Marvel Confirms Brie Larson as Captain Marvel at SDCC 2016

No, not the "Shazam!" guy.

Entertainment Weekly reported yesterday that Oscar-winner Brie Larson has been confirmed as Marvel Studio's Captain Marvel for the character's upcoming solo movie in 2019.  Larson was part of Marvel’s Hall H panel at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2016, joining Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige along with the casts of Doctor Strange, Black Panther, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, and Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Larson, 26, won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 2015 for the film Room, and has appeared in the movies Kong: Skull Island, Trainwreck, The Gambler, Don Jon, 21 Jump Street, and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (as Envy Adams).  She also appeared as Rachel on Community, as well as episodes of The League, United States of Tara, Hope & Faith, Raising Dad, and Popular.

During the panel, Feige clarified that the Captain Marvel will indeed be a woman, saying "Captain Marvel has gone by many names in the comics, has had many people who’ve inhabited that costume and used that power base.  I want to make it very clear: This hero’s name is Carol Danvers."

Created in 1968 by Roy Thomas and Gene Colan, Carol Danvers first appeared in Marvel Super-Heroes #13 as an officer in the United States Air Force and Security Chief of a restricted military base, where Danvers meets Dr. Walter Lawson, the human alias of alien Kree hero Captain Marvel.  In a later story, Danvers was caught in the explosion of a Kree device, after trying to get close to Captain Marvel.  Although Captain Marvel managed to save her life, Danvers sustained serious injuries.

Danvers resurfaced with superhuman abilities and becomes the hero Ms. Marvel in a self-titled series in January 1977, first written by Gerry Conway and later by Chris Claremont.  In the series, it was revealed that the energy exposure from the explosion of a device called the "Psyche-Magnetron" caused Danvers' genetic structure to meld with Captain Marvel's, effectively turning her into a human-Kree hybrid.

Ms. Marvel later joined the Avengers, until she was kidnapped by a character named Marcus (the apparent son of Avengers foe Immortus) in a controversial story featured in The Avengers (vol.1) #200 and taken to an alternate dimension, where she was brainwashed, seduced, and impregnated.  She gave birth on Earth to a child that rapidly aged into another version of Marcus, who was ultimately unable to remain on Earth after Hawkeye mistakenly damaged his machine.  Marcus took Ms. Marvel back to the alternate dimension with no opposition from the Avengers, claiming to have felt something between them.

Claremont effectively negated the Marcus story in 1981's Avengers Annual #10.  In that story, Danvers was revealed to have returned to Earth, courtesy of Immortus's technology after Marcus continued to age and die of old age, but was attacked by the mutant Rogue, who permanently absorbed the character's abilities and memories.  Danvers' memories were restored by Professor X, followed by an angry confrontation with the Avengers concerning their failure to realize that Marcus had brainwashed her.

During an adventure in space with the X-Men, Danvers was altered with experimentation by the alien race the Brood into a newly empowered character called Binary.  Drawing on the power of a cosmic phenomenon called a white hole, Danvers became capable of generating the power of a star.  As Binary, the character had a number of encounters with the X-Men, the New Mutants, and the British team Excalibur.

In the event storyline "Operation Galactic Storm," Carol lost her connection to the white hole she drew her powers from, reverting to use of the original Ms. Marvel powers, but retaining the energy manipulation and absorption powers she had as Binary, albeit on a smaller scale.  As Ms. Marvel once again, she soon became a member of the team the Mighty Avengers.

In July 2012, Carol Danvers assumed the mantle of Captain Marvel in an ongoing series written by Kelly Sue DeConnick with art by Dexter Soy.  As Captain Marvel, Carol currently plays a significant role in Civil War II, as the leader of a faction of superheroes who wish to use Ulysses' precognitive power to profile future crimes before they occur.

Captain Marvel is currently scheduled to arrive in theaters on March 8, 2019.