A Few Thoughts On Captain Marvel (SPOILERS)

I went to see CAPTAIN MARVEL last night and really enjoyed it. Is it formulaic and kind of tropey? Absolutely. Is that a bad thing? Not even a little. Formulas and tropes are tools, if used correctly with the right twist, they are terrific. Twenty-one movies in, Marvel isn't going to fiddle too much with what works and does it very well with CAPTAIN MARVEL. While it's no WINTER SOLDIER or CIVIL WAR, it's a solid, middle of the pack entry. If you've seen my rating scale before (which I'm in the process of updating), that's not a bad thing.

At this point in the MCU, these movies are almost impossible to be considered stand alone, but it's done well enough so that you can watch it with little knowledge of the "world" at large. That being said, it does a lot of what it needed to do in the entire arc of the MCU, especially considering the events of INFINITY WAR. I wasn't a huge fan of INFINITY WAR. It was a terrific spectacle with some great moments that was intensely lazy at times when it shouldn't have been lazy. But that's for another time. CAPTAIN MARVEL was a rollicking good time with load of great action and comedy. As a guy that says all his genre work takes place in some version of the 90s, the 90s nostalgia was an added bonus.

CAPTAIN MARVEL is actually the first Marvel movie I watched in the theaters. I went out of my way to go because of the uproar around the movie, mostly because of the fanboys that had issues with it, from those claiming that a 120 pound woman couldn't do what she did to a 220 pound man (yet totally bought the 220 pound Steve Rogers stopping a helicopter from taking off) to those that railed against star Brie Larson's calls for more diversity in the media. It's so annoying. Shut up, go away, no one cares. We get it you incel freaks. You only want to see big, strong me doing big, strong things. Good for you. I want to see heroes being heroes...and Captain Marvel is fits the bill.

A few random thoughts:

• The Stan Lee tribute was beautiful and the cameo was even better. It goes beyond meta and actually leaves some questions about the universe as a whole.
• The first act is clunky but not so much that it makes it unwatchable and it's no less clunky than other Marvel films. 
• Brie Larson and Samuel L. Jackson have incredible chemistry. I want to see a buddy cop movie with them in it. 
• Brie Larson is charisma defined. She oozes it and I loved it. 
• The de-aging of Samuel L. really worked....Clark Gregg not so much. 
• The 90s nostalgia is worth bringing up again. It's fun and really adds something to the film.
• Ben Mendelsohn has become the go to villain these days, but he's terrific in this as Talos. It shows his range in the film, playing the character as this ruthless general at the beginning then transitioning to a man just trying to survive at the end. 
• Let's talk briefly about the Skrulls. I don't like that they made them "good guys" in this. I get that they were supposed to be the bad guys in GOTG and they replaced them with the Kree because Marvel didn't "own" them for the films. The Skrulls are supposed to be villains and knowing the MCU pretty well at this point, you kind of knew the Kree were up to no good.
• Jude Law always fascinates me as an actor. I loved his John Watson in the Sherlock Holmes films and he's perfectly duplicitous in this. You knew from the first time we see him that there is something off about him. 
• The prestige that these films have gained is interesting to me. Think about it. Robert Redford, Glenn Close, Michelle Pfeiffer, Michael Douglas and John C. Reilly all took roles that could've been played by much lesser actors. Same for Annette Benning. Benning was one of the weaker parts of the film. She wasn't bad, but her presence didn't work the same way it did for the others. 
• Another reviewer, and I'm too lazy to look, pointed out that they regretted wasting Glenn Close in GOTG because this was the role for her! It got me thinking about missed opportunity. You can't help but think that Marvel feels like they wasted Bradley Cooper on Rocket. That thought got me thinking about how we missed out on a John C. Reilly Rocket and that makes me sad. (I'm all in on starting a Denzel Washington as Reed Richards movement.)
• Soundtrack was the most fun since GOTG. For movies about space people, the Cosmic Marvel movies have the best music. Think about the fun Star Lord and Captain Marvel are going to have exchanging mix-tapes. Plus, a fight scene to I'm Just A Girl. Outstanding.
• Goose. That's all. (Though I honestly wasn't crazy about his role in Fury becoming Fury.)
• I had to look back and figure out how they got the Tesseract. There's been that many movies. 
• The first credit scene actually gave me the chills. Seriously. I said I wasn't high on INFINITY WAR, but I literally got the chills when Captain Marvel said, "Where's Fury?"

So, go see it. It's fun. Unless you don't like seeing a female superhero kick ass. Then go back in your basement and do whatever it is you do.