SPOILERS FOR WHAT IF…? EPISODE 5

“What If… Zombies?”

I never thought that I would ever see Marvel Zombies in anything outside of the comic book page. However, Marvel Studio’s animated series, What If…? has made what seemed impossible not only possible, but definitive.

Episode 5 was yet another great episode from this special series, entitled simply “What If…Zombies?” I had really wondered what point that they would use in the MCU to send the world into a Zombie Apocalypse. They chose a perfect place to do it. As Hope Van Dyne is trying to save her mother Janet from the Quantum Realm, he had no idea that Janet had been infected with the Zombie curse and that by having Hank Pym bring her back to the MCU, it would lead to the end of the civilization as we knew it. I loved this way of bringing in the zombies.

It was also an awesome way to connect Bruce Banner into the story, by picking it up when he crashed back to earth into the Sanctum Sanctorum in Infinity War. It kept the Hulk out of the story at first, since he was still having his Thanos-induced freak out. However, we do discover that not even the Dark Order were immune to the zombie curse.

One of the cool aspects of this episode was seeing the different Marvel heroes, from Iron Man to Hawkeye to Captain America as Zombies. It was cool as well to see the ragtag group that had been brought together as the few survivors of the world. Hope, Spider-Man, Happy Hogan, Bucky Barnes, Agent Sharon Carter, and … Kurt (from Ant Man).

The use of Vision and Wanda was just as heartbreaking as it always seems to be for these two. Even in the zombie universe, Vision is destined to die. How many times have we seen our favorite android destroyed. Twice in Infinity War, once in WandaVision, and now here. Having Vision keeping zombified Wanda in check as he tried to find a cure was truly a sad fate for both of them. For God sakes, he was feeding her humans (including pieces of T’Challa. Chadwick Boseman once again handling the voice. I wonder how many more times we will be blessed with his voice in this series).

And…. Wanda vs. the Hulk? ‘Nuff said.

I want to comment on some of the criticism I saw on Twitter after the episode, the same silly gripes that have been in the MCU from the beginning. I saw people complaining how the zombies episode had too much humor in it and that some people were unhappy that it was not as dark as it could be. First of all, the story has the characters of Spider-Man and Scott Lange in it, and Scott Lange happens to be a head in a jar. I’m sorry, but with those characters, you are going to have humor. If you did not have humor, you would not be servicing those characters properly.

In fact, as a huge Spider-Man fan, I know that Peter Parker has been using humor to keep the insanity of the world outside of him since the very beginning. Without his humor masking his fear, he would not be able to continue on in the face of the terrible events he has gone through. It is a coping mechanism and Spidey has been doing it forever. I do not want to see a down trodden and depressed Spider-Man. The fact that Spidey is on the internet doing rules for surviving the Zombie Apocalypse is such a great character beat and is right out of Zombieland, which is a zombie movie that showed that you can have humor and still have a fearsome setting.

In fact, the episode specifically addresses this in one of the best scenes around. Spidey talks about how his Aunt May said to him that he had to keep smiling or else he may as well be gone. Plus, he mentioned Uncle Ben, something that the MCU has skirted around from the start of the web slinger.

Spider-Man was the absolute heart of this episode and it gave us the most beautifully accurate Spidey we have seen in the MCU yet. So everything was not doom and gloom. Who cares? We had a philosophy on life that is great advice and can be placed into context for any situation, not just the zombie apocalypse.

Tom Holland was unable to provide the voice of Peter Parker. The rumor was that his Sony contract would not allow it, which was sad. However, we got Hudson Thames doing a excellent job as the Web Head. The rest of the cast were back including Paul Bettany, Paul Rudd, Sebastian Stan, Danai Gurira, Jon Favreau, Mark Ruffalo, Evangeline Lilly and David Dastmalchian.

This was a great episode of What If…? As of this moment (and it might be fluid) the order of my favorite episodes are #1. T’Challa is Star-Lord #2, Dr. Strange loses his heart, #3 Zombies, #4. Captain Carter, and #5. Avengers are murdered. Honestly, I could see the top three moving around quite a bit. There has not been a clunker of an episode yet.

Oh… and that cliffhanger! WTF!!!

Spoilers for episode four of What If…?

“What If… Doctor Strange lost his Heart Instead of his Hands?“

Whoa. Dark.

The first surprise was in the credits. I was under the impression that Benedict Cumberbatch was not reprising the role of Doctor Stephen Strange for What If…? yet there his name was. The fact that Marvel Studios have gotten as many of the original actors to come and do the voices for this animated series speaks highly of what these people think of their characters and of the studio itself.

This Doctor Strange episode got really dark, really fast. As in the other episodes of What If…?, something different happens in the familiar story to send the tale into a new path. In this moment, the car crash that was meant to take away Strange’s hands cost him his love, Christine, voiced by Rachel McAdams. Her repeated deaths in the opening act of the show was tough to watch.

What stood out in this episode was the beautiful animation and the imagery that they used to create the story. The direction of this was amazing. I spent the whole show looking at these wonderful shots that truly stood out.

The Watcher gets a little more screen time this week as Doctor Strange being able to sense the presence of the omniscient observer. It gave Jeffrey Wright, who voices the Watcher, something more to do than just see what was happening. Of course, he does not interfere in what is happening. It is not time yet for him to get involved. For those of us who are aware of Uatu the Watcher, we know it is just a matter of time before he does break his sacred oath and get involved in the events. It is inevitable. I think you will see Wright’s Watcher at some point in the live action MCU and not just the What If…? corner of it.

This episode takes the trope of the “evil twin” and put a spin on it. The Doctor Strange vs. Doctor Strange battle in the show was very well done. The whole episode dove into the darkness and did not spare anything. Seeing Doctor Strange absorbing the power of all those monstrous creatures, including what looked to be the same tentacled creature from episode 1 that fought Captain Carter, was trippy.

The music was epic as well. In particular when the two Stranges are fighting each other, the music was just tremendous. It was the perfect fit for the episode.

When I think back on the comic What If? that I read as a youth, the stories always seemed to end with a dark twist. There were never a bunch of happy endings. The fourth episode is the first that has really embraced that form of storytelling. The ending of the story was downright sad and the show transmitted those feeling magnificently. This was the most artistic of the episodes so far and brought the darkest of the multiverse to light.

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE THREE OF WHAT IF…?

“What If… The World Lost its Mightiest Heroes”

Above all else, this What If…? episode reminded me how much I miss Agent Phil Coulson. It was great hearing Clark Gregg reprise his role as the biggest fanboy SHIELD agent around during the events of this story.

