In another multiverse, I would have a really funny intro
line, but in this multiverse, I would just say,
welcome to Dear Watchers, an omniversal comic book
podcast where we do a deep dive into the
multiverse.
So this is the dark universe for Rob, and we are
traveling with you through the stories and the worlds that make up an
omniverse of fictional realities we all love.
And you're watchers on this journey
are. Me, Guido from Earth.
I have no idea. Earth.
Eight.
Three eight. I'll just pick an Earth we know and are going to talk about
today.
And I'm Rob, but on this Earth, I'm, like, really
tall. That's the only difference.
I'm not short. I'm tall.
But do you have the same face? Are you played by the
same actor? Just a taller version.
Yes. They use some of that Lord of the Rings
magic on me to make me taller.
The reverse hobbiting, basically.
Okay, well, before we begin today's trip
through our multiverse, Gita, what's new with us
in our little section of this galaxy?
Well, this is our first episode in two weeks, or I guess it
was two weeks ago that you had a new episode from us. Last, we
took a little break. As we've mentioned a few weeks ago, we'll
sometimes need a week between episodes to help us
prepare things and, frankly, do other things.
So we missed you. We missed
recording and sharing with you, and we definitely missed all
of your online chatter with us. But we
are happy to be back this week with a
very timely episode.
We want Victor timely episode, if you will.
No, not a Victor timely episode. Thank you.
so we want you to use these breaks when we
do take a week off to listen to old episodes.
We are on episode 120, as you're about to
hear in Rob's, transition. And
we have 119 other episodes for you to
listen to. So go back, find some of those interviews.
It's not Halloween, but we did some great horror coverage
last month, so go listen to those. So please
use our breaks to your advantage if you haven't
listened to every.
Episode, lots of Jason Voorhees content. Two
weeks of Jason Voorhees content, and one, he was
fighting Jason Voorhees. So that's almost like, extra.
It was. It was an overwhelming amount.
Well, if you are joining us for the first time, we have three parts
of our journey through the multiverse today. Origins of
the story, exploring multiversity, and
pondering possibilities. So thank you for joining us
on today's trip.
And remember that you can follow us on all social
media at. Dear Watchers, we want you to tell
us what you think the direction of the
Marvel Multiverse is, and please leave a review
wherever you're listening. A five star review really helps
us out.
And with that, dear Watchers, welcome to Episode
120. And let's check out what's happening in
the Omniverse with our travels to today's
alternate universe. And let's jump
right into Origins of the story,
where we'll explain today's question.
Right now on this very show, you're.
Going to get the answer to all your questions.
Our amazing story begins a few
years ago, so
we always start our episodes with a what if? Question.
And today we are asking the question, what if
Marvel's multiverse saga was
redirected by just one day in the
if.
You said multiverse as
multiverse. So that's an
interesting one. Maybe we should have an episode,
about. Is it multiverse or multiverse?
Multiverse. Multiverse. Multiverse. Now, it
could probably say it either.
And you say tomato. I say tomato.
You changed it up for that one
pronunciation.
Well, I've already said it about 12 million
times in just this first few minutes here,
so, Keto, let's jump into it. What is this
question we are asking today?
Well, it really just came to us because,
probably accidentally, ultimately, because we know that
Hollywood schedules are really not
that easy to move. But somehow,
literally 24 hours in the
same 24 hours, the multiverse saga
has been redirected, at least in my opinion, by
Marvel in the MCU. And it's fascinating to me that
these two things hit and did that.
So we are going to explore what the
MCU, which is 6116, for all intents and
purposes. I know some People get really irritated that it is
the Six one Six, because the comic book universe is the six one
Six, but it's
the on screen Six one six. We're going with it. So we
are going to look at the 6116
MCU and the Multiverse
in it, past, present, and
future. And, so to start us
off in this first segment, we'll look at the multiverse
in the MCU prior to this week. So, for our
first segment, spoilers only. For things that have been
out for a year or longer, if you were.
One of the few people that did not see Spider man, no
way home. Turn it off now.
So we cataloged the, MCU
Multiverse, helped along by this month's the Marvel
Cinematic Universe, an official timeline, a
great oversized hardcover book
that we are going to refer to a few times.
So we looked at all the places that the
multiverse has been present in the saga of the
same name or a little bit prior to it.
We don't include other dimensions. We don't include other
realms. We don't include time slips, which I know
Endgame makes a bit confusing because they're sort of
alternate timelines, but they're also trying to maintain, like,
a sacred timeline to use their own language. So, we're
not going to include any of those things. We're going to look at the
multiverse.
And we're not going to talk also about the Sony
animated Spider man movies, because those are more
multiversal than really anything the MCU
proper has done. But that's in another universe.
