{"id":617922,"date":"2026-10-02T00:14:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T00:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/617922\/"},"modified":"2026-10-02T00:14:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T00:14:09","slug":"spider-noir-nicolas-cage-compares-mcu-to-glorified-wwe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/617922\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Spider-Noir’ Nicolas Cage compares MCU to ‘glorified WWE’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nicolas Cage<\/a> has some thoughts on the current trajectory of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. <\/p>\n

The blockbuster franchise has moved away from its emphasis on storytelling to prioritize big fights and action sequences, the \u201cSpider-Noir<\/a>\u201d actor lamented during a recent appearance at Fan Expo Dallas<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt started out, in my view, terrific,\u201d Cage said during a Q&A. \u201cSome of the early stories were marvelous, the way that they wove all the threads together and told the different character stories and backstories.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Oscar winner did not name any specific films but pointed out how things have changed with more recent MCU installments. <\/p>\n

\u201cLately \u2014 I do say this with love \u2014 when I see these 50-plus, otherwise intelligent, remarkably gifted thespians putting on these ridiculous outfits and getting ready for the fight \u2014 and let\u2019s face it, it is cutting all to the fight \u2014 it\u2019s hard for me not to be reminded that the MCU is becoming a well-funded and glorified WWE,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

While Cage has not appeared in MCU movies, he has portrayed a number of Marvel characters. In Prime Video\u2019s \u201cSpider-Noir<\/a>,\u201d he played Ben Reilly, a hapless and jaded private eye who used to moonlight as a masked vigilante known as the Spider until the love of his life was murdered. The series, which was canceled after its first season, is based on an alternate-universe Spider-Man known as Spider-Man Noir. <\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things I liked about \u2018Noir,\u2019 \u2018Spider-Noir,\u2019 was it wasn\u2019t cutting to the fight,\u201d Cage said during his Fan Expo appearance. \u201cIt was a detective story. There was a mystery there. I would like to see [the MCU] get back to telling the stories and not just cutting to the wrestling match.\u201d <\/p>\n

Cage also voiced a different version of Spider-Noir in the animated 2018 movie \u201cSpider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse<\/a>.\u201d That version of Spider-Noir was a Peter Parker from an alternate universe. <\/p>\n

Before his foray into Spider-Man-related projects, Cage portrayed Johnny Blaze in the 2007 movie \u201cGhost Rider\u201d and its sequel, \u201cGhost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.\u201d Marvel Studios recently announced that a \u201cGhost Rider\u201d reboot<\/a> starring Ryan Gosling<\/a> as the eponymous fiery, supernatural motorcyclist, will hit theaters July 28, 2028. <\/p>\n

Cage, of course, is not the first Hollywood luminary to take a shot at the blockbuster superhero franchise or comic-book superhero movies in general. In 2019, Oscar-winning filmmaker Martin Scorsese declared that MCU movies are \u201cnot cinema\u201d<\/a> and said \u201cas well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances,\u201d they were more akin to \u201ctheme parks.\u201d <\/p>\n

Despite some pushback, Scorsese has not backed down from his belief that movies inspired by superhero comic books are \u201cmanufactured content<\/a>.\u201d Oscar-winning actor Jessica Lange has also made similar statements<\/a> in the past, saying in 2023 that comic-book movies have \u201csacrificed this art that we\u2019ve been involved in \u2026 for the sake of profit.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nicolas Cage has some thoughts on the current trajectory of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The blockbuster franchise has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":617923,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[3376,304322,304320,304323,304326,304327,304321,156,304325,43401,2882,304319,409,304324,111,139,15174,69,109693,15370],"class_list":["post-617922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-actor","tag-alternate-universe-spider-man","tag-big-fight","tag-blockbuster-franchise","tag-comic-book-superhero-movie","tag-detective-story","tag-different-version","tag-entertainment","tag-fan-expo-dallas","tag-ghost-rider","tag-love","tag-mcu-movie","tag-movies","tag-multiple-marvel-character","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nicolas-cage","tag-nz","tag-spider-noir","tag-wwe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617922"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617922\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/617923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}