From August 2017 – January 2020, Keith R.A. DeCandido took a weekly look at every live-action movie based on a superhero comic that had been made to date in the Superhero Movie Rewatch. He’s periodically revisited the feature to look back at new releases, as well as a few he missed the first time through.
The character of Ms. Marvel was first created in 1977 in an attempt to ride the “women’s lib” wave of the 1970s. Marvel was always trying to appeal to broader markets, even if they were often ham-handed about it, and also have always at least stumbled in the direction of diversity.
And so Gerry Conway and John Buscema repurposed Carol Danvers—who had been a supporting character in Captain Marvel, as well as in CM’s introductory appearances in Marvel Super-Heroes by Stan Lee and Gene Colan—as a superhero in her own right. However, her own title only lasted a couple of years. The character was then part of the Avengers until she was appallingly written out in that title’s 200th issue in 1980. She was an X-Men supporting character for a while, powered-up and renamed Binary, joining the space-faring Starjammers in the 1980s, then returning to Earth and rejoining the Avengers (renamed Warbird) in the 1990s, before going back to the Ms. Marvel name until 2012’s Captain Marvel series by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Dexter Soy, when she took on the name of Captain Marvel.
The Captain Marvel name had hopped to several different characters over the years, starting with Mar-Vell, the Kree soldier seen in two issues of Marvel Super-Heroes and 62 issues of his self-titled series from 1967-1979. Mar-Vell died in Marvel’s first prestige-format graphic novel, The Death of Captain Marvel by Jim Starlin in 1982, and the name was then taken on later that year by Monica Rambeau in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #16 by Roger Stern and John Romita Jr.
Rambeau was a harbor patrol officer in New Orleans who had an interaction with an experimental extra-dimensional device that gave her the ability to control the electromagnetic spectrum. She’s also a woman of color, a rarity in the superhero community, especially in 1982. She joined the Avengers, and became a mainstay of that group for a while, even taking a turn as leader of the team. She later gave up the name of Captain Marvel to Mar-Vell’s son, Genis-Vell, and took on the codenames of Photon (her current one), Pulsar, and Spectrum.
After Danvers took on the Captain Marvel name, Marvel once again made an effort to diversify, this time having the Ms. Marvel moniker being adopted by a Pakistani American teenager of the Muslim faith named Kamala Khan. Debuting in 2014 in the rather unmanageably titled anthology comic All-New Marvel Now! Point One #1 in the story “Garden State of Mind” by G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona, that led to her own title the following year. Khan was a human who was exposed to the Terrigen Mists that created the Inhumans and gained superpowers, and has become a mainstay of the comics.
Danvers and Rambeau were brought into the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2019’s Captain Marvel, the former as the main character played by Brie Larson, the latter as a little girl who was the daughter of Danvers’ fellow Air Force pilot Maria Rambeau.
Monica was seen all grow’d up in 2021’s WandaVision TV miniseries played by Teyonah Parris, established as having been blipped between Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame; Maria, established as having died of cancer during the Blip, was the founder of S.W.O.R.D. (an organization dedicated to gathering intelligence about alien threats to Earth). Monica follows in her mother’s footsteps, working for S.W.O.R.D. during the events of WandaVision.
Finally, Khan was introduced to the MCU in 2022’s Ms. Marvel TV series, played by Iman Vellani. Since Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Inhumans TV series already did the Terrigen Mists thing, and since both those shows have been fobbed off into their own continuity separate from the MCU, they gave Khan’s character a different origin. She got her powers from a bangle that she inherited from her grandmother, which turned her into a super-powered hero over the course of her show’s first season.
All three characters are brought together in The Marvels. Unlike Captain Marvel, this takes place in the “present” of the MCU, but it serves as a sequel to the 2019 film by, among other things, establishing how Danvers took the revenge on the Kree that she promised. It’s also a sequel to Ms. Marvel, providing the origin of Khan’s bangle (which is similar to the quantum bands, or nega-bands, used by Mar-Vell in the comics).
Nia DaCosta—who had previously worked with Parris on Candyman—was brought in to direct the film, which was written by DaCosta, Elissa Karasik (executive story editor on Loki’s first season), and Megan McDonnell (story editor on WandaVision).
Back from Endgame (via cameos in both Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and Ms. Marvel’s first season) is Larson as Danvers. Back from WandaVision’s first season is Parris as Rambeau (with brief appearances by Akira and Azari Akbar as young Rambeau in flashbacks from Captain Marvel). Back from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is Lashana Lynch as two different iterations of Maria Rambeau (having played a third iteration in that Doctor Strange film). Back from Ms. Marvel’s first season are Vellani as Khan, Zenobia Shroff as Muneeba, Mohan Kapur as Yusuf, and Saagar Shaikh as Aamir. Back from Secret Invasion’s first season is Samuel L. Jackson as Fury (though the events of that TV show aren’t really acknowledged, which, frankly, is fine). Back from Thor: Love and Thunder is Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie. Back from Hawkeye’s first season is Hailee Steinfeld as Kate Bishop. Back from X-Men: Days of Future Past is Kelsey Grammer as Hank McCoy.
