#protective!yon

Vers: He gets needlessly protective sometimes. I have no idea why.

- convinces the SI to approve Vers for duty even tho they both don't think she's ready because it would make Vers happy

- stops the lesson the moment the children ask a question that makes Vers uncomfortable

- doesn't let Minn-erva needle Vers because he doesn't want Vers to doubt herself

- refuses to give up on her when she is kidnapped/possibly killed by Skrulls, and spends days hanging onto the comms

- 'She's stronger than you think!'

- LIES TO RONAN THE ACCUSER even tho he knows she's having doubts by now and it'll be more sensible to cut the losses and let Ronan blast the Earth to smithereens by now but he doesn't want harm to come to her in any case

- ultimately turns his weapons off because he doesn't want to fight her to the death, despite what the Kree code of honour requires him to

I know I probably talked about it a dozen times but I will just never get over how Yon-Rogg LIED TO RONAN THE ACCUSER to buy more time to recover Vers, because it's one big moment that shows, UNMISTAKABLY, that he cared more about getting Vers back safely than eradicating the Skrull threat.

He was risking so much, he was sticking his neck out instead of doing the wise thing and covering his bases.

And that moment ultimately cemented his failure.

Because if he had let the Accusers just bomb the shit out of that part of the world, the Skrull threat would be contained, and sure, Vers would be lost forever, but that's acceptable loss for the Kree Empire.

BUT it wasn't acceptable loss for Yon-Rogg.

Can we cry for a moment about this, tho.

When he finds a Skrull where Vers is supposed to meet him, his first thought isn't that she led him into a trap (or had learned the truth), but her safety.

That is his first concern, not that this is the closest a Skrull probably had even gotten to his person by using the face of one closest to him. He isn't asking about the Skrulls' plans or where to find Talos, all he wants is to get her back.

I want to talk about one of my favourite moments because it's such an obvious instance of Yon not putting 'the good of all Kree' above his attachment to his protégè.

In the context of the entire film, that line is foreshadowing that hints that we've barely scratched the surface on how powerful she is. But in the context of this scene, it's not like he's going 'you don't know this but she can rip a spaceship apart with her bare hands'. All parties present are aware of her special abilities. That's not the pertinent information here.

What he is referring to in this instance is the strength of her spirit, her resilience, her ability to think for herself and analyse the situation.

The fact that he feels like he has to defend that in front of people who technically don't care either way, and is really snappy about it, too, in like, 'you couldn't possibly understand' way, betrays the admiration he feels for her.

Plus, it adds a selfish bit into the mix, because he wants it to be true, he doesn't want to lose her, so he refuses to doubt her loyalty and firmly shuts down any line of thinking that suggests she's been compromised.