It’s been some time since we had a Marvel movie review 🙂 But in preparation for Avengers: Endgame we feel we need to review the most recent MCU production, Captain Marvel.
First things first, we’ve decided not to tackle the controversies concerning Brie Larson, the lead of the movie, and the fanbase, a huge part of which chose to get enraged. None of this serves the movie well, and we’d rather focus on the newest entry in MCU itself :).
Captain Marvel is a definitely smaller and less ambitious movie than the entirety of the Avengers franchise; in fact it’s one of quite a few origin stories Marvel has put on the screen through the years – from Iron Man (2008), Thor (2011) and Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) through Ant-Man (2015) and Doctor Strange (2016). We should probably also include Hulk (2003), at least from the chroniclers’ duty point of view, even if the majority of fans would prefer to forget it 😉 Captain Marvel also the first Marvel female-centered movie, despite fans’ ongoing pleas for a Black Widow flick. It is symptomatic, then, the the female superhero Marvel decided to depict in their response to the popularity of the Wonder Woman movie (2017) was a similarly beefed up, overpowered character of an ex-fighter pilot, who at the beginning of the movie remains an outside force not connected to Earth’s troubles or humanity, and whose main story arc revolves around the issue of getting involved and starting to care.
Captain Marvel is a well-established comic book character who possesses uncanny superpowers resulting from an accident with a strange, extremely strong source of energy. As the movie starts, Carol Danvers (Brie Larson), known to everyone (herself included) as Vers, remains in the employ of an alien race of militaristic Kree fighting their unending war with shape-shifting Skrulls. She seems content within her small special ops unit and under tutelage of an experienced Kree warrior Yon-Rogg (Jude Law) and the only thing bothering her at all are her strange dreams. It is not until Carol lands on Earth when she realizes she isn’t a Kree at all but rather a slightly unusual human.
Ola: The plot is simple and predictable, at times even overly so, with a generous amount of light fun (especially the references to the 1990s, from Top Gun to arcades to grunge) and a few nicely twisted tropes. It was definitely refreshing to see the conflict resolved in a different than the usual Marvel total-destruction mode 🙂 The message is very family-friendly and well-meaning, and in general Captain Marvel may be considered as an entry on the lighter end of the MCU continuum.
Piotrek: Yes, that is a friendly movie. Well-executed, simple story, with quite a few presents for nerds (I probably liked the old computers the most!), dynamic but no overly violent action, likeable characters and quite a bit of optimism.
Ola: The main strength of the movie was for me its supporting cast. Nick Fury actually gets a solid role to play and he enjoys it a lot – and the viewers with him :). He gives this movie the momentum it otherwise sorely lacks as, I’m sorry to say, Larson’s performance seemed very eco-friendly, i.e. wooden. It might not be entirely her fault, the role of Captain Marvel was written with absolutely zero development possibilities, and that’s my main gripe with the movie and also an issue I’ll address fully a bit later. I also appreciated Ben Mendelsohn’s role of the Skrull leader Talos – surprisingly, Talos and Monica Rambeau’s story arcs form the heart of the movie, becoming the main relationship anchors for the lead character. Cameos from Clark Gregg (unforgettable Phil Coulson) and Annette Bening were a welcome sight, and Jude Law did what he could with his role (which admittedly wasn’t that much).
Piotrek: The heroine was wooden, but not pathetic, and I don’t know enough about this character to really judge Brie Larson. But Samuel L. Jackson definitely was my favourite character of the movie and I wanted to see more of him in a Marvel film for quite some time. Jude Law made a serviceable character out of a poorly written one, I liked Ben Mendelsohn here more than I did in Rogue One 😉 I’m writing my part of the post in response to yours, and I have to admit I’ve yet to find a point to contest…
Let us check now how the movie fares in its supposedly main purpose – as MCU’s first female-led movie (we had a series in Jessica Jones, something we ultimately judged to be a failure). It was not a perfect protagonist for that, and while they tried, I’m mostly happy they did not try too hard.
