Captain Marvel | Film Review

Hey Guys x

If you know my blog, then you know how huge a fan I am of all superhero movies, but particularly Marvel and the MCU - so this review was inevitable, if slightly late!

Vers (Brie Larson) is a Kree/alien warrior who finds herself in a battle between her own people, and Skrulls (shape-shifting aliens). But, dealing with the fact that she has no memories proves too much for Vers, who wants to know exactly who she was before she became who she is. So when she lands on Earth, and begins to have flashbacks, she uses the help of S.H.I.E.L.D agent Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) to put together the mystery of her past, while also discovering how to beat the Skrulls for good.

I have to say, one of my least favourite things about writing film reviews is that it's impossible to go back and change your opinion when you see the film later in life. And because of that, I wasn't going to review this film, because I feel like if I see it maybe in a year, my mind might change. But for now, this is my current review.

I wasn't a huge fan of the film.

I'll talk about the good things first, though.

There was quite a bit of humour in the film that I really enjoyed. It mostly came from a specific group of people, but I don't want to spoil anything so I can't say. But there were funny moments that I didn't expect.

Having seen all the other Marvel films, I loved seeing young Nick Fury! He has that trademark Nick Fury humour (which might just be Samuel L. Jackson humour), but when you look at the other films, you can see the way that creating and going through everything that he went through with the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D has completely changed the character, and that was great.

My favourite characters, other than Fury, were Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch) and her daughter Monica (Akira Akbar), because not only do they add a lot to the film, but they're the most relatable, realistic characters, and if I had to see any of the movies characters in a second movie, it would be them.

And the last thing. You may have noticed in my description of the film that I didn't call Brie Larson's character either 'Captain Marvel' or 'Carol Danvers', and that was something that the movie did really well. The character, who I called 'Vers', has three personas and they are all extremely important stages of her development. In addition, they're actually all separate characters, to the point where you can prefer one to the other.

But then, there were some things I didn't like.

For a start, something that I still don't understand (and if anyone can explain it to me, please do) is the whole tesseract thing. I don't think this is a spoiler, and I'll do my best not to say anything too specific, but as far as I was concerned, it was frozen with Steve Rogers years before 'Captain Marvel' took place. Before that, I had just assumed that it was always in the hands of Howard Stark etc. Is that not the case? I'd love to know what happened between these two times, but thinking about what could have happened kind of took me out of the movie a bit.

And then there's the plot in general, which I wasn't really a fan of. The big 'twist' of the movie was something I guessed pretty much right away (actually, from watching the trailer), and so it was spoiled for me. But the story itself didn't seem that prominent. Like, I enjoyed the aspect of Vers not having past memories, but apart from that, I didn't really care about anything else that was going on. There were a few different storylines, but as mentioned, the only one I actually wanted to know about was Vers' backstory and who she was before.
Another thing that took me aback was the fact that she starts the movie with powers. I guess, from watching other Origin stories, I was expecting to see someone as either a human or alien with little to no powers, who gains their powers in whatever way, and then by the end has this huge moment of growth. And to 'Captain Marvel's credit, it tried to do this. It tried to give her that moment when everything changes, but because she was already so powerful, it didn't mean as much.
A lot of people are comparing this to Superman, and saying that you can't be annoyed that Vers is so powerful if you're not annoyed about Clark. But from my point of view, Superman is a character of iconic proportions. Even if you've never seen a film or series about him, you know about Clark Kent in some way. But I knew nothing of Captain Marvel/Carol/Vers and it took a long time in her origin story for me to really learn anything about her that made me warm to her.

Another thing that's being praised about the film is the soundtrack - which is a group of really great 90s tracks. And while I enjoy most of those songs individually, I didn't like them within the film. Or, rather, I thought that they were played at the wrong moments. It was really jarring to be about to see one of the most important, serious fight scenes in the movie start off with a poppy 90s song that just didn't fit with the mood at all. Like, when Vers is in a bar or something, it works really well, but apart from that, it felt like the movie was just trying to throw in some info about their knowledge of 90s music, and I just didn't want it.

Like all superhero movies, one of the most important things is the villain. The villain of this movie was weak, that's the best way I can describe it. Using her powers, Vers could have defeated them so easily, and in the real world, it wouldn't even have been a thing, because she would have taken them out in five seconds. We don't know enough about her back story as Vers to know why she had an internal conflict about the villain, because we didn't get to spend much time with the villain(s).

And as a final, extremely petty thing, the way that Nick Fury lost his eye, after something truly epic being set up in 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier', really disappointed me. It disappoints me every time I think of it.
Also, you might have noticed that I didn't mention the cat, Goose, in the review. That's literally because I have nothing to say about it. The movie would have been pretty much the same without it.

Overall, this is Marvel's first female superhero, and she is undeniably powerful, so I would never try to discourage anyone from seeing this film. Personally, though, it wasn't the best superhero origin story I've seen.

6/10

Lou