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Captain Marvel

Flying from Values

Carol Danvers may be one of many superheroes who punched evil in its stupid face under the moniker of Captain Marvel, but she is also one of the few female heroes to serve her country. Since her soft reboot in 2012, many comic fans have branded themselves with the symbol on her chest. Marching to the beat of a brand-new drum, these Marvel fans began to call themselves “The Carol Corps.” Carol has been “all in” in every aspect of her life: from her military experience to her time with the Avengers to inspiring the aforementioned fans. Thinking about it, there’s not a single comic book convention I’ve been to in the last five years where I haven’t seen someone cosplaying the spectacular Captain Marvel. She dives into her life like an arrow flying at a target, so let’s jump into her chapter with that same gusto.

The daughter of Joe Danvers, a former US Navy officer, Carol has always had one foot in the military world. She dreamed of being an astronaut, one eye always on the stars. Disappointingly, her father couldn’t fathom why any daughter of his needed a college degree. Joe Danvers believed Carol’s perfect place was in the kitchen as a housewife. However, that was not Carol’s destiny. Was this belief spurred by his time in the Navy, or by his upbringing in the mid-twentieth century? My own parents have some fairly old-fashioned beliefs, but I don’t think either of them believes a woman’s place is in the kitchen. I think this may have been a time when the creators who developed Carol’s origin didn’t want to fully form Joe Danvers as a real character. Rather, they imagined him as an archetype or obstacle to Carol’s destiny. So, basically, Joe Danvers was a woman-hating curmudgeon and nothing more.

In order to prove her father wrong, Carol sneaks off and joins the Air Force. As an airwoman, Carol soon becomes a pilot and adopts the call sign “Cheeseburger.” This training will be a springboard to her ultimate goal—skyrocketing to other planets as a full-fledged member of NASA.

It’s here that I must admit a kinship with Carol. As a small boy, I, too, wanted to join the awesome ranks of NASA, half-spurred by my constant viewing of Star Trek: The Next Generation and half by the wanderlust that ultimately drove me from my boyhood farm in Kansas. I was ever-present in this dream until my third-grade teacher—Mrs. Hazen—told me I’d soon have to develop an aptitude for math if I ever wanted to count myself among NASA’s ranks. (Fun fact: to this day, I have the mathematical knowledge of a caveman.) This revelation scuttled my rocket-ship dreams faster than you could say “Pythagorean theorem.” Since then, any time a fictional character seized their dream and gained the very exclusive rank of “astronaut,” I’ve always stood up and applauded.

Carol threw herself at her dreams and her military career. Was this because she unconsciously emulated her military father? Studies have shown that a high percentage of military children form strong connections with the ideals of military bases, culture, and personnel. I would theorize that this happened to Carol. At the funeral of her father, when asked to say a few more words, Carol only says this about the man who raised her: “He was a worthy opponent.”

What a perfect window into the soul of Captain Marvel this statement is. Even after his death, Carol still viewed her relationship with her father as a battle. At each turn in her life, Joe Danvers was her opponent. A father and daughter as enemies and not allies is quite sad when you consider it. Nonetheless, it does illuminate how this superhero operates. Writer Kelly Sue DeConnick bestowed upon Carol Danvers a motto while she was penning the character. That motto is: “Higher, further, faster, more.”

Another way to interpret that motto is “Never surrender, never give up”—a positive motto when applied to an airman or a soldier. I can almost hear them chanting it as the trainees run across the base for their morning’s physical training.

Yet, the words “higher,” “further,” “faster,” and “more” can lead a person away from humility. Why do these values matter to the story of Carol Danvers? Well, humility is one of the United States Air Force’s core values. Each military branch has its own set of values that help service members get the mission done while inspiring them to the very best at all times. These values are integrity, courage, honesty, responsibility, accountability, justice, openness, self-respect, and humility. Airmen are taught to study them, follow them, and encourage others to do the same through their actions and words.

These would have been drilled into her head during her training, and the word “more” flies in the face of it all. (Yes, the pilot pun was intended.) This conflict between humility and fighting for “more” lies at the very core of Captain Marvel. It can illuminate the many times she has fallen and succeeded as a superhero and as an airwoman.

It wouldn’t take Carol long to go from airwoman to cosmically-powered superwoman. She retired from the Air Force to take a position at NASA as head of security. This allowed her to leave the service a full colonel. (Take that, Captain America! She outranks you.) It was during her stint at NASA that Carol first encountered the man who would change her life, Mar-Vell. He was a soldier of the Kree, an interstellar empire that bowed down to a giant talking head called the Supreme Intelligence. (No jokes there; sometimes superhero comic books get silly.) Carol was eventually kidnapped by another alien called Yon-Rogg. Mar-Vell attempted to rescue her and, during his battle with Yon-Rogg, Carol was exposed to the Kree Psyche-Magnitron. The Psyche-Magnitron’s only purpose was to confer superhuman abilities to people! Of all the alien supermachines in all the galaxy Carol could have bumped into, she sure picked the right one! Although Carol was unaware of her new abilities at first, she would eventually don a costume and join the ranks of costumed vigilantes as Ms. Marvel—a tip of the hat to Captain Marvel, the alien hero who had rescued her.

Recently, the Life of Captain Marvel mini-series, written by Margaret Stohl, revealed that Carol’s mother was actually a Kree alien. So, instead of the alien device giving her superpowers randomly, the origin has now been changed to the Psyche-Magnitron activating her latent Kree abilities. Overall, I predict this small change will do little to alter the arc of Carol Danvers stories going forward.

Another one of the United States Air Force’s core values is justice: “Those who do similar things must get similar rewards or similar punishments.”

It’s this value that, I think, led Carol to seek out—and later join—the Avengers. This team of “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes” gathered to fight the foes no single hero could withstand. Carol would be drawn to this team because it has a very militaristic culture. (She does outrank Captain America, remember?) The Avengers have a team leader who gives orders, they take votes on who can join, and they even have access to the government’s criminal files. This core belief of justice in Carol’s head, the one that probably has been nagging her since her time in the Air Force, can finally be honored by joining a super team.

It takes years for Carol to adopt the moniker and rank of “Captain Marvel” officially. Maybe it is a sign of deference to Mar-Vell—a man she very much admired—or maybe she didn’t want to be accused of being a superhero copycat. (Marvel isn’t as fond of legacy characters as DC Comics is.) It wasn’t until Steve Rogers insisted that Carol began to call herself by that designation in the field. All it took was a simple dare from an old Army soldier.

Writer Kelly Sue DeConnick threw Carol into a situation where she had to directly confront the nature of the military. Not content with giving Carol her promotion from Ms. Marvel to Captain Marvel, DeConnick wished to send Carol directly to war—World War II, that is. In Captain Marvel Volume 7, through a series of time-travel shenanigans, Carol finds herself in a hairy combat situation on a battlefield. She has no way out. Suddenly, she’s rescued by the Women’s Air Service Pilots Banshee Squad, Class of 1943!

First, I have to admit my bias. I generally do not enjoy stories about characters being lost or thrown into a time period other than their own. However, having Carol confront airwomen of the past is an intriguing turn in the plot. How will she react to their decisions? How will they react to hers? The possible issues are endless, as we see two generations of servicemembers from different times, with different points of view, confronting combat.

After spending some time with the Banshee Squad, Carol admits to the group that her problem-solving methods generally involve “blasting it, punching it, outrunning it, or throwing it into space”—meaning that she is an attack-first-and-ask-questions-later type of woman. Interestingly enough, she directly contradicts this statement two issues later. In issue three of the DeConnick run, Carol and the Banshee Squad encounter a Japanese pilot in control of an advanced alien ship. Once he’s defeated, she lets the pilot go back to his home base. The Banshee Squad chastises her: “How can you let him go?” Carol ignores her fellow combat women and demands the pilot put together the best squad made up of his fellow combatants. Then he is to come back to this very spot, so Carol and her all-woman squad can kick their asses.

Generally, it’s not a smart move for anyone in the military to give up a tactical advantage. A captured enemy combatant can provide valuable intel, and said intelligence can save many lives in future battles. At first, this move can be seen as a gesture of “fair play.” Carol wants to prove that she and her fellow warrior women are superior to any army the enemy can muster. Upon closer inspection, though, her actions can be seen as a direct contradiction to the Air Force’s policy for military professionals to not display anger. Does Captain Marvel really need to prove herself against a World War II Japanese military squad? Yes, they have advanced weaponry, but Carol is one of the most powerful cosmic heroes in the entirety of the Marvel Universe. This woman has fought Thor and the Hulk and lived! It doesn’t matter what technology this enemy unit has—Carol will decimate them. She knows it. Yet she issues the challenge and risks the lives of the Banshee Squad in the process. Luckily, the Banshee Squad makes it through the skirmish. However, things could have gone very wrong for Carol and her team. These actions call into question something at the core of Carol Danvers: just how good a leader is Captain Marvel?

When she left the service, she achieved the rank of full bird colonel in the Air Force. This proves she was no slouch. No one can reach the rank of colonel in any military branch without being a great leader and a hard worker—unless a copious amount of bribes are issued in order to achieve said rank. This was not the case for Carol.

After the massive, cosmic comic book event known as Secret Wars (2015), Carol is offered command of the Alpha Flight Space Program. No, this was not your father’s Alpha Flight. No sasquatches or men bathed in the visage of the Canadian flag are on this team; this organization manned the Alpha Flight Low-Orbit Space Station and set themselves up as the first line of defense for Planet Earth. It puts Carol in the unique position of taking charge of a brand-new team called “the Ultimates.” This team became proactive, searching for scientific and non-violent solutions. One of their first missions was to cure the world-eater Galactus of his problem of eating worlds! (Somewhere, Galactus creator and late comic legend Stan Lee felt me write that sentence and a tinge of anger come over his spirit. “Undo my great work? Never!”)

This Ultimates team operated like a military think tank, and it allowed Carol the opportunity to command and collaborate with scientists instead of soldiers. Suddenly, Carol is exposed to problem-solving which does not involve violence or punching your enemy into submission. Despite being exposed to new worlds and infant galaxies of thought (literally), Carol is soon confronted with another situation where her core beliefs will be called into question.

An Inhuman with the ability to see the future, named Ulysses Cain, becomes the focal point of the storyline Civil War 2 (2016). Carol is intrigued by Ulysses and wants to use him to stop crimes and major disasters before they happen. One man is opposed to using this Inhuman and following his predictions without question. That man is the Iron Man, Tony Stark. Tony figures that, if Carol can stop these crimes before they happen, then the visions can only be from a single possible future. Nothing guarantees these specific people will actually commit the crimes, simply because Ulysses says they will. Carol ignores Stark and acts on every premonition Ulysses makes. This leads to severe personal costs for Captain Marvel and those who come down on her side.

During an incident with the mad titan Thanos, the sensational She-Hulk is critically injured, and Carol’s current lover, War Machine, is killed. Not long after this, Ulysses has a vision implicating Miles Morales, the Ultimate Spider-Man, in the future murder of Captain America. Carol wants Miles arrested on the spot. Tony Stark does everything in his power to prevent her from achieving her goal. A chaotic superhero battle erupts for the very soul of the Marvel Universe.

The fallout from this event leads to the death of Tony Stark (only for a few months. This is comics! No one stays dead forever, kids!). Carol Danvers is soon invited to the White House by the president, who rewards her with a blank check to do whatever she sees fit. It is a gift of thanks on the president’s behalf because he admired how she handled the situation and appreciated knowing what was going to happen in the future.

Should Carol have been rewarded? Her actions in this event are definitely in the “ends justify the means” camp. Several times, throughout Civil War 2, Carol arrested innocent people merely because of the possibility they would commit a crime in the future. Should innocent people have to suffer for the greater good, or the greater future? Our journey to the ultimate goal is just as important as the final outcome, and our morals, and our actions to achieve that outcome, are equally as important. At several points, Captain Marvel violates the Air Force’s “Service Before Self” model. It states that one must respect others: “We must always act in the certain knowledge that all persons possess fundamental worth as human beings.”

In Civil War 2, Carol saw innocent people as criminals. She locked up these citizens as criminals before any crime had been committed, and she treated said individuals as criminals. Is that respect for others? I would argue it is not. I would argue that Carol Danvers was a poor example of a moral airwoman during this storyline. (I could also fill up the pages of a whole other book questioning the motives of a fictional president who applauds her actions therein.)

The most profound thing that can be said about Carol Danvers is that she is layered. For every story in which the values of the armed forces shine through, there is another contrasting story where she fails them. I admire her bravery and her commitment, but sometimes her cosmic powers outrace her mind. Her leadership capability is beyond reproach. Her morals are where she falters. Yes, Carol is not the perfect ideal like Captain America of the first chapter, but as a full bird colonel, she is responsible for representing an example for the airmen in her command, for the heroes she leads, and for the civilians she saves. General Ronald Fogelman, who served as the fifteenth chief of the US Air Force, once said: “Because of what we do, our standards must be higher than those of society at large. The American public expects it of us and properly so. In the end, we earn the respect and trust of the American people because of the integrity we demonstrate.”

Does Captain Marvel meet the standard that General Fogelman preached? All evidence points to no. She may be a hero and inspiration to millions, but Carol Danvers could definitely try to do better. She has common values with other service members. If she allowed herself to follow them, then Captain Marvel would truly fly.