Captain Marvel doesn’t need your approval

You think our nation is divided politically? Spend some time in the fan community! The arguments (and firmly clenched opinions) that erupt can create fissures across fandom that boggle the mind, and often seem to fly in the face of reason or analysis - but they're not hurting for emotion or vitriol. Curiously, many of the superhero films that endure the most wrath and ire are the ones that position women or people of color in prominent roles. Take what happened with The Last Jedi. The mobilization of thin-skinned bot-wielding reviewers out to undermine pictures they feel threatened by has been sad and embarrassing to behold. It's the same tactic that used James Gunn's past against him, actually getting him fired from one of the most successful corners of the Marvel Cinematic Universe - a debacle that only this week saw the light of sanity, when Disney reversed course and reinstated Gunn (THANK YOU!), perhaps finally realizing they had been manipulated by arch-conservative and intolerant enemies that stand in direct opposition of the company's own values - but I digress. Suffice to say a small mountain of exponentially negative Captain Marvel user reviews began multiplying, to the degree that Rotten Tomatoes decided to suspend user reviews entirely. This is the world we live in - and Captain Marvel doesn't give a crap. If you try and get in her way, she's just going to shut you down.

Written and directed by the collaborative team of Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (Half Nelson, Sugar), Captain Marvel is an unusual and highly entertaining chapter of the Marvel Universe. The film's one of the more non-linear origin stories within the MCU, with things kicking off in the middle of the action, as a cadre of interstellar combatants are waging war against a deep space enemy known as The Skrull. Newcomers would do well to revisit Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy for a refresher, as these soldiers are the Kree, warrior-heroes who've gotten maybe a bit too used to war for their own good.

Captain Marvel is full of potential spoilers, all of which I'm going to try to avoid here. Elite Starforce warrior Vers (Brie Larson) is a fighter still under the wing of her Commander (Jude Law), who frequently mansplains that her emotions are holding her back, keeping her from achieving her potential. Vers has echoes of a forgotten backstory she's not entirely sure are real. Are they memories, or something else? Audiences may be a little confused at first, but Boden and Fleck don't linger, and Vers soon finds herself marooned on a far-flung planet called Earth, that feels like it might be somehow familiar.

It's 1995, and the filmmakers have a blast peppering the film with hilarious mid-nineties tech and pop culture references, none better than the one used for Stan Lee's always reliable cameo, in a shout-out to one of the more positive inhabitants of fandom - and of Hollywood.

Marvel Studios, you sure got me with your reimagined opening theme, where every hero we're used to seeing in those familiar graphics has been lovingly replaced with Stan the Man. Hat doffed and tears wiped.

Vers quickly meets a young SHIELD agent name Nick Fury (a phenomenally CG'd Samuel L. Jackson), and the film takes off like a rocket thanks to the phenomenal charisma these two share. Jackson is just amazing, absolutely convincing as a looser, less-hardened version of the Fury we know so well. Who knew Nick Fury was such a cat lover?

Plot-wise, I'll stop there, but Vers has both the shape-shifting Skrulls to contend with, as well as the proximity of her own past. Annette Bening and Ben Mendelsohn are both superb, cleverly cast in their respective roles. It's giving nothing away to note that just as Black Panther served as prelude to Avengers: Infinity War, Captain Marvel opens the door to next month's Avengers: Endgame. Suffice to say if you don't see Captain Marvel first, you're likely to feel hopelessly lost when Endgame unfurls. It's also important to point out that like DC's Wonder Woman, Vers/Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel is a force to be reckoned with - and tough as hell. If she's been fighting with one hand tied behind her back, she positively soars when she breaks free. She's not here to smile for you, or make you happy. She's not looking for your approval or permission. I guess that just threatens the hell out of some people. But she is here to do what she can to put a stop to war, and to set things right, and if you've got a problem with that, you'd best get out of her way. 

