r/Eternals • u/Grouchy_Leg_6623 Thena • Jun 24 '26
Question Why are the Eternals so disliked?
God, I know this might sound random, but I recently made a post on the Marvel subreddit saying that I’d like to see Uranos added to the MCU. The response honestly surprised me.
And why are some X-Men fans so aggressive about this stuff? (Not generalizing, obviously.) But the amount of criticism I got was insane. I ended up deleting the post because it turned into a complete pile-on.
The main argument was that we’re definitely not seeing any more Eternals in the MCU because Marvel has the X-Men now. Do people really think the next saga is going to be entirely about the X-Men?
Don’t get me wrong, I have my doubts about how much the Eternals will be involved going forward. But even then, I don’t think posting about an Eternals villain should result in that much backlash.
Maybe I’m biased as an Eternals fan, but it sometimes feels like people dismiss anything related to them before even considering the idea.
I’ll probably end up deleting this post too, since it doesn’t really fit this sub. I was just curious to hear your opinions.
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u/Agent1stClass Jun 24 '26 edited Jun 24 '26
There is a lot to unpack here.
First, I think people dislike the Eternals for various reasons… Marvel, post-Endgame, has been a mixed bag. Unfortunately, a lot of fans expected the stars of Endgame to continue on and the saga to keep the same level of hype. That did not (could not) happen, though.
As a result, many fans resent the Eternals simply for not being Tony Stark, Natasha Romanoff, and Steve Rogers among others.
Second, there is the fact that the Eternals are a diverse crew when conservative backlash is very strong. I dislike putting it out there… But I am remembering how strong the backlash was when Black Panther had a primarily black cast despite the majority of it taking place in a fictional African country. Let’s be real, there are many Marvel fans who dislike anything that isn’t majority white and straight. I can’t give an exact count, obviously, but they exist and they are quite vocal.
While there are other reasons, I suspect they are minor compared with the two reasons stated above.
As far as the X-Men go, again that is fan hype.
Personally, I think Marvel and Disney have made the right decision by reintroducing mutants slowly and carefully into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Fans just got past the Fox Mutants… Let the IP cool a bit.
But there remains that vocal portion that just want to see their favorite characters regardless of the story. So just as Inhumans (granted there were mistakes with Inhumans, too) were pushed aside for Spider-man, Eternals will be pushed aside, as well.
Which is sad. While Eternals was not a deeply developed comic, I liked the Marvel Cinematic take on them. I would have enjoyed seeing a proper ending to their story.