Next week, "Loki" premieres on Disney Plus In fact, I am simultaneously excited and nervous about the impending arrival of the third Marvel original TV series on the streaming platform

I've raved about "Wander Vision" before, so I don't have a problem with the MCU being delivered in a small screen format Rather, after finding "Falcon" and "Winter Soldier" extremely lackluster, I found myself beginning to feel a bit burned out on the interrelated comic book world

Of course, Marvel fatigue is not a new phenomenon; it's been around for over a decade Some of the franchise's most vocal critics, even before the first "Avengers" film was released, were decrying the overkill of making too many movies a year More recently, however, it has begun to feel as if Disney is afraid to let the MCU breathe

Loki comes out next week, and Black Widow finally hits theaters (and Disney Plus Premiere Access) in July Then comes the animated series What If in August, The Eternals in November, and Spider-Man: No Way Home in December

And not to forget, the Disney Plus shows "Hawkeye" and "Ms Marvel" are also scheduled for 2021 This is a lot of content, and with a huge franchise like "Star Wars" it feels easy to consume a few chapters piecemeal (like "Solo"), but the MCU has always been an all-or-nothing commitment

Marvel execs could really put the brakes on, as I'm sure I'm not the only one feeling a little tired looking at the upcoming schedule Because of the pandemic, 2020 has become a forced dormant year for Marvel

That said, I was naturally hoping for my first taste of Marvel goodness, which came in the form of "Wander Vision" in January, the MCU's first foray into streaming, a brilliant original series full of out-of-water moments The ending was a bit of a letdown, though

"Falcon" and "The Winter Soldier" followed soon after, where my fatigue settled in I finished watching this series three weeks after the last episode arrived, and not because I was busy I simply did not feel motivated to finish the series After all, I was doing so more out of a sense of obligation to not get caught up than out of any desire to actually see how things were going to unfold

Within weeks, I was already wishing that the franchise would go on hiatus again, as it had the year before, out of a desire to "give us all the MCU content possible at this moment"

Not that "Falcon" and "Winter Soldier" were particularly bad They just felt routine Like something we've already seen in a Captain America solo movie, but done quite well

I get the same feeling when I see the trailer for Black Widow, which after its release date has been postponed dozens and dozens of times, is playing trailers that I've seen dozens and dozens of times Yes, this first MCU feature in years looks interesting, but it doesn't look like anything we haven't already experienced (indeed, Florence Pugh is great in everything, so maybe she can elevate the film)

Some of the upcoming MCU films and series seem to be just bits and pieces of the franchise that are just going through the motions Even the recent trailer for "Eternals" looks spectacularly directed by Chloe Zhao, but it left me pretty cold

At the very least, What If seems like a fresh take on a show that deals with a non-canonical hypothetical scenario The "Loki" series doesn't look too bad either I'm already interested in a Tom Hiddleston/Owen Wilson crossover and the possibility of offering something completely new

But overall, the problem is that MCU's products should look purely inspired

Instead, they are stacked on top of each other, looking as if they came off a factory line designed to avoid schedule gaps; in the golden age of the MCU (2016-2019, if you ask me), before watching anything "Marvel Studios" I was genuinely excited every time I saw a splash screen, but it hasn't gone so far as to instill the same kind of reaction lately

An important lesson I hope Marvel execs learn quickly is that less is more We don't need a new slice of the MCU every month, but we can give it time before audiences start clamoring for more hits

In the days when there was no Disney Plus, there were three, or even four, MCU feature films a year Such a release schedule allowed for months of anticipation among the fandom and plenty of time for online discussion and debate as the latest MCU film was digested

Of course, it would be unfair not to point out that the pandemic had a serious impact on Disney's entire release schedule

I will also be the first to admit that despite my reservations, I will see Black Widow as soon as humanly possible, and the same goes for the rest of the MCU's slate; the same goes for the rest of the MCU's slate I've already seen two dozen movies, plus several TV series, and I've already seen the first two

So with less than a week until the release of "Loki," it's a little disappointing to feel burned out at a time when the MCU is expanding like never before That said, having seen a few trailers for the series, my curiosity is just about to overcome my exhaustion with the series

Perhaps I will never rediscover the childlike giddiness I had for the MCU when "The Avengers" was released: but if distinctive content like Loki gets attention (and bland Falcon and Winter Soldier content is eliminated), my Marvel fatigue is bound to quickly become a matter of the past