Captain Marvel Review

Captain Marvel Review

Brie Larson as Captain Marvel swept into theaters today and my head is still in overdrive as to where I should start with this movie. First off, my thoughts on it are this: it was a good movie, but had its share of flaws. I will go into as much detail as I can without spoiling anything from the movie.

One of the things that I had major concerns about for this movie was surprisingly Brie Larson's performance. From the trailers alone I was not fully convinced that she was a good pick for the role and the way she delivered her lines in those trailers caused a bit of concern in me. After watching around the first 20 minutes of the movie I was satisfied with her performance. I was worried that she couldn't portray Captain Marvel's personality and characteristics well but she managed to prove me wrong at almost every turn. I still think that there could have been a better selection for the role of Carol Danvers, but Brie Larson's Oscar pedigree really stood out to me. But that was mainly due to me not believing in her enough from the start. I will be the first to say, I was wrong about her.

Fair or not, the first comparison that has to come to mind is, "Is it like Wonder Woman?" For me, the answer is no. Both movies are the first female oriented big budget superhero movies for their cinematic universes and one can't help but try and compare. Right now I would say that Wonder Woman is a better movie all around, despite the fact that I think Brie Larson in Captain Marvel had a better performance than Gal Gadot did in Wonder Woman. But the key differences between the two were from everything else.

A lot of the landmines that Wonder Woman managed to avoid in the writing process were stepped on by Captain Marvel. Certain lines from the movie did feel like they were pushing a Girl Power agenda and at times it felt too forced. For instance there were things in the movie that I figured out at the beginning of the movie due to Carol Danvers being a woman in the 80's/90's but when the movie later blatantly tells you what was already easy to figure out, it made it seem like they had an agenda to it. Even the music choices throughout the movie support this agenda and at times made it feel kind of heavy handed. When Wonder Woman came out, many praised it for it's lack of blatant female empowerment tropes that might have felt forced in at times. I'm not saying female empowerment is bad, just that when it's so in your face it can feel like they are trying to shove an idea down your throat.

Another thing that bothered me at times was the CGI. During certain CGI intensive scenes, people would sometimes look like they were made of rubber and came off as extremely robotic. It was to the point that it took me out of the experience quite a bit during those scenes. There was actually one time where they literally reused the same shot from earlier in the movie and it really caught my eye and had me shaking my head in the theater.The effects for Captain Marvel's powers were pretty good and made her look a lot cooler when she was using them.

The jokes in this movie were funny for the most part. There were a few times that gave me a good chuckle but there were also times where the punchline was predictable and I sat there in the theater while everyone else around me laughed.

There were other things that I had issues with from a writing perspective but that would get into spoiler territory and I don't want to spoil anything for those who read this. I would say, if you were interested in this movie before, watch it for yourself and decide on what you think for yourself. According to Rotten Tomatoes, there is a huge divide between what critics believe and what the general audience believes. For me, I sit somewhere around the middle.

Right now, after getting out of the theater, I would give it an 8 / 10. A solid movie but could have been better and had a lot of potential to do better but came up a bit short.

A side note: The first credit scene is good and will hype up anyone looking forward to Avengers: End Game. But that's just my two cents. Thank you for reading.