Ms. Marvel is finally here! The premiere episode, written by Bisha K. Ali and directed by Adil & Bilall, gives us a sweet introduction to Kamala Khan and her world. And after the Multiverse shenanigans of Loki and What If…?, the complex worldbuilding of Hawkeye, and the literal gods of Moon Knight, it’s nice to be back with a true street-level hero again. In fact, in its opening episode Ms. Marvel doesn’t focus on heroics at all! We meet the adorable, daydreamy, Captain Marvel-obsessed Kamala. We see her life with her family, and her relationship with her bff Bruno. The episode’s biggest conflict is that she wants to go to AvengersCon, and her Ammi and Abbu absolutely do not want to give her permission.
Her own superpowers don’t even kick in until the last few minutes of the episode. And let me tell you, it was so much fun to just watch a show about a kid who loves superheroes and wants to go to Con.
Recap
We open with an animation Kamala’s made for her Youtube channel, Sloth Baby Productions. Kamala Khan is re-telling the story of Endgame from an entirely Carol Danvers-centric perspective. It’s nice, actually, to see this story without the Weight of Tony Stark’s Sacrifice hanging over it—Kamala is a Captain Marvel stan, and Tony isn’t the focus here. But enough animation! Ami is yelling up the stairs that it’s time for breakfast.
Kamala’s family is introduced in one quick scene: Ammi is fretful and worried about, well, everything; Abu is twinkly and amused; Kamala’s big brother Aamir is the religious one, and takes so long praying over breakfast that Abu cautions him he’s going to starve to death. We learn quickly that he’s getting married soon! And today is Kamala’s driver’s test! And she needs to focus!
Focusing will prove to be a theme.
Like a lot of teenagers, Kamala is so busy trying to look cool while she drives that she botches the test, ramming her parents’ car into the instructor’s. (I did way worse on my test! You’ll get there, Kamala! …and it’s okay, I live in a city with trains now.) Then it’s off to school, where Kamala is not an utter outcast, but she’s also not exactly popular. Her best friend Bruno has brought her an electric blue morning slushie; another friend, Nakia, looks out for her in the halls when she gets distracted; and they briefly talk to a girl named Zoe who I’m guessing used to be a friend? Mr. Wilson, a guidance counselor, also tries to get Kamala to focus during a meeting, even throwing inspirational Mulan lyrics at her.
We quickly understand the rhythm of Kamala’s life: home is warm and loving but also restrictive; school isn’t torture—Kamala isn’t bullied or anything—but she’s also seen as a dreamy dork; afterschool is split between time doing geeky shit with Bruno and trying to tolerate her Ammi.
The big conflict at the moment is that Kamala wants to go to AvnegersCon and she knows her parents won’t approve, but it’s the first one, it’s historic, and they’re having a Captain Marvel cosplay contest that she must win. She finally asks. They say no. (They think it’s a party and boys might be there. I’m honestly not sure if they’d be more or less comfortable if they understood what a Con actually was?) She’s upset. Then, after Aamir talks to them, they relent—but only on the condition that Abbu goes with her. Dressed as The Hulk. And she’s dressed as Little Hulk in a very loose costume.
Abbu is already dressed in his Hulk costume. He’s painted his face green. It’s fantastic.
But obviously Kamala’s furious that they still don’t understand. This isn’t a costume party, she’s not a little girl, there is no “Little Hulk” what even is that, it’s Captain Marvel that she loves, that’s the contest she’s entering, this is how she’s trying to step into adulthood a little bit, and going like this would be humiliating. Unfortunately, being a kid, she yells some of that at them, and, also obviously, they’re angry that she won’t take their generous offer, but more than that they’re hurt that she’s horrified by Abbu’s idea.
Now she really isn’t going.
And obviously that leads to a plan to sneak out, with Bruno, and go anyway. Typical teenage stuff—except that this will only be possible because Bruno’s a tech wiz who created a Siri-like smart home system for Abbu (It’s called ZuZu, he taught it Urdu). But of course, Kamala’s superpowers manifest during the Con, complicating everything quite a bit.