Appearing for the first time in this film are Zawe Ashton as Dar-Benn, a gender-swapped version of a Kree general from the comics; Gary Lewis as Skrull Emperor Dro’ge; and Park Seo-joon as Prince Yan.
The movie did surprisingly poorly at the box office, and the future of all three characters is in doubt, though Danvers is likely to be in the just-announced Avengers: Doomsday in 2026, while the mid-credits scene establishes that Rambeau will be involved in however they integrate the X-Men into the MCU. It is unknown if there will be a second season of Ms. Marvel; Vellani has co-written two Ms. Marvel comics miniseries for Marvel.
The Marvels
Written by Nia DaCosta and Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik
Directed by Nia DaCosta
Produced by Kevin Feige
Original release date: November 10, 2023
“No more touching shit! Especially glowing mysterious shit!”
A Kree ship goes from their devastated homeworld of Hala through a jump point to a world with the rather bland designation of MB-418. Dar-Benn—a Kree general who now possesses the universal weapon that used to belong to Ronan the Accuser—and her team unearth a container that has a quantum band inside it. To her great annoyance, they only find one of the expected pair, and she wonders where the other one is.
Cut to Jersey City, New Jersey on Earth, where we see Kamala Khan, who has the other band. She views it as a bangle, bequeathed to her by her grandmother and giving her super-powers, enabling her to become Ms. Marvel. We learn about this through the fanfic she writes, which also establishes that she’s a Captain Marvel fangirl and the fanfic has her helping Captain Marvel fight a big scary monster, and then becoming best friends forever.
From the S.A.B.E.R. satellite, Nick Fury contacts Carol Danvers about a surge in the jump gate network. Danvers has been using the Skrull memory-thingie that they used to torture her in Captain Marvel to try to regain more of the memories she lost when she blew up the lightspeed engine. Danvers goes to MB-418 to check it out.
At the same time, the now-super-powered Captain Monica Rambeau is leading a team to check out the jump point near Earth. She and Danvers both touch a messed-up jump point at the same time.
Some Kree soldiers show up to remonstrate with Danvers on MB-418. She starts to use her powers, which causes the first of several switches: Danvers suddenly winds up in Khan’s house in Jersey City, Rambeau winds up on MB-418, and Khan is in Rambeau’s EVA suit in space outside the S.A.B.E.R. satellite.
They eventually wind up back in their right places, with no idea of what’s happening. Khan’s parents are upset that her closet door’s been destroyed, but Khan is too busy fangoobering over the fact that Captain Marvel was in her living room and that she (briefly) met Fury (hoping that this was an Avengers tryout of some sort).
When Danvers is restored to MB-418, she learns that Dar-Benn is on Tarnax, and—after disposing of the Kree soldiers—heads there. Tarnax is a Skrull refugee site, and Dar-Benn is seen negotiating with Emperor Dro’ge, though that negotiation quickly proves to be bullshit. Danvers attacks the Kree soldiers, but the switching thing starts happening again, with Kree soldiers brought along for the ride more than once. As a result, Danvers, Khan, and Rambeau each wind up fighting Kree soldiers, not just on Dar-Benn’s ship orbiting Tarnax, but also in the space elevator that goes between Earth and the S.A.B.E.R. satellite and in the Khan house in Jersey City. (At one point, Khan sees Goose swallow some Kree soldiers with her tentacles, and she is totally freaked out…)
Apparently, any time two (or more) of the three of them use their powers simultaneously, it triggers the switch. Fury and Rambeau go to Jersey City to check on Khan (whose parents and brother are not exactly thrilled with how their house has been trashed), but Khan using her powers causes another switch. A few switches later and Khan finds herself in the stratosphere, having switched with Danvers when she was flying into orbit from Earth, and Rambeau has to rescue her (though it winds up being more of a team rescue).
Eventually, they all go to Tarnax, just in time for Dar-Benn to open a jump point that sucks the atmosphere away from Tarnax and to Hala.
It becomes clear what’s happening. Dar-Benn is using the quantum band she found to power-up the jump points so she can restore Hala. The three heroes have become entangled because Rambeau and Danvers both touched surged jump points at the same time, and that mixed with the energy from Khan’s bangle to cause the switches.
The trio evacuate as many Skrulls as they can from Tarnax. Danvers summons Valkyrie, who takes them to New Asgard.
At one point on Dar-Benn’s ship, Khan saw a star chart that showed their next destination, but the chart itself was meaningless to her. Danvers uses the Skrull memory-thingie so that she can see it—but it also triggers other memories of Danvers and Rambeau from thirty years earlier, and also of Danvers visiting Maria during the Blip when the latter was dying, none of which makes Rambeau happy
The star chart has Aladna as Dar-Benn’s next destination, which is also a planet Danvers knows well, for reasons she’s cagey about at first. She also confesses to Rambeau why she avoided coming back to Earth to see the Rambeaus. The Kree have been calling her “the Annihilator,” and Danvers explains why: Danvers’ destruction of the Kree Supreme Intelligence led to a civil war on Hala, which left the sun badly de-energized, the atmosphere not entirely breathable, and with their water supply exhausted. Danvers felt guilty about this, and couldn’t face either of the Rambeaus—especially not Monica, because she didn’t feel worthy of being Lieutenant Trouble’s Aunt Carol anymore.
