Captain Marvel: Where's the Love

Overview:

The movie establishes very early that the Skrull expansion threatens the universe, and that the Kree are all that stand in their way. The MCU often makes the mistake of presenting these world-ending stakes at scale, which make them hard to relate to. In Captain Marvel, this is expressed through Vers’ personal grief and what the Skrull have taken from her. This is an important point for a movie with a central theme of individualism versus nationalism.

For this to work, the audience needs to find the protagonist relatable. In the original release, Vers comes across as arrogant and stand-offish. While this might have been by design for Vers to put a wall up between herself and her Kree allies, it also put a wall up for the audience. The edit creates a more sympathetic character, allowing Brie Larson’s facial expressions to carry more of the subtext. The edited down humour shows Vers as brash, but not cold and insulting. The addition of the teaching scene early on also helps create a more caring mentor dynamic between Yon-Rogg and Vers.

In the original realise, we are told men -and specifically men- are what stands in the protagonist’s way. What I see in this edit is that controlling forces and the lack of agency are the enemy. While with the Kree, Vers Is told to let go of her emotions and unknown past, and to submit to the collective. By the end of the movie, Carol has reconciled her individuality, and adapted within that concept the Kree motto of putting others before herself. That’s a broader, more accessible arc that doesn’t alienate anyone nor take away from what the original release tried to achieve.

Through the edit, Captain Marvel tells a story less focussed on outside influences telling Carol she is a failure, and more on her internal conflict of failure, determination, and success.


What I liked:

Only 45ish seconds were shaved from the original before the Kree arrival on Torfa, yet I found the edit better paced with better exposition.

Adding the scene with Yon-Rogg teaching the children is a good choice. In addition to what I previously said about the scene, it also added some more sympathetic humour from Vers as we do tease each other in a more direct way when appealing to a childhood audience.

The scene of Yon-Rogg talking with the Supreme Intelligence was a good addition and adds more weight to his later line about going back to Hala empty-handed.

There were some very clever editing choices during the Skrull memory search scene.

I had no particular problem with the original “biker” scene or its extended version, but throughout the movie we don’t see Vers/Carol seek any personal satisfaction in causing harm. For someone who sees herself as a Noble Warrior Hero, this was out of character. The edit better expressed her need in that moment. There’s a memorable scene in the pilot of Alias that plays out in a similar way.

The edits to remove some of Vers/Carol’s coldness result in better payoffs for when she’s deliberately untrusting or arrogant. Such as when Carol is talking to Maria’s neighbour, or during the fight between Carol and her former Kree allies in the finale.

Replacing the “Carol stands up for five minutes” scene with one of Carol experiencing her recent memories with Fury, Maria and Monica was one of the best parts of this edit. It showed that while Carol doesn’t have any old memories, her few days among humanity let Carol know herself more than six years with the Kree did.


What I might do differently:

Some of the scenes on Torfa were quite dark and I found it difficult to follow each character as their faces were shadowed. I compared the Torfa scene side-by-side, and the original release was already pushing the limit on lighting. I think some of the colour-correction during flashbacks were a little distracting, also.

The small flashback we get on meeting Goose near the records room was probably unnecessary. It doesn’t do any harm, but it might be a case of needing to trust your audience more.

While I agree that Just a girl by No Doubt was a little on the nose, it left the editor an interesting problem. Do you replace it with 90s rock? Grunge? Maybe a girl-power jam that could leave you with the same original problem? The editor went with Violet by Hole which is a solid choice. I think the only options were to find a rock song to match the beats of that fight (like Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill), or lean so hard into the kitchy contrast and go with an extremely era pop song (something like Wannabe by the Spice Girls). I can imagine Marvel tried to go with the second option with their original choice.

Some of the cuts were rough which isn’t a criticism of the editor as they can only work with the material given. In particular, the cutaway after Goose scratches Fury’s eye is jarring. Considering the effort the movie went to create red herrings for how Fury loses his eye, leaving the line “It’s just a scratch” and editing out Talos’ reaction would have played equally as well.


