MCU films have always been kid cartoons for older audiences, but even in this line of films Captain Marvel falls flat.
I didn't expect any nuance when seeing this film, but you know the film just takes the cheapest, easiest route possible when it decides that our characters are just brainwashed and lied all along instead of having some sort of agency in their restrained life. This kind plot robs the character from their complexity and dilemmas they have to face--in few ways displayed in Spiderman: Homecoming--and makes the struggle they have to face almost non-existent. Part of the problem is having the film plays like some sort of MTV clips: you have some moment defining scenes edited here and there, but there is no thread that joins all them together.
The amnesia plot could have been used to help working on Brie Larson's character, but they end up using it only for the big final reveal that "everything is hidden within you all along". Unlike what has been a staple in MCU origin story films, there is no struggle in Carol Denvers--there is nothing to overcome. Just click a button (or destroy one) and then you go unleash the fantastical power within. Perhaps it is the same reason why in the last third of the film the climax feels really abrupt and shows us not an empowered character but a terribly overpowered, picture perfect character that serves as nothing but power fantasies.
For a film that wants to get the empowerment/feminism message spread across, it ends up jailing Brie Larson with a plot that makes the character uninteresting and unconvincing in the most bland way possible. Carol Denvers is supposed to be this smart, determined woman, but she comes out as a wooden facade of the cool outfit she is wearing. "Feminism" remains a shallow part in the film, perhaps as braindead as the film's opponent, approached in such a tacky way like the scene where Larson confronts (steals) a catcaller's bike or sending mansplaining alien to outerspace.
It's unfortunate because the buddy cop section between Larson and Samuel L. Jackson is the best part of the film--with better character and better written story, it could be much more entertaining. It has flashy scenes and the many outfits can help boosting Disney's toys however, so there is that.
Review by Pradipa PRBlockedParent2020-02-02T11:42:53Z
MCU films have always been kid cartoons for older audiences, but even in this line of films Captain Marvel falls flat.
I didn't expect any nuance when seeing this film, but you know the film just takes the cheapest, easiest route possible when it decides that our characters are just brainwashed and lied all along instead of having some sort of agency in their restrained life. This kind plot robs the character from their complexity and dilemmas they have to face--in few ways displayed in Spiderman: Homecoming--and makes the struggle they have to face almost non-existent. Part of the problem is having the film plays like some sort of MTV clips: you have some moment defining scenes edited here and there, but there is no thread that joins all them together.
The amnesia plot could have been used to help working on Brie Larson's character, but they end up using it only for the big final reveal that "everything is hidden within you all along". Unlike what has been a staple in MCU origin story films, there is no struggle in Carol Denvers--there is nothing to overcome. Just click a button (or destroy one) and then you go unleash the fantastical power within. Perhaps it is the same reason why in the last third of the film the climax feels really abrupt and shows us not an empowered character but a terribly overpowered, picture perfect character that serves as nothing but power fantasies.
For a film that wants to get the empowerment/feminism message spread across, it ends up jailing Brie Larson with a plot that makes the character uninteresting and unconvincing in the most bland way possible. Carol Denvers is supposed to be this smart, determined woman, but she comes out as a wooden facade of the cool outfit she is wearing. "Feminism" remains a shallow part in the film, perhaps as braindead as the film's opponent, approached in such a tacky way like the scene where Larson confronts (steals) a catcaller's bike or sending mansplaining alien to outerspace.
It's unfortunate because the buddy cop section between Larson and Samuel L. Jackson is the best part of the film--with better character and better written story, it could be much more entertaining. It has flashy scenes and the many outfits can help boosting Disney's toys however, so there is that.