They are. And we're also going to leave out what if, even
though what the Marvel Studios team
really wants, what if to be treated as
MCU Canon, we're not going to do that.
It also feels like that show was on about 50 years ago,
and I do not remember many M details.
And season two might be coming out soon ish.
but season one, sure, all of those are Marvel
multiverses, but they're self contained. We're not dealing with
them. We're leaving them there, and maybe one day we'll see them
again. Who knows? So here's
what we've got for you in
our catalog. We've got Quentin
Beck's references in Spiderman, far from home to
a possible multiverse. And that movie came out in
July 2019. We've got the Multiverse in
Loki series one. The existence of it really
doesn't, occur until the finale, but there are
variants. So it's clear there's a multiverse throughout the series.
But that finale is the key here. And that's from July
2021. It aired. We have, of course,
Spiderman no way home, which came out in
December 2021, and Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of
Madness from May 2022.
So before we dig into the MCU chronology of
these events and what they mean, let's just talk about
now sort of our reactions to
the multiverse in those pieces.
Well, it's funny you started with Quinton Beck, because I had
forgotten about this way back in July
2019, because, of course, he,
Mysterio claims he is from the Multiverse. We see these
other creatures, and I think a lot of us were
speculating when the movie was coming out. Oh, my gosh, it's going to be a
multiverse movie. Oh, he's from the Multiverse. Turns out
that he's faking the whole time,
or is he? I'm curious how
much they had been thinking about this when
they were creating that at the time, or how much we're
now. Looking back at that
retrospectively, I would.
Think having just read the also really great,
pretty much oral history book on the MCU that came
out, my guess is
the mapping had to be to at
least where we are now. Now, things got totally
derailed by COVID and certainly this year by the Strikes,
but in 2019,
they had to know a few years out where they were going.
So I think it was intentional.
Now, was it just a sort of
Easter, eggy, teasy, jokey kind of
thing, or will it ultimately mean
something? I don't know. I just saw this week
someone speculating that, or the rumor mill,
which is all BS, of course, that Jake
Gyllenhaal is going to be Reed Richards.
So that would be a
thing.
Yeah, I don't know about that. And
I think he would have to be in the 6116, right? Because we see
he's in Tony's life, we just haven't
really actually seen him there. So
it would be quite.
Gone to another multiverse, or, like, he could have knowledge
of the multiverse that no one else has, for
whatever reason. I doubt it. But it is
possible. It is funny to think about,
and these other three examples
are the,
explicit moments in the
MCU for the multiverse, which is funny because the
saga at the time wasn't named,
so people didn't know. Of course. I was wondering about
that building in this. Ah, I should have
looked up when the saga was named, but it
was relatively recently. Perhaps it was
around the time of Doctor Strange, but I want to say it
was, slightly after, maybe even San
Diego after that. So it's just interesting that
we started getting these drops of
this narrative through line prior
to understanding that it was supposed to be
something bigger, which is, of course, what the Infinity saga
did, too. We got the teases
of Thanos, the teases of the Infinity Stones, and
then we found out, like, that is the direction we're moving
in. The infinity saga is where we're going.
So it's been sort of fun to look
back on these different examples. Let me
bring in the official chronology of these,
because that messes with you a little.
I love this book. I love that they put it out. It is so
nerdy. There are these little blurbs that Miss minutes
does when there is a discrepancy, and
that's a real discrepancy. So, like, if someone on
screen says that Wanda was
born in 1989, but in something else, it said she was
born in 1988. There's a little box where Miss Minutes
will say, oops, there's a discrepancy here. We'll have to investigate
it. And it's just a cute way of pointing to actual
contradictions in this, because, as you said,
they can't always plan everything years in advance
the way they want it. So some of it's being
retconned, and.
Everything is actually taking place a little bit more in the
future from when.
Actually, because of the five year jump in Endgame.
So that's the key here, which makes it all really
mind boggling, because we're also, right now,
at the point of the five
year jump, we're at the point of the
Return of the Blitz, people.
So it's kind of weird when you read this
timeline, because ultimately, the timeline
places Loki breaking the
timeline, creating the multiverse, if you will,
or ripping open the multiverse, or however you want to see that
by killing he who remains as the first
in the events that we have already named.
That happens around Fall 2023.
And Mysterio
does not appear to Peter until the summer
of 2024. So again,
in the MCU timeline, obviously, we're not in the summer
of 2024 yet. So this is in the MCU timeline.
That's when that happens.
And Loki really, though, is taken out of even
the very first Avengers movie, which is even
years earlier. But I guess once you're in the
TVA time, and that's what's hard about.
Placing it even on the pages when they're
running the timeline of the TVA and Loki, because
the whole book is organized chronologically. But the
TVA timeline is like a separate timeline that
they show. So, yeah, time is a little funky there, but
they clearly position
fall 2023 breaking open the multiverse.
