Judging the current state of the MCU, this film could go
either way. And I’m not even factoring in the myriad of behind-the-scenes
issues the franchise has run into in recent years, from Jonathan Majors going to court, to recurring audience fatigue from the extent of the MCU
assembly line, to how said assembly line has grown so big that they are now
running into the issue of losing in competition with
themselves, given
how the second season of Loki basically eclipsed this film’s release.
No, I’m just talking in regards to what Phase Five has
already given us this year alone. On one hand, there’s Quantumania, a clearly
derivative and bizarrely uninteresting entry that felt very
made-by-committee. And on the other, there’s GOTG Vol. 3, which succeeds
because it is the product of a singular vision, giving the overarching
franchise a booster shot of individual creativity that seems to be increasingly
lacking post-Phase Three. James Gunn isn’t the only auteur to work on the MCU
(Taika Waititi, Ryan Coogler, and Sam Raimi definitely fit into that
category), but Vol. 3 (in my opinion) benefited the most from having that kind
of distinguishable artistic voice behind it. That Gunn has now jumped over to
heading DC Films has been taken as a sign that the kind of identifiable
uniqueness that Vol. 3 showed amongst its contemporaries isn’t likely to
repeated by Marvel any time soon.
With all that in mind, I wasn’t sure what to expect from
this. I mean, I liked the first Captain Marvel (although I’m starting to chalk
that up to being familiar with Brie Larson as an actor long before that
film became a talking point, which I’d wager a guess isn’t the case for the
Johnny-hate-latelys that have been on her arse since), but I am also starting
to run a bit ragged on the MCU myself. It’s been heading towards the continuity
threshold for a while now, where everything is so interconnected that it can
feel unapproachable unless you’ve done all the homework beforehand, this
film being no different. Along with the first Captain Marvel, this also has
ties to WandaVision, Ms. Marvel, Secret Invasion, and to a lesser extent Thor: Love And Thunder and Hawkeye. I’ll admit that I haven’t seen all of the lead-in
material, and quite frankly I’ve felt less inclined to keep up with it all as
the years go on, but I’m still willing to give this film a chance. And frankly,
I’m glad I did.
