Ms Marvel - Episode 3 - Review

For an all-new character into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the first two episodes of Ms Marvel did a decent job of establishing the girl behind the powers. But after two episodes were very little superheroeing happens, it is time for things to get moving, but does the third episode manage to achieve this, or is it nothing more than just more teen drama.

It was quite a bold move for the makers of the show to kick start the third episode, flashing back to British-Occupied India, or at least a single ruined room of it. Seeing the mystery lady from the car, in the flashback would be nothing major, except the year is 70+ years before the show takes place, which instantly puts questions around her and her motives. Seeing that she is with others and one of them is named Aisha, the great-grandmother of Kamala, it starts to raise questions, but perhaps none more so than the 10 rings iconography on the ground. While there are snippets of conversation here, it isn’t until the show brings the focus back to the modern day, when we finally get some details, including the name of this group of interdimensional beings, the Djinn.

The problem is, their story and actions are questionable at best and while Kamala is taken in, at least at first, with the desire to do some good, her friend Bruno manages to talk her out of it, or at least, slow it down a bit. Her arriving at the same decision after a talk with her mother is a good thing and getting the support from Kamran is also welcome, but as anyone can tell you, people with mysterious pasts, who long to return home, never want to wait and that is the case here. The problem is that the time between them choosing not to wait and attacking is all of an hour, at best, meaning that Kamala has no choice but to disrupt the wedding and get into a fight/survival encounter with this ground of semi-enhanced individuals from another dimension.

It was great to see that she didn’t bust out some amazing martial arts moves or become a master of her powers in the middle of the fight, yes there was a single moment of her taking charge of her powers, but even that was exceptionally brief. Sadly, brief is the way of the show it seems, at first she is on board with the Djinn, but that is only briefly before she changes her mind, she is enamoured with her rising star power as Nightlight, but again only briefly when her friend and other start to complain about the addition of a super powered person in the neighbourhood. Even after speaking with the Imam and realising that she can be a force for good, if she chooses to do the right thing, is only a brief moment of acceptance, before she does the wrong thing. Her pulling the fire alarm is a bad thing and her being seen doing it, will of course have consequences, but after being told by her mother, the Imam and over-hearing her father explain that, with family you are never alone, she does something on her own.

This is where the show is losing me, yes you can argue that the show is all about a teenager and teenagers are known to do stupid things for dumb reasons, there is an entire genre of movies about that exact topic. The problem is that this is Marvel and they are meant to be smarter than that, we have had shows for characters we have known, like WandaVision and Hawkeye and shows like Moon Knight leading the way for all new characters. With new characters though, you have to bring in the audience to it and for all the grand story telling that we are seeing with the Djinn, the Department of Damage Control and even the local community, everything keeps spinning to focus on the lead character who is wishy-washy at best and it makes it hard to enjoy. Having a character make bad decisions is normal, it happens all the time in shows from all over the world, the problem is, they start to learn after a while and they grow and right now Kamala isn’t growing as a character, just randomly changing directions, but staying on the same level.

As far as the action goes, there isn’t a lot here, there was a few moments of her powers being unleashed, and even the Djinn got a chance to see break out their own weapons and get into the fight, but again that was short lived. Having Kamala’s secret exposed by the friend who just happens to go around to the loading dock is contrived at best and of course, she was always going to learn about it, more so given how the speech played out in the bedroom about Kamala’s new hobby, but it just seemed pointless. The show ending by telling the lead character to come to Pakistan, could make things interesting, but given how she has refused to explain her powers until now, it could go either way in how it plays out.

Ms Marvel is really struggling to find an identity right now, there are times when it wants to play up the superhero aspect, but also times when it wants to be a teen drama, the problem is whenever it decides to go one way, it refuses to let go of the other. This has the show unable to reach potential in either space and the only way in which it can get better, is if they somehow manage to merge both and make it entertaining and right now, that is not looking like it will happen. Everything in the show is solid on its own, the characters, the setting, the story, but somehow they are just not mixing in well and it needs to get better at that, if it wants any chance to being a show worthy of continual watching.

The Score

6.5

The Pros

+Finally getting some traction in terms of the main story is very welcome indeed

+Kamala acceptaning of her powers, by listening to her family is something we haven’t seen in the MCU before

The Cons

-However, her choosing to ignore all that advice at the drop of a hat and then ignoring the family later is stupid

-The show feels like it doesn’t know what it wants to be and as such is leaving things a real mess