MCU Commentary Rewatch: Captain Marvel
(Cover art by Matt Ferguson, for the Blu Ray release. https://www.cakesandcomics.com/)
Where BLACK PANTHER is possibly the most important genre film ever, CAPTAIN MARVEL and WONDER WOMAN are tied for a solid second place.
When a movie gives you something you didn’t even know you wanted, it’s time to sit up and take notice. When that movie keeps on giving with every subsequent watch, it deserves careful and critical attention.
I may have to watch this one twice today. I’m definitely going to be taking notes.
TL:DR;
Running Ranking: #5 of 23
Fair warning, there are two words I do >NOT< want to read even once in the comments.
Those words are MARY and SUE.
Carol Danvers earned every bit of her skill. Her power comes not from the space stone/tesseract, but from a lifetime of hard work and her innate sense of justice. She is an adult, not a child, with an adult’s problems and privileges. As such, if you’re not willing to engage with her story on that level, I’m not willing to engage with you.
P.S. Feel free to also jettison your misogyny and homophobia right the fuck now. Because I really don’t want to deal with your daddy issues today.
For reference
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Marvel_(film)
Commentary Takeaway
“Higher, further, faster, baby.”
Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck have been making scrappy independent movies together since 2006. At one point they were in consideration to direct GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, but it was their take on Carol Danvers (heavily inspired by the Kelly Sue Diconnick run) that most impressed Marvel Studios.
Kevin Feige said in an interview, “We met with lots and lots of people… and Anna and Ryan just had an amazing way of talking about Carol Danvers and talking about her journey… We want filmmakers that can help us focus on and elevate the character journey so it doesn’t get lost amongst the spectacle.”
I share the above easily searchable wiki content because you’ve probably never heard of either of them before. They make films with heart, and they do it well enough to make frequent appearances on award ballots.
And it’s this long-standing collaboration is the key to their success here. CAPTAIN MARVEL was formally announced in late 2014, but the scripts Feige was seeing weren’t clicking, and the directors he went after moved on to other projects as the movie’s production kept getting pushed back.
And pushed. And back. And pushed some more.
Watching the movie in theaters in 2019 (I saw it 4 times, ultimately seeking out the biggest and most expensive theaters in which to do so) you know it’s something special. It presents a character who has been ill-treated by >comics< for 50 years not as a victim, but as a survivor. Someone who keeps standing back up no matter how hard she gets knocked down.
Boden and Fleck’s commentary draws you into their corner of the MCU immediately, breaking down the importance of the first shot of the movie then flowing smoothly into the supportive banter that can only come from long years of working together. And not a lot of minutes pass before you see Carol get knocked down.
But she gets back up, and you keep cheering as she does.
While listening to the commentary, I didn’t spend a lot of time looking away from the screen, and paused it when L came down to make lunch so I wouldn’t miss any of their insights about the challenges of shooting at night in the desert.
Yes, it was that interesting.
Things like praising the work of Heidi Moneymaker (the go-to stunt double for MCU ladies), then pointing out that her sister Renae was actually the Brie Larson double and how much fun the two ladies had beating each other up on the train.
Or explaining how they were able to rent a real Metro car for a couple days to run up and down the tracks to get all the shots needed to make the scene work.
Or how human chameleon Ben Mendelsohn’s early performance caused them to redesign the Skrull make-up for all actors so they could get a full range of emotion.
Or how the score interacts with the action, and how a temp score from composer Pinar Toprak moved them so much that they redesigned effects shots to get more out of it.
It’s a fantastic bit of filmmaking that made over a BILLION DOLLARS, from two directors who’d never before had a budget over 8 million. Who’d only had one out of 6 previous films make money (the Oscar nominated HALF-NELSON, which returned 4.9 Million Box office on a 700K budget). Who at this point don’t want to work with any other partner, because the partnership >works<.
And listening to them, I can tell the money isn’t what drives them. It’s the stories and the characters.
I can so relate to that. And unlike some (read, many) of the directors I’ve heard from these last few weeks, they seem to genuinely enjoy the movie they made.
I took two pages of notes on a two hour movie, and the same reverie with which they describe the thera-fluid that anchors most Kree technology about 10 minutes in oozes from the rest of the track.
So I think at this point it’s important to leave behind my notes and skip to the end of the commentary. Ryan Fleck says in closing, “I hope that you’ve enjoyed CAPTAIN MARVEL…I’m inspired. I think I’ll watch it again.”
And after a pause of a few seconds, Anna Boden adds, ” Me too.”
Me three.
Overall Commentary Rankings:
1. BLACK PANTHER
2. DOCTOR STRANGE
3. CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR
4. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER
5. CAPTAIN MARVEL
6. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, VOL. 2
7. THOR: THE DARK WORLD
8. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, VOL. 1
9. CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER
10. ANT-MAN
11. AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR
12. THOR: RAGNAROK
13. IRON MAN 2
14. ANT-MAN AND THE WASP
15. AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON
16. INCREDIBLE HULK
17. IRON MAN 3
18. MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS
19. IRON MAN
20.
21. THOR
22. SPIDER-MAN HOMECOMING
23. SPIDER-MAN FAR FROM HOME
I thought this one was heading to #3 on the list, and it nearly got there. I had a moment of hesitation as it passed GoTG 2, then Cap 2 and 3 stopped it in its tracks. I would have been very happy to see those movies dethroned, but at this point they’re more or less cemented in place.
So good job, four white guys! The Russo Brothers, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely have created some of the best MCU movies to date, and that’s probably not going to change any time soon.
Which brings me to an issue I haven’t addressed so far in my rankings. Anna Boden is the first female director on this list, and only the second female voice I’ve heard overall during the rewatch if you don’t count Taika Waititi’s two year-old daughter. (Production designer Hannah Beachler was the first, for BLACK PANTHER).
And that lack of perspective is really grating. In fact, it kind of pisses me off, so when (or if) I watch WONDER WOMAN for the DCEU Commentary series, expect to hear a lot more about it.
For those who don’t remember, Patty Jenkins was supposed to direct THE DARK WORLD. Until all the actor contracts were signed, and then she wasn’t. I feel it bears mentioning that TDW also had a female screenwriter at one point, until that changed too.
I’m not chasing zebras here, this subtext is TEXT. In a world (ours) where female creators are turning out some of the best books in the business it seems to me that these movies should have a few more ladies in charge.
Something we >are< seeing in the new Disney+ content, so maybe we’re not too far away from happy times after all.
P.S. Nia Dacosta has signed on as the director of CAPTAIN MARVEL 2, with a script (at present) written by Megan McDonnell. In case you’re not familiar with that second name, McDonnell was a staff writer for WANDAVISION, and was the primary on “We Interrupt This Program (the Monica Rambeau episode).
Next year is going to be GREAT!