Mysterio appears in summer 2024, makes that
reference. It's Fall 2024
that Spiderman unites with the other Spider people.
So Dr. Strange, of course, in
Spiderman, no way home, helping to pull
through the other Spider
Men. And that happens in Fall
2024, which is the same time that
America Chavez shows up with Dr. Strange. They
fight. Wanda, you have the example of dreamwalking
as a little bit of a multiversal thing in multiverse of
madness. And, of course, you then have Earth eight three
Eight, which is where the Illuminati are. And we meet all these
different characters, some who are familiar, Xavier and Agent
Carter. But it's a different Earth than any Earth. We've met them
on before, and Clea showing up to
talk about the multiversal incursions at the very end,
all of that eight three eight content that is fall,
2024. And so that's actually the last
time until this week. That is the
last time that we see the
multiverse explicitly that we know of right
now.
Well, what's interesting is that we really have
these three, really only
really three tangible examples of
multiverses, even though everyone seems to be
talking about multiverses today. We've been talking about this
on the show, where this is a word that's so much in our
lexicon right now, everyone's kind of talking about it. And yet,
in this giant series, which, as you've said, even
this whole arc is being named
Multiverse, we've only had these three segments. And even within
those segments, they haven't even been super
multiversal.
No. Even if you think
about, first of all, we haven't spent more
than a few minutes in another universe.
That's true. Yeah.
Eight three eight is the closest example, and we
don't spend too much time there. And then we haven't gotten
to know people that we know
of from the multiverse. If you
count Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, I guess they
probably get the most screen time. Or Willem Dafoe. Right. He's from
the multiverse in that.
Yeah, most of them. And the Doc ock. Yeah, most of,
Yeah, so, sure. Those are the people we get to
spend the most time with, and then a little bit less.
So the Illuminati, they die
pretty fast. so we get hints at
it. We get hints, which this is relevant. We
get that Maria Rambeau on Earth Eight three Eight
is Captain Marvel. We meet the
first read that we've ever seen on screen in the MCU, of
course, but it's a different one, and it's been confirmed that it will
be a different one than we see. So, yeah,
we barely spend time even
with these people.
Well, it's interesting, too, because the Spider man,
it's no way home, and multiverse of madness are kind
of almost the inverses of themselves, because in no way
home, we get a character
meeting himself from other multiverses, but we don't really
go to the multiverse. In Multiverse of madness, we
don't really have Doctor Strange interacting with another Doctor Strange,
except, like the Zombie one, which doesn't really count, but he's
in the other universe, but he doesn't really see another
version of himself. Why I'm thinking almost the Sony
movies are like, the perfect combination is because it's
another world and the characters interacting
together. We haven't really gotten
that up to this point yet.
Yeah. Though in part, it only works
because they're characters we
know.
Yeah, that's true.
Spiderman. No way home. Could you imagine if those
were like, let's just say they cast two random people
as two other Spiderman. The story wouldn't
work as well because as an audience,
you'd just be like, okay, so there's two different
Spider Men. Like, who cares?
if they were the. And we've talked about the nostalgia factor. We did
an episode on no way home and talked a lot
about the problems with that that we.
But.
And if it's the same actor, you run into a little bit
of kind of what the flash movie did, too, where it's like,
okay, now we're tracking. Okay, wait, which Barry is
this on screen?
Who am I with the short hair? The one with the long hair. So that
you can tell. They always do little M cues.
Like,
yeah, you're right. They are two different ways
of doing the multiverse. But for sure, both of them
are multiverse light. And I think that's by
design. And some of this is, in retrospect, after this
week. But this doesn't spoil anything. In
retrospect, I realized, like, okay, these were designed
to show us the cracks in the
universe, in the multiverse, in the omniverse,
let's say. So all of these stories
were just there to tell us, like,
there's an instability that's
coming, and the instability is starting to
make the boundaries more porous.
Again, in hindsight, I realized that's what these
projects were doing. And I appreciate them a little more
because.
And, it's interesting, too, both of them
really well. And then Loki, but they
both needed. Dr. Strange plays an integral
role. I mean, I know America is the one who's kind of breaking it
in, but maybe they almost felt like, oh, they needed
magic or something. Like they needed some kind of
device like magic where you can kind of make anything
happen with that.
So he's also the one, of course, in Endgame
who sees 14 million
multiverses and realize they're only going to win
in one. Now, again, I left out
time. We should have had Elliot on this
episode because he likes Time travel. I do not like
time travel. And I am sure,
of course, you can argue that every alternate
timeline is a multiverse in and of itself, but I'm
sort of leaving that out. But I think that's probably also why
Doctor Strange made sense at that point,
because his ability, if you will,
to at least see across the multiverse, if not actually
visit it was established by Endgame.
