Speaking to Raadio 2's morning show, Gold said in the era of interconnected cinematic universes, the overwhelming amount of content can leave one's head spinning.

The latest movie installment from the Marvel universe, "Fantastic Four: First Steps," starring Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards, Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm, Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm, premiered at Estonian cinemas over the weekend.

While Gold said he hasn't yet had the chance to see the new offering, he still considers himself primarily a Marvel fan at heart, over rival D.C. Comics. But the sheer volume of Marvel content makes it difficult even for him to keep on top of things.

"Kevin Feige, the head of Marvel Cinematic Universe, has acknowledged — and everyone knew this — that once Disney Plus launched, the soup got so diluted that eventually no one could tell what was what anymore," Gold said.

XMarvel's Thunderbolts, for example, received mostly positive reviews from critics yet was a box office flop. "It's a very good Marvel film — it has a certain darkness but also that signature Marvel brightness, and I think the characters are very well realized. But most of them are known from the small screen, and many people just gave up, thinking, 'Why should I watch this if I need to be up to speed on all the backstories?' So it started to backfire, even though the film itself is excellent," Gold noted.

As a result, a movie's success often hinges on how familiar its characters are to audiences. Only two major superhero films have hit the cinemas this summer, the other being Superman from the D.C. stable.

These characters are obviously much more established and widely recognized by the general public, along with Spider-Man (Marvel) and Batman (D.C.).
"But if you're presented with something like [Marvel character] Shang-Chi, then not so much. [Though] that doesn't mean it can't work," Gold went on.

Gold said he values superhero films for their sheer simplicity. "They're these archaic black-and-white stories — you have good, you have evil, it is simple, and you know good usually wins out. I like seeing something in the cinema that gives me a sense of certainty and makes me feel good, as real life already throws enough at us," he concluded.

The first Stan Lee-Jack Kirby Fantastic Four comic book debuted in 1961 and with it started the famed "Marvel method" production system. There have been several film and TV adaptations made in the past.

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