Not a bad movie, but one of the worst of the MCU

Rating: 5/10 (8 May 2019)

I'll first go on record and say that there isn't a film in the MCU that I don't enjoy to some degree or other. None of them are bad movies. Some are certainly of much higher quality than others. Some exist on a higher plain, some far lower. But none of them are exactly bad.
This much is true also of Captain Marvel. It has some very strong aspects to it. Sam Jackson, for example, is fantastic, as is Ben Mendelsohn. The musical score is among Marvel's better entries, at least at times, and the conflict in the film takes an interesting turn about two-thirds through that held my interest and kept me invested.
Unfortunately, the film also has some enormous flaws, and they mostly center around Brie Larson. Now, I'm not particularly fond of some of the things she's said leading up to the release of this movie (and some things after), but if I judged movies based on my like/dislike of the stars in the movie, I would probably have a hard time finding a movie I did like. The truth of the matter is no matter what I think of her as a person, she has shown in the past to be a fantastic actress. Room and Short Term 12 are outstanding films that she shone bright in, and I also enjoyed her small but memorable role in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. However, in Captain Marvel it seems that she displays a lack of charisma, and it proves to be incredibly distracting. I liked the way she was written, in terms of her personality, as she is given a wry and sarcastic sense of humor. The problem is that it mostly feels forced coming from her, and it becomes a distraction throughout the movie.
Other problems arise in the movie's structure early on, as the movie jumps here and there in time and those moments can be a bit disorienting and even frustrating. There's also the issue of the constant attempts at '90s nostalgia, and they are so poorly done that it leads to nothing but eye rolls. I get that they were trying to go for something similar to Guardians of the Galaxy, but that film wove the music into the fabric of story and made it a part of the characters. Captain Marvel just seems to put it in there because, hey, it's set in the '90s and we have to be reminded of how cool the '90s were, right?
I wish I could get on board with others and talk about how great the cat is since I do love cats, but to be honest I thought all of the cat's best moments were CGI and when we ultimately find out just what the cat is, it feels like something very out of place and strange. I didn't dislike the cat, but it really didn't add anything for me.
I hate to bring up so many negatives and so few positives, but the fact of the matter is that the MCU has set the bar very high and when a film fails to come even close to that bar it tends to make the flaws stand out. Again, Captain Marvel isn't a bad movie, but the word I would use to describe it is disappointing.