We’re all drowning in content—so it’s time to highlight the best. In her column, published every Friday, critic Clarisse Loughrey recommends a new show to watch. This week: New MCU series Secret Invasion, which takes on a storyline possibly better serviced by a film – or even a cumulative series of films.
Secret Invasion: Season 1
Captain Marvel, released back in 2019, feels like a century ago in Marvel years. The Infinity Saga had yet to indulge its fans’s wildest whims with its cameo-stuffed conclusion, Avengers: Endgame. Disney+ was yet to arrive, with its own cavalcade of MCU shows. And, most importantly, the words “superhero fatigue” were nothing but a murmur from the lips of the genre’s most dogged detractors.
I distinctly remember how comic book readers had collectively perked up like meerkats at Captain Marvel’s first mention of the Skrulls, a race of shape-shifting aliens with the ability to impersonate any person (or intergalactic hero). Those we met in the film, led by Talos (Ben Mendelsohn) were friendly—refugees targeted by the same imperialistic Kree that had indoctrinated Carol Danvers (Brie Larson), aka Captain Marvel. Aha, the fans cried, there’s more here than meets the eye!
The film was clearly laying the groundwork for the next Thanos-level, multi-film crossover event, modelled after an eight-issue comic series from 2008, by Brian Michael Bendis and Leinil Francis Yu. Named Secret Invasion, it revealed that the Skrulls had covertly replaced many of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes with imposters, in a plan years in the making—and now they were ready to strike. Could this also happen in the MCU? The speculation was wild. Which of our beloved Avengers, that we’ve spent so many years with, could turn out to be a Skrull? Captain America? Hulk? Thor? Post-Thanos’s snap, and the (obviously temporary) death of half the universe, this seemed like the only thing that could really shock audiences in a way that hadn’t been done before.
Then, of course, came the multiverse. With Hollywood now putrid with nostalgia, the MCU made what feels like a hard turn into fan service, centring the so-called Multiverse Saga in all its future plans. Secret Invasion was, instead, relegated to the status of Disney+ series. And with the show’s first episode premiering this week, it already seems clear: all that is good, and all that is not, about Secret Invasion confirms that this storyline would have been better serviced by a film—or even a cumulative series of films. The series, created by Kyle Bradstreet and directed by Ali Selim, is a compelling premise vacuum-packed into six episodes.
Or so it would seem. Since we’re only one episode in, I should be gracious and allow for the fact that Secret Invasion has five more opportunities to justify its existence—and maybe even set up a further cinematic venture. That said, these Disney+ shows have already developed a pattern of fizzling out with Rock’em Sock’em conclusions, so I think it’s also fair to approach each venture with a dose of scepticism.
Secret Invasion does also have to serve double duty as a Nick Fury solo series. And, thankfully, it’s revisited the character in a state that best suits an actor of Samuel L Jackson’s clout—as a man once confident he could control the whims of gods and machines, unable to process the fact his existence was snuffed out (for five whole years) by the snap of a finger. He’s returned to Earth, after years in outer space, tinkering away on an intergalactic defence system. And everyone he reunites with is keen to point out (ad nauseam, if I’m honest) that he’s lost his sparkle—an accusation that becomes particularly pointed when it comes from Talos.
See, Nick and Carol had promised the Skrulls a new homeworld, only to promptly abandon them and zoom off beyond the stratosphere. Now, there’s a rebellious Skrull faction, led by Kingsley Ben-Adir’s Gravik, who want to claim the Earth for themselves. Considering these Disney+ shows have both smaller budgets and ambitions, it’s unlikely we’ll see any major revelations that [insert favourite Avenger] has secretly been a Skrull this whole time.
Instead, the MCU has been stripped of its wonder and thrown into the dirt, now camouflaged as a paranoid thriller with a few sci-fi flourishes. It has its advantages—the show’s palette is a more elegant, mature take on comic book gloom. And its cast is packed with talent, from Emilia Clarke’s Skrull lieutenant to Olivia Colman’s suspiciously chipper MI6 agent. The immediate highlight, without a doubt, is the space lent to Jackson and Mendelsohn, who bicker like they’re sitting on the balcony watching The Muppet Show.
But while a lengthy (and terribly dry) opening monologue asks us to “imagine a world where information can’t be trusted”—wow, what a stretch—all that supposed tension is immediately deflated by the knowledge that none of this really matters. The Secret Invasion will, most probably, be neatly wrapped up by episode six and the MCU will continue to chug along into its multiverse of intellectual property. Again, maybe I’ll be proven wrong. But this is why it’s been so hard to stay invested in the MCU of late—there’s no way to know what we’re actually meant to care about.
