Avengers: Endgame director talks Game of Thrones backlash, issues with social media

Avengers: Endgame marked the end of an era for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Sure, the MCU is continuing on (and on and on and on), but Endgame concluded a story arc that had been building in earnest since at least 2012’s The Avengers, and saw the exit of major characters like Iron Man and Captain America. It was a big deal.

Meanwhile, the final season of Game of Thrones concluded that story, which over the past eight seasons had been followed rapturously by fans, in a more definitive way. Both Endgame and Game of Thrones season 8 came out around the same time, so it’s only natural that the public linked the two in their minds.

Reception to the two works was very different. By and large, critics and audiences loved Endgame, but were sharply divided on the final season of Game of Thrones. Someone brought up this split to Endgame co-director Joe Russo while Russo was talking about his career at Google. “Obviously Endgame was an amazing movie,” the audience member said. “The culmination of a ten-year storyline that either met or exceeded the wildest expectations that we had. There’s another series that just recently finished, Game of Thrones, which actually followed a very different path… did not meet any expectations…”

Coming strong out of the gate, Russo was quick to point out that he didn’t endorse that statement. “That’s your opinion,” he said. “I just want to make that clear. That is not my opinion.” And we’re off!

Anyway, the audience member continued with their question: “Where do you think you went right with the Avengers storyline and where did Game of Thrones go wrong?”

That’s a minefield of a question if I ever saw one. Russo seemed to agree. (“This is like 20,000 headlines for the next three weeks if I answer this question.” Accurate.) He didn’t directly answer the question — not immediately, anyway — but he did say some things about the nature of how we consume art that, coming from a guy who’s produced a lot of beloved, high-profile work, I think is worth considering:

"Look, it’s interesting being an artist in today’s world with social media because it’s an unprecedented level of ownership that the viewer feels over the material. When I grew up, Ernest Hemingway wanted to write a book, he wrote a book and you read and went ‘that’s great’ and ‘amazing’ and ‘thank you, Ernest Hemingway, for writing an incredible piece of literature.’ You’re very grateful for it. Today, rightly or wrongly, there is an intense amount of ownership and opinion, and opinions fly fast and furious. I’ve learned this about social media, that there’s a minority of opinions that are very loud, and they tend to drive the media cycle in a way where it’s not healthy because you’re not getting a true sampling of everyone’s opinion."

Incidentally, Ernest Hemingway died before Russo was born, but that’s really not the point. Please continue:

"It takes energy to go online and bitch about something, you know, and not all of us have that energy or care to do it. You know, it’s also a little bit of narcissism that’s involved with getting online to complain about something, so you have to have the combination of those things in order to do that and I don’t think that’s evocative of a large segment of society."

Finally, he gave his own personal take on the final season:

"They made the choices that they wanted to make with that show and people felt, what I think that they felt, was that they didn’t feel it was seeded properly throughout the series. I loved all the choices. I thought they were crazy and unexpected, and that’s what I want out of a narrative, but I see where people feel like they were upset."

“I’m glad we didn’t get as beat up,” he added with a laugh. I’ll bet.

Okay, while I don’t know if I’d go as far as to call people who complain about TV shows online narcissistic — I’d have to think about that one — I do think that online discourse doesn’t necessarily reflect how people feel about something on a wider scale, and it certainly doesn’t reflect how strongly they feel about it. Russo is right that the loudest, most vitriolic opinions tend to drive the media cycle, which can lead to negative feedback loops that are bad for everyone. And this phenomenon is by no means limited to entertainment news, but for our sanity I’ll try not to dip into the horror show that is modern political discourse.

I agree with Russo that there’s “an intense amount of ownership and opinion” regarding media today, although my guess is that it was ever so and that the internet just provided a way for those people to come together and reinforce each other’s beliefs.

I’ve always found this topic fascinating: what are the responsibilities of an artist to those who enjoy her art? How is online discourse changing the nature of that relationship? I have zero answers to those question but gladly open the floor for discussion.

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h/t ComicBook.com