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The Marvel Cinematic Universe is overrated.
漫威电影宇宙被高估了。
That's right, this is happening.
你没听错，事实就是这样。
OK, so why is this not just a steaming pile of clickbait?
好吧，这期视频并不是一期刚出锅的标题党视频？
Hear me out.
你们且听我说完。
So far, there have been twenty of these movies.
到目前为止，漫威已经出了二十部系列作品了。
And uber-producer Kevin Feige says there'll be at least 20 more in the MCU — Marvel Cinematic Universe — within the next 10 years.
超级制作人凯文·费奇表示，未来10年，MCU——漫威电影宇宙的缩写——至少还会再出20部作品。
Seriously, half of these people could disappear and it would still be 148 too many characters.
说真的，即便是这些人有一半都消失了，漫威影业也仍然有着拥有148名演员的强大阵容。
When we asked Vox's audience for things they think are overrated, Marvel and DC's movies came up again and again.
当我们向本栏目观众询问他们认为言过其实的事物时，答案中反复出现了漫威和DC的电影。
We love these movies - in the United States alone, they've grossed more than 6.5 billion dollars.
我们是喜欢这些电影的 - 仅在美国，这些电影就创造了超65亿美元的票房。
And yet there's something missing.
然而，我们还是忽略了一个问题。
When you look at the history of fictional universes — and at the MCU in particular — it's possible to understand how it could be fixed.
提及虚构宇宙的历史 - 尤其是MCU的历史 - 我们是可能理解这一问题如何才能解决的。
Go back to 1939 and you'll find the likely birth of the Marvel Universe.
倒回1939年，漫威宇宙的萌芽就已经出现了。
It's in Marvel Mystery Comics #7.
那就是第七套漫威神秘漫画。
These characters aren't that well-known today.
这些角色今天已经不是很知名了。
But here, Betty tells Namor that The Human Torch exists — establishing continuity and crossover potential.
但在这本漫画里，贝蒂告诉了纳摩霹雳火的存在 - 这就让漫威不同系列之间有了连续性以及串场的可能性。
This was the start of a new era — one in which corporations produced fiction.
漫画创作的一个新纪元——一个公司制作小说的纪元——开始了。
The idea was simple — you could use the fame of one property to enhance the audience for another.
思路其实很简单——你可以利用一部作品的知名度来给另一部作品增加人气。
And Marvel wasn't alone in recognizing the financial opportunity of crossovers in the 1930s and 40s.
而且，上个世纪三四十年代意识到了串场能带来财富机遇的并非只有漫威。
"The Green Hornet! Look at that picture on the wall. The man on that horse is one of your ancestors."
“青蜂侠！看墙上的那张照片。骑在马上的那个男人就是你的先祖。”
In the 1940s, The Green Hornet revealed that the series' central character, Britt Reid, was the grandnephew of The Lone Ranger, another popular radio star at the time.
20世纪40年代，《青蜂侠》透露，该系列的核心角色，布瑞特·里德，其实是《独行侠》，另一部当时很火的广播之星，的侄孙。
"I hope you do something about those crooks — just as your pioneer ancestor did."
“我希望你能收拾收拾那些骗子 - 就像你先祖那样。”
Movie studios were thinking about this too —
电影制片厂也在考虑这个问题 -
when Abbott and Costello met Frankenstein, it joined the Dracula, Frankenstein, and Wolfman movie franchises with a goofy comedy.
当《两傻双人秀》遇上《弗兰肯斯坦》时，该电影将《惊情四百年》，《弗兰肯斯坦》以及《狼人》等电影系列和这部傻里傻气的喜剧片结合到了一起。
It was basically Universal Studios' Avengers Infinity War, but with more running into walls.
这部电影差不多相当于环球影业的《复仇者联盟:无限战争》，只不过有更多撞墙的镜头。
By the 60s, even DC comics was catching up, like when Superman entered his fortress of solitude and finally met Batman.
到了60年代，就连DC漫画也迎头赶上来了，比如，超人进入他的孤独堡垒后便遇到了蝙蝠侠。
"I love you!"
“我爱你！”
They enjoyed some cake.