Somebody is out to put an end to the Avenger Initiative before it ever gets a chance to start. Who is it? We get a mystery in episode three dealing with the murders of several of the OG Avengers.

This was my least favorite of the three episodes so far because it felt too constricted. In a story that could have been widespread and sprawling, this one felt too constricted, hurt by the half hour time frame. That’s not to say that this was a bad episode, far from it. It just was the weakest of the three so far, IMO.

This takes place during the week in the MCU where we got Iron Man 2, Thor and The Incredible Hulk, those three movies happening basically at the same moments. Except the films take a turn and each of the main heroes end up dead. Iron Man, apparently at the hands of Black Widow and Thor by Hawkeye’s arrow.

Thor’s death brought the warriors of Asgard to earth looking to seek vengeance for his death. Led by Loki, the Asgardian forces faced off with SHIELD. Meanwhile, Agent Fury was desperately trying to figure out who was inside SHIELD and killing off these “assets.” Fury strikes a deal with Loki to give them a little time to figure out the truth.

Black Widow was voiced in this episode by Lake Bell, who has been doing the voice of Poison Ivy in the Harley Quinn series. She does a solid job as our Russian assassin. Though it appeared that Widow had been the one to kill Tony Stark, she is given permission by Fury to keep investigating. One of the coolest part of What If…? is the way some scenes are echoes in the show from the MCU. In this case, we see Black Widow in the back of a SHIELD truck, surrounded by guards as she is being transported to a secure location. This imagery echoed the famous elevator scene from Captain America: The Winter Soldier, although this time with Natasha at the center.

You almost expect her to ask if anyone wants to get out.

Natasha figures the mystery out, but is killed before she can reveal the true answer. She is able to leave a voice mail message for Fury saying that it was “all about Hope” which, at first sounded like she said Hulk.

This was where the episode felt the most rushed. The conclusion featuring our villain, Hank Pym, angry over the death of his daughter Hope (who was working with SHIELD?) and we get a chance to see the way he is able to have killed these other heroes. The design on Hank Pym was cool, making him look very insane from grief.

After Pym’s capture, Loki decides that Midgard would be a nice planet to rule and he takes over the world. Does it pretty easy too. Every episode of What If…? so far feels as if it could be setting up for a continuation of the story. Here we get Fury discovering Captain America and welcoming Carol Danvers back to earth. Is this the formation of a new team of Avengers?

I guess only the Watcher knows for sure.

Good episode that felt too crunched. I just love Coulson.

SPOILERS FOR WHAT IF…? Episode Two

“What If… T’Challa Became a Star-Lord?”

I was fine watching this episode until the dedication came on screen at the end of the show. That was when the waterworks came. It said, “Dedicated to our friend, our inspiration, and our hero” and that was all it took. Knowing that Chadwick Boseman gave his final appearance, final performance within this animated series is tough. He was such an amazing actor and he was the perfect casting for T’Challa, helping to bring the character to the forefront of the cultural zeitgeist. “Wakanda Forever” a phase that became a rallying cry in the real world, not just in the fictional one. Chadwick Boseman was truly something special.

And this episode of What If…? displays that joyous Zen for life that radiated from Boseman. This episode was amazing, featuring a ton of awesome characters all effected by the aura of T’Challa, just as we all were.

At first glance, having T’Challa become Star-Lord seemed a bit random. I wondered because the name Star-Lord came from Peter Quill’s mother’s letter to him, how was it even going to work? It was a detail not discussed, but it is such a minor quibble that it really did not matter.

This episode was different than last week’s. Last week we met Captain Carter but she basically followed the same storyline of Captain America: The First Avenger, just with Peggy in the place of Steve. There were little differences but it was basically the same. This week, we start off with the familiar and from there go in an all new direction.

T’Challa in the Ravagers was great to start with and making him an intergalactic celebrity, something that Quill always wanted, was an even better twist. Making Korath the Pursuer, voiced again by the wonderful Djimon Hounsou, a huge Star-Lord fanboy is funny on a lot of levels. Adding Korath into the Ravagers was cool, but not as cool as the addition of The Mad Titan, Thanos!

Hearing Josh Brolin return to try and explain why his original plan of destroying half the universe had merit only to be rebuffed by his Ravager teammates as it ‘still sounding like gynecide’ was an epic running joke. We meet Nebula, who is so different because of the change in Thanos that it is a bit unsettling. Karen Gillan resumed her role as Nebula. Interestingly enough, we never see Gamora, who in this universe, I assume, is living happily on her home planet which was never destroyed by Thanos. We see Drax the Destroyer (not Dave Bautista, unfortunately) too a much happier version.

Much like the Guardians movie, the crew heads to Knowhere to meet up with Benicio Del Toro’s The Collector, but they had a different mission. The Ravagers had become a force of good, taking from the rich and giving to the poor, much like T’Challa’s earth hero, Robin Leach (errr… Hood, this was a funny joke) and they were after a new MacGuffin. On Knowhere we still meet up with Cosmo, Howard the Duck (Seth Green) and show off the power of The Collector. I assume that there are a bunch of Easter Eggs found in those cages (can’t wait for Erik Voss and the New Rockstars to show me what is there). The Collector is an Elder of the Universe and he showed off his power here.

Of course, Yondu plays a huge part in the story, just as he does in the original GotG. Michael Rooker returned to his role and voiced the Ravager who, in this case, raises T’Challa. However, T’Challa’s natural goodness affected Yondu considerably more. Yondu had ‘outsourced’ the abduction of Peter Quill to the other Ravagers, who wound up taking T’Challa by mistake because all humans look the same. LOL

It is amazing how many huge named stars came to work on What If…? for one line or so. Danai Gurira, Carrie Coon, and Kurt Russell are here with cameos basically. Goes to show the power of Marvel.

What a great episode this was. RIP Chadwick Boseman.

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE ONE OF WHAT IF…?

“What If…Captain Carter were the First Avenger?”

The first animated series from Marvel Studios debuted this morning on Disney + with What If…?, a look at possible alternate timelines had one thing changed. Based on the classic Marvel Comics book What If?, this series has so many potential stories that they can tell that it could be so much fun. I know I loved the What If comic as a youth. It was always one of my favorite ones and adapting it into an animated series gives them an unlimited amount of storytelling avenues.

The episode kicks off with the voice of Jeffrey Wright as our narrator. As in the comic, the narrator of What If…? is Uatu the Watcher. He is a powerful being of the universe whose job is to watch the events unfold without interfering. If you are a comic fan, you know that Uatu did not always live up to that mantra.

