"Captain Marvel" (2019)

So, Marvel played us. And it was brilliant.

Stories can use presupposed knowledge, or even unreliable narrator devices to trick us into a false sense of comfort, or smug understanding, and then rip that foundation out from under us. When done right, it can be a great teaching device. Some contend, for example, that the opening to Job does this. The reader thinks he understands what is happening better than Job and his friends, but then at the end of the story, God shows up and puts us all in our place.

Captain Marvel did this as well. It played on the expectations and external knowledge of comic readers to deliver a powerful message.

The story opens with our heroine a member of the Kree race of aliens, a “noble warrior hero” race. Unfortunately, she has amnesia. (But the viewer should not forget what has come before. The big bad in the first Guardian’s movie was also a Kree and is in this film as well.) She and her team are fighting another group of aliens, the Skrull. The Skrull are some major bad guys in Marvel Comics as well.

But, this is not Marvel Comics. It is the MCU. And the twist that they throw at the audience in this movie is huge, and it shows how we might ought to reevaluate a lot in real life. Based on the current climate of fear, distrust, and nationalism in the world, it should’ve been more expected. Much as they did in last year’s “Black Panther,” Marvel again chastises Western Culture for how small minded we have become in the 21st Century.

“Captain Marvel” is a great, action-packed, adventure. It is worth the watch. But it is also a great example of art reminding culture of some truths that we are prone to forget.