‘Captain Marvel’ and ‘Birds Of Prey’ are the future of comic book superhero movies

“The future is female.” That’s the quote that popped up in bold letters on the Entertainment Weekly cover which offered the first behind-the-scenes look at Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel. It is, of course, both a current political slogan and initially a tag-line created in 1975 by the owners of a Greenwich Village women’s bookstore and pertaining to lesbian separatism, but I digress. Kevin Feige has discussed the idea that the post-Avengers 4 MCU will have more gender parity in-front-of and behind the camera. It may not mean much from the company that took 20 movies and 10.5 years to get to a female-led solo superhero flick (and has spent four years pinkie-swearing about a solo Black Widow movie), Captain Marvel is just one of a handful of high-profile female-led superhero flicks opening just over the next 1.5 years.

Just at a glance, we’ve got 20th Century Fox’s Dark Phoenix on Feb. 14, 2019, which is at least selling itself as a 1990’s-set Jean Grey-centric psychological drama that may or may not give Sophie Turner a Deadpool or Logan-like spotlight. And yes, Brie Larson’s 1990’s-set Captain Marvel will feature Brie Larson as the lead in Marvel’s first solo female-led superhero flick when it opens on March 8, 2019. While Avengers 4 will surely focus on Captain America and Iron Man, it will also presumably offer showy returns for Evangeline Lilly’s The Wasp and Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie, while presumably having Captain Marvel play a large role in the story. And the year will close out with DC Films’ Wonder Woman 1984 which will reunite star Gal Gadot and director Patty Jenkins when it debuts on Nov. 1, 2019.