About that. Earlier in the episode Kamala’s Nani, Ammi’s mother, sent a box of junk from Pakistan. One particular piece of junk was a lovely gold armband that Ammi took away the second she saw Kamala fiddling with it. Kamala decided to incorporate it into her Captain Marvel costume, and, seemingly, it called up a strange glowing light that knocked Kamala into a heightened sense of reality. No one else noticed and the next thing she knew she was onstage, blasting some sort of energy out of her band. Everyone thought it was part of her costume, but the energy knocked a giant Ant-Man decoration loose, and then Mjolnir, which swung through the crowd knocking Zoe into the air. Kamala’s band extended her arm just barely far enough to break the girl’s fall, and then she and Bruno fled the scene.
Is it the armband? Is it channeling some innate, previously-unknown power of her own? In the comics this tied into the Inhumans storyline, but given some of Ammi’s warning about “dreaminess” running in the family I’m wondering if Kamala’s power in the show might be more intimately bound up with her Nani?
Again, though, the action at Con isn’t the real drama here. Kamala goes home, sneaks into her room, and Ammi is there, waiting. It’s 11:30 at night. She doesn’t even seem that angry, exactly, it’s not like they’re screaming at each other. She just can’t understand why her daughter is turning into a person who lies and sneaks around. Why she’s so obsessed with a bunch of superhero stories instead of creating her own story, doing well in school, and finally: “Do you want to be good? Or a cosmic head-in-the-clouds person?”
Kamala really is sorry she upset her parents. But as Ammi leaves the room, she stares at her glowing arm and declares that she wants to be cosmic.
Meanwhile, after the credits, officers from the Department of Damage Control watch a video of Kamala’s powers manifesting, and decide they need to bring her in.
Cosmic Thoughts!
My first thought: This was fun as heck! How fantastic is it to watch such a blast of pure, uncomplicated fandom. Kamala and Bruno are great, their friendship makes me so happy, and seeing them express their love for each other through geeky shit… well, saying I feel seen by a show about teenagers probably speaks to something awry in society, but screw it: seeing the way Bruno steps back and grins at Kamala while Kamala gazes up at a statue of Captain Marvel made my heart grow a bunch of sizes.
The feel is kind of like Spider-Man: Homecoming or Hawkeye, as we’re with a modern kid who has grown up idolizing the Avengers and talking about their adventures like lore that’s unfolding around them in the real world. Unlike Peter Parker and Kate Bishop, however, Kamala has no access to the world of heroes. She lives in Jersey City, in a community so tight-knit that breaking off an engagement to go travel to Europe is seen as horrifying debauchery.
How great is AvengersCon??? It’s been many, many years since the first time I ever went to a Con, but seeing Kamala and Bruno stagger starry-eyed into a wonderland full of cosplayers, games, merch, “The Star-Spangled Man with a Plan”, the de rigeur shrine to Tony and Natasha covered in notes, merch, gorgeous people dressed as their heroes excitedly shrieking about other people’s costumes reminded me why I started writing about this stuff in the first place. Even with all the toxic elements of fandom, and “content”, and my worries about what the Marvel steamroller is doing to cinema as a whole, it’s still a magical thing to walk into a space and not just feel like you belong, but that you belong because of what you love.
Ms. Marvel is very much about being a teen, and being a fan in a world where superheroes are celebrities, and I love that the show is tapping into that so well.
And also how great was it that after rejecting her Abbu’s Hulk idea, she ends up with Bruno dressed as Banner? Nice touch, writers’ room.
Kamala’s family is wonderful, warm and loving and idiosyncratic, but you can also totally see how a 16-year-old nerd would long to get away from them. The clashes between Kamala and her mom rang especially true—neither of them want to hurt each other, but they can’t help but talk past each other with every successive sentence, and you just want to shake both of them. And then make them hug. And of course Ammi makes Bruno an unhinged amount of food to take home, all neatly stacked in tupperware, in a matter of seconds. It’s her superpower.