And even in his first movie, where he goes to other
dimensions, which are also not really multiversal
verses as well, but he's able to pull in those
other dimensions, the mirror world, and where Dormammu
is.
Well, and he creates the time loop with Dormammu,
he's essentially creating. I mean, actually, again, in the
official chronology book, they do this cool little
loop of time. Anytime
someone steps out of time, they do, like, a break in the
timeline, and then they have it loop around and show you
what's happening. And so that's essentially a
multiverse, for all intents and purposes.
And just like the other one that we haven't mentioned that came
before this week, is Quantum Mania, where you
have not really a multiverse there. I
guess the quantum realm vaults more into other
dimensions.
To me, it does to that. The multiverse in
Quantum Mania, I'd say, which we didn't talk
about, is the
character of Kang. I think that would be the
example of the multiverse there, because it's established
that he's a variant, and it's established, I guess, that he
can transverse
universes. But outside of that, I don't see
that movie as having too much of a multiverse.
Yeah, there's a singer there as well, where we meet other
kangs, which may or may not be moot at this
point.
So we know that there is, a nexus, if you
will. Not a nexus in the Marvel definition,
but an actual, just central point where
different kangs can come togetheR. So, yeah,
a little multiverse in Quantum Mania skipped over that.
Let's get on to how this all,
in my opinion, has changed for the better.
Did you know, Guido, that our segment two is actually
called exploring Multiversity? So why
don't we do that?
I am your guide through these vast new
realities. Follow
me and ponder the
question,
what if?
And this is also the section where we'll be
starting to get into some.
Heavy duty, very recent
spoilers, very, very.
Spoilers, have not seen Marvel and Loki. And I think a lot
more people are waiting to see these movies than they
were a few years ago.
True. So just be warned that this
segment, Marvel's spoilers, abound.
Yes, because we are answering the question, what if
Marvel's multiverse saga was redirected by just
one day in the MCU? And
we're starting with the Marvels with a special
focus on the Stinger mid credit scene.
And that, of course, came out in.
November 2023, when we were recording
this episode. This movie was directed by Nia DeCosta,
who wrote it with Megan McDonald and Elisa Kurasek,
and it's produced by Kevin Feige. This, just a little
background on those creators, is DaCosta's third
ever feature. Her second film was the Candyman
Reboot, and she's the youngest MCU director.
Co writer McDonald wrote some of WandaVision, and
co writer Karasic wrote one episode of Loki's
first series. So an interesting
team to be working on this and definitely
makes sense considering the threads they're pulling
together here. So we could talk
about the movie overall. I want to
stay focused on the Multiverse because the
movie overall is
less relevant to our conversation today.
I'd say with one exception, which is
the jump points and
what happens to Monica in the movie. So
before we get to the Stinger, I think there's a few things.
Where do you want to start?
well, I know some of our opinions are
differing on the movie itself, so we won't go,
as you said, too much into no.
And whether we like to review the movie. I really liked the
movie. I think it's fun. I think it works. I think it's
narratively strong. Rob?
I thought it had some fun moments
to it. I thought it
had some lessons that I will have to maybe
revisit and see if my mind
changes.
But yeah, I think the key
thing that it's doing, I'm
interested in the fact that, in fact, we
were debriefing it with Elliot, as we always do, and
he mentioned not even
realizing that the jump
points were creating the opportunity
for a multiversal story.
And I did realize that right
away. Elliot, I'm just smarter than you.
But I think they
did definitely do a soft touch on it. And
I'm really curious why. I
appreciate it. I think that it
wasn't yet another. It's
funny because in our first segment, we just talked about that the multiverse hasn't
showed up in the MCU. And yet I think you're right. Everyone
feels that there is oversaturation. We've passed
saturation on multiverses. So I sort of appreciate
that they framed this as these jump points, this
teleportation. It sort of rips space and time
and don't lean into like, this is a
multiversal story until the Stinger.
Yeah.
What did you think of that?
Yeah, I think what this movie
highlighted, well, you were talking about in our first segment that we're
not going to focus on time, but it really made
me think, well, time and multiverses
are so connected, and the line
blends together because this
movie, I think, for better or for worse,
this movie, more so than other MCU movies, I
think you do need to have a sense of the timeline and
the history with these characters, while
some of the other projects, I think you can kind of just go
into. So it was making me think,
yes, maybe it's not multiversal, but we
really need to know. Like, there's the segments where
Captain Marvel, where Brie Larson is trying to recount
her, get her memories back, and that's
time, but it's almost on, the
border and multiversal in a way, because she's bringing
in these memories from almost another person or
another life that she had. So I almost
see a connection there as well. What do
you.
