“That does not sound like science to me.”
The Marvels is an exuberant and sometimes silly space romp. It’s funny, it’s cute, it’s occasionally absurd. This sequel to 2019’s Captain Marvel has a lot on its plate. It’s tasked with tying up loose ends from the Disney+ shows WandaVision from 2021 and 2022’s Ms. Marvel, integrate individuals from those shows into the MCU proper, align with the ongoing Multiverse Saga, further develop the character of the defensive and damaged Carol Danvers and leverage in elements for the next storytelling set. The Marvels manages all of that and more while managing to be a fun film and compelling cinema all at the same time. Cats in space, FTW.
The Marvels is a 2023 Marvel Studios feature directed by Nia DaCosta who wrote the screenplay with Elissa Karasik and Megan McDonnell. The film stars Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris and Iman Vellani along with Park Seo-joon, Zenobia Shroff, Saagar Shaikh, Gary Lewis, Zawe Ashton, Mohan Kapur and Samuel L. Jackson. Hailee Steinfeld, Lashana Lynch and Tessa Thompson have brief cameos.
“I can’t believe you touched it. Why did you touch it?”
“Because it was glowing and mysterious!”
It is 1995. After breaking free from Kree repression and smashing Ronan the Accuser’s fleet, Carol Danvers (Larson) presses the attack and returns to the aliens’ homeworld of Hala. There, she smashes into the capital at Kree-Lar, where she smites down and kills the guiding force of that interstellar empire, the Supreme Intelligence. Leaving the empire rudderless, she returns to her duties as a defender of the space ways.
Now a new Kree Accuser has risen to power, bent on revenge. Binding together the remnants of the once-proud but shattered Imperium, Dar-Benn (Ashton) is driven to restore her war-torn and environmentally devastated world. She knows Danvers is responsible for her world’s slide into anarchy and aches for payback. A pair of ancient Kree relics called the Quantum Bands are the means for both her world’s rehabilitation and the makings of a concerted campaign against Carol.
On a dark moon, in a lonely tomb, a sarcophagus is found by Dar-Benn and her raiders. To her dismay, it only holds one of the bands. Her scientists are certain her plan can proceed (albeit at a slower rate), while they contine to hunt for the other one. She charges the band in her possession with her Universal Weapon and they move to the next step.
From his perch high in earth orbit, former spymaster and new SABER director, Nick Fury (Jackson) is shepherding his Skrull allies through peace talks with the Kree remnant. Carol is plying the space lanes for information concerning any threat to those talks. Coming across Dar-Benn’s dig-site, she engages the renegade Kree security team in combat.
Finishing up repairs on a vernier nozzle of the SABER space station, astronaut Monica Rambeau (Parris) notices strange electromagnetic discharges from the local jump-gate and sends her EVA team in to safety while she investigates. Rambeau jets alone through space using her suit’s thrusters. Inching ever closer to the phenomenon, she loses contact with the station. Using her abilities, she probes the distortion field and vanishes.
In her Jersey City bedroom, a Pakistani-American teenager named Kamala Khan (Vellani) fends off her mother Muneeba (Shroff) while feigning a focus on her studies. Kamala is a huge Captain Marvel fangirl and her bedroom is festooned with images of Kamala’s favorite Avenger. Kamala is super, too. A while back, her Grandma’s bangle started glowing, unlocking Kamala’s incredible light-based powers. Her mother and father Yusuf (Kapur) know about them and are desperately afraid, terrified Kamala will get herself killed running around like a hero.
Contemptuous of the Kree defenders, Carol tosses them around with her bare hands. She’s enjoying the punchy-punchy until a slew of them form a line and open fire on her. More annoyed than anything else, she charges up a cosmic blast. In a blink, a surprised Carol finds herself smashing into Kamala’s closet. Cartoon images of Captain Marvel covering the shattered door stare back at her.
It takes Monica a moment, but she realizes a few things: Her EVA suit is missing; she’s in a corridor; she’s in a conflict with blue skinned aliens and they’re firing beam weapons at her. She has to move, fight back. She energizes her powers and vanishes.
Kamala is in space. She can breathe ok, she’s in a spacesuit, thought it’s a bit big. She can see Nick Fury through what looks like a window. She’s very excited. Is this an Avengers test? Does he know about her abilities? She can show him! Kamala’s bangle glows as she disappears.