Two scenes in particular show off their dynamic. When Kamala fails her driving test her parents both yell at the instructor, trying to convince him somehow that he set her up to fail. When they’re back in the car on the way home, Ammi lectures Kamala on how she needs to focus and stop daydreaming so much. Of course, Kamala largely ignores her while she gazes out over the Manhattan skyline and imagines Captain Marvel flying over it. The second time comes when Kamala’s helping her mom with errands for Aamir’s wedding. While she’s being fitted for a dress, the tailor comments that she’s too short. Her mom immediately comes back with “Your dress is too long!” but a moment later, when a friend has joined them to gossip about the aforementioned girl who went off to Europe, the mood shifts. Kamala says she thinks it’s good that the girl wanted to see the world, and now when the friend tells her the dress is too long, her mom agrees. It’ a fabulous, subtle element—as long as Ammi is protecting her child she absolutely has her back, but she’s also deeply worried that Kamala is actually too dreamy, too rebellious, not responsible enough, and she takes every opportunity to mold her into a more mature—but also still a little girl!—version of herself.
The acting is uniformly great. Iman Vellani is so real as Kamala. She’s absolutely believable as a superhero-besotted teen, because she actually is one, but more than that she’s excellent in all the scenes of conflict with Ammi and Abbu. The way her anger at them flares up behind her eyes and is then instantly crushed with guilt and remorse is perfect.
Zenobia Shroff and Mohan Kapur are both fantastic as Ammi and Abbu—I actually almost sympathized with them a little bit even though I’m very much #TeamLetHerGoToCon. They also get a nice scene alone after she’s snuck out that encapsulates their dynamic in a really sweet way, where they actually get to be Muneeba, making decorations for her son’s wedding but willing to be distracted, and Yusuf, who would really like to take this post-kids-in-bed opportunity for some romance.
I think my two favorites are two of the boys, though? I love Matt Lintz as bff/tech wizard Bruno, who is so clearly lonely, who’s tried to turn that loneliness into independence, and who is so happy to be welcomed by the Khans. And Saagar Shaikh only gets a few scenes so far as Aamir, but when he brings chai to Kamala after one of the arguments with her parents was so sweet, and felt so lived-in.
Now about Kamala’s powers, first of all I thought it was amazing that she’s just like “I actually have powers???” and then she’s just happy about it. There’s no angst (yet), she doesn’t seem frightened or overwhelmed. It’s such a nice touch of quiet worldbuilding that a kid who grew up in this world would always know that they might have a superpower, in the same way that they might have that thing that makes cilantro taste like soap. But it builds so well on the rest of this episode, the way Kamala is just a regular kid dealing with her life in Jersey City—basically the way Peter Parker used to be before he joined up with the Avengers and things got out of hand. It seems like the show has found a way to keep her stretching ability, but possibly also made the powers more nebulous (and thus, more adaptable for plot needs) but also by tying the armband in I’m hoping they’ll be able to tie her abilities in even more with her Pakistani heritage.
I feel like I still haven’t done justice to Kamala’s geekiness. The entire opening of the episode is a movie she’s making for her YT channel, using excellent fumetti-style animation to retell the events of Endgame. She and Bruno brainstorm ways she can personalize her Captain Marvel cosplay, during which she declares steampunk dead (ouch), dismisses Princess Marvel, and debates between Captain Doctor Marvel Strange and Zombie Captain Marvel. All of these musings morph into murals on the wall behind them as they ride their bikes. Bruno makes her photon gloves! Any time she needs to think, Kamala does it via sketching and caricatures.
Also! My other favorite thing! The show does a great thing with texting, where Kamala and Bruno’s text conversations are shown through their environment: as stars on Kamala’s bedroom wall:
Grafitti on a sidewalk:
Or neon signs in a shop window. It’s really sweet, and flows well with the way Kamala expresses herself through her art and animation, and how Jersey City itself teems with street art, murals, and glowing neon. It also reminded me quite a bit of Eighth Grade, both in the soft bi-lighting choice, and in and the way the kids in the movie live equally IRL, in text, and online with none of the jolts of an older person, like Abbu with his Zuzu.
Oh and speaking of bi lighting Kamala seems to assume that Captain Marvel is queer, so huzzah to that.