Rambeau tells her she’s an idiot and that that’s not how family works. Speaking of family, Fury brings the Khans up to the S.A.B.E.R. satellite, where they aren’t thrilled about their daughter haring off into space to fight the bad guys (Muneeba’s exact words are, “Kamala, you are not going on any space adventures!”). Khan insists that she’s needed, and besides, it means possibly getting the other bangle which is, of course, a family heirloom. Her parents accept this and wish her well, though Muneeba says in Urdu that she’ll kill Danvers if anything happens to her daughter. Khan refrains from an exact translation for Danvers…
On the journey to Aladna, the trio practice working the switches, including using jump rope to switch in and out from the one jumping to the two twirling the rope.
Upon arrival at Aladna, Rambeau and Khan are amused to learn that the local language is singing and dancing, and Danvers is married to the prince, Yan. She says it’s just a political thing, but her arrival is treated with extra pomp and circumstance, including them singing and dancing together for everyone. (Rambeau asks if Khan is now writing new Captain Marvel fanfics, and Khan dreamily answers in the affirmative.)
Yan is bilingual, so he and Danvers can talk without singing. She explains the situation apologetically, as Dar-Benn is obviously going after planets Danvers herself cares about. Dar-Benn arrives and fisticuffs ensue. Alas, Dar-Benn is able to maintain the upper hand and steal Aladna’s water, while the trio are forced to retreat.
Having gotten air from Tarnax and water from Aladna, now Dar-Benn needs to re-energize Hala’s sun. Her target: Earth’s sun.
In the meantime, strange pods are found all over the S.A.B.E.R. satellite. Then Dar-Benn arrives through a jump point, which damages the satellite very badly, including trashing some of the escape pods. But then the pods crack open, and it turns out they’re Flerken eggs: Goose had a litter! Which means there are a ton of Flerken kittens loose on the station.
This actually solves a problem: they don’t have enough escape pods for all the full-sized humans, but the Flerkens can (temporarily) eat the people; that way they’ll take up way less space. So Fury and the Khan family have to herd cats, while Danvers, Khan, and Rambeau go after Dar-Benn. Unfortunately, Dar-Benn is able to get her hands on Khan’s bangle, so now she has both quantum bands.
However, the power required of both quantum bands to do what Dar-Benn wants proves too much for her, and she’s consumed by the energy. Earth’s sun remains intact, but the jump point is severely damaged and has opened a portal to another universe. Rambeau can fix it if Danvers and Khan power her up, but she can only do it from the other side.
Rambeau closes the jump point, saving everyone, though she is now trapped in the other universe. Fury and the Khans land safely in New York, along with the S.A.B.E.R. crew (once they’ve been horked back up by the Flerken kittens). Khan returns alone in Danvers’ ship—Danvers herself goes to Hala and re-energizes their sun herself.
Danvers moves into the Rambeau house in New Orleans, assisted by the entire Khan family, with her stuff taken out of storage. Khan and Danvers both get into Maria’s plane, with Khan in the pilot seat.
Later we see Khan in Kate Bishop’s loft, recruiting her for something she doesn’t actually call the Young Avengers, in a cute callback to the post-credits scene in Iron Man.
Rambeau wakes up in a lab, being examined by Dr. Hank McCoy, a.k.a. Beast, and Maria Rambeau, a.k.a. Binary. Maria has no idea who this crazy woman who thinks she’s her daughter is…
(And all the X-Men fans cheer!)
“So literally herding cats…”
This movie should have been a huge success, and I’m going to go against the grain and suggest the two main reasons are not the ones many of its detractors have given. One is the SAG-AFTRA strike, which kept the actors from promoting the movie (the strike didn’t end until after this movie’s release). This is a bigger reason than you might think, simply because Iman Vellani is a national treasure and a joy and a massive nerd and her actually being able to do publicity for the movie would have, in my not-so-humble opinion, increased its box office tremendously.
The other is the spectacularly idiotic decision to give this movie the bland, generic, meaningless title of The Marvels.
Seriously, guys, what the actual fuck? You had a gajillion-dollar success in 2019 with Captain Marvel, why the hell isn’t the sequel called either Captain Marvel 2 or Captain Marvel: Some Sort of Subtitle, like you did with every other damn character in your pantheon? This is Branding 101! Not everyone who sees these movies follows all the stuff on the Internet about it; most just know there’s a movie coming out, and if it’s not branded as a Captain Marvel movie, but instead given a generic title that just indicates that it’s from the same studio, probably, folks are gonna miss it. And by “folks,” I don’t mean the hardcore fan base, I mean just ordinary, not-plugged-into-the-geek-community movie-goers, whose interest in these movies is why they’re so wildly popular.
