Marvel reveals NEW MS. MARVEL. A Muslim Teenager From New Jersey. Diversity, Get!
Dope. Even as Galactus is trying to eat Miles Morales’ ass or whatever in the Ultimate Universe (Gross, bro! He’s a minor), Marvel isn’t done punching up their line-up with some diversity. The Company That Believes in Simultaneous Events has revealed the new Ms. Marvel, and she is a Muslim teenager from New Jersey.
The New York Times broke news today of a new solo superhero title launching from Marvel early next year — and this one comes as a welcome change of pace for readers who want to see more diversity in their super-books.
Ms Marvel #1, from writer G. Willow Wilson (Cairo) and artist Adrian Alphona (Runaways), introduces the world to the young Muslim woman who takes on the mantle of Ms. Marvel formerly held by Carol Danvers, the current Captain Marvel. The new Ms. Marvel will be the first Muslim character to get her own ongoing solo series at Marvel, one of a growing number of female solo leads, and the only person of color headlining a solo book.
The star of the new title is Kamala Khan, the daughter of Pakistani immigrants living in New Jersey. As described by Wilson and series editor Sana Amanat, the character will balance fighting super villains and coming to grips with her body-morphing powers against the pressures of her conservative family background. She takes the name Ms. Marvel because of her longstanding admiration of Danvers.
“Captain Marvel represents an ideal that Kamala pines for,” Ms. Wilson told NYT. “She’s strong, beautiful and doesn’t have any of the baggage of being Pakistani and ‘different.’”
The writer added that Ms. Marvel will be “about the universal experience of all American teenagers, feeling kind of isolated and finding what they are” but “through the lens of being a Muslim-American” with superpowers.