Brie Larson has her work cut out for her in 'Avengers 4,' but her character's comic book roots prove she is up for the task.


[This story contains spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War]


Brie Larson's Captain Marvel hasn't yet made her big-screen debut, but as audiences continue to process and debate the events of Avengers: Infinity War, it's time to take a closer look at Marvel Studio's next hero.


First, a refresher on the final moments of Infinity War: Continuing the grand Marvel Cinematic Universe tradition of teasing future films in post-credits clips, Infinity War dropped the briefest possible glimpse at the arrival of Captain Marvel, who is slated for her own solo debut in March 2019. The tease was brief — a split second look at the blue, gold, and red Captain Marvel logo on the screen of a device carried by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) which looked suspiciously like a 1990s beeper — and that was it. The world continued to spiral into post-Infinity War chaos as Fury himself vanished into dust. Not exactly the most hopeful proclamation for the future — especially if you're not totally sure who Captain Marvel actually is or what she can do. Thankfully we've got several decades worth of comics history to look at as we start making some guesses.


The Captain Marvel in question in the live-action universe is a woman named Carol Danvers, and though she's currently the most well known and commercially successful hero to hold the title, she's far from the first. The legacy of Captain Marvel stretches all the way back to the 1960s, beginning with a character named Captain Mar-Vell who started his superheroic career as a military defector from the alien race called the Kree. Mar-Vell is slated to get an MCU debut in Captain Marvel as well. Jude Law is plains Mar-Vell's human alter-ego Dr. Walter Lawson, though it's unclear if he'll remain an ex-officer in the Kree army in this incarnation.


Carol herself didn't actually take the name Captain Marvel until 2012, though she's existed in Marvel Comics for nearly as long as Mar-Vell himself.


Originally introduced as a normal, human officer in the US Air Force, her powers were the result of an extremely '70s sci-fi accident where she was caught in an explosion that resulted in her DNA merging with Mar-Vell's genetic code, making her a Kree-Human hybrid. She came out of the experience with a whole range of metahuman abilities like flight, enhanced strength and super speed — you know, the works. Over the years as she experimented with her new powers she adopted superhero names like Ms. Marvel, Binary, and Warbird and served on just about every team you could think of, from the Avengers to the Guardians of the Galaxy.


Identity crisis became a central theme in Carol's stories as she tried to figure out just where her loyalties lied and what her responsibilities were now that she was, in point of fact, a literal child of two worlds. It was this undercurrent of existentialism, expectation, and self discovery that eventually drove her to take on the Captain Marvel mantle for good as she set out to see where she fit in the name's long, complicated legacy.


Now what that history might mean for Carol's live action incarnation is hard to say. Because we know the bulk of her solo film is going to be taking place in the 1990s (complete with a younger, two-eye Nick Fury as a supporting cast member) it's pretty safe to assume that her pre-Captain Marvel superheroic life isn't going to make it on to the screen. There just wouldn't be enough time to establish multiple identities in the space of a single movie -- and the complications that would bring for the MCU's overall timeline would most likely be more trouble than they're worth. So, smart money is on live action Carol being Captain Marvel and Captain Marvel only.


That being said, her spot on the timeline pre-Iron Man does beg a fair amount of questions. Namely, if she's been active as a hero and known to Nick Fury for close to thirty years, where has she been? Why has Nick waited all this time to call her in?


We can venture a guess that the answer to both of those questions is going to be some variation on "she's been in space." Set photos of Brie Larson in costume make it seem like Carol has been training directly with the Kree Army as well as with the US Air Force, meaning that while her child-of-two-worlds existential crisis is likely still going to be a major element of her character's identity, she's not going to spend too much time on Earth debating her place in things. It's very likely we're going to be left with a Carol Danvers who commits to joining and training with the Kree wholeheartedly — though whether that's a choice she makes herself or one that gets made for her is still up in the air.


But don't panic. That doesn't mean she's a traitor to humanity, or even disinterested in the proceedings on Earth. The MCU has spent some time building up its version of the Kree Empire over the years, most directly with the Kree zealot Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace) in Guardians of the Galaxy — who, if you can recall all the way back to 2014, spent some time working directly under Thanos (Josh Brolin) himself. Pace is set to reprise his role as Ronan in Captain Marvel, making it entirely possible we're going to see the seeds of a very personal beef between Carol and Thanos (or, at least Thanos's followers) start to form in her solo movie.


Of course that doesn't necessarily spell out what Carol is going to be able to do in the face of Thanos' universal genocide. Make no mistake, Captain Marvel's abilities and intergalactic origins make her the closest approximation to a hero like Superman in the MCU roster next to the likes of Thor, but even a person with that kind of power can't exactly remake reality with their bare hands. So here's hoping she's spent the last twenty-some years out in space not only honing her craft and metahuman abilities but also studying up on both Thanos and the Infinity Stones — the future of the MCU is going to depend on it. Captain Marvel rolling up to Earth after half the galaxy turned to dust will be cool no matter what, but she's going to need more than super strength and speed to sort out this problem.

Can Captain Marvel Save a Universe?

This is a very interesting question. The answer is "sure, why not?" and I believe they will. There will surely be more gorgeous screens showing how they save the universe.
Comics say a hero saved the universe, and now a bunch of heroes will.