Ms. Mess

[setsuled]

What a mess. And a tragic mess when you consider how charming Ms. Marvel was in its first few episodes. But last night's finale was a meaningless hodgepodge, utterly failing to capitalise on any organic buildup from within the series. It did have a couple of cool moments but mostly it felt like such an incoherent rush to the finish line it hit almost Benioff and Weiss levels.

Most of the series was written and directed by Muslim women but last night's script mysteriously came entirely from white guys with tiny imdb pages. As though someone at Disney panicked and said, "Oh no, we need white guys, any white guys will do!" Story credit goes to Will Dunn, apparently not the same Will Dunn who had a role in the Harry Potter movies, while the teleplay is by Dunn along with A.C. Bradley and Matthew Chauncey. A.C. Bradley wrote one episode of Arrow and he and Chauncey worked on an obscure cgi series called Tales of Arcadia. So in case you were worried about Disney's money, don't worry, they didn't spend very much of it on writers.

And where was series creator Bisha K. Ali? Well, one can hardly blame her for not returning to the finale for a show that by this point bears very little resemblance to the one she created. After only six episodes.



I'll talk about what I liked. I liked when the imam (Laith Nakli) quoted Abraham Lincoln. And I liked how when Kamala was finally referred to by her superhero name, her father (Mohan Kapur) pronounced it Miss Marvel instead of Miz Marvel. I wonder if that was intentional. In any case, I'm glad it was sneaked in. Some people are under the delusion that the "Miz" pronunciation is really widespread, like the people who write English text books here where I work in Japan. Any counter-momentum to that idea in media is nice, especially in media as notoriously biased as Disney's is getting to be.

I also liked some of the action sequence when Kamala "embiggened".



Otherwise it was a mess. One of the cornerstones of the story from the beginning was Kamala's tension with her family but last night it was all gone so the plot could happen. Her parents, who feared for her safety when she wanted to go to Avenger-Con, didn't even ask if she was bulletproof when she revealed herself to be a superhero. Her mother is so fine with it she apparently whipped up a costume in a matter of hours, one a far sight more professional and understated than the Hulk costume Kamala's father was wearing.

As our heroes arrive at the high school, Zoe randomly shows up with some lame excuse about needing to film her TikTok there. It felt like the writers were downright flaunting it, winking at us and saying, "Oh, yeah, we can't write!"

The big action sequence felt peculiarly edited down, too.



The big surprises at the end involved a nonsensical reference to X-Men and an appearance by a famished Brie Larson. No-one's sure if it was Kamala shape-shifting into Captain Marvel or if Captain Marvel actually swapped places with Kamala. I honestly don't care.

A side-quibble: Kamran is told to go to "the harbour". Why not name a specific harbour? Maybe even a specific spot on the harbour ("The system of waterways of the Port of New York and New Jersey forms one of the most intricate natural harbors in the world" - Wikipedia). When did screenwriters get so afraid about being specific in real cities? I was watching Double Indemnity a few weeks ago and it was cool hearing characters refer to specific streets an intersections in L.A. That kind of thing helps create a real sense of location.

Ms. Marvel is available on Disney+.

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

I also liked Lincoln quote but I was a bit confused by this statement:

Some people are under the delusion that the "Miz" pronunciation is really widespread, like the people who write English text books here where I work in Japan.

Ms. and Miss are different titles and they are meant to be pronounced differently.

I also snorted at "the harbour" reference as if there is only one and, as in a video game, showing up at that location automatically leads you to the correct meeting spot.

It hadn't occurred to me that Kamala had body morphed, but rather that they had swapped places. Although why and how and whether it had anything to do with the events of the series is a big ?

I agree that everything seemed resolved just to get the season closed off. The first scene, in fact, seemed almost like it was joined in progress. I assumed that given the final scene in the previous episode and the (presumed) time lapse before their return to the U.S. that Kamala's mother had had the new costume professionally made in Pakistan before they left. But I agree about how the protective family suddenly seemed fine with her doing whatever as if her powers would somehow be protection in and of themselves.

I did like the collectivity of the protection in the school as well as the community coming to her defense in the final attack by the DODC. But the whole episode just papered over what had been something of a sprawling story that put the attention on everyone but Kamala in many cases.

[setsuled]

Ms. and Miss are different titles and they are meant to be pronounced differently.

I know. But only a very small group of people actually pronounce "Miz". Which is likely why no-one caught the mispronunciation on the show. As someone teaching English as a second language, sometimes I have to choose between teaching how people are "supposed" to pronounce something and how people actually pronounce something. I tend to prefer the latter, otherwise I risk sending students off into the world sounding like computers. Of course, the fact that, decades on, very few people even understand the difference between the words makes it a failure as a bit of social engineering, too. It doesn't help that the "z" sound doesn't flow as naturally as the soft "s".

But I agree about how the protective family suddenly seemed fine with her doing whatever as if her powers would somehow be protection in and of themselves.

Maybe her parents were replaced by Skrulls. I'm only half joking.

[yourlibrarian]

*snorts* about the Skrulls. Yes, the only way I can explain it is that her father was always ok with it and her mother was not, so her mother's witnessing of her powers and her guilt about her own mother impressed her so much that she just did a turnaround. But that sort of conversion is never easily believable. And as their own actions proved in the final episode, it's not like she's not at risk or vulnerable.