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The latest episode of Ms. Marvel is called ‘Destined’ and spends some time with Kamala trying to figure out her own destiny and purpose. The show gives us some answers as to Kamala’s backstory with a flashback to British Occupied India in 1942, which is that she (and by extension) and mother and maternal grandmother are descended from their great-grandmother Aisha (Mehwish Hayat), who is one of a small group of interdimensional beings.
Kamran’s mother Namja reveals more info in a classic exposition dump, explaining that her son is the only one that looks his age at 17 (thankfully) and that they have been called such things as Clandestines (a Marvel reference), Ajnabi, Majnoon, Unseen, and finally, Djinn. It’s hard to imagine a huge culture nerd like Bruno doesn’t know what that means (I mean I learned about them from playing D&D back in the day), but sure, it’s fine to get more context as Kamala explains they’re the things of her childhood nightmares.
Namja mentions that their dimension is called ‘Noor’ (as it’s written in the subtitles), but the concept is something in the Islamic tradition and often refers to a holy light associated with godly things. But here Kamala asks Bruno to use his powers to find out more, and he mentions a paper by a Dr. Erik Selvig, the dude from those Thor movies researching how to reach other dimensions like Asgard.
Intertwined with this story is Agent Deever, the obvious racist, throwing her government weight around at the mosque until she is rebuffed by Nakia helping out the Sheikh. Although she does tell Kamala she’s gotten on the board member — another example of how she’s been able to find herself, in contrast to Kamala. She brings up the nature of the way the government pushes the good Muslim vs bad Muslim gambit to play the community against itself and complains about ‘Night Light’ not thinking about how she would be affecting the community negatively.
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It’s not really a fair complaint, as Kamala only ever wanted to be a superhero for her own people and community, but this is clarified in a nice moment with the Sheikh where he explains that good is not a thing you are but a thing you do. After Bruno finally gets a chance to tell her he got into CalTech but wants her to be okay, it further puts her into an existential quandary.
But we also get two great further scenes with her mother explaining how her ‘mountain’ of wanting something was America itself, but the hardships were made easier by finding others. Kamala also overhears her father and Aamir talk about her brother’s own worries about the future, and her dad tells him he is brave because he has chosen family. It’s certainly a powerful thematic message about helping others, but at first Kamala takes the wrong lesson because she’s been manipulated by the Djinn to consider her ‘one of their own’.
The actual fight scenes were in contrast, just fine, and not really the best we’ve seen from comic book movies or even MCU Disney Plus shows. The only part that was legitimately fun was when Kamala is able to instantiate her giant hands again and when the kitchen staff hilariously left quickly, otherwise it was pretty unremarkable and without a lot of tension. The storylines come back again as Damage Control shows up to detain the Djinn (whose powers are 100% unclear so … I guess?) with an injured Bruno promising to finally explain everything to Nakia.
The cliffhanger of sorts for the next episode is Kamala’s grandmother calling that she also saw a vision of the train (does she have the other bangle?) and insists that Kamala and her mother must come to Karachi (which is the largest city in Pakistan). Hopefully she has her passport up to date.
The episode had a lot of fun, authentic touches, including nice bits like Bruno complaining about Kamran being an ‘average looking son’ or the band ‘Brown Jovi’ which is a pretty good name for a cover band. The action stuff which was in the ending scenes of the episode weren’t as strong, but the character moments remain very strong and the thematic throughline remains well handled too. A bit of a step down from last episode but a pretty strong first season so far.
New episodes of Ms. Marvel stream Wednesdays on Disney Plus.
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