Ola: My private measurement of gender equality in superhero genre is quite simple. It takes into account several things, most important of which are: 1) if the female character is a conscious actor, shaping and being shaped by the events on equal footing with male characters, 2) if the female character can be a convincing, fully fleshed and motivated villain (without the prevalent victim vibe or appearance issues), and 3) if the female character can be an unlikable asshole. Captain Marvel in the comic books passes the test with flying colors, falling squarely under point 3 (and maybe even a bit under point 2) as a result of the Civil War II storyline :P. Yet Captain Marvel in the movie fails the test miserably. She has absolutely no room for internal development as she has no vices or weaknesses to start with. She is in fact depicted as a victim of preying, manipulative men wishing to use her for their own purposes, and her only growth comes from the fact that she overcomes external factors designed to limit her abilities. Getting out of victimhood is a noble and much needed theme, granted, but seems not entirely suitable for a superhero movie – at least it did not work for Captain Marvel. But the root of this issue is much deeper – it starts with a character that is fully formed from the get-go and has no ability to grow. As such, it is not believable nor relatable. It’s basically an iteration of the the Wonder Woman flick problem – Diana was so ideal, without blemish or imperfection from the start, that the only thing she could have done so as not to be seen as an invariable fixture, was trying to bring to perfection the world around her. In Marvel movie at least the problem is less pronounced and paired with enough humor to make it definitely less nauseating. Yet it points to a problem within the popular culture movie industry – the approach to gender equality seems superficial; a fig leave covering up the fact that the male characters still have infinitely more ambitious, more enjoyable and more relatable story lines. Bring it on, Black Widow!
Piotrek: Yeah… although it definitely wasn’t sexist. It was just the type of superhero we got here. My thought was – they did not want a repeat of Captain America’s story, they did not have time for a fully-fledged origin story, so they did what they did and we got a decent movie anyway. Enjoyable addition to the great MCU, just not the breakthrough feminist superhero WW-haters are still waiting for. Black Widow definitely deserves her own flick, that could be it!
Ola: One of the rare occasions we’re of one mind! 😛
All in all, Captain Marvel is an enjoyable, family-friendly, feel-good movie. It is a light, funny and openly unambitious addition to MCU, with a few refreshing twists to the superhero formula hidden within a largely predictable plot.
Piotrek: It’s a movie for fans of the genre, and they won’t be disappointed. Marvel delivers movies at least competent, and only some of them are revolutionary. But, you know, not every western was Unforgiven either.
Score: Ola 6,5/10 Piotrek 7/10
Re-enchantment Of The World 
Thanks for a great review! 😀 I am ashamed to admit I went to see this movie in the theatre (granted on a very hot day, after lots of work in the sun and then a couple drinks afterward) and fell asleep
So I knew the basic premise, but I definitely wasn’t wowed by it. Your measurement of gender equality in the superhero genre is awesome, Ola! I’m definitely going to start employing it. I’d love a Black Widow movie.
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Thanks a lot! Glad you liked it 🙂
Wow, that’s an achievement! It had its boring moments, sure, but overall wasn’t that bad 😂 But yeah, totally agree, there wasn’t any wow moment in the movie. It was decent, but nothing more.
Thank you! Hope it will work for you – it works for me pretty well, though I must admit the threshold seems too high for most of the pop culture productions 😉
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I report back that I managed to stay awake through the whooooole of Endgame 😂
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We’ll write a review of that as well 😉
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Larson made it quite clear that she didn’t want me watching “her” movie, so I haven’t nor do I plan to. And watching a superman movie but without any kryptonite really doesn’t sound fun.
I have a feeling that after I watch Infinity War and End Game, my superhero movie watching is going to drop to just about zero.
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I watched Endgame on Wednesday – ah, the perks of the time difference 😀 I won’t talk about it until everyone and their uncle had already seen it, but I can safely say the superhero fatigue is starting to get me – at least in the movie genre ;).
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Spoil away. I won’t be watching it until the bluray comes out and I’ll pick it and Infinity War up hopefully as a combo pack. So anything you say, I won’t remember or really care. Besides, I read the Infinity Gauntlet/War comics several years ago so I pretty much know how the story goes even if the particulars are different from the comics 😀
It has been about 15 years, almost 20 depending on when you start counting Super Hero movies as starting, so I figure they’ve about run their course. Now they should start petering out. Like the westerns in the US did…
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Ooh, westerns! That’s another discussion altogether 😉 I’d say they never really went away, and the recent decades were pretty decent for the genre, if the only creative element is the reimagination of old tropes. So if that’s the future of superhero genre, I’m content (and really looking forward to the anti-movies, the Unforgiven of the superhero genre :D)
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Oh, I was thinking more of numbers than content in regards to Westerns. The 50’s and 60’s and even into the late 70’s saw them dominate the box office and radio and tv. Then they just kind of disappeared except for the odd one here and there. I expect that is the future of the super hero movie. One or four a year at most.
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I can live with that 🙂 I don’t need to see a blockbuster a month… but it will take some time to get there, numbers are still pretty strong for superheroes.
