How Scott Buck saved the Marvel Cinematic Universe

For those who do not know who Scott Buck is, he was the executive producer on the Iron Fist and Inhumans series’. You won’t be alone for laughing when I suggest that Scott Buck’s work saved the MCU, but I argue this because his work in the MCU was so bad, Marvel Studios has begun to produce its own shows courtesy of Disney Plus. We are not celebrating the work of Buck, instead we are celebrating the response from Marvel Studios, whereby they have stopped other studios producing superhero series that do not live up to the high bar the MCU has. This also has allowed for the one narrative within the Marvel Universe to be consistent throughout every project.

Nobody can deny how bad both Iron Fist and Inhumans were. Inhumans registered a score of 11% on Rotten Tomatoes, while Iron Fist didn’t fare much better as it scored 37%. Many problems exist within these shows and the main problem is a lack of identity.

Iron Fist fell so far short of the other Netflix shows such as Daredevil that it felt like the same story being told with a different lesser development character. Across the MCU every character has a sense of identity whether it is humour in the Guardians of the Galaxy or the aggression of Punisher. If we think about Iron Fist there is no clear identity of what the show is, instead it is a half-hearted attempt of bringing Daniel Rand to our screens.

Originally the Inhumans was scheduled to be a movie within the MCU, but this was quickly changed into a series produced by ABC. Once again a Scott Buck series struggles to create any complex characters and is complete bore. In the case of the Inhumans it was hard to connect with any of the characters introduced. Black Bolt (Anson Mount) and Maximus (Iwan Rheon) were shocking attempts at famous Marvel characters and if we compare them to a Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Loki (Tom Hiddleston), there is no comparison at which pair brings the comics to life.

As a result of Scott Buck and his series’ failure, Marvel Studios has begun to produce their own shows. They have even started to ignore the spin-off shows by these other studios. While this may be disappointing for fans of the Netflix and ABC shows, it does allow for a consistency within the MCU. WandaVision proved Marvel Studios can deliver in the TV market just as well as the film market, so it makes sense for the studio that gave us Avengers: Endgame to continue to branch out and grow its universe.

With Marvel Studios focusing on TV as well, this gives us a stronger narrative as everything feels more connected than ever before. The Netflix and ABC shows always felt in their own universe, which did work to some extent, but for the overarching narrative of the MCU which is so important to how characters interact, they didn’t follow the story as they should. For example it never made sense that an Avenger never made an appearance to help in the battles across New York, especially when that city is where the vast majority of the hero exist. Especially as the universe has expanded how it has, the MCU would have projects connected to the universe that ignore such major events.

That being said the shows were being successful so there was no reason to stop making them. Then Scott Buck began working on Marvel shows. As mentioned the failures of his shows didn’t reach the high bar the MCU set which meant Marvel Studios had an excuse to question what other studios were producing. Ultimately all the shows have been axed and the story of the MCU can be followed so much easier. Without the ‘work’ of Scott Buck it is hard to say whether the shows would have been cancelled. The Defenders may have continued on Netflix and while being successful, would have continued to cause the story of the MCU to be confusing as we are unsure of how they fit into the universe.

With the MCU expanding more than ever, it makes more sense for Marvel Studios to take control of the series, as they can now tell stories which fit within their universe. Scott Buck’s failure is one of the reasons there wasn’t backlash to the cancellations. Therefore we can thank him for what he has done for the MCU, as the overarching story is now in full control of Marvel Studios and Kevin Fiege, which in turn means all Marvel content will meet the high bar that has been set by the movies.

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