Iron Maiden - Alita: Battle Angel

It’s been a long time coming, but without hesitation I'm thrilled to exclaim that I loved Alita: Battle Angel. James Cameron has been simmering his Alita screenplay for decades. Based on Yukito Kishiro’s 9-volume manga series (which debuted in 1990), it was followed by a 2-episode video animation series and became powerfully influential. After directing Titanic, Cameron was intent on directing Alita, but then Avatar took development pole position and eclipsed everything else.

So with Godfatherly generosity, Cameron asked Robert Rodriguez (Sin City, Planet Terror) to take a crack at bringing Alita to life, working off Cameron's script, co-written by Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island, Terminator Genisys, Altered Carbon).

It's the apocalyptic 25th Century, and the denizens of industrialized Iron City toil in a society where cyborgs and robotic replacement limbs are ubiquitous. Above them hovers the mysterious utopia of Zalem, which everyone dreams of reaching, but few actually do. Cyberneticist Dr. Ido (Christoph Waltz) hunts for spare parts in massive derelict junkyards, when he discovers the intact remnants of an impossibly advanced cyborg. He takes her back to his lab, and painstakingly crafts a body for her.

When "Alita" (Rosa Salazar) awakes, she has no memory of who she was, what she did, or where she came from. She's a wide-eyed newcomer who marvels at everything, yet her reflexes and instincts are intensely attuned, and seem to naturally gravitate towards violence. Shades of The Long Kiss Goodnight. 

Alita: Battle Angel has a strong late-eighties, early-nineties Paul Verhoeven vibe, like it could have come out right after Robocop or Total Recall - except the digital effects are (for the most part) state of the art. An insane amount of Alita is computer-generated, including Alita herself, who Cameron and Rodriguez chose to give unnaturally large manga eyes to. It's initially a little jarring, but the effects are so great, and you quickly accept it (Alita's hair isn't always quite as successfully animated).

As Alita learns more about the world she now inhabits, she quickly learns there are crime lords and cyborg henchmen everywhere, none more menacing than Grewishka (Jackie Earle Haley), a delirious behemoth who reminded me of the Cain cyborg from Robocop 2. In fact Alita is full of visual touchstones to those 80s/90s sci-fi thrillers, with callbacks that evoke everything from Demolition Man to Star Trek: First Contact. Cinematographer Bill Pope (The Matrix, Baby Driver) gives the picture a subtle nostalgic hue that feels like a grindhouse B-picture, only stuffed with Baroque robotic effects of incredible detail. As the plot moves forward, the more Alita remembers. It's a fun cyberpunk mythos, peppered with "Hunter-Warriors," Panzer-Kunst martial arts and Berserkers.

Newly minted Oscar winner Mahershala Ali seems to be doing an evil Wesley Snipes impression, as the predatory mogul behind the sport of Motorball, a cyborg carnage bread and circuses that captivates everyone in Iron City. It's a wild, pulpy universe - much of which we've seen previously in countless other films, but Alita is the story that helped sire them all, plus the energy on display is fast and captivating. Rodriguez does a masterful job with the action. A scene that begins with an awkward Inspirational Speech quickly descends into an off the rails bar brawl with cyborg bounty hunters including Zapan (Ed Skrein) and an awesome dog-loving old fella (Jeff Fahey) I'd love to see a whole movie about.

Supporting characters fare less well. As Alita's love interest Hugo, Keean Johnson is from the buff Taylor Lautner school of acting, and comes off a little bland. Jennifer Connelly is icy cool, in an awkward role that never quite takes off. Big props to Salazar, as you're always waiting for Alita to come back and lock horns with Zapan and Grewishka. It's crazy and derivative, weak on dialogue, and let's be frank - is guilty of unabashed whitewashing - but Rodriguez knows how to find the fifth-gear in action sequences, and Alita herself is an appealing and ferociously fun character to root for. 

So if you're fond of that pre-digital heyday when kinetic mayhem ruled the movies, you definitely want to see Alita on the big screen. It's apocalyptic action and cyborg steel in a collision of crazy I suspect you'll really enjoy the hell out of.