Special Edition Podcast
Show Notes
Josh Flanagan and Conor Kilpatrick are joined by Ryan Haupt to discuss the latest chapter of the Avengers saga from Marvel Studios … Captain Marvel! Come for the superhero movie discussion but stay as they flail around deep into their deteriorating memories to figure out where the Cosmic Cube Tesseract has been… and what it does.
Running Time: 00:37:12
Music:
“Connection”
Elastica
Subscribe
Get Involved
Doing the podcast is fun and all, but let's be honest, listening to the 2 of us talk to each other can get repetitive, so we look to you, the iFanboy listeners to participate in the podcast! "How can I get in on the fun?" you may ask yourself, well here's how:
- E-Mail us at contact@ifanboy.com with any questions, comments or anything that may be on your mind.
Please don't forget to leave your name and where you're writing from and each week, we'll pick the best e-mails to include on the podcast!
Find us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
Subscribe to our RSS Feed
Some rights reserved.
Just wanted to mention (because you guys didn’t) that I thought the opening Marvel Fanfare logo modified to feature Stan Lee and the “Thank you Stan” message was awesome and a really nice way to start things off. Also, the Stan cameo: Stan reading the Mallrats script and going over his lines was a fantastic, period specific touch that will likely sail over the heads of the majority of the audience.
Okay, sorry guys, but I have to disagree re the Skrulls. I WANTED to like the reversal but I felt like it was completely unearned. All it needed was one throw-away line from some Skrull somewhere about “remember, don’t kill any natives/innocent bystanders” or something like the Kree got at the beginning on the ambush mission to plant a seed that justified the idea that they were victims of some Kree propaganda machine instead of a creepy evil empire. In every fight before the reveal they were take-no-prisoners (Ben/Talos was going to kill Fury in the records room in pure villain fashion, for example). Sure, you can come up with reasons logically extrapolated from the script as to why they were that way (“I’m fighting to save my family!”, or worse, “No no no… we’re the GOOD Skrulls!”) — Head Skrull even says his hands are filthy in basically a “War is Hell” moment — but for me it was still kind of a cheat.
With that said, it WAS an interesting and subversive twist, and a pretty original way of looking at the Skrulls.
Overall I liked the story, and the low key subversive/feminist vibe. Sadly, I wanted to like Brie more than I ultimately did. I see what you’re saying about “interesting choices” but I found her decidedly un-charismatic — and believe me, I walked in there wanting to love this movie and her in this role. I think she is a perfectly serviceable actor, but one without a lot of “It” factor (I would have said “star power” but that’s a bad pun in this context).
With that said I’m hoping how she interacts with the rest of the characters turns that flatness into something substantive — which it very much could.
In line with your comments I think Dr Strange became much more interesting in a group context in Infinity War. I liked his character much more in Avengers than his solo film but I don’t know exactly why. Maybe the group will benefit Carol in a similar manner.
I know I’m shouting into history at this point since I saw the movie two weeks late to be a part of the conversation here, but I don’t think you need to add anything to earn the Skrull reversal. Talos says look my hands aren’t clean in this thing. We are at war. The Skrulls are terrorists. I think they make no bones about that. Also they were clearly okay with hurting people who weren’t Skrulls to get to their objective as was shown in the movie. They only take this different tact with Carol when it’s clear they will get wiped out by her otherwise considering she was whittling down her team.
I think we are presented a version of the story where the Skrulls end up being more sympathetic, but who knows what other Skrull extremists are doing elsewhere. Talos just wanted to get his family back, which in this narrative is a noble goal so Carol helps them, but what has he done prior to abducting Carol.
Talos paints a more human picture of the Skrull just like Mar Vell gives us an example of a heroic Kree. I thought that was handled really well actually. I think we are meant to come away thinking neither side is completely virtuous. Carol sided with the Skrulls rather than the Kree because the Kree have done her tons of personal damage. The Skrulls really haven’t. Talos’ object at the time was virtuous (even if the way he went about it in the beginning was suspect), and it was inline with Mar Vell’s wishes clearly. Carol considered Mar Vell someone worth looking up to. So I think it’s all pretty relatable once you break it down.
Great podcast guys!
With regards to the tesseract being the space stone (God, did I really just type that): it was used in Avengers to transport Loki to Earth and all the aliens through a big universe-spanning world hole. I’m not 100% convinced they had it all planned out that it would be a gem at that point, but it retroactively fits.
The Mallrats gag was very cute.
He definitely used the Tesseract to open the portal but he also used it to take over the minds of Hawkeye, Dr. Selvig, etc. Does the space stone also do that??
Conor, the stone your talking about is the one in Loki’s staff (the mind stone). Tesseract was separate.
I am old.
See what I have to deal with?
I thought it was really good. My only complaint was it got a bit CGI heavy, which was noticeable. I enjoyed Larson in this movie. I think she makes an excellent Captain Marvel. Can’t wait to see what they do with her going forward. Also Project Pegaus is now canon in the MCU, which makes me very happy. That leaves the door open for a lot of stuff.