Probably around “Avengers: Endgame” (2019), Marvel Comics Universe (MCU) passed its peak period mainly due to giving us so many similar products for more than 10 years. After the immense success of “Black Panther” (2018), the franchise belatedly started to try different things as shown from “Black Widow” (2021), “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” (2021), and “Eternals” (2021), but, alas, we have become too tired and bored to cheer about that while also having to deal with heaps of TV drama stuffs from MCU.

Nevertheless, I came into the Dolby Cinema screening room of a local movie theater with some good will when I and a friend of mine were about to watch “The Marvels”. After all, this is another big female MCU film after “Black Widow”, and having no less than three female superheroes as its main characters is certainly not something I and others can see everyday.

However, unfortunately, I am rather depressed to report that I did not enjoy the movie as much as I hoped. While there is nothing wrong at all with the three lead actresses at its center, the movie often feels too hurried and clunky in terms of narrative and character development, and I frequently felt like being thrown into an expensive special episode in the middle of an unfamiliar TV drama series without much background knowledge.

Of course, I know a bit about Kamala Khan / Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) and her recent TV drama series even though I have never touched any of TV stuffs from MCU (Life is too short for me to check all of them, folks), but I wish the movie spent some more time on giving us more background information on not only her but also her new superhero colleagues: Carol Danvers / Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) and Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), who is incidentally the daughter of Danvers’ best female friend. I remember that I enjoyed “Captain Marvel” (2019) when it came out, but, boy, it feels like a long distant memory now probably due to the following COVID-19 pandemic period, and now I wonder whether I should have revisited “Captain Marvel” in advance for understanding more of Danvers’ rather complicated relationship with Rambeau.

Anyway, let’s go back to the movie itself. The villain of the movie, who is as forgettable as most of recent MCU movie villains (That is why we should be more grateful to how awesomely Tony Leung brought a touch of class to “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”, by the way), is attempting something potentially catastrophic in terms of space and time, and the opening scene of the film shows this villain figure finally finding one half of a powerful object called the Quantum Bands. Needless to say, getting the other half of the Quantum Bands is absolutely necessary for this villain figure, who certainly will stop at nothing for accomplishing the final goal.

If you are familiar with Khan’s TV adventure, you surely know that she happens to have the other half of the Quantum Bands, which is the main source of her superpower. While she has been enjoying her own superhero life, this plucky girl of one American middle-class Muslim family in Jersey City, New Jersey, is dreaming of becoming a friend/colleague of Captain Marvel someday, and, what do you know, she happens to get wish as she gets herself entangled with Danvers and Rambeau’s urgent situation due to that other half of the Quantum bands. For a reason I still do not wholly understand, they and Khan get their positions switched whenever they use each own superpower, and you may get quite confused when they try to be accustomed to this unexpected circumstance while going through the first big action sequence of the film.

Once they discern that they really need to stick together for saving not only the Earth but also the whole universe, they thankfully band together much faster than many male members of the Avengers. I wish the screenplay by director Nia DaCosta, who recently impressed us with her first two features films “Little Woods” (2018) and “Candyman” (2021), and her co-writers Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik takes its time more for the relationship development among its three main characters, but it is clear to us that Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris, and Iman Vellani are having a fun together at least, and I would not complain at all if the movie, which is rather short compared to many of MCU flicks, became longer to accommodate these three wonderful actresses more.

In contrast, many of the other main cast members are more or less than background elements. Zawe Ashton zealously chews her scenes like Faye Dunaway in “Mommie Dearest” (1981), but her effort is already limited by her thankless villain role from the beginning. In case of Samuel L. Jackson, he merely seems to be on an autopilot mode after playing his character so much during last 15 years, and he and many other supporting performers are far less impressive compared to a certain cute cat, which steals the show again as it did in “Captain Marvel”. To be frank with you, I will not deny that I chuckled a lot as watching how this cat provides an utterly outrageous moment accompanied with one of the most hideously catchy musical numbers from Andrew Lloyd Webber (I am not kidding at all, folks).

While it is not entirely without entertaining elements, “The Marvels” does not satisfy me enough for recommendation, and I become more convinced that it is already too late for the MCU franchise to embrace more diversity. After all those white male superheroes got all the fun and juice for more than 10 years, the franchise is now throwing leftovers to other superheroes without much consideration, and that is probably a very familiar situation to many of you. I do not know whether this is the beginning of the end of the era, but I still hope that we will at least get a bit more fun and excitement from whatever will come next after “The Marvels”.