It’s especially maddening because this movie is an absolute delight, tremendous fun from beginning to end. A huge chunk of that, unsurprisingly, is due to Vellani’s mere presence. Her Khan is glorious, continuing the superb work she did in Ms. Marvel.
(They really need to put her and Tom Holland together in a Spider-Man movie. I mean, they have to have a mainline Marvel Studios character accompany Holland in any Spider-film anyhow, so why can’t Holland’s next one also feature Ms. Marvel? It would be perfect!)
The three leads have fantastic chemistry together, and it’s good to finally see why Danvers has stayed away from Earth until Fury specifically summoned her at the end of Infinity War: guilt, which is always a good motivator (especially for Marvel’s more angsty heroes). She didn’t want Lieutenant Trouble to see her as the Annihilator instead of Aunt Carol.
An interesting shift in Rambeau’s character here, which intellectually I don’t like, but found myself taking to despite myself: Rambeau resists becoming a proper superhero in this movie. She rejects every overture Khan makes to give her a codename, and she prefers to be Captain Rambeau of S.A.B.E.R., not one of the Marvels. This is in direct contrast to her comics counterpart, who jumped into being a superhero with both feet, mostly because her career in the Harbor Patrol was stalled due to institutional sexism, whereas the Avengers accepted her without hesitation. Still, it works, and Teyonah Parris continues the good work she started in WandaVision, particularly with her resentment toward Danvers for staying away so long.
Meanwhile, Larson perfectly plays Danvers as a loner. She’s reluctant to let anybody in, partly because of that guilt, partly because the last group of people she teamed up with turned out to be assholes (Yon-Rogg and the rest of the Kree gang from Captain Marvel). Watching her slowly come to accept Khan’s fangoobering and restore her relationship with Rambeau is very nicely and subtly handled. (Probably too subtly for far too many viewers who don’t notice nuance in female actors’ performances…)
In addition, we have the absolute joy of the Khan family and the eternal Samuel L. Jackson. The Khan family dynamic grounds the movie, making it far more relatable to everyone except racists, as these are ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances and dealing with it as best they can. (I particularly love when Yusuf gives financial advice to one of the S.A.B.E.R. crew.) And it’s never not fun to watch Jackson be Fury (even in a disastrous slog like the awful Secret Invasion), from “Black girl magic!” to “No more touching shit!” to his encouraging Aamir to keep praying because they need all the help they can get.
It’s not as strong as the movie it’s a sequel to. It’s more of a straightforward superhero adventure, which may be a third reason why it didn’t do as well. It’s become clear over the decades that the audiences are less interested in “ordinary” superhero adventures, as the ones that have either origins or major status quo changes are the ones that tend to be successful. Which is a pity, as this movie is a great showcase for three great superheroes.
Plus, the Flerken kittens eating the crew and then horking them back up is just epic…
Next week, we look at the last 2023 superhero movie, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
Yeah, people underestimated how much damage the dual Strikes did for the pre-release campaign.
And as far as I’m concerned, that’s all on Bob Iger. Once SAG joined WGA on the picket lines, it became clear this wasn’t going to be over by the end of Summer.
The Marvels should’ve been pushed back as a precaution just in case (especially once other tent poles like Dune and Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire followed suit).
And to play devil’s advocate, maybe Iger couldn’t due to Disney’s release schedule and contractual corporate deals, the shareholders, etc.
But considering Iger (along with David Zaslav) became the face of the Strikes…I just keep coming back to him laughably and indefensibly pleading “poverty” to the Guild’s reasonable demands (especially now in the wake of RJ’s obscene $80 million salary for Avengers 5 & 6, but that’s a rant for another time).
My point is, I don’t think we can completely discount Iger’s arrogance (and contempt for talent “not knowing their place”). I think he assumed the Strikes would fold long before November, it blew up in his face, and then he threw Nia DaCosta under the bus rather than accept responsibility (even going as far as to insist The Marvels failed because there wasn’t enough Executive oversight on set)
I *loved* this movie. I didn’t see it at the theaters (other than a privately-rented one for Dr Stranger, I haven’t been to a movie theatre since covid), but I bought it as soon as I could on iTunes, and have watched it multiple times. It has one of the *best* super-hero fight scenes, and that’s right at the beginning of the movie. Kamala Khan is the best thing to come up in the MCU in quite a few movies.
same here with the exception of I bought the blu-ray + our local theatre closed after covid and I’m not driving to a different town to watch a movie. : (
I just wait (hope to avoid spoilers) and buy them when they’re released on physical media.
I actually was on a panel about The Marvels at Shore Leave this past weekend, since I thought it was a great movie despite its reputation and wanted to help promote it.
Reposting/revising my comments from Tor’s original review thread:
I hate it that this film has been stigmatized as a flop, because it’s an absolute delight. It’s enormously fun and charming and lively, I felt like I’d just stepped off a roller coaster (but in a good way, since I hate actual roller coasters), and I hope it gains a new life and popularity now that it’s streaming.
