Despite half of the world dying, the post-credits scene for Avengers: Infinity War offers a glimmer of hope for the future. Help might be on the way in the shape of Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel. Though the heroine doesn’t make her MCU debut in this film, Nick Fury does send a message to her before he dies. That’s not confirmed, of course, but we’d recognize her logo and colour scheme anywhere.
It’s a great tease of things to come, but it does leave us with a pretty pressing question: where has Carol Danvers been this whole time? And perhaps more importantly, why is Fury only calling on her now? After all, this is far from the first time Earth’s been in trouble.
Unfortunately, the answers we so desperately seek won’t arrive until next year, when Captain Marvel flies into theaters. But from what we know so far, we can at least begin to put some of the pieces together. And at the moment, there are two main theories as to where the fan favorite hero has been over the past decade of the MCU.
Up first, many think that she’s in the Quantum Realm, which we initially learned about in Ant-Man. Existing outside the normal rules of time and space, we already know that it’ll feature in Carol Danvers’ upcoming solo outing and a lot of people believe that by the end of the pic, she’ll somehow have gotten herself trapped there – kind of like Janet van Dyne did.
Now, this is certainly possible, but there is one issue with this theory, and that’s the fact that at the end of Infinity War, Fury pages Captain Marvel. This would seem to indicate that she’s not trapped (otherwise why would he bother reaching out for help?) and is instead, just there on her own accord, meaning she can come and go from the Quantum Realm as she pleases. But if that’s the case, why has she been there all these years?
It’s a good question, and one that can really only be explained by the fact that as Hank Pym’s told us, in the Quantum Realm, all concept of time is irrelevant. In other words, what’s been a decade in the MCU may have only felt like a few days for Carol if that’s indeed where she’s been all this time.
If she’s not in the Quantum Realm, though, then the other most likely option would be that she’s in outer space. Something that Kevin Feige actually hinted at a while back. Maybe she’s been assisting with the Kree-Skrull War? Perhaps she was even instrumental in helping to bring about the truce which the Kree and Xandar had entered into at the start of Guardians of the Galaxy?
Whatever the case may be, we likely won’t get any answers until next March, which is when Captain Marvel flies into theaters and reveals all. In the meantime, though, feel free to chime in with your own thoughts down in the comments section below. We’d love to hear from you!