Eternals, the latest entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, has an ambitious goal. The film aims to reveal new events in the MCU that no one knew took place over thousands of years. It's a complicated task, involving multiple zigzags through time, a huge cast and plenty of info-dumps. Unfortunately, the whole package doesn't quite work.

The Eternals, we discover, are superheroes who lived on Earth throughout the entire saga of the Marvel films, arriving millenniums before Captain America was even born. They include Ajak (Salma Hayek), Sersi (Gemma Chan), Ikaris (Richard Madden), Thena (Angelina Jolie), Klingo (Kumail Nanjiani), Sprite (Lia McHugh), Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry), Makkari (Lauren Ridloff), Druig (Barry Keoghan) and Gilgamesh (Ma Dong-seok).

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These heroes discuss their own backstories early and often, from a failed romantic relationship between two characters that lasted 5,000 years, to a medical condition that might require a memory-wiping procedure. There's a whole lot of talk