Review: ‘Marvel Universe Live!’

Approached as a theater experience, “Marvel Universe Live!” (which visited Bankers Life Fieldhouse Jan. 2-4) doesn’t pack much of a punch—although it’s nowhere near as disappointing as Broadway’s “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” proved to be.

But approached as a biggie-sized version of the stunt shows you’d see at an amusement park, “Marvel Universe Live!” is, well, a biggie-sized version of the stunt shows you’d see at an amusement park.

Bringing together a team including Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers—a lineup that budgets and contractual obligations will keep from happening at the movies for a long time—the show is simply plotted to traffic manage those familiar (masked) faces. The heroes have to track down pieces of the Cosmic Cube, which have been scattered by the villainous Loki (remember him from “The Avengers”?). World domination, of course, is at stake if the good guys can’t retrieve those pieces from the likes of Green Goblin and Red Skull.

Subtlety, of course, isn’t the order of the day for arena shows. So what’s presented are a few dialogue scenes (with recorded voices), some fighting, lots of flying (wires clearly visible), more fighting, a disproportionate amount of motorcycle stunt riding, and still more fighting.

There are plenty of wisecracks in the mix as well, a few actually amusing. Impressive video footage provides background interest and a team of stagehands effectively keep the scenes moving. Adult and teen comic book fans may roll their eyes, but they don’t seem to be the target audience. (Side note: Good luck to parents of young kids having to explain to junior why there aren’t any movies featuring Wolverine and Iron Man, or Spider-Man teamed with Thor.  “See, honey, there’s this thing called licensing and it’s very, very complicated…”)

No matter what you’re age, what’s missing here is focus. If you’ve seen one of the better Cirque de Soleil shows, you know how intense a performer can be, even in a sizable arena, when a spotlight is focused properly. Effective lighting design doesn’t mean keeping everything visible. Instead, it serves to guide our eyes. Captain America, Wolverine, Iron Man, Thor and the rest are appealing and exciting in comic books because we get to see them in close up. Trapped in perpetual long shot and without the help of a strong lighting plan, it’s too easy to lose identification with our costume-clad favorites.

And so while "Marvel Universe Live" isn't a "Splat!," it certainly doesn't have the "Pow!" that it could.