With the short runtime, I’d been worried that Kamala (my favorite of the three) and her family would get short shrift, but to me, this felt like it was a Ms. Marvel movie with Carol and Monica as prominent guest stars. I mean, it was the twin of Kamala’s bangle that drove the whole story, and she was very much the heart of it, bringing the others together and driving a lot of the action and character business with her initiative. And her family got plenty to do, although I’m a little unclear on why Fury brought them up to the space station.
My main disappointment is that I didn’t find Zawe Ashton very impressive as Dar-Benn. I also wish, since she had a sympathetic reason for her actions, that they’d let her agreement to Monica’s plan in the climax be genuine and let her redeem herself.
It was nice to finally get an explanation for the hyperspace system they’ve been using since Guardians of the Galaxy. And it was a nice retcon that flerkens apparently don’t kill the people they eat, but just cough them up again later. It doesn’t make a lot of sense, but nothing about them does, and it makes the devouring gimmick more palatable, no pun intended.
I wish we’d gotten more exploration of the quantum bands, their origin and how one of them came to be on Earth.
As for the post-credit scene, I’m startled by how bad the CGI Beast was. They must really have been rushed. Why couldn’t they just put Kelsey Grammer in the makeup again?
I didn’t realize that the Beast was CGI. I thought it looked like make-up when I watched it on Regal.
I, too, was disappointed with Dar-Benn
I’m just going to join the chorus and say I loved this movie. Sure, it feels a little messy, the villain could have had more development, and this is the first Marvel movie I actually wish was longer to spend more time with the characters, but otherwise it’s just a ton of fun. Using “Memory” as a needle drop during the Flerken herding sequence was something I didn’t know I needed until I heard it.
I only have one nerdy quibble with the movie, and I had to watch the end fight again to make sure I wasn’t missing something. For both this movie and Ms. Marvel Season 1, we’ve never seen Kamala use her powers without wearing the bangle. However, after Dar-Benn is killed and Captain Marvel is stuck by the dimensional tear with BOTH bangles, we see Kamala use her powers to pull Marvel and Rambeau back to the ship. But how? None of the characters seem to notice, and it’s never mentioned again. Did I miss something saying the bangle just unlocked her powers and she doesn’t actually need it? Also, at the end of the movie, she only has one bangle again, so what happened to the other one?
Just minor things I wondered about, but that don’t take away from this movie being a damn good time. The rest of the MCU movies should take notes.
At the very end of the Ms. Marvel TV series, Kamala’s friend Bruno tells her that her genetic profile contains a mutation not shared by the rest of her family, and indicates that he thinks that may be the source of her powers, which the bangle merely unlocked. The use of the word “mutation” is a nod to the X-Men (and, in fact, the theme song to the animated X-Men series plays for a moment in the background at that point), and it also resembles her original Inhuman origins. That moment in the film may be intended as confirmation of this, although I can’t guarantee it.
Along similar lines, I know that at least one story in the comics included characters using being eaten by the flerken as a means of transport, and demonstrated that it was survivable (if a bit unpleasant).
I agree that this is a fun movie, and I think that is a fitting description; while it has its serious and dramatic moments, it is not at all dark or brooding, but bright and fun. My wife and I saw it when it came out, and we both enjoyed it. (The singing planet of Aladna was a bit too silly for me at first, but I got over it.) Once the plot got rolling, I found myself keeping an eye on Kamala in particular, since she is the inexperienced one of the trio, and I think that she (appropriately enough) takes a little while to find her footing. (I also appreciated that they incorporated her fanfic into the movie, since that is definitely part of her character in the comics.) Likewise, I agree that the movie does help flesh out Brie Larsen’s Carol Danvers as a character. While I am sorry that the film did not do better at the box office, I hope that Marvel Studios will make proper use of all three characters going forward.
My wife swears that Carol is wearing the other bangle on her arm when she and Kamala are hopping into the two seater plane on her lawn at the end of the film. She made me go back and pause it and I think she’s right but it’s hard to make out so it might not be. Either way, it is curious to me that the bangle is either entirely missing or that Carol has it for some reason and not Kamala.
She is. You can see it pretty clearly in this image:
What I also think hurt this movie (IMO), is that 2 of the main characters came from TV shows that not everyone watched.
Also, the Khan family are the only ones that came from TV. Monica Rambeau came from Captain Marvel, and her story arc in this movie directly relates to the events of the previous one.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Well, yeah, but Teyonnah Paris debuted in WandaVision and so did Monica’s superpowers. So she’s sort of half from the movie and half from TV.
I don’t buy that. Most stories rely on past events in the characters’ lives. Casablanca relied on the established histories and relationships among its characters. Hamlet was driven by a murder that happened before the play began. The Incredibles established a whole universe and a history for its characters in a few minutes of prologue. Any well-told story will adequately explain the characters’ histories to you whether they’ve been shown onscreen before or not. That’s what stories do, make you care about characters you didn’t know before you opened the book or sat down in the theater.
