How Moon Knight Comics Explain That Crazy Episode 4 Twist

Even before the series premiered Moon Knight‘s fourth episode was the one that Marvel told fans to circle on their calendar, and now that it’s here we’re talking SPOILERS BELOW! In the most recent episode of the hit Disney+ series some major surprises happened, not only did Oscar Isaac’s hero take a bullet to the chest and seemingly die, his character almost immediately woke up in a sterile-asylum setting, surrounded by all of the characters in the series who are now either patients, orderlies, or doctors. This might seem like a totally bizarre twist for some but its roots are firmly in the pages of Marvel Comics.

One of the most influential runs on Moon Knight is the volume from writer Jeff Lemire and artist Greg Smallwood, which from the opening issue traps Marc Spector inside an asylum. What is real and what is fake is a major thread throughout the comic, with Marc attempting an escape from the asylum only to really find it’s essentially a mind prison built by Khonshu to contain and break him. Things get even wilder and more trippy throughout this run on the hero though as the various personas that Moon Knight has embodied all eventually meet and interact, leading to the revelation that the Khonshu has been tampering with Marc’s mind for decades and not just since he became his avatar.

The Moon Knight TV series appears to be headed down this road as well, made clear by the fact that Marc finds a sarcophagus that contains Steven Grant and another that seemingly contains Jake Lockley, setting up a meeting of his various personas all in one place, something that’s plucked directly from the Lemire and Smallwood run which you can find below.

In the asylum setting, Ethan Hawke’s Arthur Harrow, now seen as a doctor, tells Marc a key line, “We don’t live in a material world, we live in a psychic world,” a shout out to the audience that what they’re seeing isn’t strictly speaking real. Will the growth that occurs in this setting have a place in the real world? Almost certainly, Lemire and Smallwood’s run concluded with a wild melding of all these realities, personas, and worlds, ending with Marc free from Khonshu’s influence and able to walk freely in the world. It seems like the Disney+ series could be headed that way too.

Moon Knight is now streaming on Disney+ with new episodes releasing every Wednesday. If you haven’t signed up for Disney+ yet, you can try it out here. 

Note: If you purchase one of the awesome, independently chosen products featured here, we may earn a small commission from the retailer. Thank you for your support.