Kicking off the series is a twist on the events from Captain America: The First Avenger. The difference is a small one. Peggy Carter, voiced by the always epic Hayley Atwell, decided to stay in the lower area instead of going to the observing room. That triggered a variation of the timeline (thanks to Loki the series, we all understand that) that led to Peggy going into the container instead of Steve Rogers.

The rest of the episode featured Peggy, calling herself Captain Carter, battling Hydra during World War II. Howard Stark gets his hands on the Tesseract and builds Steve Rogers a suit of armor, called Hydra Stomper, allowing him to fight by the side of Captain Carter.

While we did not get Chris Evans returning to voice Steve Rogers, most of the remaining characters had original actors who created their roles in the MCU are doing the voice acting. This episode alone we had Sebastian Stan, Stanley Tucci, Toby Jones, Neal McDonough, Dominic Cooper, Jeremy Renner and Samuel L. Jackson. It is awesome that so many of the originals made it back to voice their characters. Someone like Stanley Tucci came in for what turned out to be like one or two lines in the show.

The animation is special. It is beautifully designed and flowed so easily during the fight scenes that you never think about it being animated. I will say that the characters’ eyes feel slightly off. I heard Animation Writer/EP Michael Vogel from The Geek Buddies describing the reason for the expressions on the faces being odd. He said that usually in animation if you are looking for the best expression, you would make the eyes or the facial features larger. Since the animation in What If is meant to show these characters are they would be in a movie, there is just so much that can be done. It made a lot of sense when Michael explained it and it helped with the one aspect of the animation that I did not find perfect.

The first episode set up the possibility of revisiting this character. I know there have been rumors floating around that we might see Agent Carter in live action some day, perhaps in The Multiverse of Madness. I wonder if this Peggy Carter who made the one decision that changed the timeline was the woman in the background in the Loki premiere.

What If…? is going to be a ten-episode series, and it sounded as if it has been renewed for season two. Now that the multiverse as been opened up, anything can happen. This series has been a great way to kick it off.

SPOILERS FOR SEASON ONE EPISODE SIX OF LOKI

Episode: “For All Time. Always”

Loki has come to an end in an episode that shook me to the core. I had no idea where they were going to go with the story and when it was revealed, I was utterly shocked.

The normal Marvel Studios title card was different. Instead of the Marvel fanfare they always play, we hear voices…lines from the MCU. We hear Cap, Vision, Captain Marvel, and a bunch of others as the camera pans across the universe and we end at the sacred timeline.

Loki and Sylvie are at the castle at the end of time, ready to kill the person behind the TVA, the man behind the curtain, if you will.

And when Miss Minutes popped up out of nowhere, I legit jumped. Then, she was sinister as could be.

I had dismissed the idea of Kang the Conqueror. Sure, there were a ton of Easter eggs that seemingly were pointing to Kang, but I was sure that the ending would be a Loki variant as He Who Remains. I thought Richard Grant would be your answer. Or King Loki from the trailers. I felt that by introducing Kang, they would not be paying off the threads of the entire series that they have been building toward since episode one.

Then, the door opened…and there he was.

Jonathan Majors had been cast as Kang the Conqueror for Antman and the Wasp: Quantumania and when that door opened and Majors sat before them, I shout that they were doing Kang. I really did not believe it was going to happen. Majors, dressed in Kang’s green and purple iconic clothes, immediately began chewing the scenery and any concerns I had went away.

Let me touch on this now, because the arrival of Kang did not affect the story arc of Loki, it just readjusted it. I felt as if Loki needed to confront an evil Loki as the man behind the curtain to complete the arc. Instead, what he does to complete the arc is confront Sylvie. Their debate showed the wrap up of the story, one we did not really know we were following. Loki realizes that he cannot be trusted and that Sylvie did not trust him- and was not capable of trust. So when Kang presented them with an option, a choice that he did not already know the outcome, it played on both of their arcs. The writing here was sublime and masterfully brought it all back to Loki and Sylvie while introducing to the MCU audience the next big bad of the franchise.

I have been a supporter of the Loki/Sylvie relationship since it was starting to look that way, but I have to say that the kiss felt awkward and somewhat …yuck for the lack of a better term. Having that kiss be the trigger to the final decision was a blow to Loki. He had been building up to tell Sylvie how he felt about her, and she prioritized something else instead. Sylvie was not ready to put aside her life’s work to accept the temptations presented by Kang.

When she shoves Loki back through the time door, we could tell what was going to happen. I mean, we all knew that this was the path, right? We knew the sacred timeline was going to unravel in this show considering all the Spider-Man: No Way Home stuff with the other timeline villains and the rumors of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield’s inclusion in the movie plus the Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness movie and the next series What If…? all depending on their being a multiverse. Still, seeing it happen was something to behold.

Then, the show tossed in the old ‘Planet of the Apes’ ending that caused a ton of emotions. When Mobius says to Loki, “What’s your name?” I thought I might break. Then, there was the statue of Kang, front and center.

When the black scene came after this image, it was nearly a crushing blow. Leaving the show with this uncertainty at the end with Loki and Mobius broken and Loki, once again, all alone, which was his greatest fear, everything was made up for in the mid-credit scene when Marvel officially announced that…

This finale was not at all what I expected. It was unlike any other Marvel finale in that it was more of a debate, a morale decision that placed our heroes on opposite ends and placed the entire MCU in its path. They say how the MCU will be changed forever a lot of times, but you cannot deny that this episode changed the MCU moving forward.

I loved this series. Where does it fall among the others? That is hard to say. I think it may be just behind WandaVision, but not by much and after I let it digest some more, it may surpass it.

Next up: Starting August 11… What If…?

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 5 OF LOKI

Only one left.

Episode 5 out of 6 brings us into the Void, the place at the end of time where everything that is pruned goes. The best analogy I heard was from Vanessa of Late to the Party, who compared the Void to the trash icon on your computer screen. When you trash something, it goes into the file until you ultimately delete it. That is a great way to look at this.

Alioth. I was unaware of this character’s Marvel Comics background, which only makes it more cool. Yet this giant creature was a real cross between the Langoliers and the Smoke Monster from LOST. As a huge LOST fan, I immediately identified the character design that resembled Smoky and I loved it.

We see our Loki variants greeting Loki as he arrived in the Void. Kid Loki, Classic Loki (who is Richard E. Grant), Boastful Loki and Alligator Loki led Loki through the wasteland of the Void that held Easter Eggs galore… including the infamous THANOS-COPTER!!!! Thanos copter is a real thing that happening in the comics and that it existed in one of the alternate timelines is just a hoot. Also…keep your eyes peeled for Throg.

