Thats not the one I am reffering too - she walked thru the frame - was clearly ‘larger’ and more ‘green’ than the rest - we did not see a face - just the dark hair and skin.
nm - just went back and re-wathced - I am clearly wrong and that is the scene in question.
Of course, it may well have been a lady cosplaying as Hulk given we don’t know if She-Hulk exists yet. Dad hulk was pretty funny.
The big Hulk and little Hulk scene with Kamala and her parents amused me. “There is no big Hulk, little Hulk!” Oh, yeah? There soon will be! It was a funny bit of foreshadowing. Kamala’s mom could have made Thor outfits for them both as an alternative.
The visual style reminds me a bit of the comics, too. They tend to have funny small background details, making you pay close attention to every panel. Sort of like a toned-down Sergio Aragones. For instance, product names and signs in page 2 of volume 1, issue 1:
The first TPB won a Hugo, BTW, in the Year of the Dumb Dogs.
Much more info on that first TPB
http://cbldf.org/2015/04/using-graphic-novels-in-education-ms-marvel/
(ETA looks like Imgur compressed the page so much that you can’t actually read the signs. Here is the original image.)
I thought it was a good start. It was a little tropey and I thought Bruno wiring the Khan house into his homemade Alexa was a bit of a stretch but that’s kind of how these show go.
Kamala’s band appears to be a Quantum Band, which would be a nice tie-in to Mar-Vell, since they aren’t going with the Inhuman origin. I was under the impression that she would have both but it looks like just one… so far. That makes me wonder if someone else will get the other band.
I also really thought for a moment that the teen in the classic Ms. Marvel cosplay got squashed by the giant swinging Mjolnir, setting her up to be rescued was a little wacky but it was a fun scene. I’m interested in seeing how this relationship develops now – she could be a Ms. Marvel fangirl and/or a Kamala Khan rival ala Flash Thompson.
Predictably, some whiny babies are review-bombing the show. You don’t like the show? That’s perfectly fine. Constructive criticism? Great! Don’t hide behind a IMDB rating. Bunch of goobers.
Birdy Num Nums?! That is one hell of a deep cut.
Okay, finished watching the premiere. I’m quite impressed. You really felt like you were in a fully realized and rich setting.
All the aspects of growing up in an immigrant family with a South Asian background rang very true to me. I grew up in an Indian Hindu family, not a Pakistani Muslim family. However most of South Asia, from Chittagong to the Khyber Pass and from the Hindu Kush to Serendip share a lot of cultural characteristics. Millions of Pakistanis and North Indians in particular essentially speak the same language although they call it by different names (Hindi and Urdu).
It also touched on a huge social problem in the community, that of the inequality of women and girls, misogyny, patriarchy, and male chauvinism. I don’t know how seriously they’re going to take it, but girls growing up in America in immigrant families with “traditional” values face a lot of unfair treatment from parents, siblings, and the “community.” A lot of them have to get out in order to have a little more freedom to make choices. It’s no coincidence how common it is for South Asian-American women to date or marry “outside the community.”
Tha scene in which Kamala’s mother said “This is not you” hit me really hard. It’s such a real and common situation, depicted very realistically, but perhaps not with the seriousness that it really takes on in real life. A girl like Kamala will face huge limits on her choices and aspirations. And like Kamala, a lot of girls in that situation end up sneaking around and having a “secret life” in order to have some degree of freedom and self expression.
Imagine of Kamala was not just secretly being a superhero but was innocently sneaking out to hang out with friends, some of whom might be boys, not to mention date boys. And what if she were wearing slightly tight clothes or showing an amount of skin that in mainstream society wouldn’t even be noticed, what if she wanted to cut her hair? Even the simplest choices might be denied. And further imagine if she were lesbian or bisexual.