I think. I think it's just woven into the
storytelling now. Again, they don't have to make it that,
ooh, there's some incursion from another universe, or,
ooh, we might end up in another universe, which is, of
course, spoiler. Now what happens to Monica?
But, yeah, they can just sort of play
with a sense of boundaries, of time and space.
Even Miss Marvel, Kamala, in this movie,
reminds everyone that she has traveled through time
and space with the bangles. That
is kind of multiversal storytelling now. She
doesn't alter the past, she
doesn't go to a different universe, but just the fact that she's
able to do that has a ton of potential for
multiversal storytelling. So I think there
are lots of elements of multiverse
in here, but without making it a movie about the multiverse,
that's what I was really struck by.
Yeah, I was almost half expecting
watching it for America
Chavez to show up, too, just because it was like, I.
Would have made it a multiverse movie.
Yeah, well, it's such a female fronted movie and
also a, diverse cast as well. So I was thinking, oh, it would just make
sense that America shows up and maybe she's going
to Jersey City High School now or something like
that.
I think Kamala is going to be recruiting America for that team she's
putting together. Yes, I'm sure we'll see
her. So now, the Stinger,
of course, if you're listening, it's because you either
don't care if you're spoiled or you saw it, but if you're
listening and didn't see it and don't care that
you're spoiled? In the Stinger, Monica, who has been
trapped past the boundaries of a
hole in space time that's created by the villain
of the film. She gets trapped when she seals
it from the side she's on. She wakes
up, and she is now in a universe where
she's, I presume, in
the X Mansion. And she is
with Hank McCoy, Beast being played by
Kelsey Grammar, who plays him in X Two
and three, and she's with her
mother, Maria Rambeau, being played
by the actor who plays Maria in the
6116. But we find out that Maria is actually
binary, so there is a lot to unpack
in this. What was your
reaction when you were experiencing
it?
Well, I think, like you and
so much of the world, I was expecting some kind of
X Men thing to come up, and
I wasn't actually expecting this. I was
definitely pretty surprised.
But I think overall,
I was then thinking, oh, this is going to make a lot of sense,
knowing the things that we've had trickle out
about Deadpool and that the way that they're.
We'll talk about the future in our next.
But I think. I think the ways that I was seeing,
oh, this is the kind of ways that they're easing us
back into the X world with
familiar characters.
Into the Fox world.
Into the Fox. Well, I think the X world.
Yeah. Because what I liked about the
presence of Maria and Maria being
binary and Charles being alive is.
It's clearly telling us that's true.
This is neither the Fox universe,
nor is it the eight. Ah, three eight, where we've already
met Xavier, that Xavier and that Maria are
dead. And so I appreciate that this
is a different universe, even though it's using an
actor for a character that we've seen
played, is, I believe it will
be a completely different universe. I wouldn't be
surprised if some of the other characters we know
are different people if Xavier is not Patrick
Stewart, not James McEvoy, but someone else.
Well, I think that's the thing about
how they've approached variants and the multiverse
that has been a little inconsistent,
which is we have. Sometimes the
people look just like them, like in Loki,
where there's a lot of other people that look like Loki, but then there's
some that don't look like Loki, and then there's only really one
we're introduced to that has a different
gender than. Yeah.
although we don't know the alligator's gender, but.
Okay, that's true. We do not know the alligator's gender. Yeah,
that's that is something that has been. So
here we have Beast, who is played,
by the same actor from the Fox universe. But I
agree, would
Charles now be someone different? We've seen Charles,
though, from, I guess, kind of the animated universe
in person, in multiverse of
madness as well. So I think that's the one thing that
they haven't quite really figured out
yet. and like Kang, we saw his variants and they
all were played by the same actor. every KaNg we've
seen so far that we know of has been played by the
same almost.
I would like to see that we almost
need. Well, actually, maybe Hank McCoy, is it? Because I was going to say
we almost need a geneticist to
give us some, explanation. And it doesn't even have to be rooted
in true genetic science, but just to explain
that probability
of genetic makeup
dictates, and the fact that there are infinite
universes then dictates that
there are many variants who are identical to
you and there are many variants who are not.
We would just need someone to say that. And maybe it will be
Hank, because the other thing that struck me about
this scene is that he says,
you could be from another universe, but of course, we all know
those don't exist, or he says something to that effect. So
he doesn't yet know this is true. And so I'm assuming
his learning about this is going to be part of the next story
we see. And maybe he'll then be the person
to explain variance, the science of variance.
To us, even for our 6116 characters.
Right. Because someone like Captain
America and Bucky will have not been
involved at all in any kind of
multiversal story. So those characters might
not know that such a thing as the
multiverse even exists because they've just been off
having their own.
