Since the release of Iron Man on May 2, 2008, the movie industry has not been the same. Iron Man forged the path for cinematic universes, as seen with the release of The Incredible Hulk (2008), Thor (2011), and most famously, The Avengers (2012). Since Iron Man, there have been sixteen different movies which all take place in the same universe. These films have engulfed a small army's worth of famous actors, and it's only getting bigger.

We've since seen cinematic universes popping up left and right, including the Godzilla/King Kong upcoming universe teased at the end of Kong: Skull Island (2017), a fluked attempt at a universe of the Universal monsters with the reboot of The Mummy this past summer, and naturally, Justice League.

So as we approach the ten year anniversary of this pilot film and the culmination of the different characters in Avengers: Infinity War Part 1, I think we should briefly analyze what makes the Marvel Cinematic Universe so successful at good storytelling.

It seems to me that the most central theme in the Marvel universe is not teamwork, or sacrifice, or any of the other commonly held superhero movie tropes. What makes the Marvel cinematic universe so meaningful are the stories of boys turning into men.

Let's look at Iron Man. It's the story of playboy weapons manufacturing mogul Tony Stark (Downey, Jr.) who gets captured and comes to grips with the real-world consequences of his iron mongering in a remote, destitute area of the world.

From this experience, he not only changes himself but his entire company, literally and figuratively emerging from a cave. Yes, he's not technically a boy, but he becomes a man, rather than just a male.

Another great example of this is Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (2017), featuring the man who largely owes his fame to Marvel, Chris Pratt. In this sequel to the 2014 hit, Peter Quill (Pratt) comes face to face with his innermost conflict: his lack of a father.

Quill's father returns and shows him the universe (Quill's father is literally a god), but as Quill and his companions dig deeper, they realize the father has less innocent motives than just finding his lost son. By the end of the film, Peter Quill resolves his longstanding inner conflict with his lost father and matures into a more independent manhood.

And lastly, Doctor Strange (2016) is both a more abstract and a more literal execution of this theme, starring the global fan favorite actor of Sherlock fame, Benedict Cumberbatch. This film takes the viewer on the journey of a highly successful surgeon named Stephen Strange (Cumberbatch) who, because of his reckless decisions and pride, is brutally injured in a car accident.

Desperate to continue his rock star-level surgical career, he scrounges for any treatment he can find, and ends up being led to an obscure temple on the other side of the world. From that point on, he is forced into a more humble life and has to shed the arrogant ways of his past and mature emotionally. This culminates when at the finale of the movie, he sacrifices himself to the antagonist in order to save earth from destruction- a decision he would not have made at the beginning of the movie. He begins the film as a mental "teenager" and ends it as an adult.

So this is what makes Marvel so great and so meaningful, in my opinion. And there are plenty of other examples of this as well. Hopefully other studios and companies will start to understand this vital component of storytelling and follow suit with their own films in the future.