And now the most important revelation of the show: Scott Lang has a podcast? Where he just… tells everyone all about the Avengers, and probably reveals all sorts of classified stuff? This is probably the most realistic thing that’s happened in the entire MCU.
Favorite Quotes
Abbu: The road is a long and winding one…so never fully stop at stop signs.
***
Kamala: Bismillah
Driving instructor: Bless you.
***
Mr. Wilson: No, Mr. Wilson was my father. My name is Gabe. His name was also Gabe so…it doesn’t super work.
***
Mr. Wilson: Kamala, who is that girl I see? Staring straight back at me?
Kamala: You’re reciting lyrics from Mulan.
***
Abbu: You’re not normal!
Kamala: Aughhh!!! (storms out of room)
Abbu: I meant you’re special!
***
Kamala: It’s not really the brown girls from Jersey City who save the world.
***
Abbu: Tell Bruno that ZuZu is possessed by an evil djinn!
Ammi: Do you want to be good? Or a cosmic head-in-the clouds person?
Kamala: Cosmic.
Leah Schnelbach is gonna have to listen to After Hours again now. Come join them in the blinding lights of Twitter!
Ok, I will admit that I was actaully nervous for this show. I figured it was gonna be corny or going too far into being “hip” with the teenagers…but I found it actually rather charming. The actors are great, i can’t help but LOVE her father, and even her mother is trying; shes your typical strict mother because she’s worried about her daughter. I also admire that Zoe, the typical “Alpha bitch” isn’t actually a bad person, she was actually STUNNED by Kamala and the powers, and i found that nice. I don’t mind the power change, because I feel it does connect better to Captain marvel and Photon better than” being a inhuman with stretchy powers” so her choosing the ms. marvel name never sat right with me. Now, there’a an actual similiartiy. Bruno totally has a crush on her, btw. One last thing: I actaully ADORED the “little hulk” outfit. though I wish Kamala just showed her mom her cosplay; seeing that it’s not actaully too tight around the body, and that it was actually pretty modest and cute.
I love the Ms. Marvel comics, and this was a pretty good adaptation. The characters feel authentic, and it captures a similar dynamic. Still, I feel it rode a bit too hard on the family angst and tension.
Ever since the trailers revealed that Kamala’s powers here came from her armband, I’ve suspected that there’s a connection to Shang-Chi’s rings, that they come from a similar cosmic source and that the groundwork is being laid for the mythology tying Phase 4 together. But I like the idea that it’s an inheritance from her grandmother too. In the comics, the armbands don’t have any powers (though Bruno modified them to be her utility belt, as it were), but Kamala wears them to represent her heritage, since they’re an important family heirloom handed down through her maternal ancestors. So I’m glad they’re keeping that aspect.
I’m getting a vibe from Kamala’s mother that she recognized the armband, knows the family secret, and is trying to protect Kamala from getting drawn into it. It’s a similar dynamic to Nicky Chen and her mother in the first season of The CW’s Kung Fu.
“a girl named Zoe who I’m guessing used to be a friend?”
So far, they’re being pretty true to the comics characterizations, and Zoe Zimmer started out as the super-popular mean girl who bullied and ostracized Kamala, but she later had a crisis of faith and re-examined her life and became a friend (and developed a closeted crush on Kamala’s best friend Nakia, the hijab-wearing girl we saw briefly here). Zoe was, ironically, the first person Kamala rescued as a superhero, and they kept that here, though they changed the specifics.
I loved how they handled the text messages. Maybe it’s just my sixty-plus-years-old eyes, but it drives me nuts when TV shows expect me to be able to read a tiny message on somebody’s phone, while the camera is looking over their shoulder maybe.
This was much easier on my eyes — and cute and clever, too!
@3/Greg: Apparently the integration of texts and Kamala’s animated artwork into the background scenery was inspired by Into the Spider-Verse. To me, it feels a bit more self-conscious in a live-action production than in an animated one.
“it drives me nuts when TV shows expect me to be able to read a tiny message on somebody’s phone, while the camera is looking over their shoulder maybe.”
