Captain Marvel was a $1.1 billion hit when it was released in 2019, and while fans continue to wonder whether that specific origin story was the right one for Carol Danvers, there were a lot of fun moments in the blockbuster.
We know many of you likely wouldn't include how Nick Fury lost his eye among those, but Captain Marvel's two costumes were in line with what she's worn on the page in recent years and looked pretty cool in action.
However, it appears Marvel Studios considered some vastly different looks for the cosmic HER-o.
Shared by MCU concept artist Aleksi Briclot on Instagram a few weeks ago, the newly surfaced concept art is described as "early exploration" for Captain Marvel, an "elite fighter pilot with some hint of Kree tech" in this iteration of the story.
"I was also inspired by the Jelly Rogers squad, especially their colour scheme ([black and white] and yellow with a skull logo)," Briclot adds. "Which was also the obvious inspiration for the Valkyries fighter VF-1 in Macross...And some Top Gun vibe"
Captain Marvel appears to have been a tough nut for Marvel Studios to crack, something that was evident from The Marvels' failings last year. When we spoke to director Ryan Fleck in 2019, he confirmed that there were at least some talks of Carol being openly gay (a plot thread cut from the 2023 sequel).
"That was one of those things when we were in the writing stage, and the sky was the limit and the movie could be anything, we were just discussing, 'Are we going to get into any type of romantic relationship with this character?' It wasn't like there was a philosophical opposition to pursuing that storyline; it just came down to real estate in the story we were telling."
"We knew we were telling a story of self discovery and we wanted friendship, and her friendship with Maria, to be a huge part of that. There was no room for any romantic storyline for us. I know people have made their own conclusions about that and I think that's part of the fun of making these movies is that they become the audience's movies and they get to create any kind of narrative they want for what's happening off the screen. For us, as storytellers, it's a friendship and a story about that and self discovery."
Check out Briclot's unique take on Captain Marvel below.
Set in the 1990s, Marvel Studios' Captain Marvel is an all-new adventure from a previously unseen period in the history of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that follows the journey of Carol Danvers as she becomes one of the universe's most powerful heroes.
While a galactic war between two alien races reaches Earth, Danvers finds herself and a small cadre of allies at the center of the maelstrom.
Directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, the movie stars Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Djimon Hounsou, Lee Pace, Lashana Lynch, Gemma Chan, Annette Bening, Clark Gregg, and Jude Law.
Captain Marvel is now streaming on Disney+.