Who is Zawe Ashton playing in ‘The Marvels?’ Her mystery MCU villain, explained

The Marvels hype train has now officially pulled out of the station — although maybe “the plane has officially pulled off the runway” would be a more apt metaphor, given Carol’s career — following the release of the movie’s first trailer. There’s still much we don’t know about the Captain Marvel sequel, however, including the nature of Zawe Ashton’s mystery villain.

Despite the Captain Marvel mythos arguably not being one that’s overly familiar to non-hardcore comic book readers, the studio likes to keep the characters of these films under wraps ahead of time, to surprise the fans who do know the lore intimately when they hit cinemas. For example, Jude Law turning out to be the evil Yon-Rogg and Annette Bening being a gender-flipped Mar-Vell in Captain Marvel.

Marvel seems to be pulling a similar trick in The Marvels, as Ashton has long been rumored to be playing another previously male character from the source material. Namely, Kree general Dar-Benn. But who is this character and how will they fit into the Brie Larson-starring sequel?

Who is Dar-Benn in the Marvel universe?

In the comics, Dar-Benn was a treacherous and power-hungry Kree military leader who partnered with fellow Kree Ael-Dan to assassinate their people’s current (incompetent, to be fair) leader and rule in their place. They even created a robotic Silver Surfer to do the deed — an interesting Fantastic Four connection for those waiting to see the First Family in the MCU — and framed the murder on the Skrulls.

Dar-Benn is an extremely minor player in Marvel Comics history, with the 616 incarnation of the character having a total of two appearances to his name. Expect The Marvels to totally revamp Dar-Benn from top to bottom, then, with the shift in gender likely being the least important change. Although, thanks to the trailer, it looks like we can expect the concept of Dar-Benn leading a coup and taking over as Kree ruler to be retained. It appears that Ashton’s villain has usurped Ronan the Accuser’s position at the head of the Kree army.

Having such a politically powerful character, and one who’s no doubt powerful in a physical sense too, opposing Carol Danvers and her new allies, Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) and Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), will hopefully mean we’re in for a thrilling confrontation come The Marvels. What’s more, however Dar-Benn is adapted, let’s hope she has the opportunity to return. It would be fun if Ashton could one day share the screen with her real-life partner, Loki himself Tom Hiddleston.

The Marvels is set to blast into theaters this Nov. 10.