[Spoiler alert for The Marvels.] Iman Vellani had a fan girl reaction to those secret cameos that end The Marvels. The Ms. Marvel star reprises her role as Jersey City supehero Kamala Khan, the self-professed No. 1 fan of Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), who teams up with her hero and Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) to form a trio Kamala names “The Marvels.” But the MCU crossovers don’t end there: the final scenes of the movie show Kamala recruiting new Hawkeye Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld) to form the Young Avengers with Ant-Man’s daughter, Cassie Lang, while Monica encounters a familiar face — and a not-so-familiar face — when she passes through a hole in space-time to wind up in the X-Men Universe.
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The ending scene playfully recreates the post-credits scene of 2008’s Iron Man, where Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) steps out of the shadows to talk to Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) about the Avengers Initiative.
“There was a version of this in an old script, but we never shot it. And then there were rumors that we were going to get to it in additional photography, but with a different young Avenger,” Vellani told The Hollywood Reporter of Steinfeld’s cameo. “So I never really got the script until right before additional photography and then I flipped out. I immediately rewatched Iron Man and texted [director Nia DaCosta] in all caps. I was like, “I cannot believe the honor that I am getting right now. This is crazy!” I did not need to rewatch that entire movie, but it didn’t hurt. So I was giddy the entire time. All of us were freaking out. It was also the last scene we shot for the movie, and it is the last scene of the movie.”
There are two more surprise cameos before the credits roll: Binary, an alternate-universe version of Monica’s mother Maria (Lashana Lynch), and Beast of the X-Men (Kelsey Grammer, reprising the role he originated in 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand.)
“They shot the mid-credit scene during principal [photography]. They shot it earlier, so they knew what they were doing. But I thought it was going to be something else. I did not realize Beast was in it,” Vellani said. “I knew they shot it, but I was expecting to see something else. And lo and behold, they kept the secret even from me. I literally jumped and had a heart attack on my bed when I watched it for the first time. I literally texted every single person we worked with, and I was like, ‘How could you keep this from me?’ But at least I got to experience it as a fan, which was so cool. I’m just so excited to see what they do with that in the future.”
Including a member of the X-Men in The Marvels seems to suggest Kamala’s future with the team, especially after the Ms. Marvel finale revealed that Kamala has a mutation in her genes (cue the 90’s X-Men: The Animated Series theme).
“Yeah, I think they’re connecting a lot of things. They’re sprinkling in the mutants here and there. We saw [Charles Xavier] in [Doctor Strange in the] Multiverse of Madness. So I honestly am not privy to what they’re doing with the X-Men and how they’re going to incorporate them,” Vellani said, “but it is extremely cool and a really big flex to have one in our own movie. Well, two, if you count me.”
The Marvels is now playing in theaters.