Yes. Yeah. as we build in the multiverse
saga, we are going to have to introduce and explain it to a
lot of other people. That's true.
It kind of reminds me of how aliens were
introduced into the world, because some of these
characters, like Sam, were not. They
didn't know aliens existed. And suddenly there's aliens, or
suddenly you have characters being brought into outer
space. It's kind of like how we were
brought into the world through Scott Lang
in civil war, where, oh, he was just kind of
doing his own thing, and now suddenly we're going off with
him and he's experiencing a much bigger world.
So I think we're going to have that. See that again
through some of these characters.
Well, and the storytelling shows it. Your space example is
a good one, because in the Marvels, of course,
the fact that Kamala's parents and brother
get to go to outer space and talk about being in
outer space just shows how big the world has
become. Ten years ago, or
when Guardians started, which was close to ten years ago,
you had people remarking on
the outlandishness of this space
existence, and now you have
this regular old family, can just be brought
into space and is not surprised, doesn't need
some big explanation. They know it exists. They know it's
happening in the world around them. So, yeah, I suspect
that the same thing will happen with the multiverse.
And I think you bring up a good point about
it being beast. And of course, there's so
many things and studio politics and all this
stuff. But I was thinking, oh, why did they
choose that character?
Because there's probably more iconic
Fox characters to choose from. And we know,
of course, we're going to see Logan, Hugh Jackman in
the next movie, but maybe it is
because of the science aspect that
they needed it to be. Hank, what do you think
about that?
I think that makes sense, because if you think about it,
like, you could get look at Days
of Future Past, the X Men, the movie,
you could use Rogue or Shadowcat
or any telepath and start
to play with a multiverse question, because if they
shunt their mind into the past, if they're
on the Astral plane or any of those things,
but all of that is metaphysical. And so that
is a little bit more like dreamwalking. And it feels like
Wanda's done that, Dr. Strange has done that. We've seen that.
We haven't yet had someone analyze,
from a scientific perspective, the multiverse.
And so, yeah, I think you're right that he's a
good character for that. He's also, I had
not thought about this until you raised, like, why
hem? He's such a good charaCter, too, if they go
in this direction with him, because
especially the last five years in comics,
he's morally ambiguous. He's increasingly
morally ambiguous. He's so driven by
science that he makes really horrible
decisions. And so he could
be an interesting character to have a part of
this unfolding storyline, because, or if
we saw.
Some kind of age of apocalypse story and we know
that there's dark Beast there as
well, which is also timeline,
multiversal, whatever you want to call it,
that we've, of course, covered on this podcast.
Before we move into, our third segment, what, I
was going to.
Say one thing that is clear to me is
whatever multiverse we are living in,
Kelsey Grammar has done very well because we've
had the return of Fraser and the return of career
in 2023.
It's true. Too bad he can't rebuild his politics, but he, has
rebuilt his career. So the last thing
on this stinger before we get to Loki and
the future is just Maria being
binary. I loved it. I
loved it because what it was, to
me, was a deep cut
meant for X Men fans.
And that was perfect and beautiful to me
because it
was shocking, it was cool, it was a
revelation. A binary, of course, in the comics
is Carol Danvers. When her
powers go binary, her powers get messed up, and
she starts to have the powers of a star and is a being made of
fire, et cetera, joins the X Men in
space. So it really is, like, just the perfect
plot. And we saw in
Multiverse of Madness, and we had alluded to
in the Marvels that Maria could easily
have become Captain Marvel, that it didn't have to be Carol,
it could have been Maria. So it makes sense that in some other
world, Maria became Captain Marvel and then became binary and
joined, and they.
Could have easily called her Captain Marvel like they did in
Multiverse of Madness, but they made that very
deliberate choice to bring back this other
character name, which was not a name, with a name I
had heard, but I didn't really know the backstory, and I did
not know that this was a character who was on The X Men
that was also Captain Marvel. So as you were saying, that was
definitely a deep cut comics
fan kind of inclusion.
Yeah. And it's a good way of putting
emotional stakes in it, because it's Maria. It's Monica's
mother. And so it's interesting.
It could have been Carol as binary, but
it was Maria's binary, and that means something very
different based on what happened. And so we'll get to the
future in our final segment.
Yes. So let's, start pondering some
possibilities.
Will the future you describe
be averted, diverted? Diverted?
And we are talking Loki, series
two, with a special focus on the
finale from November 2023, which
was entitled Glorious.
Purpose, and was out the day the
Marvels premiered. That is just
wild.
But as you said, it wasn't supposed to be. Right, because
all these dates were moving around and everything.