One of my favorite moments in the episode was one of the quieter parts of the episode. Richard E. Grant explained how he avoided having his neck broken by Thanos. He said that he used his illusion ability to create an image that fooled even Thanos. That was a fan theory that was floating around after Avengers: Infinity War when they were looking at possible ways that Loki could have survived. When the writers used this idea as the way Richard Grant could survive, it was fun.

The President Loki variant made his long awaited appearance too, bringing a bunch of henchmen with him. This led to one of the greatest, most chaotic moment of the series as the group of Lokis were betraying each other and battling for supremacy. In a homage to Peter Pan, Alligator Loki bit the hand off of President Loki. The scream of Prez Loki was a series highlight for sure.

At the TVA, Sylvie and Ravonna were having their confrontation and, I’m sorry, but I did not believe one word that Ravonna said. She was trying to manipulate Sylvie, to delay her long enough for the Minutemen to arrive. However, she had told Sylvie that Loki was still alive and she told her about the Void. As a way to escape, Sylvie pruned herself. That was quite a leap of faith considering Ravonna is clearly a liar. Ravonna goes to talk to Hunter B-15, who is in a special holding cell and she wanted to get whatever info she could get from her. It does feel as if Ravonna did not know that the Timekeepers were fake and she did not seem to know who was behind everything. I still got the indication that she was loyal to whoever was pulling the strings.

Back in the Void, Sylvie awakens and is found by Mobius! Mobius is alive too and this was one of the fish-pumping moments of the episode. When Mobius was pruned last week, it was one of the most difficult scenes because Owen Wilson is such a great part of this series, and to see him back was such a wonderful thing.

Our group of Lokis meet up with Sylvie and Mobius, and they come up with a plan on how to find who was behind the TVA. Sylvie had touched the monstrous Alioth and she saw past it. She believed that she could enchant it. The entire ending sequence with Sylvie and Loki working together while Richard E. Grant distracted Alioth was just tremendous. And it opened up the path to a castle, where clearly our “Wizard of Oz” would be found.

There is so much to unpack here because this episode was packed full of awesomeness and it does an amazing job setting up the confrontations for next episode. Loki and Sylvie on their way to the end of time and Mobius on his way back to the TVA for a final confrontation with Ravonna Renslayer. Mobius tells Loki that he is going to “burn it to the ground.”

The relationship between Loki and Mobius was cemented this episode too, as the two friends shared a hug before Mobius returned to the TVA. It was one of the sweetest moments of the show, and it showed the playfulness as well as Mobius, as he was hugging Loki, whispered to Sylvie that she was his favorite. It was a perfect example of the friendship formed by these two.

One more Wednesday to go. This show has been so wild that next week could bring us literally anything. I mean, we have already had an alligator Loki….

What is next? Is it … Kang?

SPOILERS FOR LOKI EPISODE 4

I am not okay.

Episode 4 was a rollercoaster of emotion and was just so unexpected that I am not sure how to handle it, or to even begin to recap it. I’m just going to go through some of the major points of the episode without worrying about any sort of order.

We see Sylvie in Asgard, prior to her blonde hair and prior to the name change, being taken by the TVA agents led by Ravonna Renslayer herself. This was before Ravonna had become a judge and we see how, even as a young girl, you cant trust a Loki. Young Sylvie stole one of the time doors and took off, starting an obsession for Ravonna and the consistent search for this variant.

They are not specific for why they took young Sylvie, since all she was doing was playing with her toys in Asgard. There is something more to this than what we have found out yet. Sylvie winds up asking Ravonna if she remembered this, but Ravonna lied and said she did not. However, there is something there.

Loki and Sylvie survived on Lamentis-1 because something major had happened and there was an actual Nexus timeline that was formed, despite it being at an apocalypse. This drew the attention of the TVA and they returned the Lokis to TVA headquarters. Some may wonder why they didn’t just leave them to die on the doomed moon, but with the new timeline being formed, they could not risk it. Instead, they brought them back to HQ to interrogate them.

And we got the return of Jaimie Alexander as Lady Sif! She was in the Time Cell they put Loki in as a way to punish him. It was an old memory of when Loki had cut Sif’s hair and she punched him out. What a great cameo this was.

Loki and Mobius continued their dialogue with one another, both of them disappointed with the other. Mobius is trying to get Loki to tell him how that Nexus Event occurred on Lamentis-1 and Loki trying to tell him about the information he got from Sylvie las episode. Mobius was starting to piece things together, especially after discovering that Ravonna had put to death C-20 because she had been “compromised by the Lokis.” Hunter B-15 was another one who was having a crisis of belief as the enchantment from episode 2 was still bothering her. She went to Sylvie for answers. This trip back to Roxxcart was our first real emotional beat of the episode. When Hunter B-15 saw the memories of her past life, her line of how she looked happy was tough.

Of course, we were just starting with the emotions here because, after accepting that Loki is telling him the truth and having a powerful moment of trust between Loki and Mobius, they were confronted by Ravonna and other agents. After a defiant Mobius let Ravonna know how he felt, in an unbelievable moment of the series, Ravonna had Mobius pruned.

You could see that Ravonna felt terrible about this too, even though she held back her own feelings on the situation. Mobius had been her friend and confidant, but she was just doing what she felt she had to do. That does not make it any easier as we watch this character we have come to love in a short while get pruned. The pin in Loki’s face was tough too considering he had just professed friendship for this man.

Loki and Sylvie are taken into the golden elevator and are taken before the Timekeepers, who we had gotten a quick glance at earlier in the episode. I am not sure why this was done. This is the one big question mark I have in this episode because we find out that the Timekeepers are just androids as Loki and Sylvie, with help from Hunter B-15, break free and start to fight. Sylvie winds up decapitating one of the Timekeepers, revealing the truth. So, who wanted Loki and Sylvie brought here instead of just pruned as Mobius and C-20 had been? They do wonder who is behind the TVA if the Timekeepers are not real. That is most likely a major point still to come. Is it Kang? Ravonna? Another Loki variant?

Just when it seemed that things were going well, Ravonna is able to prune Loki. I can’t tell you how my jaw dropped. I had yelled out a “No” when Mobius was pruned, but this one was a shock. I stared at the screen dumbfounded. I did not know if there was going to be another Loki variant coming or if the rest of the show was going to focus on Sylvie. I was not thinking logically, since we have seen other scenes in trailers featuring Tom Hiddleston’s Loki that I should have understood that something was up, but it did not stick with me.

Sylvie got the drop on Ravonna and demanded that she tell her everything, holding one of the pruning sticks on her.

Then, we got our first mid-credit scene for the Loki series and it was a mind blower for sure. We see Loki awakening from his pruning and he wonders aloud if this was Hell and if he were dead. A voice tells him that he was not dead yet and if he wanted to stay that way, he needed to come with them. And then we saw it….