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Yeah, definitely! I still hope for some strong superhero movies in the future 😀
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Well, with Thanos she will have a stronger opponent, we’ll see how that’s gonna play. And I’m waiting to see the post-Endgame MCU, they will probably try to change a bit, after this long multi-movie storyline concludes. But I don’t see any better genre on the horizon, so I’m not going to give up on this one 🙂
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Eh, let movies slide into oblivion. I’m ok with that…
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Me, I’m not ready for that 🙂
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*speaks in mysterious tones*
That is because your feelings for this world betray you, young padawan.
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I’m a grey Jedi 😉
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Ha, no such thing. The EU doesn’t exist any more 😉
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Not in my head-canon.
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Oh, thank you for a very detailed review that makes me want to re-watch the movie to go past the action scenes and take a good look at the actual “meat” of the story! As super-heroes movies go, this one had enough humor (and some tongue-in cheek humor as well) to counterbalance nicely the action scenes: I don’t enjoy movies when they are all car chases and explosions and take themselves too seriously 😀
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Yes, it was well done and enjoyable, and in a way that’s enough. We don’t need every movie to be revolutionary…
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You’re very welcome! 🙂
I did appreciate the lighter tone, though I’d prefer a bit more “meat” on the bare bones of the story 😉 Still, it was enjoyable and my whole family had fun 😀
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I love your take on gender equality and how you split it into 3 points. I have to admit that this movie falls into the category of horrible MCU movies for me. It was its feminist agenda that really killed me. Not because there was one but because of how explicit and evident they made it, they didn’t even try to hide it or even try to deliver it with tact. That one scene where you see all of her past selves get up after falling felt like an ad for a product with a feminist connotation to it. I also found her character to be overpowered with no room for development. It didn’t help when you see from the start that she was just going to try to prove by the end of the movie that “her emotions” are not her weakness but her strength… And how she defeats all her enemies at the end was cringey! I couldn’t wrap my head around them. Great post nonetheless!
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Thanks! 😀
I agree, it is very heavy-handed in its feminist aspect indeed, especially the part of being a victim of conservative and blood-thirsty males of Kree; and yet, I still prefer it to WW, where feminism was just a cover for the regular chainmail bikini-clad stupid brunette defeating all by the power of love; surprised they didn’t reach back to the bondage tradition of WW 😉
But I totally agree with you on the power overkill; it doesn’t even hold up to the internal logic of MCU: however you count it, a manmade (or womanmade) engine could not generate energy able to infuse someone to become a mini sun! That’s why Dark Phoenix makes so much more sense to me – at least within Marvel universe 😉
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Hahahha if they ever do Grant Morrison’s take on Wonder Woman in live-action, it would be the end of the world 😂
Ahhh Dark Phoenix… can’t wait to see if the movie adaptation will even hold up to the comic counterpart… so far, I don’t there’s a single person who is excited for that movie 😂
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[Shudders] that image just damaged my brain, Lashaan! More to the point, however, I’m sure there’s a group of people waiting for this kind of movie, and they all are over 18 😛
Ah, I’ve seen the trailer and… exactly. Don’t count me as an even remotely excited fan 😉 Especially after Apocalypse, which was simply terrible – and this doesn’t look to be even a tiny bit better, I’m afraid.
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I was excited for this but so much was going on outside of the movie that I lost all enthusiasm. I’ll just watch Endgame without seeing this most likely
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It’s not a bad movie, but the controversies around it definitely took away a lot of enthusiasm and good will for the movie and the main character – a pity, in my opinion, as there are many worse around than this particular flick… You can watch Endgame without it, it’s not crucial or anything, but I’d still recommend seeing it at some point 😉
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I probably will give it a watch in the future when my curiosity gets the best of me. Won’t be seeing Endgame for three weeks or so 😭
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Oh, poor you… By that time all the spoilers will be out! Maybe I should spare you the pain and spill the beans already?? 😂
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I think not 😂 I’m 2 seasons behind Game of Thrones. Not seen any spoilers yet. I’m good at dodging
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Gotta admit this movie didn’t do it for me, though I can see why some people quite liked it. While I do agree about the supporting cast (and even didn’t mind bree Larson) I wasn’t blown away by the simple and (too) predictable plot. But most of all, I just really agree with everything Ola said about Captain Marvel as a character. The way they explored her was so bland and had no room to grow. For me, it’s disappointing to see female heroes as flat and perfect. Great review!
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Thanks a lot! 😀
I felt they went one step forward and two steps back when it comes to female characters. She is a definite improvement on Wonder Woman, but could have been much better if they treated her as a human being and not a feminist banner (as it should look like according to some men ;))
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