'Avengers: Endgame' directors weigh in on Captain Marvel 'make-up' debate

Last month, a minor furore gathered online after the release of the most recent trailer for Avengers: Endgame.

In it, Thor gave his – doubtless unwanted – endorsement of Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel, as his hammer whistled past her head.

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She didn’t flinch. But, fans noted, she was – for some reason – in full make-up. And they began asking why, when she’s likely to be the most powerful of all the Avengers, would she need to have been fully made up?

Talk of her alleged ‘objectification’ began circumnavigating Twitter higher, further, and faster.

Now, the directors the Russo brothers have weighed in, and it has little to do with them, and everything to do with Brie Larson and her own decisions.

“This was Brie’s first time playing the character,” Joe Russo told Slashfilm at the Endgame press junket.

“She [filmed Avengers: Endgame] before she filmed Captain Marvel, and I think she was experimenting with what the character was. And those were the choices that she and her hair and makeup team had made.

“And I think as she started to gain a deeper understanding of the character, especially as she approached her own movie, she started to make different choices and as an artist she should be afforded that right to make whatever choice that she wants to make.”

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Larson having shot Captain Marvel after appearing in Avengers: Endgame, it’s clear that the vision for the character’s look evolved some along the way.

Plus there’s the fact that Captain Marvel was set in the 90s, while Endgame is right up to date, so there’s likely to be some change in look.

But Russo adds that it’s not just Larson who gets free rein to do with the character as she wishes, in terms of how they appear on screen.

“We give all the actors ownership over there,” he went on. “Every hairstyle that Scarlet Johansson has had and every movie that we’ve done has come from Scarlet Johansson.”

Avengers: Endgame is due out across the UK on April 25.