Miss Marvel
An analysis of Disney’s new production, “Ms.Marvel” from a Desi lens. Is it worth the watch? Was it good? Should you be looking forward to Season Two? SPOILERS UPCOMING
By: Amrita Guha
From Kate Sharma in Bridgerton to Kamala Khan in Ms. Marvel; the industry is going crazy with representation these days, they even got us our own super hero. Miss Marvel features Kamala Khan, an ordinary highschooler weirdly enthralled with the world of Marvel, until one day she unlocks powers of a superhero herself ( shooting blue crystals out of her hand.) Like many superhero tales, her world flips upside down in the matter of days, as her problems go from attending Comicon to saving reality as we know it from merging into a darker realm.
Ms. Marvel is centered around Kamala’s Pakistani heritage, including several episodes shot in Pakistan and talking about the India – Pakistan partition. The show goes in depth about the partition and all the hardships Kamala’s family had to overcome to give her the life she has. This show was, at times, touchingly relatable for desi demographics and very informative for others. One thing I imagined hit pretty close to home was Kamala’s relationship with her parents. Understanding that your parents love you but also having a hard time seeing eye to eye on things. In the beginning of the season, its is clear that Kamala loves and cares for her parents but doesn’t communicate it in a way her parents will accept. In her parents eyes, sorting out all of her teenage issues makes her rebellious and disrespectful. As a little brown girl it was nice to see how she handled that stress emotionally and had a family dynamic that I’m familiar with. It wasn’t the typical “strict Asian parents” trope because the show took the effort to share both sides of the story, not villianizing anyone but helping us understand where everybody is coming from.
Moving on from the sappy relatable stuff, I thought this show was wasted potential. I appreciated the creativity and detail that went into the show. But I’m sorry, the plot was awful. For noobs who did not watch the show, this is how the show worked. The first episode was obviously introducing Kamala and her family. We learn that Kamala is a Ms. Marvel superfan and that she desperately wants to go to Comicon in her Ms. Marvel costume. Pretty normal. But as a last minute addition to her costume she puts on her grandmothers old bangle, and boom, she discovers she has superpowers while making a mess of comicon. Following the origin of her powers, there are 3 episodes solely explaining the history of the bangle and the supernatural existence in her family, all of which is intertwined with real historical events like the India-Pakistan partition. However, while the history lesson moves on, Kamala’s white boy sidekick is doing a subpar job at helping her control her powers, so she begins to rely on the new rowdy kid group she falls into: The Djinn. Basically, they try and trick her into using her powers to merge our reality into some scary ghost reality. So, for the next episode or so she is saving the world from this merge and fighting the people who, 2 minutes ago, she thought were her friends. And then she succeeds in stopping the merge and the show is over. Right? No you’re wrong. After she basically saves the world the government starts chasing her down and she has to fight them off with her friends. However, then Kamala’s only compelling love interest goes mad with rage and turns on her while she ALSO has the government trying to kill her. While all of this is happening, one of Kamala’s TikTok famous friends summons a mob of people to witness the final showdown between Kamala, her should’ve been boyfriend, AND the government. Kamala wins, the rude government lady gets in trouble, and season 1 ends.
I would compare this show with Dr. Strange Multiverse of Madness because every scene leaves you wondering what in the world, but Ms. Marvel had an extremely fast paced plot yet was still a little boring. I found myself skipping through a lot of parts but after condensing the plot like I just did, I may have not been in my right mind when I found myself bored while watching.
One thing I did love about the show were the details. Oh and of course the grandma. The show immediately got brownie points from me when I heard the soundtrack. WHEN PASOORI CAME ON. Oh man I was so happy. And songs like “Tu Mera Chand” in the more historical parts of the show that had the special old Bollywood charm to them. As I looked through the soundtrack, I realized that a lot of the songs were sampled from smaller Pakistani/Desi artists. Not to mention production included many Desis in the creative industry. It was really beautiful to see how intentional this show was with everything, especially in giving back to the desi community.
For that, I think regardless how chaotic or boring this show was I can’t say I hated it. At the end of the day, these shows aren’t about being the perfect representation or having the perfect plot, they are about putting more appropriate diversity out there. Even though the show was mediocre, I will still waste my time watching every season that comes out.
“I watched the trailer and I almost started crying it was so bad” – Alana
“I forwarded most of it because it was very slow. It wasn’t even her original story” – Akshara
Image credited to Disney