他们还一起吃了蛋糕。
"You love me."
“你爱我。”
By the time Spiderman got his comic in 1963, he was spending time with the Fantastic Four and promoting guest appearances from the Hulk.
到1963年蜘蛛侠也有了自己的漫画的时候，蜘蛛侠便和神奇四侠走到了一起，还到《绿巨人》里帮忙客串了一把。
And this was also when the Marvel Universe's problems started.
也正是在这个时候，漫威宇宙开始出问题了。
This snowglobe contains a half-century of television.
这个水晶球里装着半个世纪的电视剧。
It's the basis for the Tommy Westphall Universe theory, which some argue might be the biggest fictional universe of all.
它可是汤米·韦斯特法尔宇宙假说——有人认为它可能是所有虚构宇宙中最大的宇宙——的基石。
The snowglobe appeared on the ‘80s television show St. Elsewhere.
该水晶球出现于80年代的电视节目《波城杏话》。
That scene possibly showed that the whole series had taken place inside a snowglobe world imagined by a minor character named Tommy Westphall.
那个场景大概表明了，那整部电视剧其实都发生在一个名叫汤米·韦斯特法尔的小角色所想象的水晶球里。
The theory is that if a show had a crossover with St. Elsewhere, that show must have taken place in Tommy's snow globe too.
那个假说声称，如果一个电视节目与《波城杏话》串场，那么，那个节目也必须发生在汤米的水晶球里。
And every crossover that show had, no matter how tangential, would be in the snowglobe, and so on and so on,
而且，那个节目的每次串场，无论多么微不足道，都必须发生在水晶球里，依此类推，
until you get almost 450 television shows in the same universe, in the same snowglobe.
直到那个水晶球里的同一个宇宙中容纳了近450个电视节目为止。
It spans from 1952 to today.
这一假说时间跨度从1952年一直延续到了今天。
It's a dumb theory.
它很愚蠢。
But, it's meant to be.
但它本意如此。
That said, the Tommy Westphall universe actually illustrates some of the problems with the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
即便如此，汤米·韦斯特法尔宇宙还是说明了漫威电影宇宙存在的一些问题。
Crossovers require a bunch of artistic compromises.
串场需要进行一系列的艺术妥协。
No one wants Cheers and I Love Lucy to be a connected "universe."
没有人希望《欢乐酒店》和《我爱露西》成为一个互联的“宇宙。”
It's because of a bunch of business decisions connected them.
它们被串起来是因为一些列的商业决定将它们串到了一起。
Sometimes, the network forced crossovers on producers,
有的时候是电视台强迫制片人们在多部电影之间进行串场的，
other times, the producers came up with it —
其他时候则是制片人自己想到的——
Garry Marshall said the reason that Mork from Ork knew Fonzie from Happy Days and Laverne from Laverne and Shirley was because his son said that Fonzie should dream about an alien.
加里·马歇尔说《欢乐时光》里“奥克认识方奇”一集里的莫克和《拉文与雪莉》里的拉文串场是因为他儿子说方奇应该做一个关于外星人的梦……
These crossovers are always about juicing ratings, not telling a good story.
这些串场通常都是为了评分，对讲好故事并没有帮助。
The Tommy Westphall universe is a thought experiment.
汤米·韦斯特法尔宇宙是一个思考实验。
Frasier and The X-Files don't mix, even though they do in Tommy Westphall's globe.
《欢乐一家亲》和《X档案》之间不会串场，即使它们都发生在的汤米·韦斯特法尔的水晶球世界里。
But even at Marvel, where continuity was planned, it became a hassle to maintain.
但即使是有意要保持系列连续性的漫威电影，实际执行起来也很难。
Marvel editor and writer Len Wein said:
漫威编辑兼作家莱恩·韦恩说到：
"The problem at Marvel was that we suddenly became a business with a bunch of books that Stan (Lee) don't think, ever in his heart expected to last more than a couple of years."
“漫威的问题在于，我们突然成了一个创作了大量书籍的公司，而斯坦（·李）并没想过，他心里从未指望这些作品能维持好几年。”
