Rating: PG-13 | Runtime: 105 minutes
Release Date: November 10th, 2023 (USA)
Studio: Marvel Studios / Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Director(s): Nia DaCosta
Writer(s): Nia DaCosta and Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik

Grab Kamala now or she’s not gonna finish high school!

If there’s one good thing about the zeitgeist all but dismissing the fact that The Marvels even exists, it’s me not getting the mid-credits sequence spoiled two months after it debuted. I feel like that moment was the sort of fan service game-changer that would have been ruined before opening night earlier in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s tenure. Which is ironic since Nia DaCosta’s film most closely resembles that early period—episodically self-contained and character-driven.

It just makes the backlash that much more perplexing … or telling if the real reason audiences passed was Disney daring to center three women as if doing so is any different than the countless other chapters centering three men. I mean, we know the difference. The ones centering three men always had a woman on the periphery. The misogynists could point to her and say, “See! It’s inclusive.” without having to *GASP* pay attention to her. That’s a bridge too far.

Fans of “Ms. Marvel” (like me) should have a great time with this team-up because despite the heavier moments of Carol Danvers (Brie Larson) and Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) reuniting after decades apart, the bigger focus is on Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) meeting her idol. All that unchained exuberance that kept bubbling to the surface during the TV show whenever she fan-girled over Captain Marvel is increased further when she gets to fan-girl over her in-person. It’s so much fun because Vellani is so much fun.

As for the story: it’s straightforward. Big Bad (Zawe Ashton’s Dar-Benn, making the MCU a family affair considering her husband is Tom Hiddleston) wants to destroy worlds to simultaneously save her own and get revenge on its destroyer (Carol “The Annihilator” Danvers). The power she needs to travel between them comes from the other half of Kamala’s matching set of bangles, so the start of her plan conveniently quantum entangles the titular “Marvels” together due to Khan, Danvers, and Rambeau all having powers dealing with light. If one activates her abilities, she switches places with the other.

So, it’s a race. If the trio (collaborating with Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury—the man you don’t have to pay attention to) can guess where Dar-Benn is heading next, they can try and stop her. They’ll need to learn how to be a team, clear the air of the baggage that exists between them, and remember that it’s never too late to make right that which you made wrong (even if the MCU yet again misses an opportunity to truly unpack this notion). With cool special effects (the transporting fights are wild), fantastic humor (DaCosta shares writing credit with Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik), and a litter of Flerkens, there’s little to dislike.

But this is America where half the country misreads its art in ways that make them believe they’re the good guys and thus must always be represented as such to reinforce the belief that they matter. So, having four women leads (the heroes and villain) in a movie with a musical break surely got them even more bent out of shape. While it’s funny to watch them implode, though, it’s a tragedy when the product fails to shut them up monetarily. Hopefully Kevin Feige sees through the noise and doesn’t let this latest box office hiccup unfairly sideline good people.

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(L-R): Iman Vellani as Ms. Marvel/Kamala Khan, Brie Larson as Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers, and Teyonah Parris as Captain Monica Rambeau in Marvel Studios’ THE MARVELS. Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. © 2023 MARVEL.