At most, I’ll concede that many people’s erroneous belief that it’s somehow impossible to follow a story without having seen the earlier installments may have made them assume they couldn’t follow the movie. But that’s a perception problem, not a problem with the movie itself. The story tells you what you need to know about Kamala and Monica even if you didn’t see their shows. Heck, it even incorporates the actual footage from WandaVision that establishes Monica’s backstory as a Blip returnee. (I concede that it glossed over how she got her powers, but that’s a trivial matter in a universe with dozens of superpowered characters in it.)
Maybe. It’s impossible to determine because Disney+ doesn’t release viewer figures. In general, more people watch TV than go to movies, and since 2020, more people watch movies on their TVs, so I’m not sure that the audience for WANDAVISION and MS. MARVEL is smaller than the audience for THE MARVELS. I’m also not sure if it’s bigger. Only Disney knows for sure.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Brie Larson does not get enough credit for her facial expressions. Sure they’re not as dramatic as someone like David Tennant (who is awesome in his own right), but her ability to communicate a whole mood with a slight twitch of her expression deserves respect.
“Stop running, and let the flerkins eat you!”
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I grew up reading the Mar-Vell version of the character, and this film is a delight. Brie is superb (if you haven’t seen her in “Lessons in Chemistry” on Apple+, you are in for a treat), and Iman Vellani is wonderful. Thanks for the terrific review!
The strike didn’t help. Putting Vellani all over the place would have been a huge help in drawing people both to her show and the movie. Yes, the show was Disney Tween Drama + Marvel, but that works for the character and can pull in new eyeballs.
The fact that of the MCU movie in front of it was also space based (Guardians 3) and the four before that got meh reactions really didn’t help.
The release order shuffling so that Secret Invasion got put in front of this probably was a minor issue, but still not a help.
That said I really enjoyed it and it felt like the one of the few action movies in a long time that respected my time. It didn’t spend half an hour on a red herring. All the action sequences were reasonable length. The training montage used one set and was the length of a Beastie Boys song. Some of the comedy bits and multiple endings were a little much, but no more than usual for these days. Hell, a MCU film at less than two and a quarter hours is an achievement in and of itself these days.
Kind of a shame that they didn’t work in the character of Tyesha, but there wasn’t time to give her much to do anyway.
I actually thought this film more entertaining than it’s predecessor, but otherwise am very glad to agree with every point of this review: I really enjoyed this film and was surprised to see it fumble at the box office.
I don’t recall seeing anyone else at the time raise the Stupid Title Tricks issue as KRAD does here – but I totally agree with the point, especially given that with the strikes running, the title was one of the only marketing tools left in the promotional toolbox.
With benefit of hindsight, I think I’d have called it CAPTAIN MARVEL CUBED, and tag-lined it “Three heroes, three missions: saving the world, saving their families – and saving each other.”
How about Captain Marvel and Her Amazing Friends?
??
I recognize the callout, but I’m clearky missing the intended punchline.
Just that Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends teamed the title character with two other heroes.
I do think there are a couple of issues with the movie overall. I think the attempts at comedy can sometimes feel a little clumsy or unbalanced (namely the Flerken insanity at the end), and I also feel the movie doesn’t lean nearly enough into the conflict between Carol and Monica. Seriously, you could see the sparks flying during the Avengers movies whenever they put Tony against Cap (or anyone else). If Monica is resentful of Carol going AWOL, show it. I can understand a more nuanced performance coming from Parris and Larson – they certainly deliver when it comes to showing guilt and hesitation. But I feel it does the story a disservice in this case. if there had been more tension between them, it would have made Monica’s final predicament all the more tragic.
These are small issues though. There’s a bigger one, and that’s Dar-Benn. On paper, she should be one of the more interesting villains. Like Killmonger, she has a rightful gripe against Carol over what she did. Her anger and desire for vengeance is more than warranted. But we never see Carol actually destroying the Supreme Intelligence. We should have been right there with Dar-Benn and the Kree people suffering the consequences of Carol’s attempt at retribution over what was done to the Skrulls. I feel there would have been enough material there for a movie in-between the first Captain Marvel and this one. Either that, or a lot of potentially interesting footage got cut for time. For that matter, showing us the damage and consequences would have bolstered Carol’s guilt instead of treating it as a major character reveal so late in the movie.
All that aside, the movie is tremendously fun. What it gets right, it absolutely nails it. There’s never a moment where Kamala is anything less than adorable. Same for her family. And I love seeing the lines between TV and cinema blurring like that. Much like Civil War 8 years ago, I love the interconnectedness of the MCU, and I feel rewarded for having watched Miss Marvel, carrying all that baggage and knowledge going into this one. The Khan’s transition to the big screen feel seamless and natural.
Love the concept of a planet where people communicate through song (reminds me a bit of Lorne reading the Angel characters on his karaoke bar), and the movie could have spent even more time there. Same for the wildly coreographed set piece of the three heroines teleporting from place to place fighting various foes. Inventive.
Which is why I really hate that the movie got so shafted in the box office. The dual WGA/SAG-AFTRA strikes certainly played a part into that, with the lack of promotion (thanks to greedy and dishonest CEOs – the fruit of 40+ years of failing Reaganomics).