Kid Loki! Richard E. Grant in comic book Loki attire! Another guy… is he meant to be a variant of Heimdall? Um… is that an alligator Loki? And where is this taking place? The landscape behind them is certainly all messed up. The Loki series is clearly about to go batshit crazy… and I am all for it!

Can next week be here now, please?

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE THREE OF LOKI ON DISNEY +

Episode three is in the books and there were some frustrations with it. Off the top, I loved the episode and I thought it was really well done. It is just a few things that I missed. The biggest was that I missed the presence of Owen Wilson. Wilson’s Mobius has been such a huge fixture in the series so far that his absence was totally felt. The other point that bugged me was that this was too short. It was over before I knew it and I was having WandaVision vibes. That show always ended at a point where I wanted more and Loki episode three was the same way.

Having said that, I enjoyed what they gave to us and there were absolutely some important reveals that they gave us.

Entitled “Lamentis”, this episode found our “hero” trapped on a doomed planet that is about to have the moon crash into it. It is an awesome setting and the background CGI is well done.

There has been plenty of speculation that this “Lady Loki” was not a Loki at all. Because of the use of the name Sylvie in the foreign language credits, people believed that perhaps this was actually The Enchantress and not a Loki variant after all. That has been laid to rest as we find out in this episode that Sylvie is the variant’s name, one that she changed from Loki. She is a variant of Loki, after all. I think that they are taking pieces from both Enchantress and Lady Loki from the comics to create this new character for the MCU. That is fine with me.

Early this week we see Sylvie and Loki taking on each other, as well as the TVA. The attack on the sacred timeline last week was a way to allow Sylvie to arrive at the TVA and get to the Timekeepers with minimal effort. She did have to fight several of them, and she discovered that her enchanting magic did not work here, which probably means that she had never been in the TVA before. She was confronted by Judge Renslayer at the golden elevators which supposedly would take her to the mysterious Timekeepers.

Another major reveal this week was that the TVA have not been created by the Timekeepers, as we were told, but were actually variants from different worlds, just like our two Lokis. Loki was shocked by this revelation and he mentioned that the TVA agents did not know this. This is another piece of information that makes us believe that the Timekeepers are not exactly what they seem to be. The façade is starting to be peeled away.

Another huge part of the episode dealt with love. Loki was working on a metaphor to explain the feeling of love. This was happening during the scenes where Loki and Sylvie are on a train heading for an escape ark, hopefully to survive the apocalypse of Lamentis-1. The dialogue between Loki and Sylvie continues the show’s excellent in the area, as they provide us with background details of what these two people think, feel and the life in which they have experienced It is also where the show confirmed Loki’s status as bi-sexual. I know this was a big moment on Twitter right after it happened and I am happy for anyone who was made happy by this news.

Then we got drunken Loki singing.

Loki and Sylvie’s mad dash through the city to try and find the escape arc, only to have it destroyed at the end provided us with some masterful shots and some beautiful imagery. The final shot of the episode left us in a desperate state, wondering how Loki and Sylvie were going to get out of this. The feeling of hopelessness washed over us all and then the sudden end of the episode made it even more despondent.

Some short thoughts:

• Is there a romance on the horizon with Loki and Sylvie, a variant of himself? How would that work?
• Who was the lady with the power weapon? Was she just a random character?
• Lamentis-1 in 2077… any significance of this or just a random setting?
• Loki this week had some definite Dr. Who vibes, or as was said by a few others, Time Machine vibes. Time Machine is on the DailyView list. Maybe I should see how familiar it is.
• Loki slamming the glass down and demanding “Another!” was very much a throwback to the first Thor movie. Chris Hemsworth does the exact same thing.
• Rampant speculation: Is Kang the man behind the curtain of the TVA? Possibly, yes.
• I guess we now know what Hunter C-20 was referring to when she was saying “It’s all real” as we saw what Sylvie did to get the info on the Timekeepers.
• I get tired of people online complaining about “filler episodes.” This is part of the narrative. It gave us important pieces of information. Online people complain when they aren’t fans of something or when they have expected something that doesn’t happen. Doesn’t make it filler.

Again, the bereft nature of this week’s show was frustrating, but that is because it was so good, I was not ready for it to be over.

Bring back Owen Wilson!

See ya next week.

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE TWO OF DISNEY + SERIES, LOKI!!!

The second episode of Loki has dropped on Disney + last night/early this morning and it is continuing the excellent that episode one brought and it has significant impact for the MCU.

First off, I love the interplay between Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson. They look to be having a massive blast with every scene together. I love the dynamic and the way they both seem to know exactly what the other is trying to do. Mobius calling Loki out on his plan to take over the TVA and Loki saying to Mobius that it was cute that he was trying to manipulate him. The way Mobius tries to inspire Loki by playing into his ego and Loki always looking for the best situation for Loki. This pairing is gold.

The chase for the evil Loki variant that is causing problems is on and Mobius is playing on Loki’s ego to try and keep him focused. The beginning of the episode had a lot of paperwork, investigating files in search of any clue that might give them an idea of where the Loki variant is hiding. Loki comes up with an idea…something he would do. Apocalypses! Loki theorized that this variant could be hiding in the time prior to an apocalypse because it would not matter what was done, the timeline would not break off because they were all dead anyway. This is such clever writing and it leads to Loki and Mobius testing the theory at Pompeii.

After confirming Loki’s idea, they had to find which apocalypse was the one the variant would be hiding in. Thanks to the candy from last episode, they are able to narrow it down to some time around 2047-2051. As they continued to investigate this, Loki comes across the information about Ragnarok and the destruction of Asgard by Surtur. Again, we see how these pieces of information affect the God of Mischief, a single tear forming in his eye.

Loki finds where he believes the variant is located in 2050 and they send a strike team to search for the rogue variant. They wind up in this retail store in the middle of a huge storm. It is here where the major reveal occurs and we get to meet the Loki variant that has been causing all this chaos… Lady Loki.

Then, the even more major event happened. Lady Loki had been stealing the “time bombs” from the TVA agents that she killed and we see her plan. It was to attack the sacred timeline itself. The bombing of the sacred timeline looked to release the multiverse once again as variant branches began exploding from the line.

Rampant speculation: Lady Loki had snatched one of the TVA agent (C-20) and, apparently, got from her the location of the Timekeepers. Could Lady Loki have sent some of those reset charges to the location of the Timekeepers. Could the Timekeepers be reset?

