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You Can Make $1,000 Binging All 20 MCU Movies, but It Will Cost You Your Soul

A cable company wants to pay you to watch all the Marvel movies, back to back.
Avengers Infinity War
Image via IMDb

Do you love Marvel movies? Can you barely wait for Avengers: Endgame to put a depressing-as-all-hell cap on the MCU's last decade? Are you searching for a way to commemorate the occasion while simultaneously punishing your poor body for two days straight? Look no further—you're in luck!

Between now and April 15, a website called CableTV is accepting applications for one lucky—or unlucky, depending on how you look at it—Marvel fan to watch all the MCU films, back-to-back, for $1,000.

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Whoever wins the contest will have to binge all 20 official Marvel Cinematic Universe movies in chronological order, starting with 2008's Iron Man and going all the way up through last year's Ant-Man and the Wasp. CableTV will also throw in some Marvel-themed extras, like a Captain America popcorn maker and an Iron Man snuggie. You even get a $100 GrubHub gift card, so you won't be forced to survive exclusively on superhero-branded popcorn the whole time.

The so-called "Marvel Movie Marathon Dream Job" won't include Captain Marvel, since it's still in theaters, but no worries. You aren't exactly missing much.

"We’re not including movies outside of the MCU, like Deadpool, X-Men, Fantastic Four, earlier Spider-Man films, and certainly not Ghost Rider—you’re welcome. Also excluded are tangentially related Marvel/Netflix series like Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Luke Cage," the company wrote in the contest announcement. "We’re only asking you to power-watch approximately two days’ worth of proper blockbuster Marvel movies. Easy, right?"

Sure, it sounds like a fun challenge and a good way to make a cool grand (pre-tax), but let's think this one through a bit, shall we? The first few hours will be pleasant, as you cruise through the Phase One movies—complete with a nice break to nap through Incredible Hulk and Iron Man 2—but by the time you get 12 hours in, the fun will be over.

Even just sitting on a couch for two days is enough to make you feel like a living, breathing mound of garbage. That's not to mention the psychological trauma of listening to the constant screaming of large muscular men and the crash of buildings as various villains lay waste to a dozen different cities. Watching anything for 40 hours straight will demolish your soul and leave you a crumbling, broken husk, as if you're living out a protracted version of the end of Infinity War but without the merciful speed of a single snap.

Besides, there's more to it than just the physical and emotional toll. CableTV will force you to live-tweet the entire experience, making sure you tag the company in every post. How many hours of sustained social media detritus can your friends put up with, really? Ten hours? Fifteen? At what point will they scroll through their feeds, read another one of your derivative jokes about a Stan Lee cameo, and decide that maybe you're not such a good friend, after all?

Is it worth $1,000 and a popcorn maker to emerge, after 40 hours of Marvel mayhem, bleary-eyed, broken, and spurned by the friends and family who once loved you? If your answer to that is "hell yes," fantastic! CableTV has you covered. All you have to do is head on over to the company's website and fill out the admission form for a chance to win. Good luck holding on to some small semblance of your former self, everybody!

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