Why I stopped collecting Marvel movies

When Marvel first started becoming big in the film world, I was obsessed with collecting every movie.

Conveniently, that happened to be right about the same time Blockbuster went out of business up here in the great white north, and I capitalized by picking up every price-slashed Avenger movie I could get my hands on.

I spent a few years happily hoarding them and lining them up on my shelves in chronological order so that someday, I might be able to look back on my collection and maybe, given enough caffeine and snackage, watch all of them in order.

Looking back now, I can see what a pipe dream that was.

A Strange realization

The other night, Shane and I decided that we would finally sit down and watch Dr. Strange. Conveniently, some of the smaller Marvel movies (like this one and the Guardians series) have been popping up on Netflix lately, which is uncommon for Canada.

There was no real reason why we hadn’t seen it yet; ironically, it probably came down to time more than anything.

As weird as it was to see Benedict Cumberbatch using an American accent, it was an amazing movie—and it made me realize something.

See, at the end of the movie and after the postscript, there was a simple blank screen informing us that Dr. Strange would return. At first, we assumed it meant that he’d be back in the Infinity Wars films, but the postscript seemed to be setting up for another standalone film.

A quick bit of research confirmed this theory; there’s going to be another Dr. Strange film that takes place after Infinity War, even though I’d kind of assumed that was what the entire MCU was building up to, and where the whole timeline would stop.

This is why I’ve stopped collecting Marvel movies.

As much as I love them, and as cool as it would have been to have a full set and marathon them all, they’re starting to become as never-ending as the doctor’s infinite time loop.

At this point, I doubt they’d fit in a neat little collector’s case like Marvel offered after the first Avengers film. As big of a fan as I am, I can’t even remember which ones I don’t have now.

Maybe someday I’ll manage to get my hands on a full set and a shelf big enough for them all, but for now? Well, I guess I’ll stick to catching up to them all on Netflix.