Suddenly, a confused Carol is in space, the SABER station gleaming in the distance.
What has linked the three heroines and has them bouncing through the cosmos? What dastardly plan has Dar-Benn dreamed up to get her vengeance on Carol? Can Kamala be calm alongside her idol or will she explode in a burst of squee? Why hasn’t Carol contacted Monica in all the years since she left? Can Carol keep her newfound charges safe in the dangerous void of space? Will the entwined ladies be able to save several worlds while jumping uncontrollably from place to place? How many Kree soldiers can a Flerken swallow in a single sitting? Please see The Marvels to find out.
“We’re literally herding cats?”
Many have written off The Marvels before seeing a frame, ever convinced of the imminent downfall of the MCU. Those waiting for Feige’s impressive edifice to come crashing to the ground will have to wait another day. The Marvels is a very fun film. Iman Vellani’s enthusiasm is infectious. Brie Larson and Teyonah Parris have remarkable chemistry. It feels like they’ve known each other for a very long time and exude familiarity. The suddenly reunited dear friends walking on glass over an old hurt as their present selves come to grips with past pain is played perfectly by the pair. Mohan Kapur and Saagar Shaikh take the comic relief to the point of caricature but Zenobia Shroff’s Muneeba finds the perfect balance between coddling and care. Samuel L. Jackson returns to the role of Nick Fury with a wink and a grin. There is a casualness to his performance in this film. This time, Fury is more relaxed, less furious, if still very frustrated by some of the circumstances.
The Marvels carries the load required of it and lays the groundwork for the next stage in the cinematic cycle. In this regard (and in several others), The Marvels isn’t subtle. Like 2010’s Iron Man 2, there are some foundations The Marvels has to dig and some concrete to pour as the movie assembles support-structures and planks down scaffolding for future films . However, The Marvels is beset by the same curse that has bedeviled several other Marvel movies since the dawn of the MCU: The villain is very undercooked.
Dar-Benn gets a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it backstory. Her quest to repair the damage done to Hala is an honorable one. It’s one that the myriad of super-scientists or super-people on Earth would be inclined to help her with were she to ask but she’s too blinded by vengeance to see the best path forward. Instead, she travels a path of spite on her way to retribution by means of planetary restoration via large-scale, bulk transfers of the elements like air and water. Her plan doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, even with comic book science and logic. Zawe Ashton doesn’t really have a lot to work with here and it shows. Dar-Benn is all bulging eyes and teeth grinding through bad bridgework. It’s like she went to the Chancellor Gowron School of Acting. She’s very shouty and one-note, a portrayal that is nearly as flat as the pictures and drawings on Kamala’s bedroom walls.
The Marvels is nice to look at. DaCosta has a fresh eye. The various visuals of alien cityscapes are inspired, and unique, especially the smooth and curving architecture of the Skrull colony. The innovative and complex fight choreography constructed around the triple-teleportation gimmick is used with great imagination. The effects, from the disparate planetary designs, the degraded hex-fields of the hyperspace thresholds and the near-instantaneous, multi-system jump-trips are all rendered tightly. Carol’s ship is very cool, looks comfortable and feels lived in. There is a clear graphic delineation between the power sets of the three heroes.
While much of the dangling fruit from the Disney+ earlier work is plucked, there are some glaring exceptions. Again, there is no mention of the Vision and some through-lines from the Ms. Marvel plot are left untouched.
The movie’s brisk pace glides over some sloppy writing. The consequences of some scenes seem forgotten mere moments later. The mid-credit sequence opens up a huge can of worms. The Marvels is also weird as fuck in certain places with one beat being particularly ludicrous. This reviewer does not intend to visit the planet of ugly hats any time soon. That being said, The Marvels is a lark. It’s a good-time, popcorn-crunching return to fine form for the MCU. There are cats. In space. Check it out.
The Marvels is in theatres 11/10/23
Nick Fury was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.
Carol Danvers was created by Roy Thomas and Gene Colan.
Monica Rambeau was created by Roger Stern and John Romita, Jr.
Kamala Khan was created by Sana Amanat, Stephen Whacker, G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona and Jaime McKelvie.
Dar-Benn was created by Ron Marz and Ron Lim.
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Brian Isaacs - Executive Editor / Publisher