"It's about damn time", said Evangeline Lilly's Hope van Dyne in one of the post-credits scenes of 2015's Ant-Man, and now, eight full films and the best part of half a decade later, the meta-promise of that short scene has finally come to fruition - far too late by any measure, but still. In Captain Marvel, the Marvel Cinematic Universe at long last has its first film led by a woman, an origin story (of sorts) for the titular Captain that while almost inarguably imperfect, gets far more right than it does wrong. The result? A movie that I enjoyed considerably more than I expected to based on the rather lackluster trailers, only making the upcoming Avengers: Endgame all the more tantalizing in the process.
Set in the mid 1990's, we follow an amnesiac member of the Kree Starforce known as Vers as she and the rest of her squadron (led by her mentor, Yon-Rogg) are tasked with rescuing an undercover Kree spy from the Skrull, a race of shapeshifting aliens with whom the Kree are at war. After the mission goes badly wrong, Vers finds herself stranded on Earth with the Skrull hot on her tail, only to learn that she may once have lived here before she lost her memory. Teaming up with SHIELD agent Nick Fury, the two of them start investigating how she ended up losing her memories and joining the Kree, all while trying to avoid the Skrull as she waits for Yon-Rogg to arrive on Earth to pick her up and take her home.