Marvel Studios has recently come under fire from fans complaining about the inconsistency in the VFX work of the production company’s projects. Thor: Love and Thunder was criticized for the inconsistency in the CGI, and She-Hulk: Attorney at Law faced several complaints for its shoddy animation.
Marvel Studios is definitely one of the biggest names, if not the biggest, in the entertainment industry. Thus, their demands come hand in hand with immeasurable pressure, and to top it off, a bad word from them could mean a big dip in business.
With new TV shows and movies being added to the slate all the time, Marvel easily releases three to four projects yearly, and since most of these productions are based on green screens, CGI, and VFX, the workload is immense.
Confirming these facts, an anonymous VFX artist has opened up about the poor conditions in which post-production employees must abide by their overachieving demands. In a report by Vulture, the VFX artist explains the tension Marvel creates in the production market, and tells that their dominance over the said market has made it hard to say no to them.
Not every client has the bullying power of Marvel.
Not only overworked, but these production houses are also heavily underpaid. To score a project, special effects companies underbid the prices set by Marvel, thus leading to the work of a ten-person team to fall on two people, which leads to understaffing. And despite it all, a denial or extension will lead to falling into Marvel’s bad graces, which can translate to career suicide.
Some of the problems I mentioned are universal to every show and every project. But you end up doing less overtime on other shows. You end up being able to push back more on the directors. When they say something like, ‘Hey, I want this,’ you can be like, ‘This doesn’t make sense.’ Not every client has the bullying power of Marvel.
Despite all these complaints, Marvel is infamous for making last-minute changes, which usually lead to a huge amount of editing and revisions. The artist added that they do not work under a director of photography and develop most action sequences based on their own shots, meaning extra work. Most directors have little experience with VFX, leading to edits being made just before the release.
Maybe a month or two before a movie comes out, Marvel will have us change the entire third act. It has really tight turnaround times. So yeah, it’s just not a great situation all around.
The anonymous artist recalled sights of breakdowns and anxiety attacks several times and stated unbelievable working hours put in by all employees. And what’s more, this one person is not the only one complaining about the horrid work hours and understaffing.
There is a growing employee union forming against Marvel to move them to prevent underbidding and allow more freedom to deny impossible requests without the looming fear of never being asked to work on future projects.
This press-drawing attention to the plight of the overworked special effect artists could not have come at a better time since their conditions could get worse with MCU’s Phase 5 and Phase 6 projects announced at SDCC.
Marvel Studios has announced approximately twenty new projects at SDCC. With the work increasing rapidly over time, the time for them to revise their working methods is now.
About Marvel Cinematic Universe
The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is an American media franchise and shared universe centered on a series of superhero films and TV series, independently produced by Marvel Studios and based on characters that appear in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.
The franchise includes comic books, short films, television series, and digital series. The shared universe, much like the original Marvel Universe in comic books, was established by crossing over common plot elements, settings, cast, and characters.
Source: Vulture
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