Is Ms Marvel Worth the Watch?
Since the big blockbuster film, Avengers: Endgame, fans have been eagerly awaiting to figure what the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) looks like. The fourth phase which takes place after the infamous “blip” in 2022, has begun with a number of separate and seemingly confusing simultaneous storylines. To begin, there are abundant newly introduced characters such as Yelena Belova in Black Widow and Monica Rambaeu in WandaVision.
Although it’s tough to say how and where the MCU is going next, one key playing piece in figuring this out is newcomer Ms Marvel. You might not have heard of her because the debut television series featuring her introduction into the MCU scored some of the lowest viewership in record for MCU series. And it’s important to note as well that she’s Marvel’s first South Asian leading superhero character. She’s also only 16-years old.
Whether or not you’re now beginning to think about searching up who in the world Ms Marvel is, I can’t promise you it’s worth it. If you come across the reviews and ratings, it’s not going to impress you. But I do advise you to continue reading this. You might realize that although not all MCU series have been as popular in comparison to some of the big blockbusters out there, there’s a lot that Ms Marvel encapsulates that might shift your decision making process. From the supposed integral role she’s going to play in the future of MCU, to the creative decisions of including a new form of diversity in the mix, as well as the public’s reactions to the series, you can decide for yourself if you think the watch is worth the shot.
Ms Marvel Matters
Ms Marvel is one of the newest editions to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). She first appeared in “Captain Marvel: Issue 14” in August 2013. Co-created by six different people, Kamala Khan, aka Ms Marvel, was given her own comic series a year later.
Her origin story begins in Jersey City, where 16-year-old Kamala was born and raised by her traditional Muslim Pakistani family. Kamala is a Captain Marvel super fan.
As many of the MCU on-screen stories deviate from the comics’ plotlines, the adapted television series Ms Marvel was no different. Kamala’s origin story in how she discovers her powers and the nature of them is one example. Initially, she was written to have developed her powers after being exposed to something called a terrigen mist. Such powers gave her abilities to heal, shapeshift and polymorph–stretching her body similar to Elastigirl in The Incredibles and Mister Fantastic from The Fantastic Four. In the television series, however, she discovers her powers through a mystical ancestral Pakistani bangle. It gives her some sort of crystallization power where she can shoot beams out of a magical fist, create a shield and walk on air.
In terms of the MCU timeline, Kamala’s story comes around two years after the Avengers: Endgame, also known as the “2022 Blip.” It falls under phase 4 of the MCU between 2024 and 2025.
Future film, The Marvels, is in the works and set to release in late 2023, where Iman Vellani, the actress who plays Ms Marvel, will make her big-screen debut alongside Captain Marvel and Monica Rambaeu (introduced in WandaVision). Spoiler alert, the end-credit scene at the final episode of Ms Marvel showcases Captain Marvel switching places with Kamala, hinting at this upcoming blockbuster film.
A few aspects in the first season of the show hint that some future clarification of where the MCU is going, and Ms Marvel’s prominent role in it. For one, her best friend Bruno discovers her DNA has a mutation. X-Men fans can begin to get excited as multiple films feature similar hints with Professor X’s appearance in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse Madness and new villain Neymor in Wakanda Forever.
Another hint lies in how Kamala finds the rest of her mystical bangle in the “Teng Rings Temple.” and the Legend of the Ten Rings is centered around this power source.
Needless to say, Ms. Marvel’s debut is beginning to add clarity to how all the recent numerous MCU ongoing storylines since Avengers: Endgame connect with one another–or at least what’s next.
Crafting her Culture
“We’re finally letting the world into the secret that it’s quite cool to be South Asian, that our music, our food, our culture, our textiles are very, vibrant, rich, and special,” said Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, an Oscar-winning Pakistani documentarian who directed two episodes.
In writing the comics, one of the six co-creators, Sama Amanat who also executively-produced the show, says Kamala’s character was largely inspired by her own upbringing as an American Muslim in Jersey. In an interview with Times Magazine, Amanat describes how Kamala deviates from the typical “nerdy math” South Asian character trope. Especially for Muslim young women, Amanat wanted them to feel seen regardless of how they practice their faith. Growing up in the States and balancing the traditional religious aspects while assimilating to dominant American culture is extremely difficult.
Kamala embodies this struggle, shown through how she modestly dresses compared to other American teen girls, how she wants to go to parties, talk to boys, but has all these rules her traditional family needs her to respect at the same time. Having lead characters showcase the super-human ability to balance the double lives many immigrant children face is something to be celebrated and highlighted, and most importantly included in the MCU.
