At this point, it's not exactly a secret that Martin Scorsese doesn't like superhero movies. The filmmaker takes every opportunity he gets to take a shot at the genre, usually to get more eyes on whatever new project he's promoting.
The fact he doesn't view the likes of Avengers: Endgame, Black Panther, and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse as "cinema" remains a sticking point for many fans. However, last week's episode of Loki - "Breaking Brad" - appeared to reference the legendary director's scathing assessment of Marvel movies.
After Hunter X-5 becomes actor Brad Wolfe, he refers to his new movie, Zaniac, as "cinema" and an "elevated thriller." However, if Loki director Dan Deleeuw is to be believed, actor Rafael Casal simply improvised the line!
"I love that it was an elevated thriller," Deleew told ComicBook.com when they asked if Brad's review of Zaniac was a deliberate nod to Scorsese. "That's what happens, in all honesty, that's what happens. We had where we needed to go in the script, we had to know that Mobius figures out that why is Brad acting so jumpy? But we had Owen [Wilson] and Rafael [Casal] there that day and were shooting that scene last, and they had the entire day to play."
"So I had first take, I'm like, 'Alright, let's do it straight. Let's do what we talked about,'" Deleew added. "Then the second take, 'Let's amp it up.' And then the third take, I was like, 'Alright, go for it.' And it was just Owen and Rafael just tag teaming off each other, and the cut that's in there now is with one little trim is, the two of them just running...[it's] just the beauty of having two geniuses and two writers on your show."
While the director is giving Wilson and Casal credit for the line during what sounds like a fun day of improvised back-and-forth dialogue, he's not exactly definitively denying that Marvel Studios wasn't aware of what sort of impact a line like that might have!
It's all in good fun, anyway, and we're shocked Scorsese hasn't come under fire in superhero movies and TV shows more often. It was in 2019 that he compared MCU movies to "theme parks," adding: "It isn't the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being."
A handful of new stills from last week's episode of Loki have also been released today. You can check those out below.