A lot of shows these days mimic the device that Sherlock pioneered, showing the text message superimposed on the shot of the person reading it, so we can see it without having to look over their shoulder.
Yes it was really fun and a promising start to the series (a slight caveat here is we have had promising starts to MCU TV shows before and then they have not been able to keep the strength up through all the season.. Falcon, Loki, Moonknight for example ) but I hope this one does manage to keep things fun and entertaining. Incidentally did anyone else pick up on Bruno’s line about not wanting Kamala to do the zombie impression ever again? A nod I’m sure to the fact that Bruno is played by Matt Lintz who was poor doomed Henry in The Walking Dead.
Honestly, the only real complaint i have for the show so far is a very minor nitpick: How does everyone know who characters like Groot and Gamora and drax are are? Sure, they said that apparently Scott told everyone what happened there, but he wasn’t there for the Gamorra scenes or any groot scene (unless rocket and nebula told him about them. But like i said, that’s a very unimportant nitpick that doesn’t actually detract from the show.
Easter egg: Early in the end title sequence, a “TRUST A BRO” moving truck drives past.
I was really looking forward to this because I have loved the Ms. Marvel comic right from the start. I thought it would capture the “normal teen whose life is upended by superpowers” theme of the Spider-Man comics from when I was a teenager myself, and it lived up to my expectations.
And the show didn’t disappoint either. The actors are all great, and Iman Vellani is perfect (although Bruno is a bit too classically handsome compared to how he is portrayed in the comics). The humor is very good, and the story moved right along. I even like the different powers, and suspect the origin of those powers will be an interesting mystery to unfold.
I can’t wait to talk about this one with my 16 year old granddaughter, who Kamala reminds me of (other than the superpowers, that is). It seems to me this one will really hit the spot for her.
@8/Alan Brown: “(although Bruno is a bit too classically handsome compared to how he is portrayed in the comics)”
It seems they’ve generally cast based more on personality than physical resemblance. A lot of the characters look different, like Aamir having a much thicker beard and Zoe having red or auburn hair instead of blonde.
So we should all assume that Luis is the co-host of Scott’s podcast, right?
@10/Cybersnark: If that were so, how would Scott ever get a word in edgewise?
They were at Tony Stark’s funeral after the Battle of Earth (as the fight at the climax of Endgame is apparently named in-fiction). Presumably the heroes made mutual introductions, well enough to be described in Scott Lang’s podcast interview or via other publicization. (Well, Gamora wasn’t there, but I’m sure Drax, Mantis, or Star-Lord would have talked about her.)
This show was a lot of fun with a great sense of style. Both I and my kids enjoyed it very much. I’m looking forward to seeing more of it.
Also, Aamir’s beard is *majestic*…
I love the Ms. Marvel comics and her character. Interestingly for me, I don’t hate her parents in the comics, but I really seriously do in the show. I find myself hoping she ditches them when she graduates high school. It’s not so much the Muslim thing as a general toxic religious vibe thing. If I didn’t already know the origin story, I’d be guessing that her mother will be working for the big bad.
I loved the episode. I am thoroughly impressed at how completely different in tone and style each Marvel project feels.
I thought some of the dialogue was a little bit cringey, and that was the most moodily lit convention I’ve ever seen, but otherwise I enjoyed the episode. I appreciate that while they are casting the mother in the role of “obstacle to adventure,” they aren’t just making her an annoying one-note obstacle.
@6 – To be fair about people knowing about the Guardians, it looks like their knowledge is rather limited. Groot is called “Mr. Tree,” Peter Quill is “Star Boy,” and Rocket is “Trash Panda.”
I don’t believe it was Scott’s podcast, he was being interviewed on someone else’s. It was referred to as The Scott Lang interview.
I’m not overly familiar with Ms Marvel since she was introduced after I stopped collecting comics (for monetary, not literary reasons). I have, I think, read one story with her that I vaguely remember.
The show was a bit shocking in its tone; but I enjoyed the heck out of it. I thought Kamala was wonderful and Bruno just a delight; both the classic geeks whose parents don’t really understand them.
