7 Things You Should Know about Captain Marvel before Seeing the Movie
Pop quiz: when Captain Marvel's logo popped up on Nick Fury's pager in the post-credits scene of "Avengers: Infinity War" did you react
or
Be honest! I was the former while my husband was like,
And he's not alone: Captain Marvel as we know her is a pretty recent phenomenon. When the first Avengers movie came out, she wasn't even Captain Marvel yet! Coupling that with the notorious secrecy surrounding the MCU, I don't blame anyone for being like, "Okay . . . ? Why should we care about her?" So here are 7 facts about who Carol Danvers is and why Nick Fury can count on her to whip Thanos' purple behind:*
*Do you think his butt has ridges in it like his chin? I refuse to Google this.
1.) Her powers are flight, super strength, and energy
"Energy" here doesn't mean she's perky and loves coffee--although she does:
--but rather that she has the energy of a star (hence her eight-pointed star emblem) that she can call upon to make laser-light beams with her hands. When she's in what I'm calling her Avatar state,
it's basically the same thing Thor does with lightning, but with the sun. I don't care how this scene is presented in the movie, my mind will start playing "Immigrant Song" when she's like this.
From 1967 - 2012, Captain Marvel was, well, a dude. This is not to say that Captain Marvel is transgender--though, Marvel Comics, if you haven't already written a trans superhero, GET! ON! THAT!--but from 1968 - 2012, Carol Danvers was Ms. Marvel. (Not to be confused with, of course, DC's Captain Marvel, now known as Shazam!)
But then Captain Marvel's commanding officer tries to kill Carol Danvers to get to him. Captain Marvel shields Carol Danvers in the blast and she gains some of his Kree genetic superpowers in the process, becoming Ms. Marvel. Ms. Marvel was Captain Marvel's sidekick until the mid-1970's, when she got her own comic and eclipsed Captain Marvel in popularity.
From the 1970's to 2012, Marvel Comics kept killing off Captain Marvel, only, in true comic fashion, to bring him back. In 2012 during the Avengers vs. the X-Men event, Captain Marvel sacrifices himself to save the Kree race. Carol Danvers, long since broken up with him but touched by his heroism, takes on the Captain Marvel mantle and changes her costume to reflect his Kree heritage, with the 8-pointed star and mohawk helmet that resembles his. However, she keeps her Ms. Marvel sash as a nod to her history, itself a nod to her first costume:
(Sidenote: I know you can buy a belly-baring bodysuit from like Forever 21 these days, but I hate seeing it in a superhero costume. It's like a big sign pointing to, "Hi! My essential internal organs are RIGHT HERE!")
Since Jude Law was cast to play Mar-Vell/Dr. Lawson, it's safe to assume that the movie is going to stay pretty close to this origin story. Judging by the memory-wipe scenes in the trailer, I also wonder if they'll sprinkle some of Carol Danvers' Binary storyline for garnishment. (Binary is Ms. Marvel + horrific torture to tease out her powers = Dark Phoenix, in so many words.)
Another continuity suggests that the lady Captain Marvel was urged by Captain America to take on the name, and she goes through with it in memory of her late friend Helen, a fellow Air Force pilot. (Helen is not the other Air Force pilot we see in the trailers. That person is Maria Rambeau, who, besides having a baller last name, might become the superhero Photon, who also has energy powers.)
3.) Her cat is an alien
Goose (called Chewie in the comics) is a Flerken, which is an alien that contains voids where it holds a bunch of stuff like tentacles and egg sacs--basically Mary Poppins' purse meets a xenomorph--and takes the form of a cat because wouldn't you? A popular fan theory speculates that Goose is how Nick Fury loses his eye, and judging by that picture above, Nick Fury is lucky he got away with his life after messing with Goose.
4.) War Machine is her boo thang
In the comics, Captain Marvel and War Machine are boo'ed up, which has interesting implications for the MCU since Colonel Rhodes is such a well-established character there. Even more interesting for implications is that in the comics there's a second Civil War, this time dealing with a superhero Ulysses who can see the future. Captain Marvel takes Ulysses' side, and Tony Stark (how is he always in the middle of these things?) doesn't. Colonel Rhodes takes his girlfriend's side and dies in the ensuing battle, which . . . hoo boy. But then Ulysses predicts that the Hulk will kill thousands of people, and Hawkeye preemptively kills Bruce Banner to prevent this, which, HOO BOY. (But I guess after Thanos-snap, MCU fans can't be surprised by anything anymore . . .)
5.) She's an Avenger
While not an OG Avenger, she's been an Avenger since the 70's, and when other characters in the comics talk about her, they say, "Oh, Captain Marvel, the Avenger?" Granted, a lot of people have been in the Avengers at various times--shoot, even I can't rule out that I haven't been an Avenger (maybe, like Captain Marvel, my memory's been wiped, I don't know)--but Captain Marvel is fairly consistently an Avenger, to the point where they staged an intervention for her when her alcoholism got bad (she turned to alcohol because Mystique murdered her boyfriend and she was date-raped by her time-traveling son--long story, hopefully the movie won't go into that).
6.) She's a Guardian of the Galaxy
Captain Marvel also often teams up with the Guardians of the Galaxy--that Goose comic above features Rocket Raccoon. Because of this and her Avengers status, some MCU fans are saying she could be a good bridge between the Guardians and the Avengers, because we saw what happened when they interacted without a mediator *glares at Peter Quill.*
Could be interesting in Avengers: Endgame if Peters Quill and Parker are un-ashed and they interact with Captain Marvel, because Peter Quill is aggressively late 70's/early 80's, Captain Marvel is so 90's her official movie site looks like a Geocities page, and Peter Parker is endearingly Gen Z (to the point where there's a tongue-in-cheek Tumblr fan theory that he based his Spider-Man costume off the "It is Wednesday, my dudes" Vine)
--in conclusion, give me an entire movie about just Peter Quill, Peter Parker, and Carol Danvers arguing about pop culture.
7.) She's an agent of SHIELD
Yeah, Captain Marvel just has her hand in every Marvel pot, doesn't she? She was even in the X-Men for a time, which the MCU, and I, will gloss over for the time being.
As a young woman, Carol Danvers joined the Air Force and became a fighter pilot (hence why the movie changed her cat's name from Chewie, after Chewbacca in "Star Wars," to Goose, from "Top Gun"), and then became a spy with the CIA, and then started working for NASA. As you do. So when she leaves the Avengers and joins SHIELD to become Warbird, they welcome her with open arms.
This definitely explains why Nick Fury is so buddy-buddy with her, and dayyyyyum he must think really highly of her if he lost his eye to her cat and he still thinks to page her when the Snapture happens!
A Note on the Skrull:
Remember in one of the trailers when Captain Marvel punched an old lady in the face on a subway car and everyone was like, "Um . . . y'all sure Captain Marvel's the feminist hero you're making her out to be?" She punched her because the old lady is a Skrull, a shape-shifting race of aliens who want to take over the world and sow discord among superhero teams. And I don't blame them for wanting to look like humans, considering they look like the lovechild of Thanos and the Green Goblin:
Ah yes, the noble Ballchinians from Men In Black . . . anyway, to make a long story short, they are the Capulets to the Kree's Montagues, and Captain Marvel will probably be their Mercutio--initially aligned with the Montagues before she goes "A pox on both your houses!" and peaces out.
What questions do you have about Captain Marvel? Who is your favorite Captain Marvel character and why is it Goose?
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