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- There's a moment in the movie

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that I'm particularly fond of.

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You know, Carol lands and
she's kind of off-balance.

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(they laugh)

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And that is so beautifully her.

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(screaming)

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- Hey guys, this is Charles Pulliam-Moore

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from io9 and we are here to
have a very special conversation

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about all things Carol Danvers
and Captain Marvel with.

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- Kelly Sue DeConnick.
- Mary Livanos.

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- I think it's really
interesting that Carol's become

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like a hot topic of conversation,

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not just for Marvel movie nerds

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or comic book geeks,

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for just like, you know, regular people

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and so with that in mind, how,

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what's it been like to really sort of see

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the Carol discourse pop up

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in such a big and drastic way so quickly?

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- Yeah, I think there were
a lot of expectations.

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Like there's a lot of nerves

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around how it was gonna go

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and I wasn't involved in Endgame at all

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so I had those nerves as well,

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I had a fear that, it was

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‘Please don't let her
be a deus ex machina,

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‘please don't let her be deus ex machina.’

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You know, and I thought she
was actually used in a way

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that was really smart.

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- What elements of Carol's
life in its entirety

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were really important for you

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to emphasize in your respective stories

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where you were bringing
her to a new audience

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for the first time?

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- For us, making Captain Marvel the movie,

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it was really taking all the best parts

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of the Carol from the comics,

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Carol's A-type personality,

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the fact that she's a fighter pilot

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making sure that we were
displaying that correctly

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and representing Carol
correctly was a huge task.

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- Carol has such an
expansive comics history,

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there's so much that you can pull from.

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- Starting with In Pursuit
of Flight, I wanted to

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revisit a lot of moments

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from classic Carol Danvers' history.

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I wanted to see if we could

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revisit important touchstones

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in a way that gave her more agency.

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What I mean by that is, oftentimes

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in storytelling with
women, they are acted upon.

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I wanted to give Carol these experiences

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in a way where they
were her choice, right?

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So for instance, when Carol

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has her memory wiped out

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in previous runs, it's a thing
that happens to her, right?

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So when I messed with Carol's
memory in Enemy Within

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I did it in a way where it was her choice.

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She was making a heroic choice,

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a heroic sacrifice, right?

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She knew she would lose
her sense of herself

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and her identity, but by making this choice

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to use this power, she was
going to save a bunch of people.

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It was more active.
- Right.

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- It's hard 'cause she's so powerful.

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How do you keep that character realistic?

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How do you make sure,

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like when she swoops in

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that the rest of the story
still feels grounded?

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And so I think like when in the finale,

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Thanos is at his most powerful,

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it's a feat of storytelling

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to have Carol sweep in when she does.

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- Usually what you can balance that with

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is her poor decision-making

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which is actually really excellent.

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Carol doesn't think things
through and is very impulsive.

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That's a beautiful and very human way

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of tempering that power in your story

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but then in Endgame, that was
something they had to balance

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and again I wasn't involved in that,

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so I can't speak to how it was handled

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but as a viewer, I was like ‘Oh okay,

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‘that's really smart.’

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Because you can't use the usual ways

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that we temper her power

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because it's such a large cast

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and you can't assume
people have seen her movie

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you can't assume, so you
have moments to introduce her

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and they did a great job
of establishing her hubris,

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right with that line where she's like.

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- 'Cause before you didn't have me.

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- You know, and that's
gonna work for you Carol,

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it always does, you know.

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- But it's true, right,

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she's a character with a ton of power

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so that makes sense,

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there's the Earth-centric Marvel universe

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but then there's a whole other...

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- Right, right, there's
a universe out there.

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- There's an entire universe out there,

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so she's a character,
because of her powers,

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that has a ton of responsibility so.

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- With great power comes
great responsibility.

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(they laugh)
- Yes, exactly.

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- Her father is a construction foreman

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and he has three kids, two boys and a girl

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and he refuses to pay
for college for Carol

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because she's gonna get married
anyway, was the thinking.

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And so Carol initially enlists as a way

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of getting college paid for.

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For me, it was always Carol trying

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to prove to her now dead father, you know

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that she's just as good as the boys

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and just as worthy as the boys

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and that's an un-fillable hole, you know.

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You can't get approval
from someone who's dead.

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(Kelly laughs)

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In a normal human being's life,

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we hope that you get to the point

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where you understand
that kind of fulfillment

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can only come from within,

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but luckily we don't allow
our superheroes to do that!

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So, she's become an adrenaline junkie.

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Because of this, kind of always trying

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to push herself further.

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- What's it been like to sort of see

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the fandom as a whole really have

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to reckon with the fact

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that like Carol is here now

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and she's not going anywhere.

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This is my insidious way of being like,

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what do you think about the
negative reaction to her?

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- Carol coming to the forefront

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of the Marvel Cinematic Universe

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is part of the reality
that Marvel Universe

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for the films has to grow and evolve.

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If men or other folks
have an issue with Carol,

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it might be their own baggage
that they bring to the table.

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- As a character who lived
in my head for so long,

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she feels like a friend,
and so I feel like,

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‘Look what you did, girl.’

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I mean people who are drawn to this person

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who always wants to do better,

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those are people who
always want to do better.

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If you are threatened by that,

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if you feel that takes
something away from you

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or that's not realistic enough for you

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in a world where, Thanos?

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I mean I don't know what to say to that.

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I mean they waged this huge boycott,

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can you imagine how many billions

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the movie would have made if...

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- The fact is that so
many have seen this movie,

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so many people are inspired by this movie.

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I mean growing up,

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I'd just grasp for any
like cool female lead movie

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that I could, because I
felt like a little Carol.

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I loved adrenaline, I wanted to be cool,

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I wanted to aspire to be something more.

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So, to have Carol do
that for little girls now

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is just the greatest thing here on Earth.

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(ominous clanging)