Captain Marvel is the newest character to be introduced in the MCU. Her high power level is key to overcoming Thanos, so her inclusion in Endgame was inevitable. Marvel needed a way to introduce her to the audience, and this film serves that purpose while tying up some old story-lines from Phase 1.
Story summary: Carol Danvers becomes one of the universe’s most powerful heroes when Earth is caught in the middle of a galactic war between two alien races.
The film is set sometime in the 1990’s, which leads to a whole lotta nostalgia feels. All of the music is from that era. You had a lot of nods to cultural references too which was fun to find. The de-aging process for Fury is amazing. The technology has come a long ways and Samuel L Jackson actually doesn’t look ridiculous! You forget that he isn’t really that young. Clark Gregg’s Agent Coulson didn’t look as good in his de-aging, but he is only in the film for a few scenes.
The visual effects and sound design were top notch as expected from ILM (although if you stay through the credits it seems that Disney farms out VFX work to a couple dozen studios lol). There are some drawn out action scenes that are set in space that really had me smiling from ear to ear. The effects and design work were just so good. It really makes it worth watching in IMAX.
The first act of the film had me drawn in between the interspecies war with the Kree and Skrull. The dynamics in the team that Carol Danvers is in get you introduced to some of those characters, but then the story throws her character to Earth circa 1990. We don’t see any of the Kree team again until the last act of the film.
Carol Danvers and Nick Fury quickly get teamed up in the plot through SHIELD’s knowledge of her crash landing. They form a fun team up that really is some of the best work that Samuel Jackson has put into the character since Winter Soldier.
The story itself is fun and engaging. We find out Carol’s past, and how she got her powers. The humor is pretty good throughout which helps because Brie Larson plays the character so stiff at times. I get it though as she was playing a soldier character.
The Stan Lee nod was great – nice and short but the audience I was with liked it. I’m not going to spoil anything here, but my favorite side character in this one is Goose! Gotta love Goose.
This film serves as a tie-in with Phase 1 of the MCU and sets up Captain Marvel for her entry in Endgame in April. It makes a lot of changes to the source material, including a huge change for the Skrull. Not sure if I like it for now, we will have to see where it goes.
I give Captain Marvel a 7/10
Maxwell Reviews 