TL;DR – This was just a fun delight from start to finish.

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene and an audio tag at the end.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film.

The Marvels Review –

We are in an interesting time for the MCU. The once dominant cultural force in the cinematic landscape is now starting to find itself on rocky footing. It has struggled to find its voice in the post-Endgame world, with only Guardians 3 shining in the mix. It is in this space we get a film that stars two characters that we only introduced in the Disney+ series, and that might be a tall order to pass.

So to set the scene, Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) is enjoying spending time writing comics about her hero, Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), instead of doing her science homework, but little did she know that on a planet in space, Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) is digging up her other bangle. This fractures space-time, and as Captain Marvel and Captain Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) investigate just what happened, they all get zapped by the energy. This would be bad enough on any day, even less because now, whenever one uses their powers, they switch with each other.

This is one of those films where you need to have a lot of previous knowledge before going in. We have Danvers’ story from Captain Marvel and Endgame, Kamala’s from Ms. Marvel, and Rambeau from WandaVision. That is not a problem for me because I liked all those shows/movies, even if WandaVision fell apart by the end. But the question is: do you need to have watched them all to be able to follow this film? And thankfully, the answer is no. They do an excellent job of introducing all of the characters, in some cases going in-depth with how they got their powers, and sometimes all you need to say is ‘witch hex energy wall’, and everyone goes ‘um sure’ and moves on. You probably need to watch Captain Marvel to get the most out of it, but you should be fine.

If I could use one word to describe the film, it would be “fun”. From the moment things start going wrong and people are jumping between locations, Goose (Nemo & Tango) is eating Kamala’s Family’s furniture while it is all falling apart, and you can’t help but feel joy as you watch it all. Part of this comes from the clever way they move from location to location, it could have been a chaotic mess, but they make it work. But also, the joy of adding Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), Muneeba (Zenobia Shroff), Yusuf (Mohan Kapur), and Aamir (Saagar Shaikh) to the chaos brings it all together.      

What does cut through all of this is Iman Vellani’s exuberance, which the MCU desperately needs. I didn’t mind her introduction in the MCU because I was not attached to her power set beforehand, and I think they used it to the best here, but also with some tweaks that I think people who did like the comics will appreciate. Dar-Benn is not the worst villain the MCU has had, but they are still not one of the strongest. At least you can understand their motivations and the outcome they are after. Narratively speaking, it is not a deep film, but it knows what it wants to be and leans into it. Here, we have a planet where people communicate by singing, which is super fun, and sign me up for it. It was funny how the longer the film went on, the more irrelevant Secret Invasion became.   

From a production standpoint, everything was solid. Nothing truly stood out to me from an effects standpoint, but there were no glaring errors either. They leaned into the fun with the sets and costumes, which was great to see. Also, I have to say that Laura Karpman’s musical score might be one of the better scores the MCU has put out in a while. It used music to unite all the characters by bringing their musical flourishes to the equation. Also, not to get into spoilers, but there is a track from a famous musical that is used during one particular sequence that had the entire cinema in stitches.

In the end, do we recommend The Marvels? Absolutely. It is a film that knows what it wants to be and leans into it. It ramps up the fun while still having a serious undercurrent running through it. I had a smile on my face from that opening comic montage, and it did not let up until the end. If you liked The Marvels, we would recommend to you Shazam!.     

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you watched The Marvels?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day. 


Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of The Marvels
Directed by – Nia DaCosta
Screenplay by – Nia DaCosta, Megan McDonnell & Elissa Karasik
Based on – Marvel Comics
Music by – Laura Karpman
Cinematography by – Sean Bobbitt
Edited by – Catrin Hedström & Evan Schiff
Production/Distribution Companies – Marvel Studios & Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Starring – Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris, Iman Vellani, Zenobia Shroff, Mohan Kapur, Saagar Shaikh, Zawe Ashton, Gary Lewis, Park Seo-joon & Samuel L. Jackson with Daniel Ings, Colin Stoneley, Shamier Anderson, Abraham Popoola, Ffion Jolly, Caroline Simonnet & Jessica Zhou and Lashana Lynch, Tessa Thompson, Hailee Steinfeld, Kelsey Grammer, Nemo & Tango  
Rating – Australia: M; Canada: PG; Germany: 12; New Zealand: M; United Kingdom: 12A; United States: PG-13