Review Transcript

Captain Marvel is directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck and is the 21st film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe- but is actually a prequel that takes place before the first Iron Man film. It’s 1995 and there’s two galactic groups at war with each other: the Kree and the Skrulls. Our story centers around Carol Danvers, portrayed by Brie Larson, who is a part the group known as the Kree and throughout the film she learns things about her past that she was unaware of and this dramatically affects who she becomes. Ben Mendelsohn is Talos, the leader of the Skrulls and our main villain. Samuel L. Jackson, de-aged digitally by 25 years, reprises the role of Nick Fury who still has an eye and at this point has not started the Avengers initiative. Fury’s interaction with Carol Danvers has a huge affect not only on this origin story of Captain Marvel, but also the MCU as we know it.

My biggest complaint about Captain Marvel is that the beginning setup is incredibly slow. Die hard comic book movie fans may not mind as much as I did but I found these lengthy dialogue-focused scenes to be unengaging. The tone of the film feels similar to many other comic book movies and while the setup and structure is different, it just felt like a generic superhero movie. It’s fun. There’s action. but- if you do not like super hero movies I can’t see this changing your mind and if you do love super hero movies this will probably be enjoyable as it felt it to be similar to others I had seen before. If you’re somewhere in the middle like me, this movie will probably be mixed for you is well. Luckily, once the setup is complete, the fight scenes and acting by Brie Larson was good. I felt several decent moments of tension fused with humor and I was interested with how the story would resolve. Danvers has lots of good chemistry with a few different characters. I liked her relationship with Nick Fury but also her friend Monica whose played by Lashana Lynch. She was a pleasant addition as I liked the friendship between the two characters. The story does begin with Carol Danvers having her powers and I think I would’ve been interested in seeing more of her before she got her powers. Seeing more of a human side to her, could have maybe allowed me to connect better with her character. Despite this being a prequel, there are easter eggs and subtle references to other MCU movies, that it certainly helps if you’ve seen some of the other Marvel films. In fact, my favorite aspect of Captain Marvel is how it connects to Avengers: Endgame. I won’t spoil how that is but make sure you stay around for two end credit scenes.