Movie Review: Captain Marvel

Captain Marvel

Directors: Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck

Starring: Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Jude Law, Annette Bening, Lashana Lynch

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 124 minutes

Avengers: Endgames, the culmination of 10 year’s worth of movies, releases at the end of April. And while Marvel fans are speculating and fantasizing away in anticipation, Marvel Studios gives us one more installment before the final showdown between Thanos and the surviving Avengers.

Captain Marvel, many might say, is Marvel’s counter to DC’s 2017 hit Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman did prove to Hollywood that audiences were more than ready and waiting for a strong female lead in a superhero movie and with its success, many more female hero projects are now in the works. But this isn’t an article comparing Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. This is all about how our girl Carol Danvers did on her solo outing. So let’s get to that.

Captain Marvel serves both as Carol Danvers’ origin story as well as a prequel of sorts that explores S.H.I.E.L.D. in its earlier phase of operation. In this story, we explore Captain Marvel’s journey of self-discovery as she learns about her past and her true identity.

I’ll just go ahead and get this out of the way now: I liked this movie. I think as far as origin stories go, this one was pretty enjoyable and I can see all the hype surrounding it for people who are excited to have a strong female hero on the big screen. Even though it is ultimately another formulaic Marvel film (they’re never going to change), the cast is fun enough and the plot is just interesting enough to keep me entertained throughout, and I liked the twists they added to popular comic characters to change the story a bit.

But I didn’t love this movie. And that’s the biggest problem. To me, nothing about this movie makes it great. Sure, we finally get to see the Skrulls in the MCU. Yes, we get more world building in terms of Kree and Skrull societies. And granted, having Samuel L. Jackson as one of the main characters was an absolute delight for me. But nothing in this movie really wowed me or stood out in a way that made me say “This is why I love superhero movies.” Instead, it was just “okay.

I liked Brie Larson for the most part in the movies, but she didn’t really sell me on any of the emotional scenes. She was more of just the “badass independent woman” stereotype that showed zero weakness almost to a fault. In tender scenes, it was the other characters like Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch) or Wendy Lawson (Annette Bening) who sold the emotion rather than Larson. The action scenes were pretty generic to me, and while there was admittedly some fun action (the fight in the train probably being the best example), there wasn’t a single action scene I could point to that I loved or was really impressed by. To that point, I will say that Danver’s energy effect did look pretty cool as long as she wasn’t wearing that silly helmet.

The most unfortunate part for me is the plot. While it’s not terrible, having the amnesia plot with a character we all know is more annoying than interesting. I guess if you’re just a fan of the movies this would have maybe been a shock, but for me following a character discovering things about herself that I already know isn’t nearly as appealing as it would have been if they’d been able to implement some bigger twist to her character. Despite this, the rest of the plot is interesting enough and to the directors and writers’ credit, there are plenty of other twists or spins on popular characters that you don’t see coming.

Captain Marvel didn’t blow me away, but it was just the appetizer I needed before Avengers: Endgame. There will be plenty of people who love the movie more than me, and I’m happy for them. I think anyone could find something to enjoy here. Not a bad movie by any means, Captain Marvel is another fine addition to the MCU.