As with every other Marvel series, fans have been tuning in to Ms. Marvel hoping to find even the slightest reference to the larger MCU. But even though the franchise has big plans for Iman Vellani’s freshman superhero, it sounds like the show’s producers are more focused on keeping Kamala Khan Earthbound for now. While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, head writer Bisha K. Ali offered new insight into Ms. Marvel’s creative process. Specifically, she discussed how much groundwork the series lays for Vellani’s upcoming turn in The Marvels.
Ali was happy that Marvel’s “ground level” parameters for Kamala’s introduction lined up with her own aims for the character. Regardless, she won’t stay grounded for long. The Marvels will find Vellani sharing the screen with Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers and Teyonah Parris’ Monica Rambeau in an adventure that presumably takes them all off-planet. But surprisingly, Ali is just as oblivious to the film’s plot as the rest of us.
“At the point we started up the Ms. Marvel writers’ room, we already knew going in that The Marvels was going to happen and that Ms. Marvel was going to be part of it,” said Ali. “What I didn’t know — and still don’t — is what’s going to happen in that movie, but I have some guesses … So I was very aware that we would get a teenage girl in Jersey City, without powers, and we would have to get her ready for whatever is going to happen in that movie.”
“So I was very aware of that connectivity,” continued Ali. “And by the time they got moving in earnest on that feature, most of our scripts had been written. So, they had read all of our scripts, and they knew what was going to happen to her. They had all of that in mind as they were going into their movie, but I would love to know what happens in their story.”
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This doesn’t mean Ms. Marvel won’t feature any Easter eggs. One of the premiere episode’s biggest surprises was the post-credits return of Arian Moayed’s Agent Cleary, the Damage Control operative who was last seen interrogating Peter Parker in Spider-Man: No Way Home. A cameo like this would normally require the show’s creators to watch dailies from his earlier MCU appearance. But according to Ali, she and her team didn’t see any of Moayed’s footage before No Way Home hit theaters last December. Instead, they simply trusted Kevin Feige’s judgment.
“It’s a Kevin thing,” confirmed Ali. “Kevin knows all that, man. He introduced the idea of Agent Cleary being a part of our show, and that’s the thing about working with Marvel. Kevin and the execs know all the pieces that we might not even know, so they’ll come in and be like, ‘OK, you have this, so let’s manifest it through this piece, interconnecting it with something else.’ And that’s the thrill of being a part of the MCU. So that’s definitely a Kevin fix.”
The second episode of Ms. Marvel is now streaming on Disney+. Episode 3 will debut on Wednesday, June 22.
Have you been enjoying the series so far? Let us know in the comment section below!
Recommended Reading: Ms. Marvel Volume 1: No Normal
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