NS: Captain Marvel (Spoilers)

[fiddlingfrog]

Kind of surprised nobody has posted on this yet.


Really enjoyable. More humorous than I was expecting, with the humor coming from places I wasn't expecting.

After all the speculation that last year's "The Life of Captain Marvel" retconned her backstory to more closely match the movie I was really pleased that the movie actually stuck pretty closely to her comic origins. Yon-Rogg? Check. Mar-Vell? Check. Exploding thingy? Check.

Loved the twist with the Skrulls.

For some reason I was expecting to see more of Ronan in this movie, but it was little more than a cameo.

I thought there were some parts of the final space & aerial battles that needed better editing, but that's really only a minor quibble.

Comments

[ironymaiden]

And the set up for Monica Rambeau? Yes, please.

[mazway_75]

I'm surprised at reactions like below on how "Monica inspired by Carol is a slap in the face of the character." Folks tend to forget that if they had Monica an adult in the 1990s, she'd be much older in the present so only natural she be a kid.

[zachbeacon]

It should have been Monica to begin with.

Marv is boring.

Genis is too derivative of Marv and I'm not sure I trust them to handle his mental illness well.

Phyla is too derivative of Marv and you can't sell her in a lot of international markets.

Carol is too derivative of Marv and she's unlikable.

Monica uses the name, is a solid character, has cool powers, and doesn't really require the others for her origin to work.

Plus using Carol just makes it look like Marvel is playing catch up to DC's Wonder Woman whereas Monica puts them in the lead in terms of representation.

[deh_tommy]

I'm really glad they kept the hero Mar-Vell in Carol Danver's origin, regardless of what form (s)he took.

So, what was the deal with Life of Captain Marvel, anyway?

[fiddlingfrog]

Here, let lordultimus explain.
Issue #1, Issue #3, Issue #4, Issue #5

[stubbleupdate]

It is fucking dreadful.

Really, stupid and bad.

[cyberghostface]

I was underwhelmed. Certainly not the worst MCU film but it could have been a lot better.

Brie Larson did the best she could with the material she had but as far as MCU protagonists go (not counting characters like Natasha and Hawkeye) she was probably one of the least interesting. Maybe I'd rank her above Dr. Strange who I felt was bland aside from the hospital scene.

Samuel L. Jackson was a hoot but this film was basically a slap in the face to anyone wanting a Fury origin film. "The last time I trusted someone I lost an eye... lol j/k a cat scratched me."

Ben Mendelsohn was the best part, he was very funny. But so much for a Skrull invasion film down the line given that they're all misunderstood.

I was looking forward to the MCU worldbuilding with bringing back Ronan and co. but they could have cut out him out entirely for all they did with him.

Also it's depressingly predictable that Marvel would cast one of the stars from Crazy Rich Asians only to cover her in blue makeup and throw her in the background with maybe three lines.

[luxshine]

I have to say.. I liked the thing with the cat. Because well, he was trusting an alien cat that he SAW eat not only a cosmic powerful cube but about a dozen Kree, and he was trusting his own bias about how Goose was a cat, and not a dangerous Flarken as everyone was telling him he was. And he even was trusting himself with "Its only a scratch". So... well, that taught him not to take anything or anyone at face value. Sure, it looked funny, but it was also a bit deep.

I also don't think a Secret Invasion down the line is out of question. We have had pockets of Good skrulls in the comics too, and they still had the crazy queen coming to try and invade earth.

But then I am biased. I loved every single second of the movie.

[akodo_rokku]

Nick really trusted Goose, man.

Also I assume Gemma Chan was cast (and probably most of the shooting done) before Crazy Rich Asians came out.

[thehood]

Talos did say that there are thousands of Skrulls scattered around the Galaxy and with no way of contacting each other. Verake's group could be the bad ones.

[mazway_75]

I really liked it. Amazed the slams on Larson as thought she nailed Carol great (I actually had a friend going "Ronda Rousey could have been a better actress" which is.....no....).

Just annoyed we still get the rants of the idiots on how "it hates men" etc (I saw one guy openly saying in utter seriousness "Imagine if Stan Lee could see what the MCU was doing" ignoring how he's in the movie") to overwhelm the reaction.

Anyone else have their audience break into applause at the Stan Lee opening?

[cyberghostface]

"Just annoyed we still get the rants of the idiots on how "it hates men" etc (I saw one guy openly saying in utter seriousness "Imagine if Stan Lee could see what the MCU was doing" ignoring how he's in the movie") to overwhelm the reaction."

lol people were actually complaining about Nick Fury doing dishes if you want to get an idea how how deep the rabbit hole goes for them...

[stubbleupdate]

Ronda Rousey struggles to play a convincing Ronda Rousey on TV.

[hybrid2]

People applauded to.and me.
Up here in Quebec.

[beardedjellybean]

The big negative was that Carol's personality was somewhat skewed. It's sort of justified story-side, but for a decent portion of the movie she was so stoic it was unengaging, which was unfortunate as when her snarky, loves a scrap approach came up it was really enjoyable . The rest of the movie was lot of fun, though the Kree were just kind of there and the cat scratch thing was mostly a dumb, not particularly funny joke that's now canon.

That said, I wouldn't say Cap, Thor, Doctor Strange and a few others really shined until they appeared in the team movies, so hopefully that trend continues with Carol.

