"Houston, we have a problem."
Apollo 13 (1995) – Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks)
If this movie was set in the 90’s, there might be a sound-drop expected to accompany the following question. Isn’t it ironic that the movie whose title most closely matches the name of its powerhouse studio would be subject to such an anticipation of failure. Never in the recent history of Disney’s MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe in case you’re newly arrived on the planet) has a sequel to a blockbuster Marvel Movie been so dreaded.
Looking at it on paper, it’s reasonable to choose the title THE MARVELS over CAPTAIN MARVEL 2 - or as more recent naming conventions would have it, CAPTAIN MARVEL: SOMETHING ABOUT THE PLOT. Were this a more direct adaptation from the comics we might’ve gone with ANNIHILATION, GALACTIC STORM, or KREE/SKRULL WAR from among the many Marvel space sagas. A lot of them are Wars and there are already a few in the works, some of which are open secrets. It makes sense to go with MARVELS as the movie features the returning Brie Larson as Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel meeting super-fan Kamala Khan/Ms Marvel played by Iman Vellani fresh from her eponymous 2022 Disney+ series. Also joining the cast is Teyonah Parris, reprising her role of Monica Rambeau, a break-out character from Marvel’s first Disney+ series WandaVision (2021) and the original woman Captain Marvel.
Despite the power of an Oscar-winning actor and the appeal of characters from Marvel’s better received series, the 250-million-dollar movie is expected to bring in only $75-$80 million on its opening weekend. That’s less than ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA (2023) which earned a meager $104 million, or the $185 million DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS (2022) earned domestically. Not that the average viewer particularly cares about this. They're more concerned by the increasing price of seats and the decreased quality of the visual spectacle that they come to theaters to experience.
One audience in Texas had that experience early. For the first time ever, Marvel Studios hosted a test-screening for their movie; something that had been previously exclusively reserved for Disney employees, their families, and friends. The result was a swap in release dates with QUANTUMANIA (moving that movie forward in their schedule) and an additional release date change from a patriotic July to November. It was that scheduling shuffle which allowed for an extra four weeks of reshoots to be made in the hopes of bringing more coherence to what ought to be the origin of Marvels next cosmic franchise now that GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY: VOL. 3 (2023) brought that story arc to somewhat of a conclusion earlier this year.
To build seamlessly on the success of “Captain Marvel,” this movie could have still been set in the 90’s or the turn of the century. They could have explored the space/time relativity of faster than light travel, or what the captain was up to during the blip (that 5-year flash-forward which took place over AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019) and used to greatest effect in SPIDER-MAN: FAR FROM HOME (2020). Instead, director Nia DaCosta’s THE MARVELS unites Larson’s heroine with two other heroines, ostensibly named Marvel in a breezy 105 minute action/comedy. One of the complaints which won’t be leveled at this movie is that it’s too long. Others, however, have complained that DaCosta has already moved on to her next movie and apparently that’s not a good sign. But Wong Kar-wai did similar with CHUNGKING EXPRESS (1994) when ASHES OF TIME (1994) itself was in post-production.
“Space is boundless. It squashes a man's ego.”
Planet of the Apes (1968) – George Taylor (Charlton Heston)
Our review of CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) thoroughly covered the origins of what I’ll call the Marvel Copyright Wars. It briefly mentions the 1982 debut of Marvel’s second Captain Marvel, Monica Rambeau – in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man Annual #16 (August), only six months after the death of the original Captain Mar-Vell of the Kree empire; the first of perhaps two comic characters to die from cancer (The second being Dr. Jane Foster whose tale was told, in a most comedic fashion in THOR: LOVE & THUNDER (2022)).
Rambeau was created by writer Roger Stern and designed by second generation comics artist John Romita Jr. (his dad was responsible for much of how we see Spider-Man today). She arrived in New York City fully formed and garbed in costume so iconic it wouldn’t see redesign for several years. This African American Woman Superheroine showed up with her origin as backstory – told in flashback and fairly rote; super-science gone wrong. But of greater interest is the socio-political story behind the character of Rambeau herself. As a lieutenant in the New Orleans Harbor Patrol, she faced institutional difficulties in her ascension to the rank of captain within that system.
It turns out the ceiling for advancement in the superhero business is sky-high. This iteration of Captain Marvel would find herself leading the Avengers through several line-up changes and make use of multiple aliases; several of which are mentioned throughout the movie to delightful effect. But we should note an important yet almost invisible dimension to this trope-defying character, her super-power. Along with the critique on promotion bias which informed the character’s origin, she was among the first black superheroes to NOT possess electrical powers.
It’s a bizarre and often overlooked trope particularly among comics, but with the notable exception of BLACK PANTHER, lighting and electricity is so frequently used as a super-power for black superheroes it’s become cliche. The most iconic among them first appeared in his own title Black Lightning #1 (D.C. comics April 1977). Licensing shenanigans and copyright workarounds would see multiple versions of that character spawn (ie. Black Vulcan from The All-New Super Friends Hour 1977) until an official BLACK LIGHTNING tv show starring Cress Williams debuted on The CW January 16, 2018. A few of the other more superheroes which have seen adaptation on the small or large screen include Storm (Marvel Comics, Giant-Sized X-Men #1 1975), Bumblebee (DC comics Teen Titans #45 1976), Static (Milestone Comics/D.C. 1993) and Ultimate Spider-Man: Miles Morales (Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man #1 2011). So while this movie sidesteps that particular superhero trope, it trips over another, older science-fiction one. Fortunately, one of the MCU’s mutant gifts is for the slight-of-hand that keeps any one trope from sticking…like how death is often impermanent for certain comic characters.