Final thoughts:

This edit shows us the movie we could have gotten. A more widely relatable lead, while still representing the original message that was likely targeted towards young women. Tremault should be very proud of this effort as it shows what a love of the source material and more ruthless editing can accomplish.

An excellent edit of Captain Marvel that streamlines the movie tonally. This edit removes any references to sexism that Carol Danvers faces, and tones down some of her meaner moments. While I think there is a really interesting story that Marvel could have told about Carol coming to terms with being from a planet that treats her gender poorly, the sexism is never actually addressed as part of the story and just ends up feeling tacked on. Removing it helps bring the focus back to Carol and her quest for her memories. Same with the underlying girl power motif. This could have been fun if Disney had leaned into it, but instead it's random appearances feel out of place in a movie that is clearly about something else.

The editor made a couple other fantastic changes. Flashbacks are now desaturated. This distinct visual look actually helped make the flashback sequences play better giving them a more mysterious quality. I was surprised by just how effective this trick was.

The other massive change is to the opening structure of the movie. Jude Law is given a new introduction, and most of the Kree home world scenes have been played with. This is the first time I believed Carol was an accepted part of that world, and I found myself more engaged with the movie than I ever have been before. It is a huge improvement in every way, making her relationship with Jude Law much more engaging.

Unfortunately, the second half of the movie still suffers from some script problems that are outside of the editor's control. Carol still has a limited emotional arc, and surprisingly cares very little that for her old friends the Kree or that they lied. There is a lovely change to Carol reconnecting with her memories that the editor added. Using some of the flashback footage we can see Carol start to connect with her memories far better than in the theatrical version. I really liked this change, and actually thought the editor could have pushed it a little further. It goes a long way towards fixing an area of the movie that really lacks character development. Unfortunately, what the back half of the film needs is additional footage that simply doesn't exist. But the editor did a fantastic job with limited resources here.

All that said, this is far superior to the theatrical version. The edits are smooth and unnoticeable. There were one or two moments where I thought the dialogue was a bit loud, but otherwise this was a very sound edit from a technical perspective.

If you want some Captain Marvel in your life, this is the version to watch.

I am always curious when a new marvel fan fix comes out. especially for those criticized movies. I tend to like all of them but some parts are so cringe or on the nose or generic that they are easelly forgotten.
The editing is great and the narrative works well! Less cringy and more enjoyable than the original. Of course the AV quality is hard to get perfect but still great!
My go to version!

I enjoyed this version of the Captain Marvel movie much more than the theatrical release. The edit actually makes the Captain Marvel likeable again. Will definitely be my go to version for Marvel movie binge watching.

Ok I have to say this is definitely the best version of this movie. I never thought it was possible, but I truly enjoyed it! I disliked the TC version, since it focused too much on making her strong and cool as a sock in a refrigerator. But that made her unrealistic, unrelatable and even at times unlikable. I was really hoping that I would like this edit since I could not stomach the original version and never could finish watching it, since I just simply could not enjoy it.

The insertion of the deleted scenes were brilliantly picked. The audio / video is great and they blend perfectly. This version removes / changes all the right spots, which now makes me forget all about the massive amount of hate the original version got, which is a huge compliment since it means I immersed in the movie.

Oh and I forgot about funny. Now that the bad jokes were cut, the good ones actually can be and are funny :)

I recommend this edit to everyone who previously - like me - disliked the TC or actually wanted to watch the film, but instead listened to the critics (of which many were not wrong) and did not even want to try afterwards. This movie proves also a point: The problem of the original version was not that the hero was a woman, but that the movie (at least the cut) was bad. And that's it. Anything beyond that is just frustration about unmet expectations in my opinion There was so much hype around this movie at its release and the final TC just did not feel right and dissapointed many fans.

But NOW this feels like a really good superhero movie that is entertaining and even exciting to watch.

Focusing on the emotions and friendships in this movie made me care about the characters and made them more real since - duh - humans are emotional beings and we do not want to watch a long movie if it does not make us care or trigger emotions that we like.

That's the magic that I love: Watching a fan edit (fan fix rather!) which makes a good movie (good cut) out of a bad one (bad cut)!

Many thanks and much applause!