I see from the link above that “real” Marvel fans think it’s stupid to center a show in this aspect of American culture. I don’t know what to say about it but I bet there are a lot of American kids, especially girls, who can see themselves in this story. I think that’s really exciting, especially given that the first episode seems to have done it reasonably well, unlike previous depictions of Asian Americans or South Asians (See “Outsourced” or that failed Margaret Cho show from 30-40 years ago.)
My own two daughters, who have an Iranian mother and definitely feel they represent a blending of cultures, were delighted by the show. They don’t know much about this particular culture, but they definitely appreciated the emotional conflict of trying to chart an identity between multiple reference points.
I really liked Kamala and Bruno in this episode.
Kamala’s parents and “Aunty Ruby” were scarily realistic, even as comedic roles.
I’m concerned about Amir, because in real life that ultra-religious brother can turn out to be a huge asshole. I’m somewhat concerned about how his religiosity will come into play. Because it can be a neutral thing or it can be very bad for Kamala. At least in this episode he had her back somewhat.
I’ve read a lot of the Ms. Marvel comic series (I got a bunch of the softcovers for my niece but I read them before handing them over!) and I think her powers in the comic are goofy and fun. It wasn’t terrible the way it was depicted in the show but it might not be as fun.
That’s really great. I wish I had something like to identify with in the 1970s and 1980s. Even though, not being a girl, and not living in NY/NJ, there’s a lot about her experience that isn’t directly translatable to mine. (Immigrant life in the Midwest 40-50 years ago was much more isolating). However, like Kamala I grew up obsessed with fantasy — Batman, Star Trek, Tolkien — and I’ve never grown out of it (perhaps to an extent to my own detriment). But she is going to get to live out her fantasy and I get all squishy inside thinking of that.
Oh, totally jealous that they got to go to such an awesome convention. I haven’t been to a convention in years, certainly not since the pandemic.
Her interview on The Daily Show shows that Iman Vellani is just as charismatic and likable in real life.
I don’t identify with her character at all but that girl is so immensely likeable that she can carry the whole damn show on charisma alone. That said I could have done without the ridiculously tropey generic “friend of the superhero that is good with gadgets”, a regular ass friend would have been much better.
Review-bombers suck. Racist assholes who think that everyone has to be a straight white male.
Maybe you are a second or third generation Immigrant from South Asia, and have a different perspective of India, but NO - the cultural characteristics are quite different at Hindu Kush than at Sri Lanka.
For example Homosexuality is illegal (Haram) and will get you killed in Hindu Kush (Afghanistan) but not the rest of India.
Also having multiple wives is common in Afghanistan. Please read the autobiographical story of Kabuliwalar Bangali Bou ( A Kabuliwala’s Bengali Wife ; 1997)[ where she describes being married to a Afghanistan Muslim Man and her perils. She was killed by the Taliban in early 2010’s.
Anyways, my daughter, a teenager is a Marvel’s movie fan and does these Marvel marathons; and as much I dislike marvel, I watch the movies with her because she likes it. But the hodge podge of character Kamala seems to be; confused my daughter because she sees the cultural differences in Indian and Pakistani families.
For one - I had to spend an hour explaining HARAM and KAFFIR to her.
What sucks even more are the people I’ve seen asking, “Why is this being review bombed?!?”
Come on, guys, you know why it’s being review bombed. Stop acting surprised at racist shitbags acting like shitbags who are racist. Any movie or show with a non-white male lead that gets huge numbers of one star ratings before it even airs is being targeted by the shitbags, and their “reviews” should be ignored. Were I in charge, they’d also be deleted, but at the moment, ignoring is the best I can do.
Do you know what “a lot” means?
Pick any major University near you. Visit their Campus and the International Student Center. Meet the student bodies of “Indian Students”
And “Pakistan Students”.
You will get the answer to what “a lot” means in this context. Do not live in the imaginary world - in reality the cultures are quite different.
The first difference you will see is the percentage of female students in the student bodies. There are many many more - if you’d like .
So the answer is “no,” you don’t. Fine. Moving on …
