An actual marvel

• Published date: 14 June 2022
• Publication title: Signal

A superhero — and a star — is born in Ms. Marvel (Disney+) , the latest small-screen foray into the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). The superhero is Pakistani-American teenager Kamala Khan, Marvel’s first Muslim headliner, whose solo comic book series made its debut in 2014. The miniseries tells her origin story, deviating somewhat from the source material and somehow humanising it further

The star is Iman Vellani, in — incredibly, given her charisma, comic timing and dramatic chops in every scene — her first acting role. Her second will be in the next Marvel film outing, The Marvels (I hope you’re clear about us being in a Marvel universe for the duration of this piece), a sequel to Captain Marvel and focusing on the adventures of Carole Danvers/Captain Marvel and our new Ms. Normally, you would fear for a young actor, but Vellani seems so born to the purple that you almost have to shrug and say, as an elder might to a nascent superhero in — oh, I don’t know, the MCU perhaps — that it is her destiny.

The series itself? It’s early days, but things look glorious. The plot so far is slight. At the moment it is as much a real-life coming-of-age as a superhero origin story. Sixteen-year-old Kamala is an artist, vlogger and diehard devotee of the Avengers generally, and Captain Marvel specifically. We meet her enthusiastically narrating her latest animated story about them.

Most of the first episode features her trying to persuade her parents to let her go to the Avengers comic convention a bus ride away, refine her Ms Marvel costume and placate the school principal when she is hauled into his office for her constant “doodling” and daydreaming. Although it will probably get swallowed up in the deeper joy and wider significance of seeing a Muslim character come to life, I just want to note how absolutely wonderful it is to see an accurate, loving and untrammelled depiction of passionate female fandom, so often derided or ignored while boy geeks get to inherit the world.

Eventually, and with the help of her best friend, Bruno (Matt Lintz) — who is also, handily, a tech genius — Cinderella gets to the cosplay ball. When she adds an old family bangle to her costume at the last minute, she becomes invested with the ability to shoot energy beams that take on...