Quick hits:

• Mobius has never met the Timekeepers. Is that an important piece?
• Will the series end with Mobius on a jet ski?
• Miss Minutes returns as a tutor program for Loki.
• Loki uses his magic to dry himself off.
• The music on this series is spot on. It perfectly encompasses the tone and mood of each scene.
• Can Loki be trusted? I have no idea.
• Roxxcart… a market from Roxxon perhaps?
• We got more from the Ravonna Renslayer, played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw, this episode. It looks like she is going to play a bigger part than we first thought.
• “Holding Out For A Hero from Bonnie Tyler is having quite the comback.

This has been amazing so far. With Loki stepping through the time door in pursuit of Lady Loki, leaving Mobius and the TVA agents behind, who knows what is going to happen next.

SPOILER WARNING FOR EPISODE 1 OF THE DISNEY + SERIES, LOKI.

Well, here we go again.

After two highly successful and entertaining Disney + Marvel series, WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Marvel Studios has arrived with the start of its third, hugely anticipated series, Loki. The first episode debuted on the streaming service in the middle of the night with what has to be considered one of the most impactful episodes for the MCU of any of the Disney + series so far.

The episode began with a recap of Avengers: Endgame, specifically the time travel in New York where we see Loki escape the clutches of his brother Thor and the others by using the Tesseract that Iron Man and Ant Man were attempting to steal in their “time heist.” These scenes are vitally important for anyone who was unsure about who this Loki was or for those two or three people who have never seen Endgame before.

We find out that the Tesseract takes Loki to Mongolia, into the Gobi Desert (in a scene that was reminiscent for me of when Ben Linus turned the wheel and was transported off the Island on LOST). Here, Loki gets confronted by members of the TVA.

The TVA stands for the Time Variance Authority, which turns out to be an all-powerful organization in place to keep the timeline clean. These time agents arrive any time that something happens that is not supposed to have happened and they deal with it. Actress Wunmi Mosaku played Hunter B-15, a standout in this first episode.

We are introduced to another one of the TVA agents, Mobius M. Mobius, played by Owen Wilson. Wilson and Tom Hiddleston’s chemistry is off the charts and it is setting up an awesome buddy cop type story moving along in Loki. Mobius, as is the entire TVA, is shown as a bureaucratic agent, much like all of the government agencies that we are familiar with. We can relate to Loki and his frustrations over the seemingly mindless paperwork and hoops that require jumping through.

The main thrust of the episode was taking this “variant” Loki from the 2012 time and showing him the parts of his life that he had not lived through yet. This is done through the use of clips from Avengers, Thor: Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers; Infinity War. Watching Loki watch himself go through the loss of his mother, father, and his own death, as well as a nice moment between him and his brother, was extremely emotional. It allowed this version of Loki to reflect upon his life and the loss that is ahead. We know that these events lead to Loki discovering that he is more than just a would-be world conqueror, but to see him see it was tough.

We then get the set up for the remainder of the season. Mobius tells Loki that they want his help in stopping a variant that is causing trouble in the timeline… and that the variant is a Loki… and then we see this Loki torch some TVA agents in the 1850s.

More

• Infinity stones! They use them as paperweights!
• There was so many cool tech weapons or items, such as the time loop collar.
• The look at the TVA… “city?” It had a very Fifth Element/Star Wars look to it. I’ve heard reference to Dr. Who as well.

• Is this Mephisto finally? Or is it Loki with his horned helmet? According to Mobius, this devil is afraid of the TVA

• We find out that the Avengers were not messing with time because what they did was what was “supposed to happen.”
• The very idea of the inescapability of time makes me a tad concerned. I don’t want to think that the future cannot be altered. The past? fine. But the future is more challenging of a concept.
• The animated PSA at the beginning is a great and simple way to bring everyone into the time travel concept the MCU is pushing.
• Loki as DB Cooper because he lost a bet to Thor? AWESOME!

• “Do a lot of people not know if they’re robots” is my favorite line of the whole show.
• Episode title was “Glorious Purpose”, coming from Loki’s classic quote of being burdened with glorious purpose. It gets to the center of what the episode is about.
• Loki’s reflection with Mobius near the episode’s end is powerful.
• Tom Hiddleston plays this character brilliantly. He is so familiar with Loki that he can go deeper with just a glance or a look. Hiddleston is also one of the most charming of the all of the MCU actors.
• The episode is 52 minutes long. It still goes quickly.
• Why do the workers at the TVA not know what a fish is?

Loki has started with a fantastic episode full of humor, plot details and great characters. Loki and Mobius look to be a great pair and I can’t wait for the show to give me what it next.

SPOILERS FOR THE FINALE OF THE FALCON AND WINTER SOLDIER, EPISODE 6

This show was initially expected to be back to the Marvel formula of action. You have two buff stars and everybody absolutely knew that this was going to be nothing but a big Marvel action fest.

Oh, we did not know what we were going to get.

While the show had plenty of great action, The Falcon and the White Soldier brought so much more to the six episode series. The show dealt with issues of identity, racial disparity and entitlement and did them all extremely well. The show built Sam Wilson up into a position where it was clearly his right to take the mantel of Captain America.

The new Wakandan uniform is exceptional and appeared very comic book accurate. There was a slight concern on my part that they might remove the wings, but I was extremely pleased to see Sam rocketing across the sky at the beginning of the show.

The sixth episode starts with a ton of action, including some amazing aerial fights involving helicopters. The scenes are brilliantly shot and fill the anxiety of the viewers.

During the action scenes, we get confirmed that Sharon Carter was indeed the Power Broker. We did not get much info on why she is now the Power Broker (though they hinted at how the US ignored her), but I fully expect that the character of Sharon Carter has more to do in the MCU and that we will learn more about her as the years movie along.

She did end up killing Karli to “save” Sam’s life. She did save Sam as Karli was preparing to shoot him, but she was also doing it to keep the secret that she was the Power Broker silent. Sam brought the body of Karli to the authorities in a gorgeously shot scene.

John Walker has a bit of redemption in the action scenes too as he showed up with his newly minted shield. It may not have lasted long in the battle, but Walker made a solid choice to try and help save a group of people in a truck that were about to fall to their deaths. Wyatt Russell brought a really complex character in the series and, thankfully, he survived the show and, thanks to Julia Louis-Dreyfus, he is able to take his place as USAgent. Looking forward to more from him.

The monologue Sam gives to the Senator and the other members of the GRC is the final step for Sam to become Captain America in the eyes of the world. There are so many great lines included in the monologue that showed the world, including Isaiah, that he had the strength of character to be Cap. Bucky called him Cap. Tears came to my eyes when a bystander yelled “Yes, Black Falcon!” and another one said to him, “No, that’s Captain America.” Beautiful.

