Some critics think ‘The Marvels’ has taken the MCU to “a new low”

The new entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), The Marvels, has split the critics with a range of mixed reviews.

READ MORE: ‘The Marvels’ review: a quirky cosmic caper that lacks punch

The film, which is directed by Nia DaCosta, is the sequel to 2019’s Captain Marvel and a continuation of the television miniseries Ms. Marvel. The 33rd film in the MCU, it stars Brie Larson as Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel, Teyonah Parris as Monica Rambeau/Photon and Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan/Ms. Marvel.

In a three-star review, NME has said that “while DaCosta’s Candyman reboot was thrilling, this never musters the same level of engagement, despite a script that is chock full of good lines and a cast of willing participants. More meh than marvel, you might say.”

Other reviews have been less generous. In a one-star review, The Telegraph wrote that the film has taken the superhero franchise “to a new low”, adding that “the shortest of the films is also the most interminable, a knot of nightmares that groans with the series’ now-trademark VFX sloppiness.”

Similarly, a review from Associated Press states that, “as is often the case with Marvel’s girl power attempts, it feels a little pandering in all the wrong places and doesn’t really engage with any specific or unique female point of view.”

A scathing review in the New York Post describes The Marvels as “the worst MCU movie yet”, adding: “If you thought Eternals and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania were low points for the limping Marvel Cinematic Universe, strap in for the ride to abject misery that is The Marvels.”

In a one-and-a-half star review, The Washington Post said, “There’s a lot of fighting and the fate of the world is said to hang in the balance, but when you look at the screen, all you see is a bunch of people trying to grab some shiny things from one another … The film progresses turgidly and mindlessly, with respite granted only by two delightful interludes.”

Others, however, have been more positive in their assessment. A three-star Guardian review wrote: “Here is a sci-fi superhero action-comedy which pops as sweetly and insubstantially as bubblegum,” adding that it is “presented with such likeable humour and brio” and that “Larson, Parris and Vellani are an entertaining intergalactic ensemble”.

Empire Magazine gave the film four stars, describing it as bringing “the zippiest and paciest film the studio has made in some time.” It says the film “reminds us how a superhero film can and perhaps should zig along, and then lands a crowd-pleasing one-two punch of final scene and mid-credit sting”.

A broadly positive review in The Hollywood Reporter also states that “DaCosta’s kinetic direction and intimate storytelling style lets audiences see this trio — whose lives collide in unexpected ways — from new and entertaining vantage points.”

The Hollywood Reporter also reports that the film is projected to take between $60million and $65million (£49-53million) in its opening weekend, which it says would place is as one of the lowest MCU openings so far. 2008’s The Incredible Hulk remains the lowest US domestic opening for one of the films in the series, with $55.4 million (£45.2 million).

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