Well, Ms. Marvel has just pulled a Boba Fett: use an entire episode (which Ms. Marvel only has six) to tell the story of another interesting, story-worthy character that is not the main protagonist. And just like how it hurt Boba Fett, it has damaged Ms. Marvel too.
I have to be honest. Episode 5 of Ms. Marvel was a massive disappointment for me. This show had TONS of potential after its thrilling first three episodes, yet Disney and Marvel have (uncharacteristically) “dropped the ball” with the latest two installments.
Just like Disney did with Boba Fett.
What do I mean? Well, Episode 5 of Ms. Marvel centers almost exclusively around Aisha, Kamala’s great-grandmother. For 30-35 minutes of the show’s 40-minute runtime, we witness how Aisha escaped from the British, started the Khan family, escaped her Djinn enemies, and how she died protecting her family and helped them flee to Pakistan.
Now, this story could have been very compelling as Aisha’s actress, Mewhish Hayat, was very charismatic and believable as the Khan family’s original matriarch.
Moreover, seeing how Hayat is an award-winning Pakistani actress, I don’t understand why Disney just didn’t make a show revolving around Aisha, her origins as a Djinn, the origins of her powers, the British occupation of India, the India-Pakistan partition, and how she broke away from her Djinn origins to be with her family before making Ms. Marvel.
Clearly, Disney was trying to cram both Aisha and Kamala’s stories into one show.
The “Aisha Show” could have been a great limited series, which would have served as a precursor to Ms. Marvel. Yet, with Aisha’s compelling story being crammed into one Ms. Marvel episode, I fear Kamala Khan will suffer the same sad fate as Boba Fett: character underdevelopment.
For a TV show that only has six episodes, with 40–50-minute runtimes each, every minute is needed to develop and showcase the main protagonists and side characters. It can’t waste time on characters who are not central to the plot. Which Aisha, seeing how she is long dead, is not.
Kamala’s development up until she got her superpowers was fantastic as we got to see a real, high school girl struggling with the challenges of not only being a high school girl, but also with the ramifications and hardships living as a first-generation American.
Plus, the show wonderfully displayed the culture and traditions of Pakistani and Pakistani Islam, which was great to learn about and watch.
Yet, as soon as Kamala found out she had superpowers, it was as though she became an Avenger overnight. I thought the whole purpose of the show was to portray what a “real high school girl” with superpowers looks like and how it is not even remotely as easy as what the Avengers make it out to be.
(Disney/Marvel-Ms. Marvel-Connected Trailer)
Aside from a half minute training montage, Kamala basically mastered the powers of the bangle within the span of one night. And, before we could process anything, she was flying off to Pakistan to stop the evil Dijinns.
Kamala still has a lot of potential, but some of it has definitely been wasted by the directors, writers, and Marvel itself rushing her into “Avenger-level” status too quickly. She needs time to grow into her character, which Marvel doesn’t seem to realize.
Anyway, speaking of the Dijinns, I really can’t recall seeing a worse antagonist in a Marvel movie/show. I was going to withhold my full judgment of them until the last episode, but I can’t. They have just been that bad.
These Djinns have one of the most vague, confusing, and uninspired driving motivation I have ever seen in a Marvel movie/show. Now, the Time-Keepers weren’t great in Loki, and neither was Ultron in the second Avengers movie, but at least you knew what they wanted and how they went about achieving their goal.
With the Dijinns, I know they want to go home, but that is about it. They don’t have any special powers to get their way, they are extremely boring and generic with everything they say or do, and they…SPOILER ALERT…have all died already. So, no going home for them.
(What’s worse is that the lead Djinn even renounces her neglectful, evil ways right before she dies all in one conversation with Ms. Marvel. I mean, come on, Disney. Not every villain has an epiphany of their wrongdoing)
I just don’t understand the point behind them being portrayed that way. According to the show itself, Djinns are evil, deceitful SUPERNATURAL beings of malice and spite. Not just some lame, “would-be” Pakistani assassins.
Nevertheless, my criticism of the Dijinns is not directed at the actors solely, though they definitely have not helped in making their characters look believable and interesting. Instead, my issue is more with the writers.
They had a great villain in the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents from the earlier episodes, who are still trying to hunt down Kamala Khan. If I was writing this show, I would have moved the Djinn plot to the “Aisha Show” (or just dropped it completely) and had a more intimating villain (the US government, essentially) be Ms. Marvel and her friends’ primary antagonists.
Like I said in my previous article, wouldn’t it be great if Kamala Khan was chased and hunted by her idols, such as S.H.I.E.L.D. and even an Avenger, because she achieved her dream and became a superhero like them?
Ms. Marvel has been an enjoyable, good show to watch so far, despite some of the clunky writing, plot contrivances, and poor villains. These last two episodes have definitely cooled my excitement about the show, but I’m still looking forward to seeing the last episode of Kamala Khan’s initial journey.
PS: (Disney, would you please stop using your shows about “Character A” to then tell the story of “Character B”. It really takes away from Character A, while leaving me to want more from Character B’s involvement. A lose-lose situation, if you ask me.)
Images Source: Featured Image: (Disney/Marvel) (Connected | Marvel Studios’ Ms. Marvel | Disney+ – YouTube)
In Text Image 1: (Disney/Marvel) (Connected | Marvel Studios’ Ms. Marvel | Disney+ – YouTube)