My Reaction
I’m an avid fan of the MCU on-screen franchise. So in June of 2022, when I received a whatsapp notification from my aunt in India telling me about the newly released Marvel television series staring a Muslim American South Asian lead, you bet I was excited.
Until recently I never realized the extent to how white and cisnormative the content I was viewing. Every Marvel movie until Black Panther has a straight white male lead. And although that never held me back from being a fan, seeing more diversity and representation I identified with was amazing to me.
My dad and I rushed over to the couch and switched the show on Disney Plus. It didn’t take him more than five minutes before turning it off. He said it was childish and didn’t look good. He made us watch Obi-Wan Kanobi later that night instead.
Unlike my dad, I’m a part of Generation Z. I can agree with him that Ms Marvel is evidently aimed at a younger audience. The Bollywood references are cool to incorporate but the childishness felt cringy with the animated effects and how sparkly her powers were. The action, danger and intensity was lacking.
The viewership numbers back this up. Samba TV’s released statistics for the first five days after the show was released showed that Ms Marvel was a record low for a MCU television series, with only 775K US households tuning in on the premiere night. Ratings were mixed. And most of the people that tuned in were aged 20-24 or younger, and more likely Black, Hispanic, Asian or other – in other words not White.
As a Marvel fan, I was angered that more people didn’t care. But Marvel could have done a better job with the show. They seemingly forced an Americanized version of Pakistani and Desi culture into Kamala’s origin story and casted someone that was too young to be taken seriously. Because you don’t realize how important she could be to the future of MCU, her story falls flat in showcasing why she’d matter more to the MCU than simply being a tokenist representation of South Asian culture.
Public Reactions
A day prior to the series release, Marvel tweeted a note they received from Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani female education activist and 2014 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
“It is not every day that I turn on the TV and find a character who eats the same foods, listens to the same music or uses the same Urdu phrases as me,” wrote Malala. She applauds the MCU franchise for making a young girl from an immigrant family a superhero, with powers that originate from her heritage.
Much like Malala’s reaction, there were a number of favorable reviews. According to a Forbes Report on the viewership ratings, Ms Marvel is the best reviewed MCU series on Disney Plus. It received 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, above Black Panther that received 96%. However, at the same time it is the lowest scored MCU series on IMDB’s star ratings.
It’s hard to conclude the general consensus of how viewers felt about the series given how mixed the user-star ratings were. But what’s interesting is within the demographics of the user ratings on IMDB, females were more positive reviewers and males were more mixed.
The general demographics of the MCU is not publicly accessible information. However smaller sample size studies demonstrate that the majority of viewers are white male millennials. Many of whom wouldn’t be interested in a childish young MCU series that stars a South Asian superhero whose powers come from her not-so-very-white-American heritage.
Why wasn't it clearly a success?
There’s a couple reasons why Ms Marvel’s high Rotten Tomatoes rating isn’t enough to consider it a success. Based on Samba TV’s viewership statistics on MCU series, half of people that watch MCU series didn’t tune in for it.
To begin, the show is aimed at younger audiences with their high school content, PG language, and low sex appeal. The cultural representation might not be relevant for non-South Asian viewers. Avid comic fans might be upset with the changes made on-screen from the written format. And finally, most of the MCU series that gained better viewership ratings than Ms Marvel had lead characters that played pre-existing roles in established big-screen Marvel films unlike Kamala – Wanda, Vision, Loki, Bucky, Sam and Clint.
So is it worth a watch?
I initially believed that this was just Marvel’s effort at creating a token of diversity for South Asians. I get the reactions. The show feels childish. The editing and CGI aren’t as high budget as the big-screen films like Black Panther. But in truth I think many of us didn’t share the same love for Ms Marvel as we did for WandaVision or Loki because she doesn’t seem to matter that much. Unless you're a comics fan, you wouldn’t even know who she is. And the series doesn’t reveal her possible larger role until the end-credit scene of the finale.
The intensity of the story line, its villains and the stakes of her journey aren’t that dangerous. It’s hard to take her seriously. It’s possible this was Marvel’s way of trying to reach a new audience: young kids. And young kids might not have access or the ability to write up reviews and be considered statistically in the demographics IMDB or Samba TV could record. So the effectiveness of the show’s reaction to its targeted audience is unknown.
The decision to represent South Asian culture and the child of an immigrant family experience, might also be better received by a younger audience that not only is more open-minded but also impressionable. In this way young brown girls like myself will feel represented and worthy of a superhero status. Also, future generations will begin to believe that cultures outside the white norm equally deserve a spot on the screen.
Only time will tell if Ms Marvel can be more than a token. As we approach the release of The Marvels, we shall see if Marvel can effectively convince their large audience that being a superhero can extend beyond the cis-white image. The power in being a child of an immigrant is just as important and worthy.