The Marvels director Nia DaCosta has spoken about the complicated build-up to her movie in the MCU, stating that the film is “sort of a sequel to five different things.”
Keeping up with the Marvel Cinematic Universe is hard work these days. When the series started with Iron Man in 2008, it was pretty simple: there were a couple of movies a year, and they loosely interconnected before coalescing in The Avengers.
More recently, TV shows have been added to the mix, with the movie universe frequently crossing over with multiple shows on the small screen. So knowing what’s going on is an increasingly time-consuming task. One that – when the quality dips – sometimes feels like homework.
The Marvels releases this week, and requires knowledge of quite a few titles to understand everything that’s going on. As the film’s director explains…
The Marvels director says movie is a sequel “to five different things”
“They have a whole history before this,” director Ni DaCosta explains to GamesRadar of her characters. “We have Ms. Marvel the TV show, Captain Marvel, WandaVision, and it was kind of a constant negotiation to figure out, ‘Okay, how much information do people need? It was a real trial and error.'”
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The Marvels has three leads: Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers, Ms. Marvel/Kamala Khan, and Monica Rambeau. The movie is a direct sequel to Captain Marvel, which is why DaCosta name-checks that title. While Kamala debuted in the Ms. Marvel TV show, making that required viewing. And Monica developed superpowers in WandaVision, so that needs to be watched.
DiCosta co-wrote The Marvels script with Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik, and said their work needed constant calibration for the sake of an audience who might not be up-to-speed.
“We don’t want people to have to watch anything else” says DaCosta. “But, of course, you also have to be honest and be like, ‘This is the [33rd] project in this universe.’ It’s sort of a sequel to five different things. So at a certain point, you have to just be like, ‘Okay, yeah, there are some things that we can’t get in here, but it’ll be fun.'”
The Marvels hits theaters on November 10, and is covered extensively here. In the meantime, check out more superhero previews below:
Spider-Man 4 | Venom 3 | Deadpool 3 | X-Men ’97 | Captain America: Brave New World | She-Hulk Season 2 | What If Season 2 | Thor 5 | Fantastic Four | Avengers Secret Wars | Avengers The Kang Dynasty | Agatha Darkhold Diaries | Daredevil: Born Again