My folks didn’t either, in many ways. My advantage over Kamala was: they didn’t try to cut me off or restrain me much. My dad did try to get into activities he thought would be helpful; boy scouts, which I was meh about, and baseball, which I despised. (sorry KRAD).
I have to disagree with @14 Mel. I saw no “toxic religious” vibes anywhere in this show. Her folks are devout. That isn’t a bad thing. There were no religious lectures, no demands of extreme religiosity. They were normal parents trying to spark their love of their faith in their child. I think that’s a good thing. My parents did that as well. I am religious, and devout. Its not a bad thing. I don’t lecture people; I don’t proselytize. I didn’t see Ammi and Abbu do either.
Regarding AvengersCon. My wife and I go to lots of conventions, but not the professionally run ones. We prefer the fan run events. I’ve never seen a con like that, though I have no doubt they exist.
I will say, as a costume (cosplayer) of forty years, with a long string of competitions as both contestant, staff, and judge behind me, I would never enter that contest. It didn’t allow any focus on each contestant; just a cattle run. Sorry, not my taste at all.
But they were having fun, and I’m all for that.
@19/costumer: Agreed. There’s nothing toxic about the Khans’ faith here. It’s just an everyday part of their lives, like it is in the comics. It’s just that Kamala and her mother grew up in different countries with different attitudes about certain things. No, Muneeba doesn’t want her daughter to dress revealingly, but what mother does?
Although I should clarify that Yusuf and Muneeba don’t have to “try” to spark love of their faith in their daughter. Kamala is a practicing Muslim, and she goes to temple regularly. She’s not as traditional about it as her brother, but she is a believer. We saw that when she followed Aamir’s advice and said Bismillah before the driving test.
As for the authenticity of the convention, the thing that seemed odd to me was how dark it was. I haven’t been to that many conventions, but the ones I’ve been to and the ones I’ve seen online videos of have always been brightly lit. Otherwise, it seemed pretty genuine, though the costume contest did strike me as a little odd.
really besides her mother and aunts judging the one girl who went backpacking, there wasn’t really bad toxicity. Their father even teased her brother about praying too much. It was actually more of a culture than a religious thing. Unlike abuela from encanto, or the mother from turning red, muneeba actually seemed to criticized others for kamala’s shortcomings; it wasn’t her fault she drove into the car, it was the teacher failing her. The tailors dress was too short. She only turned that around when the aunt said kamala was too short.. while they were criticizing someone breaking off a engagement. She clearly wants kamala being happy, but feels like her hobbies are just passing fads. A toxic relationship wouldn’t make a costume outfit like that in a single night
This was not a con for comic fans, like in our world. This was a con for people who are fannish about real life superheroes. So I would expect events in that universe to be different than the ones we attend.
@22/AlanBrown: I did something similar in my story “Conventional Powers” in Analog (reprinted on my Patreon site), a sequel to my hard-SF superhero novel Only Superhuman from Tor, in a universe where transhuman crimefighters embrace superhero iconography as a means of winning public support and trust. I treated it as a cross between a comics/media convention and an industry trade show, both for fans of the real-life superheroes and for the heroes themselves to compare notes on techniques and crimefighting challenges, learn about new equipment from the inventors/manufacturers, make connections within the hero community, etc.
I know the MCU often stirs up disparate stories from the comics — as the comics themselves may realign things during reboots or via discrete retcons — so the “nega-bands” worn by Mar-Vell (the original, uh, Marvel Captain Marvel) could be brought into the backstory of Kamala’s armband here; while ornate its size suggests as much a utilitarian bracer as a decorative bracelet, presumably imbued with mystical and/or cosmic powers.
@2. ChristopherLBennett: I’m getting a vibe from Kamala’s mother that she recognized the armband, knows the family secret, and is trying to protect Kamala from getting drawn into it. It’s a similar dynamic to Nicky Chen and her mother in the first season of The CW’s Kung Fu.
I had the same reaction.
