HERO OF THE WEEK: CAPTAIN MARVEL (Marvel)Real Name: Carol Danvers
First Appearance: Marvel Super-Heroes #13 (March, 1968)
Fight Club Ranking: #76
Featured Fights:
- vs SECRET AVENGERS: Civil War #3 (Sep 2006)
- vs SECRET AVENGERS: New Avengers #36 (Jan 2008)
- vs THE HOOD & DORMAMMU: New Avengers #54 (Aug 2009)
- vs LUKE CAGE: New Avengers #2 (Sep 2010)
If I'm perfectly honest, Captain Marvel (aka; Ms. Marvel, aka; Warbird) isn't a character who's ever done much for me. As a superhero, she makes a lot of sense. I like the lineage from the dead Captain Marvel. The idea of an Avenger on active military service gives her something a lot of Marvel's free-wheeling vigilante heroes don't have. Unfortunately, those same hooks that give her an interesting identity, also tend to make her a better utility character for a story - not a lead. Far from Marvel's answer to Wonder Woman, most of the brushes I've had with Ms. Marvel have been pretty boring.
Something that does a whole lot for me, however, and might just give Ms. Marvel a boost on the path to becoming a legitimate Marvel Entertainment icon, is the announcement of Marvel versus Capcom: Infinite!
The debut trailer shown at PlayStation Experience made rumor reality - believers of sceptics. The fourth core installment in the gaming crossover franchise started the fight with Ryu & Mega Man on the Capcom side, Iron Man and Carol Danvers representing Marvel. An extended trailer also unveils Lilith (Darkstalkers) and Captain America.
Ms. Marvel is the most surprising of the six characters revealed so far, but given reports the game will focus mostly on Marvel's film and entertainment properties, it's easy to understand the choice. Brie Larson is already lined up to star in a Captain Marvel movie slated for a tentative 2019 release.
Admittedly, the film focus isn't the most exciting way to start expectations for a fourth game. Seeing comic book characters come to life has always been one of the great appeals of these games. Capcom's renderings of four colour costumes were superb in the 2D era. Recreations of movie designs - a little too mundane to match the manic, energetic, epilepsy inducing splendor of gameplay.
It's a little early to be jumping to conclusions about the game's minutiae/ The real alarm is the fate of characters currently operating outside the Marvel Entertainment license.
Spider-man should be safe, both as Marvel's most major mascot, and through the agreement with Sony that allowed Tom Holland to crossover into the Avengers films as the web-slinger. It'll be surprising if Miles Morales doesn't factor in somehow, as well. MvC3 characters like Wolverine, Deadpool, Dr. Doom, Magneto, Phoenix, Storm, X-23, Sentinel, Super-Skrull and Galactus are all in danger of hitting the scrapheap (in descending order), though. That also means no country for discarded past heroes like Cyclops and Cable, or eternally overlooked heroes like the Fantastic Four!
This extends the challenge of keeping things fresh, given Marvel vs Capcom 3 already introduced sought after heroes like Iron Fist, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Ghost Rider, Nova, MODOK and Taskmaster!
I'd like to see some of those returning, with a variety of characters available to try to fill the void of the departing stalwarts. There are an abundance of unused martial artists still at Marvel's disposal: Black Panther, Daredevil, Shang-Chi, Black Widow, Winter Soldier, Blade, Elektra, Bullseye and even Kingpin all interesting compliments to Iron Fist. With all that Defenders love, Luke Cage should finally make the cut, an adequate replacement for the likes of She-Hulk.
We'll probably get more Guardians of the Galaxy joining Rocket: Groot, Star-Lord, Gamora, Nebula and Drax all obvious choices. If they actually dare to cut Wolverine, I could see Drax playing a style similar to his. A comic inspired Ronan would make up for the disappointing movie version. Thanos seems like a no brainer -- although it looks like a Capcom infused version of Ultron might be the big bad, rather than the mad Titan.
If Ultron's the bad guy, Vision could be a natural addition in comic or movie fashion. Thinking along those lines there are winged heroes like Falcon or the upcoming Vulture, who could be fun. Ant-Man is a novelty fitting Capcom's expert gameplay. Quicksilver might be fun for speed. Scarlet Witch might pick up the slack for departing X-Men like Phoenix and Storm. Shocker would make me happy, as well -- especially a comic accurate version, rather than the movie.
Indeed, the Marvel side of the equation will be the most intriguing. As a notorious Street Fighter fan, I'll be hoping Capcom pulls some of the favourites who didn't make Street Fighter V (ie; Sagat). I wouldn't mind seeing some Muscle Bombers in there, as well.
There are a lot of other heroes I'd like to see, but there's plenty more time for speculation. In the mean time, bask in the glory of the extended trailer [embedded above], and await more Ms. Marvel!
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