“Thank you, Stan.”
Captain Marvel’s opening montage, a collection of Stan Lee portraits set against the Marvel Studios logo, is a poignant and meaningful dedication to an iconic personality who was partly responsible for giving popular culture a bevy of iconic characters with abilities as diverse as their backgrounds. They’re joined by Carol Danvers, an amnesiac Air Force pilot who is one of the Kree, a civilization of noble warriors (not to be confused with the First Nations group known as the Cree) battling against the Skrull, a race of shapeshifting beings who have invaded countless worlds.
Captain Marvel, notably very rarely referred to as such, is an origin story that feels immensely self-aware of its pedigree almost to a fault, with significant portions of the film feeling slapped together and rapidly edited as if to say, “The audience has seen this before, but the story can’t exist without it.” This punctuates the whole film and keeps it from being its same-named studio’s finest offering, but the film is bolstered by existing almost completely independently of its own controversy, never coming across as insulting or demeaning any portion of its audience even in the name of girl power. Also importantly, star Brie Larson brings her A-game and is backed up by an enjoyable and frequently funny supporting cast, who bring more warmth than the enjoyable but unintentionally disturbing story might suggest.
Projected Realities 
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