connective tissue, and the architecture required for such an astonishing feat of world building.

On the other hand, I left the theater even more disenchanted with the way these characters have been subsumed into the spectacle around them, and fear that next year’s “Infinity War” sequel will be more of the same. One thing’s for sure: I’ll be watching that movie on its own.

Oh, and I still don’t understand why I’m supposed to care about Bucky. Sorry, guys.

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