The Hero's Journey has been a staple of heroic literature dating back to when sagas were sung instead of written. Some modern examples include both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and the original Star Wars movie (which I refuse to call by it's revised name). In the classic hero's journey, the hero, who is often young and inexperienced, is forced to leave his comfortable life behind and undertake a quest. Along the way he meets a mentor who teaches him. Eventually the hero and the mentor are separated and the hero has to use his new knowledge to complete the journey.
In Tolkien's novels, Gandolf sends Bilbo then Frodo on journeys. He accompanies them for a while but in the Hobbit he has to leave to go join the fight against the Necromancer (Sauron). In LotR he is killed (although he recovers). For a while Strider replaces Gandolf as Frodo's mentor but, this being a more adult book, Frodo realizes that he has to leave his companions behind. In Star Wars, Obi-wan saves Luke and whisks him off on a quest. Along the way he gives Luke a bit of training before Darth Vader turns him into a Force Ghost.
The MCU has their own version of the Hero's Journey. Let's call it the Super-Hero's Journey. It's not used in every MCU movie but it's pretty common. The biggest difference is that instead of being young and inexperienced, the hero is flawed. Instead of being forced on a journey by external events, it's the hero's own faults that leads to the journey. The role of the mentor is reduced greatly. Instead of losing his mentor, the hero hits bottom before overcoming his flaws and learning from his experiences to overcome the villain.
Iron Man, the first MCU movie, is also the prototype for the Superhero's journey. Stark hits bottom fast. One minute he's a spoiled millionaire industrialist and the next he's being held hostage in a cave and forced to lug a car battery around or he will die. He has a mentor in the cave who dies pretty fast. He also has a father-figure who betrays him. I'll come back to this later.
In Iron Man 2, Stark is on a self-destructive path, eventually getting a a drunken brawl with Rhodey before Fury sets him on the proper path. In the third movie he's obscessed with making armor and suffering from PTSD after the Avengers movie and loses his home and armor before he once again pulls himself together.
Doctor Strange goes from talented neurosurgeon to bum before the Ancient One trains him to become the Sorcerer Supreme. Thor loses his hammer and his powers until he discovers self-sacrifice. Spider-Man screws up constantly until Stark takes back his Spider-Suit then finally gets his act together.
The Black Panther is a special case. He hit bottom as hard as anyone but he's not flawed. His problems are external. His father and his mentor lied to him. This is an important point. I'll come back to it later.
So, lots of MCU movies have the Hero's Journey. Even the DCU does it with Aquaman. But both Marvel and DC have a different journey for their women. I'll call it the Feminist Journey.
A huge pint is that the heroine is not flawed so there's no need to hit bottom. The Feminist Journey is always up.
The second point is that the heroine is much more powerful than she thinks but she has a mother figure holding her back (echos of the Black Panther's father lying to him).
Finally, the heroine seems to have a mentor but he's actually her enemy.
At the beginning of Wonder Woman, Diana's mother forbid her to even train as an Amazon. Eventually her mother relents with the instruction that Dianna is to be pushed harder than anyone. She's been told that she began as a statue that the gods brought to life and that the armory has a special sword and shield to be used to fight Aries, the God of War. After learning about The Great War, Dianna takes the sword and shield and leaves to go find Aries and stop the war. Near the end of the movie we discover that her mother lied to her. She is a demi-god, the daughter of Zeus and she is the weapon against Aries, not the sword. And, Aries is not the evil German general. He's the kindly English lord who's been helping her.
In Captain Marvel, Carol is a soldier fighting for the Kree. She is trained by Yon-Rogg, her commander and mentor. The Kree are ruled by the Supreme Intelligence who appears to Carol as a mother-figure and constantly warns her about controlling her powers. During the course of the movie she discovers that she is much more powerful than she thought and that she's fighting on the wrong side. She's been told that the Skrulls are terrorists but they are just innocent victims. She discovers that her real enemy is Yon-Rogg.
So the only two superhero movies featuring a woman have the Feminist Journey. But this raises the huge question, why was Wonder Woman such a better movie? The answer is that the Feminist Journey was the A plot in Captain Marvel but it was only the B plot in Wonder Woman. The A plot in Wonder Woman was stopping the German general from using nerve gas on the English and extending the war. The final denouement and CGI battle at the end almost seemed tacked on. In contrast, Captain Marvel put it's Feminist Journey front and center.
The biggest problem with the Feminist Journey is that flawless heroes (or heroines) are kind of boring. Its the flaws that make the heroes interesting.
