So this is what The Franchise — with its sometimes sort-of funny, increasingly toothless sense of satire — is doing, then. Each episode is going to be focused on some terrible ill committed by comic-book movies as we know and love them: Last week, faux feminism and “women’s problems,†and before that, how awfully some of the most absurd superhero concepts translate to the big screen. This time, it’s the scourge of cameos that find themselves in the crosshairs, with the introduction of a relatively popular, but still very much B-tier, super-character who will turn up in Tecto for a few minutes, say some lines, and leave, all in aid of selling more tickets. (And will presumably leave their target audience with a mess to clean up in the aisles. What’s that, milkshake?)
With meet-ups and crossovers dominating superhero filmmaking in the half-decade since Avengers: Endgame threw every single Marvel hero into a blender and set it to “pulverize†— critics often point to the reliance on cameos and their diminishing returns as the premier failing of the multiverse era — this feels like the timeliest topic for The Franchise to tackle yet. Yeah, yeah, it’s still low-hanging fruit, but movie fans are especially pissed off about the onslaught of cameos in superhero films right now, with all the cynical nostalgia milking they have come to represent. 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine isn’t even the worst example, because its lineup of “feeling old?†20th Century Fox returnees serve a purpose and sort of have their own arcs, but the film is still largely a nostalgia play. Which is to say that this is a trend that should be easy to haw-haw about. Alas, the results of “Scene 83: Enter the Gurgler†vary.
The cameo in question is expected to be Maximum Studios’ prime asset, Many Man. (Duplication seems like a pretty weak and deeply uncool superpower for such a popular supe to have, but sure.) A last-minute switch-up with Centurios 2, the flagship tentpole that has just moved in next door, sees Many Man swapped for a B-tier hero, the Gurgler. His actor, Kyle, is played by Nick Kroll, who appropriately hacks and gurgles his way through the episode to greatly gross effect.
Kyle happens to be Adam’s old sitcom partner in a show called Brad and Butter, in which he played Butter, “the fat one,†before losing weight (fingers for pudding, or so he gestures). There’s a lot of resentment there, mostly from Kyle’s side, who still has an inferiority complex from the days of being the slob to Adam’s TV hunk, despite having ascended beyond his onetime screen partner on the comic-book movie ladder. He becomes quick friends with Peter, who admires Kyle’s “excellent energy,†which is to say his disinterest in political correctness.
Kyle is here to shoot a scene in which the Gurgler, Tecto, and Eye will fight over a MacGuffin in the shape of a ludicrously expensive crystal that Eric protects with his life: “It’s the realest thing in my movie,†he says. “Maybe in any movie.†After a debate over the pronunciation of Eric’s made-up word, resourcium, which I may or may not have spelled correctly, Kyle posits that they should just riff through it. It’s only a BFOGT — Big Fight Over Glowy Thing — anyway, a scene that Kyle has shot three times in the last two years. He soon imposes himself as the biggest, swingiest dick on set. Once again, we are reminded of the central thesis of The Franchise: God, who would want to work with any of these people?
Certainly not Adam, whose own ever-present feelings of inadequacy are amplified with the arrival of Kyle. So, when it becomes clear that Kyle is going to want to improvise, Adam recruits Steph to write him some improv prompts, which are predictably terrible and only serve to humiliate him further. Kyle and Adam come to blows when they try to riff through the scene anew, ending with one hell of a read from Kyle (ostensibly in character as the Gurgler, but that pretense is quickly dropped): “You’re a limp dick Dorito with no soul; you’re desperate, man. You’re fuckin’ sweaty, and you stink out every single room that you walk into. But you’re a real A-lister. Said no one ever.â€
In the meantime, it comes to pass that Centurios 2 has made a bigger, sparklier version of Eric’s reality crystal, which means that they have to replace their own with a bigger, sparklier one; only the Centurios 2 lot have used up all of the sparkly paint. He’s about one swordfish-stolen-from-craft-services away from his breaking point, and … would you look at that? The crew of the tentpole next door have stolen the swordfish, too. It sends him into an apoplectic rage and — to quote — he goes full 9/11 on the Centurios 2 set, ramming the central soundstage in a golf cart while a thinly veiled Nick Fury parody rattles off some nonsensical exposition about the power of resourcium, etc. Hey, man, there’s only so much studio interference a guy can take. (Here’s your weekly “Daniel Brühl is great in this, isn’t he?â€)
To end the episode, Kyle visits Adam in his trailer, where he admits to his built-up resentment and apologizes for being so cruel; he then kisses him, which is kinda weird, and I guess a joke about how Kyle, in reality, wants to be Adam. (Stupid joke, IMO.) Not that it matters much, anyway. In retaliation for Eric’s kamikaze attack on Centurios 2, the Gurgler cameo has been pulled from Tecto. More and more, it feels cut away from the central franchise. The Sword of Damocles that killed off The Sisters Squad is swinging ever closer. Not even the Mollusk guy can catch a break.
Post-Credits Scenes
• Pat thinks that The Seventh Seal and Persona director Ingmar Bergman is a forgotten Iceberg-themed superhero from the Maximum Studios back catalogue: “Berg-Man? Which one’s Berg-Man?â€
• I wish she was given more to do other than shadow Eric and regurgitate many of his lines, but Jessica Hynes is becoming a bit of a standout for me — though I do wonder if I’m just biased as a mega-Spaced fan who doesn’t watch enough of Hynes’s other stuff.
• An issue I have with the series generally, and I think is typified by the Gurgler and Many Man, is that none of the superheroes or their powers are credibly appealing. Like, there are kids who grow up admiring Spider-Man and Thor; they and others are beloved characters who provided the foundations for the MCU to become a monocultural behemoth. You’re telling me in this universe that an appearance from a dude called the Gurgler, whose shtick seems to just be his ability to conjure up gross balls of phlegm, is going to raise the roof? Yeah, the joke is supposed to be that all superheroes are kind of silly and absurd at a very basic, fundamental level. But is pointing that out in itself really that funny? Not really, but it does feel lazy.