Maybe Marvel’s latest is meant specially for women — in particular, women who have been told all their lives that being a woman meant they weren’t good enough, weren’t strong enough, weren’t fast enough, etc. — and so its journey of self-discovery through self-recovery was not designed, executed, and polished to a high sheen for my particular benefit. Or even moviegoers’ general benefit. But I certainly wasn’t bored like this during the much weirder superheroine movie Border, which shares an awful lot of themes with this one. But then, that was a film that didn’t feel like an object lesson in empowerment through self-affirmation; it felt like the story of a person. Here, star Brie Larson seems a bit bored by her own tale: that of a Kree warrior who gets stranded on earth, only to discover that our “shithole” planet may be the key to her mysterious dreams. Humor comes from Samuel Jackson’s Nick Fury, heart from Lashana Lynch’s Maria Rambeau, and pathos from…well, I don’t want to spoil anything. But it ain’t Larson or her character; her wondrous-to-behold super-powered energy has to do all her expressing for her. The story is set in the ‘90s, because it’s an MCU prequel of sorts, and because of the jump back in time, Mr. Jackson has to act through a CGI mask of himself, which is less enjoyable than watching Ben Mendelsohn act through the groovy green mask of a shape-shifting Skrull. Also because of the jump back in time, there will be good-time oldies from Garbage and No Doubt on the soundtrack. Also, outdated tech played for yuks. What follows is deeply sloppy in the plotting department, with the film’s prequel status dictating the eventual resolution to a much greater degree than anything inherent in the story at hand. (2019) — Matthew Lickona
This movie is not currently in theaters.