Captain Marvel

THE GIST: Vers is part of the Kree Empire's elite Starforce, but has no memory of her past, apart from some random images when she dreams. On a mission, she's captured by the Kree's main enemies, the Skrulls, a race of shapeshifters, who start probing her mind for information only to find an intricate mess. Attempting to escape, she ends up stranded on planet Earth, where the tangle of her past starts unraveling, revealing truths the Kree kept from her. Eventually, her incredible powers reach full potential, and she becomes Captain Marvel.

Captain Marvel is the first Marvel Studios movie based entirely on a female superhero and it's a total blast.

The screenplay perfectly captures the state of mind of this young woman, who feels like she doesn't belong in her current life and who yearns for bigger things.

It also masterfully inserts the story of one of Marvel's greatest and strongest superheroes into the larger MCU timeline, placing it in 1995, way before almost any of the other well-known superheroes we have become so familiar with even emerged.

Casting the excellent Brie Larson turned out to be a great choice. Jude Law, Annette Bening, Ben Mendelsohn, Djimon Hounsou, Lee Pace, Lashana Lynch, and Gemma Chan also are great, and it's a real treat to see Samuel L. Jackson and Clark Gregg visually rejuvenated to play the roles we've come to love them in, but when they were just starting out discovering all these outer space beings and threats.

THE BOTTOM LINE: A fun and cool story that's also an origin one for this great character, fantastic visual effects, and great acting. What more can one ask for?!

Grade: 9.5