Speaking of beautiful, the scene at the end with Sam and Isaiah at the Smithsonian was such a wonderful tag to the side story of Isaiah.

More details:

• Batroc dies. Shot by Sharon.
• Amazing scene where Sam flies through the helicopter, snatching away the pilot.
• With Eli Bradley following with his grandfather, how long before we get The Patriot. The Smithsonian scene probably helped open Isaiah’s mind for the future of the Young Avenger.
• Zemo gets the last laugh. His butler blows up the remaining Super Soldiers.
• Sharon melted one of the super soldiers with poison gas. That was brutal.
• Who does Sharon call in the mid credit scene? She got her pardon, her job back and an in to the secrets and weapons of the US government.
• Hey Bucky… don’t take a cell phone from a mysterious person. You could die from that.
• When Sam lands on the bridge, wraps his wings around the shield and allows the helicopter to bounce off him… I mean… WOW!
• Two Redwings!
• Walker quoting Lincoln. “Mercy bears richer fruit than strict justice.” Don’t quote Lincoln John.
• Bucky gets invited to the cookout!

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier delivered great action and unexpected depth of character and emotion. This was the second huge hit for Marvel Studios on Disney +.

And now you can call it Captain America and the Winter Soldier!

Loki is next in June.

SPOILERS FOR THE FALCON AND WINTER SOLDIER EPISODE 5

Episode 5 of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier dropped on Disney + this morning and it brought another fantastic episode hot off the end of episode four’s shocking twist with the murderous John Walker and his bloody shield. Walker finds himself retreating from the area where he had murdered the Flagsmasher and into a nearby warehouse.

Bucky and Falcon arrive and approach John with the intention to give him to give up the shield. Let’s just say that John was not too excited about complying. Then, the three of them engage in an epic battle. Sam gets his wings ripped off. John gets his arm broken as they tear the shield away from him.

This was going to be our sole action beat of the episode as the remainder of the episode was full of amazing character driven moments and deep scenes of development.

Then, we see John Walker at a military trial and being removed from his rank and his commission. However, after the trial, John is approached by a mysterious woman who calls herself the Contessa Valentina Allegra de la Fontaine. I had to look twice when she walked up because I could not believe who I was seeing.

Julia Louis-Dreyfus.

Amazing. She is playing a character with a lot of background in the Marvel Comics, but who knows who she is going to be here. Rumor has it that she is going to appear in the Black Widow movie coming up in June. However, no matter how epic I thought this was, all I could think was…

How did they keep this secret? I had no idea she was going to be here. And she is a huge star. We knew there was a big cameo in the episode, but I would not have guessed Julia Louis-Dreyfus if you gave me a month to guess. It also feels as if she is going to be a major factor moving forward in the MCU.

Baron Zemo arrives at the Sovokia Memorial and Bucky walked up to him. He makes it look like he is going to shoot Zemo in the head, but he reveals that he had removed the bullets. The Dora Milaje escorted Zemo to the Raft.

Zemo was fantastic in this entire show and Daniel Brühl stole every scene he was in. I love the fact that he is off to a super prison, ready to be brought back whenever we need him. In WandaVision, Agatha Harkness winds up in a prison (sort of) too so maybe Marvel has learned their lesson about killing off their awesome villain characters.

Sam started off by heading to Baltimore to carry on a conversation with Isaiah Bradley. This scene is short with Sam and Isaiah, but it was one of the more powerful scenes that you could get. This was a master class of acting between Carl Lumbley and Anthony Mackie. Finding this scene of racial injustice in a Marvel TV show is mind boggling. I hope somewhere down the road, we get more of Isaiah Bradley.

After this, Sam went back to his sister’s home to deal with the boat. They begin to fix it up and Sam gets the people of the community to pitch in. Bucky shows up with a suitcase from Wakanda. Then we get the first of out montage scenes as Sam and Bucky work on fixing the boat and it is one of the best things we see. It is such a heart warming moment that shows the relationship between them.

There is a second montage scene in the show this week as Sam is training with the shield. It was another fantastic scene that developed this friendship even more. Bucky looked at Sam and said, “When Steve told me what he was planning, I don’t think either of us really understood what it felt like for a black man to be handed the shield. How could we. I owe you an apology. I’m sorry.” One line and we see that Bucky finally understands the reasoning behind Sam’s choices for originally giving the shield back to the government. Sam then dove into his old ways of talking to soldiers with PTSD and he told Bucky how he can move on. It was a tight and brilliantly scripted moment that gave us the relationship that we have been waiting for. So many epic conversations in this episode that had so little action. Despite that, you do not miss the action one bit. This was a wonderful episode.

Other items

• The scene where Sam’s nephews wake up Bucky as they are playing with the shield and the second one where one of them traces the star on the shield are simply inspirational and transcendent. It is a beautiful pair of scenes that give hope that even the little black boys can have hope in America.
• Um… Sharon Carter… is she legit the Power Broker? She sent Batroc the Leaper to Karli and he is wanting to kill Sam. WTF

• Unless Julia Louis-Dreyfus is the Power Broker and Sharon is working with her or working undercover.
• Bucky flirting with Sam’s sister.. perfect.
• The scene with John Walker talking to Lamar’s parents was all kinds of tragic. It gave us even more layers into the character of John Walker while giving us a taste of Lamar.
• Isaiah Bradley’s tragic story needs to be told in some extended series somewhere.
• Show blatantly leaves us dangling with the reveal of the new suit for Falcon from Wakanda. Can’t wait to see.
• In the first mid-credit scene of the series, John Walker is making his own shield.

• Batroc is here!
• The show is setting up a huge final battle with our heroes and the Flagsmashers at the GRC for next week.
• Christ…it was Julia Louis-Dreyfus!

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE FOUR OF THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER

Some people found episode three of the Disney + series to be a bit of a step down (not me though) from the rest of the series. However, I don’t think anyone is saying that about episode four, an amazing thrill ride.

There are two images/moments that are right near the top of the best moments not only of this series, but also the MCU (that may be hyperbolic, but…). One of those were at the very beginning of the show and one as the ending image at the very end of the show.

The episode started off in a flashback from six years ago in Wakanda. Bucky and Ayo are at fireside and she is saying the trigger words that activate the Winter Soldier program that was in Bucky’s head. Shuri had been working to remove the programming and this was an attempt to see what would happen. Sebastian Stan was absolutely brilliant in these few minutes. He worked through such pain and anguish as the words were being said. He had flashbacks to some of his past atrocities as the Winter Soldier and he struggled to maintain his control. Then, when the words were complete and Ayo said that he was free, Bucky’s tears of relief rolled from his eyes. The scene ended with a slight smile from Bucky. Such a powerhouse moment for the character of James Barnes.

