'Captain Marvel' Editor Reveals The Movie's Original Ending |

Captain Marvel was always going to have Carol Danvers join the Avengers for their next (and final) movie, Avengers: Endgame. It was just a matter of narratively plotting out how to get her on the team.

[WARNING: Spoilers for Captain Marvel happen beyond this point. Read at your own risk.]

Her origin story movie, set in the ’90s, ends with her flying off into the far reaches of the galaxy to find a home for her new Skrull friends, hence why Nick Fury has to use the world’s strongest pager to summon her to help Earth after Thanos’ Snap. But according to the movie’s editor, Danvers’ first big-screen outing originally planned to go out on a slightly different note.

Editor Debbie Berman recently told ET that Danvers initially went off exploring the cosmos alone. “And I found that a bit jarring,” Berman said. “Like, where exactly was she going? And what was she doing? It felt like we needed a stronger visual to assert a more specific justification for her leaving and disappearing for so many years. So we added Talos and his family in their spaceship waiting for her, and they all fly off together.”

Berman went on to say that this slight adjustment ended up speaking volumes about Captain Marvel’s character. “It gave her more of a sense of purpose and made it easier to believe that she left her newfound life on Earth because she was with a friend we knew she cared about, and for a more specific mission. It gave more resonance and closure to her final moment.”

Tweaking the film’s ending isn’t the only story point Berman helped influence. Remember when Danvers confronts the Supreme Intelligence and drops the mic with her “My name is Carol” line?

“I remember when I came across [that] line and there was a take [when she said it] where a tear runs down her cheek,” Berman explained. “I had a lot of other takes of that line where she just said it in a stoic, kick-ass fashion. And I was drawn to those other takes because that’s what I am used to seeing – and in a way, I’ve been programmed to feel that someone being strong and emotionless is the right play. But then I thought, I have never seen a superhero cry while saying her most kick-ass of lines, and honestly, if I had gone through everything she had just gone through – no matter how strong I was feeling at that moment – I think I would be having a multitude of emotional experiences simultaneously.”

So Berman obviously went with the “kick-ass tear” take and she expected pushback from the movie’s stakeholders on the choice, but she was “surprised and delighted everyone loved it.”

Judging by the movie’s considerable box office, that choice clearly paid off.

Captain Marvel is currently in theaters. Get your tickets for it here.