How Secret Invasion Can Become An MCU Game-Changer In One Key Episode
Marvel's Secret Invasion is now halfway done, and as Episode 3 debuts on Disney+, there are a lot of fans openly wondering if the show can both stick the landing and offer any significant development to the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe storyline. That's not to say there's been nothing to enjoy with Secret Invasion – after all, it may be Marvel Studios' most prestigious series yet in terms of acting caliber and star power (Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Olivia Coleman), but it ironically feels like one of the weaker entries when it comes to relevance and meaning to the larger MCU saga.
That's not entirely the fault of Secret Invasion: the entire MCU cosmic storyline (outside of James Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy Trilogy) has felt somewhat disjointed and half-formed. Now Secret Invasion has asked fans to invest in a story about Skrulls and their plight over multiple decades but still feels new and recent since Captain Marvel was our only real experience with the shape-changing race.
However, Secret Invasion could both correct some of that imbalance in the Skull relevance and earn its place as a game-changing chapter of the MCU (a la Captain America: The Winter Soldier), if the show can pull off one great (and revealing episode).
Release The Skrull Cut
The "Secret Invasion" storyline from Marvel Comics was built on the idea that a faction of Skrull radicals had spent significant years replacing key world leaders and even some superheroes with Skrull operatives. Those reveals were incredibly pivotal in a lot of cases, as they revealed substantial pieces of Marvel Comics history were carried out by Skrulls. Along with the debut of new "Super Skrulls," it's the hook that has made the "Secret Invasion" storyline a new-age Marvel classic.
The MCU Secret Invasion series clearly made its Super Skrull intentions known in Episode 3, so that's already in motion. However, Secret Invasion has yet to actually pull off some kind of shocking twist reveal about just how long Gravik's (Kingsley Ben-Adir) forces have been manipulating events on Earth.
The live-action Marvel Disney+ series almost always offer one episode that takes a narrative and stylistic departure from the rest of the series. WandaVision and Moon Knight are two of the biggest examples, with both shows including episodes that took viewers on deep flashbacks through the characters' respective histories. Secret Invasion could make being waves by doing something similar: an episode dedicated to showing us alternate looks at MCU history, revealing how the Skrulls secretly influenced events.
Rhodey (Don Cheadle) is the most obvious candidate to be the center point of such an episode. Fans have been betting that Rhodey is a Skrull and the show certainly teases it; an episode of Secret Invasion showing us how/when Rhodey got replaced – and all the shady things Skrull-Rhodey did to advance the Secret Invasion across the MCU – would be an episode of Secret Invasion that definitely carries weight, and makes the series a major talking point in the MCU Saga.
Even if this "Skrull Cut" episode of Secret Invasion didn't center on Rhodey, the technical and narrative of feats of revisiting key MCU events from Skrull's perspective would create a must-watch buzz that Secret Invasion could definitely use.
You can watch Marvel's Secret Invasion on Disney+.