Kamala’s powers in this iteration remind me a bit of Quasar’s Quantum bands, both in their source and manifestation, and they’re definitely gonna tie in with the Ten Rings, and maybe the Eternals as well.
I don’t dislike Kamala’s parents but her interactions with them feel very… old? Dated? There’s a cultural element at work, of course, but it feels a bit of a missed opportunity to have a pakistani family in 202x act exactly as a white family in a ’90s sitcom. Ammi might have been worried about hero worship, or maybe didn’t want her daughter to enter the cosplay contest because she was afraid of the backlash against a cosplayer of color, or some other reason with a little more nuance than “I don’t like boys, skimpy costumes, and fantasy stuff”.
(In fact, her school counselor feels a bit dated too, because he can quote Mulan but his reaction to “inattentive kid who can hyperfocus” is not “maybe ADHD” but “you should pull yourself together”?)
@25/Atrus: “There’s a cultural element at work, of course, but it feels a bit of a missed opportunity to have a pakistani family in 202x act exactly as a white family in a ’90s sitcom.”
Why would you want that? Cultural erasure? Artificial conformity to white norms? That’s the worst possible way to do it. It’s the way it would’ve been done in the ’80s in a show written exclusively by white writers for white viewers. And it would erase the generational and cultural difference between the American-born Kamala and her Pakistan-born immigrant parents, which is an absolutely integral part of what’s being explored in the series.
Kamala Khan was co-created in the comics by a Pakistani-American Muslim writer, Sana Amanat, based on her own real-life experience. The TV show’s head writer Bisha K. Ali is British-Pakistani and has a similar background. So this isn’t a caricature. Having them act exactly like white people would be a caricature, and an insult.
@26/ChristopherLBennett : Er, I think you may have misunderstood my comment. I meant that to me they are already acting like white sitcom parents. In fact, I’ve had many similar interactions with my parents in the last 30+ years, at least on the topics of fandom and fantasy and living in the clouds. By “cultural element” I only meant that I’m a white guy living in southern Europe, and so I’m bound to miss many of the nuances of being a pakistani family that lives in Jersey, not that I wished the Khans to be caricatures.
@27/Atrus: “…to me they are already acting like white sitcom parents.”
I have no idea why you think that. There are things about parents and children that are pretty universal, but there are also aspects individual to each culture, and I’m seeing both here in believable proportions. White parents don’t have a monopoly on being overprotective of their children or not understanding their fandoms.
I really liked the touch that they wanted to help Kamala by going to the con with her and supervise. It seemed a reasonable thing to me at the middle age but Kamala reacted as a teenage girl and the parents, of course, didn’t understand it was about her trying to assert her independence.
We’re coming into this kinda late, but I agree, it’s a charming, cute show (although maybe if it weren’t Marvel I would feel is a tad young for me). I really like the style – I’m actually kinda getting Into the Spider-Verse vibes from it.
I also – having zero comics background or knowledge – got a Shang-Chi vibe from the armband. And also picked up that there’s some sordid history here that perhaps her mom is trying to shield her from and overcompensating.
I agree the family is sweet and I agree, they aren’t totally hearing each other (but of course as an older parent now, I understand a little some of the nervousness too!). It seems to be a common theme lately in Disney/Pixar movies as well.
@27 Yeah, I think you ARE missing the nuances that are there in the immigrant parents (who already are different from their relatives back in the origin country).
Coming back to this – I think a few people have already mentioned some of the feelings of heartbreak for Kamala’s dad. I’ve been in both places – the teen who said snotty/hurtful things to parents I felt were pushing too close, as well as a parent who is doing my best to guide my kids according to what I see as best or to protect them from some things I think I may have a wider view of than my kids do (while still being a fallible human) – I personally wouldn’t want my 16 year old at a late night Jersey city convention unattended either – while still trying to be a part of their life in some way. Like, it’s easy – especially when the parents are already portrayed as a bit more conservative – to just turn it into ‘the parents are controlling and narrow minded and autocratic’.
But I also – especially on rewatching – feel like Bruno has this moment of brief, fleeing, quiet heartbreak when he realizes she forgot the gloves that he clearly worked so hard on for her, haha.