The second image that brought tears to my eyes was the very end of the show. John Walker, the new Captain America, who had taken the final vial of Super Soldier Serum that Karli had (Zemo had destroyed the rest and took a shield to the head for his trouble), flipped out and chased the Flagsmashers away. He flipped out after Karli kicked Battlestar into a pillar and he dies (we think). He caught up with one of the Flagsmashers and he brutally killed him with the shield. The show gave a final shot of Walker standing, holding the shield with blood covering the bottom of the shield. It was a gutshot to me. It was so disturbing and painful for me to see the shield tarnished with the blood of the Flagsmasher. It shook me.

By the way, as John Walker is driving his shield into this helpless man, there are tons of people with their cell phones out and recording. It is very much like the current world when police officers are over stepping their boundaries and using excessive force. I certainly think the scene with John Walker plays as an analogy to those real life moments.

Now, the rest of the episode was awesome too. It was just bookended with some amazing awesomeness.

In particular, the Dora Milaje was here. We saw Ayo show up at the end of the third episode to confront Bucky. This week she told him that he had eight hours and then they were coming for Zemo. Then they came for him and wound up in an epic battle with Walker, Battlestar, Bucky and Sam in a hotel room. The expertness of their fighting skills were on full display as they showed why the Dora Milaje is considered the elite fighting force in the world. And, Ayo delivered one of the defining lines for the characters of the Dora Milaje when she said, in response to Walker saying that they did not have jurisdiction, that “The Dora Milaje have jurisdiction wherever the Dora Milaje find themselves to be.”

We continue to develop the character of Karli. Last episode, it looked as if she had taken the turn to full fledged villain, but her motivations are walked back a bit this week. There are still some ways to redeem her because they have truly made her shades of grey. She had a philosophy that you could, conceivably, get behind. Her interactions with Sam during this show were so well written that you could see how the two of them could be connected. It is still unclear who might be the “big villain” of this show because there are so many shades here.

Of course, Daniel Brühl is just the best. After Disney released the extra scene of Zemo dancing (looped for an hour), it is obvious that Baron Zemo is a star in this show. He continued here being one of the best characters on the show. He is both hilarious and sinister at the same time. He is the smartest person in the room and he is fully committed to his agenda. As he smashed the super soldier serum, Zemo showed that he could not be corrupted by the power. You could almost respect it if he was not taking things in another different path,

Other highlights:

• “Looking strong, John!” – Bucky
• Bucky has his metal arm removed in battle
• John Walker’s story is great. Plus, he is shown as being uncertain about what to do with the super soldier serum he had found. It is a great character moment as we watch him slip into his head.
• Bucky shows his knife fighting skills once again.
• The extra drop of Battlestar’s head is dramatic when he is “killed.” I put it in quotation marks because I am assuming that he is dead, but you can never be sure.
• Was there a relationship between Bucky and Ayo? There was a look of betrayal from Bucky when she took off his arm. This has easily been Sebastian Stan’s greatest MCU performance so far.
• Karli is still iffy in my mind. She made a threat against Sarah and her children.
• Is Sharon Carter the Power Broker? Could be.
• It is amazing that Zemo’s head is still on his shoulders after taking the shield to his face.
• Zemo in the bathrobe is just a perfect character trait. Zemo has been such a fantastic character here.
• Sam stood out here too. It seems clear that Steve Rogers was right when he picked Sam to carry the shield.
• It was sad how the man Walker murdered with the Shield was the same man who had told Karli that he was a Captain America fan as a child.

The brutality of the final scene is something that we have not seen a lot of in the MCU and it caught me off guard. It served to taint the symbol of Captain America and it was a serious gut punch. I did not know that it meant as much to me as it did until I saw the shot of the shield with the blood on it. The show has two more weeks left and it has stepped up into a new stratosphere with this week’s offering.

SPOILERS FOR THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER EPISODE 3

Baron Zemo is here.

Daniel Brühl reprised his role from Captain America: Civil War starting big time in this week’s episode of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and he dominated the screen.

Bucky helps break out Zemo from his prison cell in Berlin (unbeknownst to Sam) and the scene where Bucky is telling Sam the “hypothetical” situation is awesome. Sam’s reaction, especially the line “I don’t like how casual you are being about this, it’s unnatural” which I absolutely laughed.

Anthony Mackie was great here with his quips throughout the episode.

Back to Daniel Brühl. I lost my mind when he walked onto screen with that jacket. It was perfect costume for Zemo, and that was before he put the purple mask on. We discover that Zemo is wealthy and has a ton of resources, including his own evil Alfred butler, played by Nicholas Pryor, who used to be Kevin Collins’ father on General Hospital/Port Charles. Brühl works as this character amazingly well.

Agent 13, Sharon Carter (Emily VanCamp) made her return as well, helping Sam, Bucky and Zemo in their search for the new super solider serum. We find out that there had been a limited amount of new serum created, and, when Zemo killed the scientist, the limit may have a shelf life. Sharon Carter showed off her super spy fighting skills as she beat the crap out of a bunch of henchmen.

Speculation: I really have a theory that Sharon Carter is going to be revealed as the Power Broker. When Sharon got into the car with her driver and she said that they were going to have two troubles, I got a feeling she had some nefarious actions in her future.

We got a huge setting for the first time, right out of the X-Men comic books. Madripoor is one of the iconic places in the Marvel Universe and, with the rights now under the Marvel Studio banner, it gets to make its debut in the MCU. The phrase “hive of scum and villainy” springs to mind when thinking about Madripoor (as does Patch, but that will be for another time). This is a setting that we will see again in the MCU without a doubt.

Then, the episode came to a close bringing up yet another tie in from Civil War, this time being Ayo (Florence Kasumba), apparently the second in charge of the Dora Milaje from Wakanda. Her arrival made a lot of sense since she was the Dora Milaje that was protecting King T’Chaka, who was killed in an explosion set by Baron Zemo. She might not be to fond of the idea that Bucky, a person they brought into Wakanda, helped “fix” him and dubbed him the White Wolf, helped the Wakandan king’s killer to escape.

Other points:

• John Walker starting to show some cracks
• Sam’s sister makes a return with an ill timed phone call
• The whole snake shot thing was horrible.
• Sam’s lines were epic: the reference to looking like a pimp and then not being able to run in heels…LOL
• Flagsmasher Karli Morgenthau continues to be an enigma, showing both sides of her character.
• I guess Sharon is also an art thief.

Three more episodes to go.