Benedict Cumberbatch is doing an Omaze campaign for the Avengers: Infinity War premiere. If you’re not familiar with Omaze, it’s a charity platform that partners with celebrities—maybe other people, too? I only see it with celebrities, though—for fan experiences driven by giving campaigns. You donate a little money, get entered in a raffle, win a prize. Marvel works with Omaze regularly, letting their stars pimp their charity of choice with set visits and trips to premieres, which smooths the edges of their corporate machine. (And I bet Marvel’s participation with Omaze had something to do with that app f*ck up involving Jeremy Renner and a thwarted set visit. Remember when his app was loaded with drama?)
Part of the deal with Omaze is that celebrities make a cute little video advertising their cause and giveaway, and the latest cute Omaze video features Benedict Cumberbatch. He’s offering a trip to the Avengers: Infinity War premiere, and also tea with Cumby, with donations to the raffle benefitting GEANCO (you can find out more here, if you’re interested). Everyone is cooing over this video because Cumberbatch does a dramatic rendition of “I’m a Little Teapot”, but I’m more stuck on the way he announces, “I am Benedict Cumberbatch, ac-TOR.” Whenever an actor goes off on how miserable and serious their work is, all I hear is “I am an ac-TOR” on a loop. I feel like Cumberbatch understands this joke. But that’s exactly the point of these videos, to make celebrities seem like someone you want to hang out with. Or, more importantly, to make them seem like someone who would want to hang out with you.
And this is a reminder that we are now less than three months from Avengers: Infinity War. Are you excited? I’m not. I mean, I’m sure it will be fine. I don’t think Marvel is capable of making a genuinely bad movie—the machine is too refined. But with so many characters to service, I don’t see how it isn’t at least a little messy. And that problem Duana had with Civil War being nothing but subplots? That’s definitely not getting better in Infinity War. It will undoubtedly be entertaining, but after the comparatively isolated Thor: Ragnarok and especially Black Panther, the team-up movies have lost some appeal to me. I’m more interested in these characters doing their own thing in their own corners of the universe. Let them cross over if and when it makes sense, but after we get through Avengers 4 in 2019, I’d be happy not to see another team-up for a while. Just me?
Attached - Bendy playing soccer with some kids in London earlier this month.
