KHAN DO ATTITUDE

OVER THE 14 YEARS THAT MARVEL STUDIOS has been making movies, and now streaming series on Disney+, its ongoing successes have fed a mission to expand the narrow definition of who a superhero can be in the cultural zeitgeist by showcasing characters like T’Challa, Carol Danvers, Shang-Chi and Makkari for a global audience.

This more purposeful approach to making sure everyone gets to see themselves within the stories it tells gets another major expansion this June with Ms Marvel. The series ticks a whole bunch of new storytelling “firsts”, with the story of Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani), a 16-year-old Muslim, Pakistani-American superhero who stans Captain Marvel something fierce.

Based on the Eisner-nominated comic book of the same name by writer G Willow Wilson and artists Adrian Alphona and Jamie McKelvie, Ms Marvel aims to tell the relatable and smaller-scale story of a misfit teen trying to juggle her culture, her religion and social status after she gains powers that she assumes will solve all her problems. Of course, they don’t...

It’s a story that instantly connected ‘s head writer, comedian Bisha K Ali, from the moment she picked up issue one in London’s Orbital Comics. “I in her Los Angeles office. “It was a deeply personal moment and a deeply evocative moment for me just thinking back on it. Fast forward [eight] years and suddenly I’m really a big part of this story. It’s really astounding.”