4 Years On, The MCU Just Repeated a Trick From Loki

WARNING: There are spoilers ahead for Eyes of Wakanda! Eyes of Wakanda just repeated one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s best storytelling tricks last seen in Loki Season 1, and it’s still one of the best techniques for any primary-world fantasy. In the Loki series premiere, an off-handed joke revealed that the God of Mischief himself (Tom Hiddleston) was behind the real-life mystery of D.B. Cooper, unceremoniously ending decades of research and speculation. Similarly, the finale of Eyes of Wakanda Season 1 gives a fantastical answer to the historical mystery of Ben Pease, a real-life slave-trader who disappeared mysteriously in 1870. You can read on for more context, or simply accept the story laid out in Eyes of Wakanda Season 1, Episode 4, “The Last Panther,” streaming now on Disney+.

Eyes of Wakanda is an anthology series detailing the actions of Wakanda throughout history, as the secretive nation sought to hide its technology and resources while maintaining peaceful relations, and do some good in the world along the way. It follows Wakandan “War Dogs” — those sent out on missions of espionage or sabotage around the world. This episode focuses on the War Dog Kuda (Steven Toussaint) and his partner Tafari (Zeke Alton), who also happens to be the Prince of Wakanda.

The duo have their own adventure in this episode that is epic and not easy to summarize, but once again, the historical background on Ben Pease is just a quick, casual mention. While complaining about the mission going differently than he expected, Tafari says, “I wanted to rid with the legendary Kuda of the Mining Tribe — the agent who slayed the pirate Ben Pease.” There’s no further explanation, but for history buffs, this is a cool nod to real life.

Ben Pease

The real Ben Pease was a sailor from Edgartown, Massachusetts who participated in the opium trade and other voyages across the Pacific Ocean. He eventually rose to captain his own vessel and used it for the dubious practice of “blackbirding” — kidnapping people from the Pacific Islands and taking them places where they’d be forced to work on plantations. People like Pease would claim these people were under legitimate “indenture,” or even that they had volunteered for this lifestyle, but in reality it was considered a means of finding laborers outside of the Atlantic slave trade as laws throughout Europe and the U.S. began to change.

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Pease was plying this trade in 1870 when he helped fellow pirate Bully Hayes escape from jail in Apia, Samoa, and flee on Pease’s ship, the Pioneer. The two then cruised between various islands trading for several months, with one major stop in Shanghai. When the ship returned to its home port, Pease was gone, but there were conflicting reports of what had happened to him. Hayes said that Pease had drowned while trying to evade Spanish military forces, while other crew members said that Pease had been killed in a fight during a stop on the Bonin Islands in Japan. Intriguingly, Hayes would later claim that Pease had actually taken his share of the money from the Pioneer and its cargo and bought a home for himself in China, planning to retire. Whatever the case, Pease was never seen again, and Hayes was the undisputed captain of the Pioneer.

D.B. Cooper

This is very reminiscent of the MCU’s meddling in history back in 2021. The joke comes from a scene where Mobius (Owen Wilson) was interrogating Loki about his narrow escapes over the years. Using TVA technology, he pulls up footage of Loki on Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 in 1971. He acts out the entire historical vignette, complete with the leap out of a moving plane. The show then explains this mystery by having Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Heimdall (Idris Elba) use the Bifrost to transport Loki back to Asgard at the last moment.

The mystery of D.B. Cooper has been nagging at investigators for half a century now. A man using the name Dan Cooper was on a flight from Portland, Oregon to Seattle, Washington when he discretely told the flight staff that he had a bomb, and he was holding the entire plane hostage for $200,000 in ransom. The plane landed at its destination and Cooper let all the passengers off before demanding that the flight crew prepare to bring him to Mexico City. However, shortly after takeoff, Cooper jumped off the moving plane with a parachute, gliding off into the dark with his money in hand.

Cooper’s identity was never conclusively determined, but he has been a figure of urban legend ever since. Revealing that he was actually Loki is funny enough, but the MCU went so far as to say that this was all just a bet between him and his brother Thor. It’s a brilliant trick for tying the real world and the fictional world together in a fantasy story, though there aren’t always loose threads like these to grasp at. Eyes of Wakanda found another great opportunity with Ben Pease, and hopefully the MCU has more down the road.

Eyes of Wakanda is streaming now on Disney+, along with Loki and most other MCU titles.