“Space - the final frontier.”
Star Trek;: The Wrath of Khan (1982) – Spock (Leonard Nimoy)
"In Marvel Studios’ THE MARVELS, Carol Danvers aka Captain Marvel has reclaimed her identity from the tyrannical Kree and taken revenge on the Supreme Intelligence. But unintended consequences see Carol shouldering the burden of a destabilized universe. When her duties send her to an anomalous wormhole linked to a Kree revolutionary, her powers become entangled with that of Jersey City super-fan Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, and Carol’s estranged niece, now S.A.B.E.R. astronaut Captain Monica Rambeau. Together, this unlikely trio must team up and learn to work in concert to save the universe as The Marvels.”
What’s not indicated by that official synopsis is how many pages the borrowed from Gene Rodenberry. The cast of Ms. Marvel’s down-to-earth family is introduced to a brighter outer space. Gone are the flat blue and grays of early Marvel settings, replaced with a space-base and shuttlecraft perfectly at home in Star Fleet. It terms of design, it’s the sci-fi elements which look best; the greater MCU cosmos continues to prove to be colorful. However, jarringly, there are some superhero costume updates that unfortunately add extraneous detail to ill-fitted designs. There’s a kind of apologetic joke made about it and there’s one deep-cut of a costume adaptation which makes watching for the credit sequence worthy.
But the similarities to Star Trek don’t stop with the tech-design. Rather than adapt any of the above-mentioned space-sagas, this movie is quietly framed around some inter-planetary political truth and reconciliation processes between post-war space civilizations, as well as a serving of environmental crisis/remediation. As a bonus, it may not have been trouble with Tribbles, but the movie literally gets some good gags in. It’s an effective means of world building for the next phases of the MCU. The interaction between the movie’s three leads allows for plenty of plausible technobabble, expanding lore, explaining stakes and modeling qualities of heroism that go beyond fisticuffs. But worry not, because THE MARVELS have that covered as well.
"The loser must exile himself and his army to deep space for eternity"
The Transformers (1984) – Megatron (Frank Welker)
Back when we saw CAPTAIN MARVEL, we were delighted to note that the movie opened with a one-on-one fight – a sparring session between the lead character Carol Danvers and her mentor. As the movie progressed, this grounded fight scene was gradually replaced by increasing visual effects spectacle. Along with the battle among faceless hordes, it’s a trope that superheroes tend to have great difficulty in handling. At their worst, it devolves into actors grimacing while they point special effects at each other. That first CAPTAIN MARVEL movie made it more of a Star Wars ending by exploding Star Destroyers.
This movie takes a similar tack by frontloading fun fight scenes early on. Added to that there’s some power-staff fighting, perfectly appropriate coming from the man behind that Tonfa (a.k.a. Z6 Riot Control Baton) Stormtrooper FN-2199 put to great use in STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015). Added to that we get to see one of Marvel’s other iconic hammers knocking heads. Created by Jack Kirby, the Universal Weapon first appeared in the pages of The Fantastic Four issue 65 (May 1967) wielded by Ronan the Accuser (played by Lee Pace in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (2014). While not as sentient as Thor’s, this long-hafted hammer is a storied piece of Kree weaponry and is notable for its association with Marvel antagonists as compared to the variety of heroic weapons audiences continue to grow familiar with such as the aforementioned hammers, Cap’s shield and Hawkeye’s bow and arrows. Honorable mention can also go to DEADPOOL’s Katana (or Ninjado) and ELEKTRA’s Sai
Making interesting use of space displaced punches, palms and flying kicks is assistant stunt coordinator / fight coordinator Liang Yang and assistant fight coordinator Andy Lister. We last mentioned Liang in our review of DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS (2022). He leaped into a career in epic action scenes as stunt double to Pedro Pascal's Oberyn Martell in GAME OF THRONES (Season 4 Episode 8: 'The Mountain And The Viper' 2014). More recently he’s returned to the MISSION IMPOSSIBLE franchise as fight coordinator of DEAD RECKONING PART 1 (2023). It seems not even that that brutal bathroom brawl with Henry Cavill and Tom Cruise in MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE FALLOUT (2018) can hold him back.
Despite a film filled with cosmic power blasts and quantum-superpositioning, this duo make sure stunt doubles Joanna Bennett, Pamela Forster, Jessica Hooker, Rashid Phoenix, Hélène Tran and Jade Xu all got good workouts making their representative combatants look capable. There are some personality-revealing flourishes in those fights and a few surprises that had us wondering about the state of after-school wushu programs in the MCU’s Jersey City.
Maybe not surprising as British Stuntman Andy Lister also has wushu roots. Starting his training at age 13, he’s said to have been inspired by Jackie Chan and trained under coach John Staples, owner of the Dragon Wushu club based at Penketh High School. Regular trips to China for training at wushu centers there yielded results, By age 20 he earned medals at the Combat World Games in Derbyshire and earned a slot on Great Britain’s own wushu team.
You can find a recording of his changquan routine which earned a gold medal in the 2004 British Wushu Nationals on YouTube.
It was that same year a production company was asking around martial art schools for people to audition for a film. A good coach, Jon Staples put him forward for an audition. The role – a Ninja from the League of Shadows in BATMAN BEGINS (2008). The other fight coordinators involved include Trayan Milenov-Troy, Andrei Nazarenko who’d both got their share of epic action and sci-fi fights under their belt, just no record of wushu. And beyond the occasional barrel-role or butterfly kick it’s the accompanying themes of wude, xiákè & jiànxiá which shine through this tale of heroes at different points on their journey.