But I don’t think that’s the only reason either. The notion that audiences aren’t that interested in a more ordinary or traditional superhero story isn’t without merit, but I feel there’s this gleeful desire from a lot of people to see Marvel stumble. To have a movie that will do so badly as to break the ongoing trend of popcorn superhero cinema. I feel this across both traditional and social media – an attempt at selling a certain type of narrative: that Marvel is spreading thin and becoming fatigued.
Looking back at the last 3 years of MCU, I feel there have been only two real stinkers: Secret Invasion and Eternals. Other films and shows have had their issues, but I feel a lot of it has been blown way out of proportion to craft that narrative. Mind you, I have no stake in any of this. I just want good stories, and I feel The Marvels – a few issues aside – absolutely counts as one.
Fully agree here, and I feel that this is the very closest that the tiresome troglodytes of the ‘anti-woke’/rampant misogynistic crowd have come to anything that could be called success. They aren’t nearly the actual root cause of this semi-backlash towards the MCU, but it aligns closely with their aims and they are eternally eager to push it anywhere that people aren’t actively shutting them out of. Worse than cockroaches and not nearly as charming, that lot.
“Next week, we look at the last 2023 superhero movie,”
Wasn’t The Flash a late 2023 movie? I don’t think you’ve yet done it.
He has, just on his personal blog:
https://decandido.wordpress.com/2024/01/10/you-could-also-destroy-everything-the-flash-2023/
Oh, thank you. Is there some Reactor policy boycotting it from being posted here?
In my personal headcannon, there was a whole gigantic Bollywood dance number on Aladna, with Kamala and Monica participating, but it got left on the cutting room floor. They set it up perfectly, and then…nothing. I will not be dissuaded from this belief.
That’s part of my only complaint about the movie: it feels a bit rushed. There were complaints about Marvel movies being over-long, so this one was the shortest ever. That smells of studio interference, and I think the movie would have benefited from a few extra moments here and there. Aside from the missing dance number, I felt like Carol jumped from “I’m a loner who must always be alone” to “I trust you both with my life” just a touch too quickly. A little room to breathe, maybe some introspection for Carol, would have made a lot of difference.
Overall, I loved it when I saw it, I love it now, and I’d like more Monica and Kamala (together or separately) as soon as possible, please.
As someone who has seen all of the MCU movies at least once, but not seen any of the TV shows because how many streaming services can you afford, the problem I had was that there was just too much backstory you had to know. Not for the surface story. I agree that was well most well done. However, without all of the other background, the emotional core of the movie was just missing. I vaguely knew the basis of Ms Marvel, so I at least got what that was, but was clueless about the the other pieces.
I also agree that the movie was too short. Stuff was flying by too fast with lots of inside bits for those in the know, but not for the more casual viewer. The description above of how many characters came from how many different movies and TV shows is prime evidence for what I mean. A longer movie would have had time to provide more info and, as suggested, make Danvers’ guilt more relatable.
So, I am not surprised that it did not do well in the box office. I saw it only because it was available on a long flight. Would I watch a sequel. Maybe, if the focus was on Khan. I agree that she is the best part of this.
Too much Incel hatred. The strikes didn’t help but the real damage was the shear fury of the manbabies who fear and hate strong women because they are so terrified by them. They can’t realize that all of us – men and women, children and adults – are stronger when the we are all lifted up. “We All Lift Together”.
I was a soldier in cold war Germany. As an NCO my job was to ensure my people made it through what ever the mission was – No Matter What. That was all there was to it. These little sh*ts don’t understand that.
If only I could spank them and put them to bed without dinner… :(
I dearly loved that She was USAF. And whoever wrote it understood that.
F* those damn Incels.
I’m sure the haters believe their negativity is powerful enough to be the primary cause of a movie’s failure, but I think that’s giving them too much credit. I mean, there was plenty of sexist hate thrown at the original Captain Marvel and it still did well. And I’m sure there were racist complaints about Black Panther, and it was hugely successful. The haters want to control the debate, they loudly insist that their opinions are the decisive ones, but if we believe that, we give them power they don’t deserve.
No, the main problem was what’s been said, that the strikes didn’t let the actors or filmmakers promote the movie. People tend to overlook that movies in general did worse around that time. Box office grosses overall were lower in the latter months of 2023. The Marvels was actually #1 at the box office in its debut weekend, because profits were down overall that month.
https://www.boxofficemojo.com/weekend/by-year/2023/
Another factor is simply that action movies have become ridiculously overbudgeted, which makes it far harder for them to make a profit. If Marvel, DC, and the rest had more budgetary discipline, they’d have more success even with movies that drew only moderate crowds.
Of course they are too expensive. Nowadays Marvel movies that earn less than 500 million in worldwide box office are considered a flop, and it it’s original Avengers character, less than 1 bill will not do. By today’s metrics original Captain America, Thor, Ant-Man are big flops!