[joetuss]

Monica Rambeau being a kid, and then being inspired by Carol was a slap in the face. I'm glad she's part of the MCU but that bit didn't sit right with me. I'll say it again...Brie wasn't the right choice as the lead. I think Emily Blunt (who I'm hoping will end up playing Sue Richards) or Jessica Chastain would have shined in the role of Carol...Brie just makes me sleepy. I've heard a lot of people say they would have rather seen a movie about Monica instead of Carol, which I wholeheartedly agree with...Carol imo has never been likable. Overall I didn't like the movie, and I'd put it right down there with Thor 2, and Iron Man 3.

[mazway_75]

To each their own, I thought Larson was great nailing Carol's dry humor and the dramatic beats needed later in the film. The part where she rises up and embraces her power had my audience cheering.

We can hope for Monica in the sequel but I never saw it a "slap in the face" as they made her being inspired by Carol as a great thing.

[stubbleupdate]

It wasn't stunning, but it was good, and it did surprise me at bits. I forgot that the Kree were space racists, so the Skrull reveal came as a shock. I'm surprised that the bedwetters aren't more up in arms about refugees being painted as something other than a sinister invasion force.

Lee Pace needed more to do. Lots more.

The Kree costume looked really good, and the Mckelvie suit worked very well.



The origin was a new twist on an old classic and worked very well.

I enjoyed some of the easter eggs like Kelly Sue and the original Mar-Vell costume appearing.

[speedingtortoise]

I went into this movie with slightly lowered expectations, but ended up really loving it. Brie Larson did a great job, the skrull twist was really great, and fully powered captain marvel blasting the crap out of everyone literally made me grin ear to ear in the theatre. Im glad it turned out so well.

[thehood]

I love what they did with the Skrulls, i'm happy they weren't generic evil aliens.

[janegray]

I'm very happy about that!

I'm still salty that Crusader was murdered in cold blood by the "good guys" and it was treated as okay just because he was a Skrull. He just wanted to be a hero ;_;

So this felt like vindication :P

[janegray]

There were four (4) skrulls.

One of them died in a car accident. One of them was shot to death by the bad guy whose name I can never remember. One of them was Talos.

Whatever happened to the fourth one?

Is it going to turn out that he was the lone extremist of the group, introducing the info that some Skrulls are good and some are evil, and it will be the plot point used to make Secret Invasion?

Or is he going to turn into a cow and get eaten, turning humans into Skrulls, as it happened in the comics?

[thehood]

Not counting the ones in Mar-Vell's ship?

[dcbanacek]

I went to the movie with an open mind and spoiler-free. Overall, the movie was "ok". Wasn't the worst, wasn't the best.

I did like the Skrull twist. They kept Danvers' origin relatively simple but I noticed they never seemed to show her Mom in the flashbacks. The reasoning about why she had Kree blood in her made some sense, guess Danvers' and Agent Coulson can go visit Tahiti together, its a magical place after all. (I do wonder if this is where they got the corpse)

Law and Mendehlson were criminally underused but quite good in their roles nonetheless. The other members of the "Starforce" could have been fleshed out more. As mentioned elsewhere here, Ronan didn't even need to be here but Lee Pace did okay with what he was given (all three seconds of it).

Sam Jackson, while good as always, looked awkward in his action scenes.

I'm very glad they didn't show the comics version of the Supreme Intelligence, that would have gone as well as that baby thing in the third Matrix movie. Annette Benning was underused as well. I'm VERY curious how she got ahold of the Tesseract since the last person to have it prior to the Avengers movie was Howard Stark. (at least that we know of)

As for Brie Larson as Captain Marvel, I think she just needs more time in the role.

This movie did seem like a lot was left on the cutting room floor, though.

Overall, if you haven't seen it yet, go to a matinee viewing.

[qalchemist]

Project: Pegasus was a SHIELD project, or associated, from what it seemed.

I'm guessing that she had been experimenting with it 'on their behalf', but when the lightspeed ship was exploded they were convinced that the entire Tesseract went kaboom.

[flint_marko]

It wasn't perfect, but I enjoyed it. Goose was great, but with the way she was being hyped up I wanted more screentime.

I wasn't a fan of the Skrull twist; in the comics neither side of the Kree/Skrull conflict is right, making it so one side is the clear bad guy is less interesting.

And I wish Carol's Kree teammates got more development. Like that scene where Carol asked Minn-Erva if the reason why didn't hang out was because she knew she was really a human, and Minn-Erva said she just didn't like her. There was no interaction between them before that to show it.

[thehood]

I don't know about neither side being right, it was established that the Kree attacked the Skrulls first.

To me the Kree always came off as the bigger bastards. A good example is when Mar-Vell was dying of cancer. The Skrulls sent a representative to give their respects, even though he was their greatest enemy at that time. The Kree, his own people, sent no one.

As for Minn-erva, i thought their lack of interaction further showed the fact she didn't like Carol.

[laughing_tree]

Not a criticism of the film, which I thought was really good, but I can't help but be a little sad that even here on a board devoted to comics scans, a post about a movie gets massively more comments than any of the comics posts.

[stubbleupdate]

Captain Marvel had millions of viewers. It has some sort of cultural impact.
The latest issue of whatever doesn't do that.

[penguinzero]

I really liked it. I think I liked Alita slightly better, but 1) that may be down to the fact that the manga was a foundational experience for me when I was a teen while my interest in Captain Marvel is somewhat more recent, and 2) I love that we're in a place where I can say 'this is only my second-favorite comic-adaptation action movie with a female lead released in the past month.'

[erikred]

-- audience applauded the Stan Lee title screen.
-- the movie was fun, well-paced, action-packed, and featured a competent, driven human hero whose primary superpower is the one we all aspire to: the ability to get back up.
-- for just one brief glorious moment, I thought they were going to go the full Binary:



-- for just one brief glorious moment, I thought they were going to break the binary:



I rank it just below Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther.