Mild spoilers ahead…
Captain Marvel isn’t too far away now! In less than two months, we’ll get to see the latest MCU instalment, a movie that is potentially designed to introduce a new member of the Avengers.
When we join ex-pilot Carol Danvers (Brie Larson), she’ll have bypassed her origin story, and will already be part of an elite team called Starforce, fighting in a Kree war against the Skrulls far, far away from her past on Earth. The leader of her Kree Starforce team is played by Jude Law (whose character name is still somewhat debatable), and he’s been chatting to Collider about the nature of the war that he and Carol are fighting when we first meet them.
We’ve previously seen the Kree featured in James Gunn’s Guardians Of The Galaxy in quite the negative way – you may remember bad guy Ronan the Accuser keen to wield the purple Power Stone in an effort to wipe out civilisations like the one on Xandar. Not very cool, Ronan! It seems like the Kree will be the good guys in Captain Marvel, though. At least, compared to the shapeshifting Skrulls.
“The Kree and the Skrulls are constantly in conflict, so both communities are living really at high alert and both obviously live with a huge wariness of each other,” Law explained. “The Skrulls to the Krees really represent despicable maneuvering and manipulation. The Skrulls have this way – they can simulate other people, they can turn into other things, and so it’s this idea of subterfuge that you’re not who you really are, whereas the Kree have a kind of purity about them and an honesty, as far I see it.”
Law’s character might be a mentor to Carol as the leader of Starforce, but that doesn’t mean he might not ultimately be as dangerous as Ronan was.
“My character has a very particular relationship with Supreme Intelligence which becomes revealed and is quite complex and ultimately very revealing of what it is that motivates. I’ve kind of based him almost on a sort of, not religious fanatic, but he’s got a kind of divine sense of purpose because of his relationship with this greater being.”
In the trailers, we’ve seen Carol getting into scraps with the Skrulls here on Earth. So is our planet worth anything in the war between these two alien races? Mmmm, no.
“I think it’s a curiosity,” mused Law, before adding “It’s described as a shit hole by someone actually, as is often the case in these, isn’t it? We’re always pitied. ‘Why would you want to possibly stop there? They’re so backwards.’ And it’s not much difference. I think, as usual, we are viewed on the scale of things as unthreatening, rather idiotic, and somewhat backwards. Not far wrong really!”
The actor was also challenged a little about how much of an MCU fan he was before starting work on Captain Marvel:
“I’d seen most of them. Well, the test is the Infinity War, isn’t it? If anyone goes to Infinity War and [says] ‘Who’s that? And what’s that all about,’ then you haven’t seen them all and I didn’t ask that question once, so clearly I’ve seen all of them.”
Ah, we’ll let you off, Jude.
There’s a lot more in Collider’s interview, which you can read in its entirety right here.