The Marvels' plot holes and confusing moments in the film created uncertainties about the future of the MCU's Captain Marvel franchise. The withholding of information about a safe haven for Skrull refugees caused unnecessary conflict, while the omission of events in the film, such as the Secret Invasion, led to major inconsistencies, particularly with missing characters such as G'iah and Varra.
The Marvels released in November 2023 as the sequel to Captain Marvel, but it suffered from several confusing moments and plot holes in the Phase 5 movie. Many major MCU plot holes and confusing moments were created in Marvel Studios' The Marvels, which marked the return of Brie Larson's Carol Danvers, a.k.a. Captain Marvel, and the feature film debuts of Teyonah Parris' Monica Rambeau and Iman Vellani's Kamala Khan, a.k.a. Ms. Marvel. Despite The Marvels' disappointing box office performance, the Phase 5 project has been praised for focusing on the sisterly bond between its titular superheroes, and for expanding the MCU's Multiverse Saga, but the film wasn't without its flaws.
12 Biggest Factors In The Marvels' Historic Box Office Disaster The Marvels faced a multitude of issues that contributed to the record-breaking opening weekend failure for an MCU movie.
10 The Skrulls Had A Planet, So Why Did Secret Invasion Happen? The Marvels revealed the existence of the Skrull Planet of Tarnax, but the motives and consequences of their secret invasion remain unclear, leaving the audience with more questions than answers.
Prior to its release, The Marvels was billed as directly following on from the events of 2023's Secret Invasion series on Disney+, which saw Nick Fury return to Earth to deal with a rebellious faction of Skrulls. Gravik and his followers had become weary of Fury and Danvers' empty promise that they'd find the Skrull refugees on Earth another home across the galaxy, so wanted to claim Earth as their own. However, The Marvels revealed that Captain Marvel knew of a safe haven for Skrull refugees: Tarnax. Had Danvers revealed this information, the tragedies of Secret Invasion wouldn't have happened.
Marvel Studios' Ms. Marvel series in Phase 4 saw Kamala Khan unlock her latent mutant abilities with her great-grandmother's mysterious bangle, which The Marvels revealed to be one of two Quantum Bands. While there is some confusion about why Kamala continues to wear the bangle, she doesn't actually need it to access her abilities. Ms. Marvel's hard-light powers come from within her own body, meaning the Quantum Band serves no purpose aside from unlocking these gifts, so the fact that she still wears it in The Marvels is confusing, especially since she practically delivers it to the villainous Dar-Benn.In one of The Marvels' most entertaining moments, the staff aboard the SABER Space Station use Goose's Flerken kittens as transportation back to Earth. Each Flerken has a pocket dimension inside their bodies that apparently enables safe travel for living individuals, but there was no way for anyone to know this prior, as no living being had been witnessed coming out of a Flerken. In 2019's Captain Marvel, Nick Fury uses Goose to take out several Kree soldiers, but they are never seen again, so it's unclear how he knew that traveling down to Earth inside the Flerkens would be safe.
The SABER Space Station first appeared in Secret Invasion, but The Marvels provides a detailed examination of the new organization and its mission. SABER is a defense system designed to protect Earth's residents after the Blip, and its existence is shrouded in secrecy. While Nick Fury allowed three civilians, Muneeba, Yusuf and Aamir Khan, Kamala Khan's family, aboard the SABER Space Station, it is unlikely that the Khan family would have been permitted to join the mission.At the end of The Marvels, Monica Rambeau sacrificed herself to patch up a rupture in the fabric of the universe, knowingly trapping herself on the other side. While this allowed The Marvels' post-credits scene to tease the MCU's X-Men introduction, it didn't actually make any sense, as Monica Rambeau never explains why she needed to be on the other side of the rupture to mend it. Surely it would have made more sense to fix the hole in reality from her side, allowing her to remain safely in her own universe, but for reasons unknown, this wasn't the case.
The Marvels' post-credits scene saw Monica Rambeau wake up in another reality inhabited by a variant of her mother, Lashana Lynch's Maria Rambeau, who is the superhero Binary, and X-Men member Hank McCoy, a.k.a. Beast, with Kelsey Grammer reprising the role from Fox's X-Men franchise.
Early on in The Marvels, Carol Danvers, Monica Rambeau, and Kamala Khan find their abilities entangled, meaning that they switch places every time their powers are used simultaneously. The Marvels tried to explain why this happens, suggesting that, because their abilities are all light-based, they are intrinsically connected, but this creates another major point of confusion. In Secret Invasion's finale, Emilia Clarke's G'iah was enhanced with the DNA of several notable MCU characters, including Captain Marvel, meaning she should have also been entangled with Danvers, Rambeau and Khan, but she didn't even receive a mention in the Phase 5 film.Similarly to G'iah, Nick Fury's own wife, Priscilla, a.k.a. the Skrull Varra, was not mentioned or seen in The Marvels. Despite the release of Secret Invasion, which received a poor critical reception, Varra was noticeably absent from the series. This suggests that she was intentionally omitted from the film, which leaves fans puzzled and wondering why she was not included in the final roster of MCU characters.
On several occasions in The Marvels, Captain Marvel and Dar-Benn engage in hand-to-hand combat, which often results in Dar-Benn overpowering the cosmic Avenger. While this fight scene is visually impressive, it's ultimately undermined by the fact that Captain Marvel is one of the MCU's most overpowered superheroes, having proven her ability to destroy spaceships by flying through them, defeat Thanos' attacks, and restart a sun. Therefore, Dar-Benn's victory in this fight is highly questionable, as he never should have been able to defeat Captain Marvel in a hand-to-hand fight.
While it is unclear why Zawe Ashton's Dar-Benn was able to best Captain Marvel, her intentions when going into battle were equally ambiguous. The destruction of the Supreme Intelligence had caused the Kree homeworld, Hala, to become inhospitable, making Dar-Benn's fight to protect her people extremely difficult. However, she possessed only one Quantum Band, which she needed to complete her mission of draining other worlds of their resources. Despite her valiant efforts, Dar-Benn was unable to wield both Quantum Bands simultaneously, suggesting that her arrogance played a significant role in her defeat.
The Marvels is now streaming on Disney+ and has had no significant impact on the future of the MCU due to the events of Secret Invasion.
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