Ms. Marvel had too much villain-y for just 6 episodes

[Ed. note: This post contains spoilers for the end of Ms. Marvel season 1.]

A superhero’s rogues’ gallery is often more interesting than the hero themselves. They are the architects of conflict, mapping out the plot by achieving a nefarious goal or one that conflicts with the hero’s priorities. But too often a villain’s darkness contrasted with the hero’s light becomes a flatline of monotony, rather than a shade providing depth to the story.

Take Disney Plus’ Ms. Marvel. This show and its main character are my favorite. The show was charming, hilarious, beautiful, and showed people like myself as human. However, the magic that imbued the show with its magical qualities was diminished whenever there were villains. The show was too generous with screen time for villains that needed an entire season, but too few to established characters. This led to the show falling prey to the traps of an overloaded season.

In just six episodes, we get three sets of villains — The Clandestines, Kamran, and the Department of Damage Control — with differing levels of personal involvement with Kamala and her new powers. They are superpowered, human-like beings that appear to be from another dimension. These are djinnIn Islamic mythology, they are invisibly made from fire and light.noor in Arabic). Kamran belongs to this group. Kamran finds it difficult to choose between loyalty to Najma (head of Clandestines) and Kamala’s love/love interest.

Finally, there’s the Department of Damage Control, a faceless bureaucratic entity whose goal appears to be capturing superpowered individuals. Damage Control views such individuals as dangerous and inherently chaotic, and pursues Kamala throughout the entire season. Only six episodes are available. Ms. Marvel’s creative team took clear shortcuts that undermined the potential for establishing proper conflict — and, with the Clandestines, conflict that actually made sense.

Image: Marvel Studios

Najma exudes calm and maternal energy when we meet her for the first time. She fills in the blanks in Kamala’s knowledge and teaches her how to use her powers to help them return home. Kamala believes she must take time to fully process all this before going on this adventure.

However, the show barely lets us — or Kamala — breathe before the Clandestines suddenly turn evil. Najma says she will wait no longer, and the entire Clandestine crew go after Kamala on the day of her brother’s wedding.

The change in my attitude was unearned and strange. I had no idea who the Clandestines actually were. They seemed happy families with diverse backgrounds who wanted to come home. But here they were, decades-old and skilled in their powers, going after an 18-year old girl who just discovered her abilities. I couldn’t fathom what their goal was; they needed her, but also were intent on hurting her, despite Kamala not doing anything to them or even saying “no.” They had already waited decades to find the magic bangle. Is it possible to wait a few days or even weeks before finding the magic bangle?

We also learned very little about Najma or her son through this superficial handling. I don’t know their names, their powers and so on. We don’t find out why or how they were exiled, what their dimension is like, how and where they lived, what they have been doing for half a century since parting ways (in bloody fashion) with Kamala’s great-grandmother. This could have been a clue that Kamala was in real trouble, not the cartoon characters they became on Saturday mornings. It’s unclear what harm they were suffering — sure, they said they WantedI would like to return home. wantA villa in Southern France. It doesn’t matter what you think.

Photo: Chuck Zlotnick/Marvel Studios

By not fleshing out the Clandestines, we not only lost out on potentially interesting lore, but proper conflict — something that the show better achieved with the semi-villain Kamran.

Kamran, when we first see him, is trying to balance his duties as a protector of Kamala and son to his now evil mother. By the final two episodes, Kamran seemed set up to be the final big bad (which makes sense, given he is one in the comics); he’s lost his mother as a direct consequence of Kamala’s actions. Kamala’s newly acquired powers give him every reason to hate Kamala. Kamala saves him, however, and it takes only a few scrapes. It’s an enticement that the show may do something with later, but that feels more organic to Kamran’s story than his mother’s. Although he did have conflict, his acting style felt right for him.

His and Kamala’s shared culture filled in a lot of how their connection might be strengthened (or compromised) in a way that her plot line with the Clandestines just didn’t. It’s also a big part of why I could identify with the show — and see the clear antagonism of the Department of Damage Control.

Minority groups — especially in the United States — tend to raise the hackles of the state. Damage Control, a thin substitute for ICE or similar law enforcement arms in the (U.S. state), is our main hero. A Muslim girl starts her super hero project protecting her local Muslim community. Damage Control then decides that it will target any brown residents of Jersey to capture her.

Like all such law enforcement agencies, its agents are bullish and arrogant in their conduct with others, justifying their actions because they are trying to “protect” people. They enter Kamala’s mosque — with shoes on! — but don’t get far, thanks to Kamala’s BFF Nakia noting they require a search warrant. Other times Damage Control agents refer to Kamala and other superhero with terms like “their kind” or “their type,” often having to clarify they mean superheroes, not Muslims.

Contrary to Clandestines Damage Control was dirty. EnoughScreen time. The show and both the viewers already knew the antagonistic nature of the U.S. Muslim community and its faceless law enforcement. Given the small number of episodes, making the agency the villain would’ve meant less time wasted on trying to establish who they are, why they’re bad, or where the conflict was. Although we don’t know what Damage Control does to superpowered individuals they capture, the episode is still interesting. feltIt is clear that this fits in with the Kafkaesque nightmare faced by innocent people when trying to navigate faceless, all-powerful bureaucracies.

Everything about Damage Control’s antagonism felt more personal, and more dangerous. Kamala is the only victim of other villains, but Damage Control targets Kamala. Her entire community. There is more resonance when the show brings together the Muslim community of her home, as well as her wonderful family.

As a result, we learn to love the community, and can then empathize with their grievances when law enforcement targets them unfairly. The show subverted the hero and he is still considered to be a hero. The radical act of normalization allows us to see a hero from a loving, happy and wholesome Muslim household. It resonated with me so much that I found it hard to look at the show without a skepticism, considering the lack of similar portrayals on prime TV.

It’s that the show did so much right that made its failures stand out. Because it had so little space to build its villains, the show obscured why its hero was important and crucial. Kamala is the first brown-man hero with whom I’ve ever identified. This show had a powerful, clear, and direct message for its creators.

If Marvel gives them another season, I believe the creative team will deliver. We can only hope that, going forward, as much nuance is given to its villains as was given to the show’s heroes.