Scarlett Johansson has made quite a splash as Black Widow in three Marvel movies now, ‘Iron Man 2’, ‘The Avengers’ and ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier.’  Hayley Atwell’s ‘Agent Carter‘ will headline her own TV series this winter.  But neither of these powerful women will star in their own live action movie.  The first Marvel heroine to star in a solo film will be none other than Carol Danvers, Captain Marvel.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Fiege announced the proposed film along with a slew of upcoming movies.

“Black Widow couldn’t be more important as an Avenger, but like Hulk the ‘Avengers’ films will be the films where they play a primary role.  Her part in ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ is very, very big and further develops her character. The plans we have for her through the rest of the Avengers saga are very big and she is a linchpin, in fact, to those films. So instead of taking her out there or doing a prequel which we haven’t done yet, we’re continuing the forward momentum of the continuity of the Cinematic Universe, of which Widow is a key part.”

‘Captain Marvel’ isn’t slated to hit theaters until July 6th, 2018 and will follow the long-rumored movies based on ‘Doctor Strange‘ (November 4th, 2016), ‘Guardians of the Galaxy 2‘ (May 5th, 2017), ‘Thor: Raganarok’ (July 28th, 2017) and ‘Black Panther’ (November 3rd, 2017).  (Also announced was an ‘Inhumans’ movie, targeted for November 2nd, 2018 and additional ‘Avengers’ and ‘Captain America’ movies.)

Marvel has been pushing Carol Danvers for a few years now, showcasing her in two separate solo comics and bumping her up from the dated moniker ‘Ms. Marvel‘ to ‘Captain Marvel’.  Originally, Ms. Marvel was a female spin-off from a male character named ‘Captain Marvel’, more commonly known as Mar-Vell.  But Marvel killed Mar-Vell off in the early 80s and since then, Carol has been positioned as the name-bearer of the Marvel Universe.

Carol was a human Air Force Captain who was imbued with powers from the Kree alien race, including flight, energy absorption and projection and super strength.  She has since served as a long-running member of the Avengers and an ally to the X-Men.  Rogue, formerly a villain, robbed her of her powers and memories.  Carol then gained cosmic powers and went by the name Binary, before regaining her Ms. Marvel powers, and then recently graduating to the name Captain Marvel.

The ‘Captain Marvel’ movie will arrive roughly one year after Warner Brothers plans to release a ‘Wonder Woman‘ solo movie in 2017, so Marvel won’t be the first studio to release a solo female super hero movie.  This movie will also follow ‘Black Panther’ the first Marvel production starring a black lead character.  (Not counting ‘Blade’ which was produced by New Line Cinema and Storm in the ‘X-Men’ which was produced by Fox.)

What do you think?  Are you excited to see Carol Danvers swoop onto the big screen?  What other female heroes do you think could hold down their own movies?

Sources: Marvel.com and The Verge