Is Marvel Learning the Lessons of 'Go Woke, Go Broke'?

The end of the Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike has changed the way at least one studio thinks about its hiring practice for writers, and it may wind up being a refreshing change. Marvel Studios, which as we know Disney owns, is rethinking how it hires writers for its struggling streaming series.

"Word on the street is that Disney Marvel Studios has plans to completely restructure its television division," wrote Riley Brown at ScreenGawk last week. "And this apparent restructuring could mean eliminating diversity hires and a stronger focus on the individual’s experience, skillset, and salary requirements."

It's a stunning admission, and it could make a major difference in the quality of Marvel's content. The failure of Marvel's TV shows on Disney+ has led the studio to examine what it could do to reverse its streaming fortunes.

"There’s no doubt that Marvel makes some of the most successful and beloved films in Hollywood, but for some reason, they can’t quite figure out how to make a TV show that people want to watch," Brown points out.

Disney CEO Bob Iger admitted that Marvel's TV output led the studio to take its eye off its bread and butter — movies. 

"Marvel’s a great example of [Disney spreading itself too thin],” Iger told Variety in an interview over the summer. “They had not been in the TV business at any significant level. Not only did they increase their movie output, but they ended up making a number of television series, and frankly, it diluted focus and attention. That is, I think, more of the cause than anything.”

For Our VIPs: The Battle for the Soul of Disney Is On

So how did Disney get from "we're doing too much" to "we need to aim for quality over diversity"? The agreement that settled the writers' strike had as much do to with it as the failure of Marvel's TV content did.

The Minimum Basic Agreement (MBA) between the WGA and the studios gives showrunners more power in producing their shows. The showrunners must be union members, and the MBA gives them autonomy over hiring decisions. Marvel is reportedly using the MBA to its advantage.

"Marvel’s plan is apparently to focus heavily on high-quality content," Brown reports. "Instead of making several pilots and testing them on an audience, the studio will approve, write, and produce an entire series before showing the world. That means that Marvel needs the best of the best, and they will only be hiring experienced writers and producers."

"Because Marvel plans to only hire writers with extensive experience, they will likely be ignoring the idea of hiring a diverse staff of different ages, genders, backgrounds, and ethnicities; they only want those who have made successful TV shows before," Brown continues.

Admittedly, all of this is more speculative than substantive, but if Marvel makes the shift from focusing on diversity to creating quality content, it could be a boon to the bottom line as well as welcome news for fans.

"Steve Jobs liked to say that A players hire A players but B players hire C players," my friend and colleague Stephen "VodkaPundit" Green said in a conversation with me on Slack. "I’d add that diversity hires hire diversity hires — so Marvel likely has a lot of firing to do before the new policy will actually accomplish anything."

Disney does have a long way to go to root out the wokeness in its ranks. It would be nice if a change like this at Marvel got enough attention to shake Disney out of its woke mindset.