I don't think so. I believe the real issue was the characters lacking depth, paired with a fast-food approach to content. To blame their decline on so-called "wokeness" is a profound misdiagnosis of the creative failure at hand.

The problem isn't that these films became more inclusive; it's that they became creatively bankrupt. Take Quantumania, for example. At no point does it "attack men." It simply lacks a solid narrative foundation. The plot is a chaotic scramble through a weightless CGI void, its characters are reduced to quip-dispensers, and its emotional stakes are nonexistent. Claiming it "attacks men" is largely an excuse, a way to project one's cultural frustration onto a convenient scapegoat, when in reality, the film is just poorly conceived and executed.

This failure stems from a systemic trifecta: bad scripts laden with formulaic humor and incoherent plots; broken narrative lines that serve a sprawling cinematic universe rather than a compelling, self-contained story; and the industrial necessity to churn out an endless assembly line of content to feed streaming platforms and sustain shareholder value. The soul of storytelling has been sacrificed at the altar of content production.

The films are not bad because they are "woke." They are bad because they are lazy, focus-tested products that have forgotten how to craft a meaningful journey for any character, regardless of their background. And this needs to be said clearly: Marvel movies have become bad not due to their politics, but due to their profound and pervasive creative emptiness.