Captain Marvel 2 / The Marvels

[Spectral Knight]

I'd thankfully avoided spoilers, which is good, as they were probably the most interesting parts of a movie, that on the whole, was a bit shit.

I feel really bad for Larson, Parris and Vellani, but I think the script, editing and direction has done them no favours with this at all. I thoroughly enjoyed CM and never understood the criticism Larson has faced for her portrayal of Carol, thought Parris as Rambeau was great in WandaVision and whilst I've got complaints with Ms Marvel as a show (which was inconsistent to say the least), Vellani was actually decent as Kamala in terms of capturing her spirit, but collectively they've been let down by the Marvels.

Firstly every great Marvel film has a great antagonist; and those that have been most middling are when these have been lazily constructed or lacking in character or unclear motivations. Zawe Ashton's Dar-Benn is amongst the worst of all MCU threats. Not helped by the idea of a dying Hala star and Kree civil war coming from nowhere. Also, the set up of Carol killing off the Supreme Intelligence should have been a pretty freaking big deal that was relegated to a flashback...? Did this happen pre or post Snap? Doesn't matter, it's just exposition... What makes Dar-Benn special? We don't know. Why/how did she find the Quantum Band? We don't know. Shallow as anything with gaps barely hinted at in exposition. Also, did she ever really feel a threat to the three protagonists.

Then... Fury? Are we supposed to believe this is the same Nick from Secret Invasion? Talk about a personality shift. Normally Sam L is one of the most reliable MCU actors but he was reduced to herding cats in this. Talking about Secret Invasion, wouldn't it have been useful to have Carol on the line during this...? Oh, Fury was in contact with her all along. Eh.

The choreography between the quantum entangled leads was fun and added some interest during the fight choreography but it was mostly against faceless Kree waves.

I really hoped the negative reviews were an overreaction or a bit of a review bomb thing like CM got, but this was bang average at best, and that's being kind. I know there's expectations of familiarity with the MCU, and I've watched everything in it and still came out of The Marvels being simultaneously surprised at the prior knowledge needed and yet frustrated at how things that should be major continuity issues are relegated to after thoughts or just not even referenced at all (the last time we saw Danvers before the Quantum Entanglement she was meeting Banner, Wong and Shang-Chi about the Ten Rings being a beacon to something. Was this related to the Quantum Bands or not is anyone’s guess at this stage).

[P-90]

I'd thankfully avoided spoilers, which is good, as they were probably the most interesting parts of a movie, that on the whole, was a bit shit.

I feel really bad for Larson, Parris and Vellani, but I think the script, editing and direction has done them no favours with this at all. I thoroughly enjoyed CM and never understood the criticism Larson has faced for her portrayal of Carol, thought Parris as Rambeau was great in WandaVision and whilst I've got complaints with Ms Marvel as a show (which was inconsistent to say the least), Vellani was actually decent as Kamala in terms of capturing her spirit, but collectively they've been let down by the Marvels.

Firstly every great Marvel film has a great antagonist; and those that have been most middling are when these have been lazily constructed or lacking in character or unclear motivations. Zawe Ashton's Dar-Benn is amongst the worst of all MCU threats. Not helped by the idea of a dying Hala star and Kree civil war coming from nowhere. Also, the set up of Carol killing off the Supreme Intelligence should have been a pretty freaking big deal that was relegated to a flashback...? Did this happen pre or post Snap? Doesn't matter, it's just exposition... What makes Dar-Benn special? We don't know. Why/how did she find the Quantum Band? We don't know. Shallow as anything with gaps barely hinted at in exposition. Also, did she ever really feel a threat to the three protagonists.

Then... Fury? Are we supposed to believe this is the same Nick from Secret Invasion? Talk about a personality shift. Normally Sam L is one of the most reliable MCU actors but he was reduced to herding cats in this. Talking about Secret Invasion, wouldn't it have been useful to have Carol on the line during this...? Oh, Fury was in contact with her all along. Eh.

The choreography between the quantum entangled leads was fun and added some interest during the fight choreography but it was mostly against faceless Kree waves.

I really hoped the negative reviews were an overreaction or a bit of a review bomb thing like CM got, but this was bang average at best, and that's being kind. I know there's expectations of familiarity with the MCU, and I've watched everything in it and still came out of The Marvels being simultaneously surprised at the prior knowledge needed and yet frustrated at how things that should be major continuity issues are relegated to after thoughts or just not even referenced at all (the last time we saw Danvers before the Quantum Entanglement she was meeting Banner, Wong and Shang-Chi about the Ten Rings being a beacon to something. Was this related to the Quantum Bands or not is anyone’s guess at this stage).

The Marvels is the latest Pitch Meeting subject by the always entertaining Ryan George, you actually brought up some of the same issues that he did.

[sambadaemon]

Given the relatively decent word-of-mouth (reviews are mediocre, but most comments I've seen here and elsewhere were somewhat positive) I decided to go and see this and yeah, I'd say it was probably an above-average movie, 7/10-ish or so. I saw one review say it was the worst MCU movie ever, which is ludicrous, it's not even the worst MCU movie of this year.

Iman Vellani was (of course) great, and Larson and Parris were pretty good. Both the song planet and the Flerkin escape pod scenes were great, really madcap moments that I wish we maybe had a bit more of. I really appreciate the short runtime (only 105 minutes!) as I've grown weary of the 2.5+ hour long slogfests in cinema recently. It's tough because while there was some parts I think needed more time/explanation, I also think the movie would've been weakened if it was longer, so not really sure what to take out.

