The Captain Marvel Movie Review!

(Last week I took a lovely spring break day and spent it in the local theater. First I watched Captain Marvel with a chum and later that afternoon I caught the new Shazam movie with another friend. Today and tomorrow I will present my reviews which are spoiler rich so tread gently.)

Captain Marvel was a movie deeply embedded in the rich Marvel mythology and added to that richness with some very sharp and well-defined characters of its own. In fact you might well say that we now know why this whole gaggle of movies is called "The Marvel Universe".

I'm an original Captain Marvel fan and went to this flick with my eyes and ears sharp for reference to Mar-Vell. We got them, but not at all like I imagined. In the cinematic Marvel universe Mar-Vell is a woman portrayed by the gorgeous Annette Bening. She is a Kree who has decided to act against the sprawling military empire of her people by trying to help Skrull refugees and develop faster-than-light technology to do so. She is stopped in her mission on Earth and killed but her Earthling partner Carol Danvers is not, but bereft of memory taken to Hala and made into a warrior. We learn that all this fuss was to tap the FTL energy which had found a home inside the young Danvers. She is made to think she is a Kree and that's where the story begins.

This is not my Captain Marvel by much any means, but there are lots of intriguing echoes as the narrative unwinds. This story is set in the 90's before the events of Iron Man which ignited the Marvel Universe story and we meet younger versions of Nick Fury and Agent Colson. The former is not quite so cynical as he is in the current day, but then that's likely true of most of us.  I loved how he and Carol had a true partnership, she in no fashion even for a second seeking his approval. She is her own woman even when she's not sure who she is.

And that's the grand message here. Captain Marvel is a superhero movie for girls and a great one. The sense of empowerment developed by the end of the tale is enormous and even an old fossil of a male like me could take note of it.

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