Captain Marvel (2019)

Although it took Marvel more than a decade to make a movie about a heroine —and they probably made it only because they needed her in End Game— and the web filled with negative reviews earlier this week, I'm a Marvel ho and I love Brie Larson and I'm also a woman so of course I went seeing Captain Marvel. And I had pretty high expectations about it, even though I was said to lower them. 

Set in 1995, the story begins on the planet Hala with Vers (Brie Larson) training with her mentor, Yon-Rogg (Jude Law). They soon go on a mission to rescue an undercover Kree operative who infiltrated a group of Skrulls, shapeshifting aliens who have been fighting with Krees for centuries, but it turns out it was an ambush, Skrulls leader Talos (Ben Mendelsohn) captures Vers and tries to extract information. Instead, he revives some of her memories, she manages to escape and crashlands on planet Earth, where she joins forces with Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) to discover who she really is and to stop the Skrulls from getting an experimental engine designed by Dr. Wendy Lawson (Annette Benning).

After a pretty bad start —I don't know if it was just me, but the beginning was so tedious and uninteresting—, and despite the many plot holes and the fact that there's simply too much going on to fit in a two-hour film and because of it, it often feels clumsy and rushed, the story eventually becomes interesting and engaging and the major twist, while slightly predictable, is nicely pulled off.

As for the main character, there's something about Vers/Carol Danvers that didn't work for me. While I liked the way the filmmakers introduced her past —and I loved that she is just as clueless about it as us, the audience— and I adored Brie Larson's sassy and charming performance, I just didn't feel an emotional attachment to her. I rooted for her because I liked her, despite the character's striking arrogance, but when the film finished it felt like I still didn't know her. Also, her relationship with some of the supporting characters just didn't feel right —the friendship between Carol and Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch) doesn't feel real; the relationship between Carol and Maria's daughter, Monica (Akira Akbar), on the other hand, feels way more genuine and warm.

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

The supporting characters, on the other hand, are quite interesting, specifically the twist they put on Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury. He is not the serious man we saw in the previous MCU movies, he is more relaxed, trusting, and has this sarcastic attitude that fits Jackson like a glove. The Skrulls, despite their lack of everything really as they have no character, they are fun and Ben Mendelsohn is terrific as Talos and manages to give the character that complexity the script denied him.

While I wasn't a fan of the editing which at times reminded me of a Best Editing winner I do not want to mention, the special effects are great, for the most —the de-aging is really impressive and you would never notice it if you didn't know the cast—, the soundtrack is great, and the action scenes are quite good —I don't know whether it was intentional or not, but I liked that 90s spy movie vibe they have. Not to mention how hilarious the film is —there wasn't a lot of people at my 2:45pm screening, but it sounded like everyone was having a really nice time, adults and kids alike.