One big drawback would be the editing, as it's clear this movie had a LOT of cutting done. A lot of stuff gets kinda skipped over and then explained in exposition later, which definitely made things feel a bit rough. The biggest hole I think is just all the Kree/Skrull background (I echo Milkshake's complaint here), as it is the movie doesn't give me a lot of reason to know/care what's going on... and since it's MCU, it always makes me wonder if there was an important plot point in a prior movie I don't remember or TV show I didn't watch. Carol killing the Supreme Intelligence and starting a Kree civil war definitely feels like something that should've happened on-screen instead of a flashback here. And I probably could've done without the now-overused multiverse angle, much as I enjoy seeing [REDACTED].

And the villain was one of the MCU's worst... I never got a clear sense of who she was, or what her motivation was - i.e. is she a religious zealot, truly believes what she's saying? Just motivated purely by personal revenge against Carol? Is she the overall leader of the Kree, or one warlord amongst many, so on and so forth. On top of that Zawe Ashton just seemed miscast for the role, as I could never really take her seriously as an intimidating leader type, instead she just looked kinda like a kid playing dress-up. (I haven't seen her in anything else so I have no idea if she's otherwise a good actress or not). Especially at the end when the main trio takes her on, I never for an instant felt she had a chance - it felt like Carol would mop the floor with her 1v1 and both Kamala and Monica could probably hold their own individually, so 3v1 was only ever gonna go one way.

So yeah, all in all a decently good movie, though I do wonder if there's an even better movie sitting on a cutting room floor somewhere at Marvel Studios.

About the editing: I went back and re-watched the trailers and there was at least one scene on the song planet that we saw in the trailers that didn't make the final cut.

[P-90]

Given the relatively decent word-of-mouth (reviews are mediocre, but most comments I've seen here and elsewhere were somewhat positive) I decided to go and see this and yeah, I'd say it was probably an above-average movie, 7/10-ish or so. I saw one review say it was the worst MCU movie ever, which is ludicrous, it's not even the worst MCU movie of this year.

Iman Vellani was (of course) great, and Larson and Parris were pretty good. Both the song planet and the Flerkin escape pod scenes were great, really madcap moments that I wish we maybe had a bit more of. I really appreciate the short runtime (only 105 minutes!) as I've grown weary of the 2.5+ hour long slogfests in cinema recently. It's tough because while there was some parts I think needed more time/explanation, I also think the movie would've been weakened if it was longer, so not really sure what to take out.

One big drawback would be the editing, as it's clear this movie had a LOT of cutting done. A lot of stuff gets kinda skipped over and then explained in exposition later, which definitely made things feel a bit rough. The biggest hole I think is just all the Kree/Skrull background (I echo Milkshake's complaint here), as it is the movie doesn't give me a lot of reason to know/care what's going on... and since it's MCU, it always makes me wonder if there was an important plot point in a prior movie I don't remember or TV show I didn't watch. Carol killing the Supreme Intelligence and starting a Kree civil war definitely feels like something that should've happened on-screen instead of a flashback here. And I probably could've done without the now-overused multiverse angle, much as I enjoy seeing [REDACTED].

And the villain was one of the MCU's worst... I never got a clear sense of who she was, or what her motivation was - i.e. is she a religious zealot, truly believes what she's saying? Just motivated purely by personal revenge against Carol? Is she the overall leader of the Kree, or one warlord amongst many, so on and so forth. On top of that Zawe Ashton just seemed miscast for the role, as I could never really take her seriously as an intimidating leader type, instead she just looked kinda like a kid playing dress-up. (I haven't seen her in anything else so I have no idea if she's otherwise a good actress or not). Especially at the end when the main trio takes her on, I never for an instant felt she had a chance - it felt like Carol would mop the floor with her 1v1 and both Kamala and Monica could probably hold their own individually, so 3v1 was only ever gonna go one way.

So yeah, all in all a decently good movie, though I do wonder if there's an even better movie sitting on a cutting room floor somewhere at Marvel Studios.

About the editing: I went back and re-watched the trailers and there was at least one scene on the song planet that we saw in the trailers that didn't make the final cut.

Though I can't remember a specific instance, I'm sure I've often got to the end of a movie and realised there was something in the trailer that wasn't in the final cut.
I do recall a couple of trailers being purposefully misleading where scenes that do appear are completely different to that in the film. The trailer for Infinity war shows a scene during the battle of Wakanda where the heroes all slowly run towards the camera, it features the Hulk as part of the group but of course in the film Banner can't change into the Hulk and wears the Hulkbuster armour during that battle.

[Spectral Knight]

I think the Infinity War thing was actually very different, and closer to the 'edits' found in the NWH trailer; it was deliberate changes to the footage used to avoid the spoiler of massive plot points. I don't necessarily think this is the same issue.

[P-90]

I think the Infinity War thing was actually very different, and closer to the 'edits' found in the NWH trailer; it was deliberate changes to the footage used to avoid the spoiler of massive plot points. I don't necessarily think this is the same issue.

Yeah, that's what I meant by purposefully misleading. And while I completely understand why they did what they did in the NWH trailer and have no issue with it, going through the trouble of adding the Hulk to the trailer for IW seems a bit much TBH.

[EvilMonkeyPope]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TGg0_xtLoA

[Spectral Knight]

I think that'd be a better movie.