But it is wild to me that last
Thursday, that you could
see both these things at the same time. That's why we're talking about them
together. This series was mostly directed by
Justin Benson. And Aaron Morehead, mostly written by Eric
Martin, executive produced by Kevin Feige, Brand Witterbaum,
and a whole bunch of other people who are in Marvel Studios
TV. Martin wrote for season one
of Loki. Benson and Morehead have done a lot of
Sci-Fi films that had similar themes
and reality warping effects and visuals.
They did work on Moon Knight and are going to be involved
in the rebooted Daredevil. born again.
Redirected Daredevil, born again. So
we are talking about the
impact of the finale of Loki series two.
Before we get into what happens in
the finale of Loki series two and
what we think it tells us about the future of the
MCU's multiverse saga, I do want to mention
that, of course, we don't know the chronology
of these things. Sadly, this book was
published and had to be sent to the printers some months
ago. So we don't know
where, secret Invasion lies, though we
can safely assume that might be added to the pile of
Inhumans properties. We
don't know, though, where
the Marvels and Loki series two
take place in terms of their relationship
to each other. We have no idea which one comes
first or after. And frankly, I don't think
it matters that much.
But it will matter in the future,
and so we can assume both will have occurred before we get to
Deadpool next year, which we're going to talk about. But
real quick on Loki series two,
do you want to give an overall impression of the series before
we talk about the content of the
finale?
Oh, sorry. I was falling asleep there thinking
about Loki series two, but
I thought there.
Was a lot of most enjoyable, I'll say.
I think the bones were there, but I think it
was not doing what I really
wanted from this series, which some of its
expectation, but it felt so prolonged. I
think you and I were saying it would have made a really probably
great two hour movie, not six hour series.
And we were saying maybe the Marvels, you might disagree,
but the Marvels might be the opposite. The Marvels might have made a really
good six.
Oh, I would have been fine with it being a six part series.
It felt kind of rushed to me as an hour 40
movie where I think they could have definitely expanded
on and had more emotional beats. So they wish
they had kind of switched places in that way.
Yeah. So you and I weren't too into
Loki series two. We were watching it
kind of out of obligation
and curiosity. The finale, however,
I think we both liked what they did with the
story, and I really
liked. I saw the Marvels before I
watched the series finale, and I had really
liked how it made
me think about the future of the multiverse saga.
So, again, spoilers. And if you're
listening, we're assuming you don't care about spoilers if
you didn't watch Loki. A very brief synopsis
of a kind of complicated
and overly simple, maybe a little too
complicated.
Yes, you and I were saying it's a little too complicated and a little
too simple at the same time.
But ultimately, what happens is, because the multiverse
is completely destabilized, and the choice is
presented between something that will
annihilate, everything and every timeline,
or going back to compressing down to the
sacred timeline and starting to cancel,
Prune, destroy the other
deviating timelines.
Now, Loki inserts himself as the god of stories, if
you will, and takes on the power of the
multiverse, stabilizes it gets to sit on his throne at the heart
of the Multiverse, creates
Idragasil, the world
tree of the Nine realms that we've heard about in the
MCU before. And essentially now
the Multiverse is a stable
series of branches that coil around
each other like the trunks of a tree or the branches of a
tree. It's no longer a single line with
deviating branches. nor is it
a threaded mess that we're led
to believe it was between series one
finale and series two finale of Loki.
So, m
huge change, huge
shift. And for me,
I'll start because I did have
the experience of seeing the Marvels. What
the Loki finale did to me is it
made me realize that the rest of the multiverse
saga is going to now get to
be actual stories just being
told in other worlds. And m
knowing that Secret wars is four
years away, if that's when it happens,
there's an end date. And I appreciate both
of those things. I like, one,
that we're going to finally just get a, stabilized way
of telling stories in different worlds. The story doesn't have to
be about breaking into another world
or an incursion or a destabilization or
anything like that. We can just get stories in other worlds.
And two, that this won't last forever. And I
like that because, especially with the Fox X Men
franchise, I am ready for the MCU X Men. And
while it's fun to see some of these folks, I
appreciate knowing that we're not going to see any of them past
Secret wars if I had to, yeah.
I mean, you think it's going to be four years? I think we're not going to see those
Fox people pass Deadpool, frankly.
And that is possible because.
Yeah. so what did you think of these two
things together? The Loki change to the
Multiverse and the Marvel Stinger and the
future?
Well, I think what we saw from Loki is that it's
removing, as you were saying, having a
giant plot device to get
us into the multi worlds. We were talking at the start of
our conversation that Dr. Strange and
magic had to constantly being brought in. And really,
that whole first quarter of no way
home is Peter asking for
Dr. Strange to do this favor. And then the
box explodes or whatever happens. So I
think you're just going to eliminate that now. And it also
will free them up story wise, where we don't have
to give 30 minutes of the movie
or two episodes of a TV show
to explain the mechanics. It's just going to
be, the transparency
between these worlds is going to be a lot different. I think
Monica sacrificing herself at the end of
the Marvels might be like the last time we're going to see
one of those big occurrences
until after Secret Wars.
