Meryl Streep thinks a glut of superhero movies has resulted in boring, un-nuanced characters throughout all of cinema.
To promote The Devil Wears Prada 2, the three-time Academy Award recipient, alongside castmates Anne Hathaway and Emily Blunt, was a guest on The Hits Radio Breakfast Show. During the interview, Streep expressed her disdain for what the success of MCU movies has done to subtlety in film characterizations.
The actress shared that The Devil Wears Prada sequel shows a “realistic view” of her character, Miranda Priestly, 20 years after the first installment.
“I think we tend to Marvel-ize the movies now. We got the villains and we got the good guys, and it’s so boring,” the 76-year-old said.
“What’s really interesting about life is that some of the heroes are flawed and some of the villains are human and interesting and have their own strengths,” she continued. “So that’s what I like about this [movie]. It’s messier.”
Streep’s take is similar to one expressed by iconic filmmaker Martin Scorsese. The legendary director has repeatedly expressed a distaste for the MCU, once telling Empire that their movies are “not cinema.”
“Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks,” he told the magazine in 2019. “It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being."
Despite the criticism, the Marvel calendar is packed this year with Disney+ shows The Punisher: One Last Kill, the second seasons of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man and X-Men ‘97, along with VisionQuest. Movies Spider-Man: Brand New Day and Avengers: Doomsday are slated to arrive in theaters on July 31 and December 18, respectively.
The first Disney+ Marvel series to premiere in 2026 was season 2 of Daredevil: Born Again.
