With The Marvels gearing up for its second weekend in theaters, Iman Vellani recently shared some behind-the-scenes details about what happened to some deleted scenes. She stated that a significant sequence involving Monica Rambeau’s (Teyonah Parris) code name Photon was excluded from the Captain Marvel follow-up.
For heroes to excel, they do not always require a recurring code name. Well, even though Monica has taken on many aliases over the years, the public knows her by ‘Photon’. Indeed, although this superhero name is often used in marketing and toys for The Marvels, the code name is not actually used in the Nia DaCosta-directed latest film.
Vellani claimed that Monica was formally christened Photon after the first version of the movie’s “climatic battle scene”. The Pakistani-Canadian was correct when she said it was a cool moment, even if The Marvels removed it for a “good reason”.
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Iman Vellani Unveils the Mystery: The Absence of Photon in The Marvels
As per Yahoo, The Marvels featured a scene wherein Iman Vellani‘s character Kamala Khan and Teyonah Parris‘ Monica Rambeau were trying to come up with a superhero name for the latter.
However, the scene in the film where Monica decides to take on the alias Photon has been cut from the theatrical release. Vellani claimed that Monica was formally christened Photon after the first version of the movie’s pivotal confrontation with the Kree warrior Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton). In her words (via CanWeGetSomeToast):
“The original version of the film’s climactic battle ended with Monica officially being christened as Photon.”
However, Vellani, 21, was quick to observe that Parris’ Monica was already repairing the harm Dar-Benn caused, glowing like a true Photon:
“You don’t even need the words — she was Photon in that moment. And I don’t think Captain Marvel was even called Captain Marvel in her own movie!”
For the record, after making her MCU debut in the 2019 film Captain Marvel (as played by Akira Akbar as a young girl) and the 2021 Disney+ limited series WandaVision (by Parris), Monica Rambeau will make her third appearance in The Marvels. In the comics, the character has gone by a number of names, including Photon, Spectrum, and Pulsar.
Was Iman Vellani Disappointed That The Marvels Cut The Film’s Coolest MCU Moments?
Iman Vellani gave the film, led by director Nia DaCosta, the benefit of the doubt when asked if she was unhappy with the cut. She was positive that it was done for a “good cause” (per Yahoo):
“I’m sure it was [cut] for a good cause.”
Several minor beats, the actress thought, had been cut out of the film to make it more concise. She went on to say:
“There were all these little beats that they took out to make the movie more succinct. I mean, we shot a lot on this movie! Hopefully those all come out on Blu-ray or something..
Not insignificantly, Vellani has firsthand knowledge of how superior the catering was on The Marvel as opposed to her television series, Ms. Marvel (2022). With a laugh, she explained how they were treated like queens:
“On Ms. Marvel, I had a chicken Caesar salad everyday, because that’s all I could stomach. It wasn’t that the food was bad — there was just a lack of options. It’s nice having Brie Larson on a movie, because she has a whole ‘cast chef’ and everything. We were treated like queens! It was pretty nice.”
As a part of MCU Phase Five, The Marvels was released on November 10. Reviews were mixed; some complimented DaCosta’s directing and the chemistry between the three leads, while others criticized the story. The Marvels, which has made $117.7 million worldwide, has been labeled as a possible box office bomb by some publications.
The Marvels is currently playing in theaters.
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