When Carol Danvers steps into Avengers headquarters in the trailer for Avengers: Endgame, she looks a little…different. Gone are the loose waves of hair and bare face of Captain Marvel, in which Brie Larson made her debut as the cosmically powered superhero just months ago. Instead, she rocked a smooth straight-ironed hairdo, red lipstick, and a full face of makeup.

The hair could be explained away by the 10-year absence (it was a little ridiculous that her hair was so bouncy after getting blasted by so many aliens), but fans wondered when Carol would have had time to stop by a Sephora while the world was ending. The new look incited more than a little outrage, as fans criticized directors Joe and Anthony Russo for needlessly dolling up Carol Danvers and subjecting her to the “male gaze.” But the Russo brothers have an explanation for the change in the Captain Marvel makeup look: filming schedules.

At the Avengers: Endgame press junket, /Film’s Peter Sciretta got a chance to ask the Russo brothers if they could address Captain Marvel’s changed look. The directors said that while they “set the parameters…in terms of what we need,” the makeup and hairstyles of all the characters are actually decided by the actors and their makeup team. “We give all the actors ownership over there,” Joe Russo said. That includes Scarlett Johansson’s shocking blonde hairdo in Avengers: Infinity War, which Joe Russo said was the actress’ idea. That and her ever-changing wigs, apparently. “Every hairstyle that Scarlet Johansson has had and every movie that we’ve done has come from Scarlet Johansson,” he said.

So why is Carol Danvers’ look so inconsistent when Brie Larson has shown a passionate dedication to the character and what she stands for? It turns out that when they were filming Avengers: Endgame, even Larson didn’t have a total grasp on her character. “This was Brie’s first time playing the character,” Joe Russo explained, continuing:

“She [filmed Avengers: Endgame] before she filmed Captain Marvel, and I think she was experimenting with what the character was. And those were the choices that she and her hair and makeup team had made. And I think as she started to gain a deeper understanding of the character, especially as she approached her own movie. She started to make different choices and as an artist she should be afforded that right to make whatever choice that she wants to make.”

It was reported last year that Larson had shot her scenes in Avengers: Endgame before production for Captain Marvel started, which explains the inconsistent look and yes, the full face of makeup. But thankfully a little experimentation did Carol Danvers good, as her final look in Captain Marvel seemed truer to her personality — grungy and straight-to-the-point. However, Larson gives credit to Avengers: Endgame for helping her figure out her character for the first time.

“This film [Endgame] will always be personally dear to me because it was my first time playing Captain Marvel,” Larson said at the junket press conference. “We shot this first so I had to stumble and figure out who this character was with no script for this and no script for Captain Marvel, either, and perform for the first time in front of legends.”