I fucking love this movie
The entire film is an utter subversion and destruction of the Master/Student relationship. In film, the master dreams for the day they are bested by their student, that's the entire goal of the training. Here Yon-Rogg fears it, he is not training Danvers to one day best him, he is training her to make sure she never does. She's not his student, she's his weapon, to be used and controlled by him. It's fucking brilliance to use such recognizable trappings like the Master/Student and the sparring scene to demonstrate an abusive relationship, because that's often how abuse is.... it looks normal.... it looks familiar and from the outside it's invisible.
Even the climax is a subversion of Master/Students tropes. Even when they go the route of the Master is actually the bad guy, the climax is still often the student defeats the master hand to hand (or sword to sword or whatever) as they were trained to do and the fight is presented as somewhat noble, and definitely tragic and usually the defeated Master tells the student how proud they are, even a tragic fight between hero and now villainous master is framed with an air of genuine love... etc... .
Here Yon-Rogg wants her to fight how he trained her because he's trying to manipulate her and because he's relishing the opportunity to beat the shit out of her, it was never training it was grooming. So rather than give in, rather than "fight him like a man", rather than buy into Toxic Masculinity Macho Bullshit (which often entrap Strong Women Trope characters), she blasts him. She doesn't use the masters tools to dismantle the house, she uses her own tools.
Fuck yes
