The Eternals are a race of immortals who have been on Earth for thousands of years protecting us from monsters called Deviants. Having believed the Deviants all dead, the Eternals went their separate ways to either live among us or in isolation from us. That is until the Deviants re-emerge and a truly catastrophic event threatens to destroy life on Earth. 

Sersi (Gemma Chan) is living in London with Sprite (Lia McHugh) when they are attacked by a Deviant following a global earthquake. Sersi’s ability to transmute materials into others and Sprite’s powers of illusions seem little match for the monster until Ikaris (Richard Madden) flys in to assist them. His super strength, flight and laser vision making him reminiscent of Superman, something other characters reference at different points in the film. Yes, it seems DC comics exist in the Marvel Universe. 

This group then set out to reassemble the diverse team. Thena (Angelina Jolie) the goddess of war, Ajak (Salma Hayek) their leader who can heal, Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani) who can shoot laser bolts from his hands, Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry) who is an inventor, Makkari (Lauren Ridloff) who has super speed, Druig (Barry Keoghan) who can control peoples minds and Gilgamesh (Don Lee) who has super strength. 

Eternals is a very different Marvel film. In fact, remove a few elements and you would be forgiven for not realising it was. Co-written and directed by Chloe Zhao, recently awarded Oscars for Best Picture and Director for Nomadland Eternals has a lot more focus on indie and naturalistic film making roots. Our family of Eternals spend a lot of time chatting about their lives together and what the right thing to do is. Mostly set in real locations filmed during magic hour (when the sun is setting for a glorious moody image). There is a lot of fighting as well of course, but it really feels like some effort has been made to differentiate it from the normal good versus evil with a lot of shades of grey. 

I found myself really enjoying the characters and their relationship with each other. The fact that they all had different opinions on the right course of action and were not all simply good or simply bad was a welcome change. Gemma Chan and Richard Madden were the absolute stand outs as a couple who had spent thousands of years together before separating whilst Kumail Nanjiani gets to have the most fun as the Bollywood film star. 

I suspect that it will not be for all though. As far as Marvel films go it is incredibly muted both in its colour palette and action set pieces. Whilst the fact that it is more detached from the other properties may make it harder to care. As with all Marvel films there is also a mid and end credits scene, both setting up even more new characters detached from previous films as well. 

Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings is still the stand out in Phase Four so far.