I think it’s worth bearing in mind that during the time this came out, a fair number of people who aren’t incel/racist manbabies were still cautious about theater-going due to the (still ongoing) pandemic, so the in-seat numbers may be skewed.
The ONLY people I have seen hate on the movie are doing so because of it being “too woke” or other dog-whistles about a leading cast made up of 3 women, 2 of which are POC.
I’d still like to see a directors cut, and find out of studio interference might have been the cause of some of the legitimate questions about what made it screen…
I could support a direct’s cut ….
Thanks for this insightful review. I really enjoyed this movie, and would love to see it again.
On the “flop” designation, it’s still worth comparing it to two major “successes” in the same strike months: Killers of the Flower Moon and Napoleon. Neither of those is considered a flop, despite poor Box Office results (including poor marketing for strike reasons) because they both went on to do numbers on Streaming (Apple TV+ in both of those cases). The Marvels went on to do numbers on Streaming (Disney+). What makes The Marvels more of a flop than the the two Apple TV+ films? Is it Awards bait and that Superhero Movies don’t win Awards?
Admittedly the classic definition of “Box Office Flop” is did less at the Domestic Box Office in opening months than it cost in budget. The Marvels failed that test, sure, but the two Apple TV+ films only lucked out on passing it by having much smaller budgets. But why was The Marvels held to such a traditionalist test, if that’s reason for calling it a flop? Hollywood has already known for years that test is out of date: International Box Office is sometimes as or more important. Plus Streaming revenue is its own massive economics shift of the last few years. In the weeks where it looked like Killers of a Flower Moon and Napoleon might not make their budgets in Domestic Box Office, everyone sure was adamant that Apple didn’t care and the movies would both still be a “success” rather than a “flop” if streaming numbers were good enough. The Marvels didn’t get that benefit of the doubt in the public narrative, despite so clearly being a “Disney+ Streaming Special Event” twice as much as either Apple TV+ film: The Marvels needed you to watch WandaVision and Ms. Marvel, wanted you to watch Secret Invasion, and was almost particularly designed for the comfort of viewing in the same service that let you watch those other things in close proximity. It shouldn’t be a surprise that The Marvels is allegedly one of the top watched MCU films on Disney+, has presumably been watched by a lot more people there than saw it in theaters, and feels comfortably at home on Disney+ in a way that it didn’t quite in theaters, for many of the mentioned reasons in this article, and elsewhere in these comments.
This another case where Bob Iger could have been smarter and kinder to his talent and just used the “Apple TV+ excuse”, and said something like “The Marvels is a great experience in the cinema and we hope everyone goes to the theater to see it, but it was designed and budgeted as a winner for Disney+ and we’ll be happy to see everyone watch it there, too. It should drive new subscriptions, we think, too, given how well it ties into our other Disney+ content.” That would have been pretty close to the truth, too, and would have done a lot to get rid of the “flop” narrative at at time when the movie most needed it.
“The Marvels needed you to watch WandaVision and Ms. Marvel”
No, it didn’t “need” that. As I said above, no competently made story should ever require you to see earlier installments to understand it, because explaining backstory is an elementary part of how storytelling works.
After all, the fact that the three heroes have never met before means that they have to explain their situations to each other, and thereby to the audience while they’re at it. The story is specifically designed to bring new viewers up to speed.
Let’s not forget, Captain Marvel worked much the same way. It relied on a backstory that the audience didn’t know, so it built the story around Carol’s discovery of her own past, so that the audience learned along with the character.
I didn’t intend to imply a direction to that “need”. It wasn’t meant to be a “needs you to watch them first”, it was more of a “needs you to watch them eventually” for “synergy” and “cross-promotion” (and “fun”), because you like the characters. I agree that I think The Marvels did a great job of cliffsnoting the shows just shy of an Editorial Pop-Up “See WandaVision #8” style comics thing. But I also think it did a great job in that way of “if you enjoyed this movie, go see those shows for more of these great characters”, in a very post-Streaming way that is more comfortable and easier contextualized on a Streaming service because those Pop-Ups do kind of exist in the Recommendations at the end of the movie on Disney+.
I call that an option, not a need. The goal of a shared universe is to allow the audience to experience as much or as little of it as they choose and still have a complete experience. After all, the comics that inspired the MCU were too numerous for your typical collector to be able to buy every series. They did cross-reference each other and have frequent team-ups and shared continuity to encourage people to buy other series, but if a reader chose not to, then it would just be a bit of texture hinting at the larger world the characters inhabited.
I tried to emulate that in my 2012 hard-SF superhero novel Only Superhuman. When the main heroine interacted with other heroes, I dropped in references to their own ongoing adventures and nemeses, to try to capture the feel that these characters had their own ongoing “series” that we were just getting glimpses of. It’s good for a work of fiction to imply the existence of a world beyond what the reader can see, since it makes it feel more real that way. Even if the references are to other released stories, that doesn’t require the audience to read or watch them. That’s supposed to be an optional opportunity, not a mandate. This is entertainment. It’s not a test you have to study for. Nobody “needs” to seek out any part of it they don’t want to.