The director behind Secret Invasion has said he doesn’t “feel bad” about garnering some disappointing reviews from some “rabid” Marvel fans.
Having just watched the final instalment of the long-awaited MCU series air on Disney+ this week (Wednesday, July 26), the sixth episode of the limited series clocked up a critical rating below 10% on Rotten Tomatoes.
However, director Ali Selim has responded and said that he doesn’t pay attention to reviews (even from the Hollywood press) when asked about a certain amount of backlash to aspects of the MCU series.
“I don’t know – is it our job to fulfill their expectations? Or to tell the story that we’re telling?” he responded when asked by Variety about critical responses to the series.
Addressing the fact that much of the six-part series has garnered mixed responses from viewers and critics alike, Selim said: Oh, I don’t read reviews. With all due respect. For me, I view all the storytelling work I do as a dialogue with an audience.
“When the show is finished and put up on the screen, that’s my half of the dialogue. And the audience then starts their half of the response to it.”
Addressing the blockbuster nature of a Marvel property, as well as the franchise’s loyal fanbase, Selim continued:
“I don’t feel bad about mixed reviews. If you had unanimously good reviews, every movie would gross $10 billion, trillion dollars, right? [Projects] resonate with different people at different times for different reasons, and Marvel has a very devoted – even rabid – fan base who have expectations and when their expectations aren’t fulfilled, they move in the other direction; they give it a thumbs down.
“I don’t know – is it our job to fulfil their expectations? Or to tell the story that we’re telling? So, it’s a tricky thing. I would love it if everybody loved it, but I also don’t have that expectation myself, so I feel great about the response to it.”
In its four-star review of the series NME praised the different direction Selim has taken. The review praised the more mature style of story-telling and direction of Secret Invasion, saying it felt like “a teenage franchise stepping out into the real world for the first time”.