Well, the only thing, I agree with
everything, but at the end, I don't know if I agree, and here's why.
Because what I'm excited about is I'm
excited that Monica being in
this other universe made me realize that would be a
great way to get us to secret wars, is if you
start to have people almost trapped in these other
universes. Because even though we know
Doctor Strange and Magic and America
Chavez and her powers, and maybe some
extreme cases, Miss Marvel's powers
can transgress dimensional
barriers. It's still going to be hard. So even post
Loki finale, it's not like you can just take a
plane and decide you're going to go to Earth
One, three three, or whatever it is, it still
is going to be a challenge. And so I like this idea that
people might get stuck, people might get trapped.
Monica being there, she might want to be there because
Maria's there. And then what happens if Carol and
Kamala are trying to bring her back here?
I could just see that creating the potential for
wars to battle each other, for there to be, like,
conflict between worlds. With
conflict being that someone broke
the barrier, the conflict is more just like, wait,
where do I want to end up? And where Should I end
up?
Yeah, I think that is where the
emotional payoff will be. Is
what if you could suddenly be
with your dead parent again?
Or is it actually your dead parent because
it's not actually the same person?
That's why that final moment of the Marvel Singer is perfect when
she says, who are you? And Monica's
like, oh, shit. So, yeah,
Monica's feeling all this emotion, and Maria's like, oh,
I don't know who you are.
I hope they go there, though, because I think
they've stopped short of really getting into a lot of,
like, we didn't get,
like, her. Her experience of what if you were
separated from your family in this other universe? We didn't,
in secret Invasion, get, what if you were married to somebody and
you never saw their true, like, these are really
interesting philosophical questions to
actually bring into a superhero world. And
the shows, and movies have stopped short of doing
that. So I hope we could get into, oh, what
if Tony Stark can be back in this
universe? But could that also mean that Thanos
could win there if he didn't had, like, I
think there's a lot of interesting quantum things
and emotional things to discuss if they choose
to go there.
Yeah. Part of me even thinks what I've been starting
to, I think, hope for, actually, because I think it's at
least rumored that Marina Baccarin is in Deadpool Three.
And part of me wonders if Deadpool is
going to be trying to get to a world where she's still alive,
because.
I think her dying was premature. I think it was
fridging her. I think it was an awful decision. She's
a comic book character that had so much potential. She's
an actor that had so much potential, and both were
so. But what was clear in both
movies is what a love story they had. And so part of
me wonders if that will be some of the plot
is Ryan Reynolds or Deadpool trying to get to
her, because that would do exactly what
you're saying. It would bring in that emotional
selfish, which Deadpool certainly could be
part of the storytelling that we lack when everyone is
being a herO, which is,
think.
I think Monica is going to be, like, the third lead of that
Deadpool movie. I don't know. I hope that will turn out to be
true. But I just think incorporating her into
that Stinger, I think she's really going to play
a big part in there. And I think the cool
thing about, well, and I think the cool thing
about having Deadpool, as well as a
character is that he'll be able to break the
fourth wall. Like, he can say, to tell
Kelsey Grammar, like, aren't you Frazier? Or. I really want him to
sing the Frazier theme song.
Yes.
Niles or something.
yes, exactly. But we've already had him
mention Hugh Jackman as an actor in one of the other
movies, and now he's going to be aside Hugh Jackman. So I
think there's all that
fourth wall breaking, which I think is also maybe
what the multiverse stuff needs at this point. It needs, Some of that
inflation, that air to be taken out of it.
Yeah. Well, now that it's stabilized, I feel like that kind
of thing can happen. And
I just think, the
potential is so great at this point. I'm excited
again, and I've been someone who, for at least two years,
at least since Wandavision, I've not been
excited for the MCU. And these two projects
made me really like, okay, I can
sort of start to see a sense. I think there's a lot of
mistakes and loose threads that are still
out there from this phase,
but I think all of these pieces
together make me really hopeful about what's
coming. And I agree. I think Deadpool Three
is going to do a lot to move that
ahead and move it into new Directions.
Now, a couple of questions I'm thinking is,
do you think that we will still
have these more
multiversal stories versus the more
earthbound stories that might be coming in with, let's
say, Thunderbolt.
Thunderbolt and Captain America Four? Yeah, I think
those two for sure are going to be
Earthbound. No question there might
be a stinger that leads us to something more.
Because I think it's not until we
hit the Avengers, maybe Kang
Dynasty and the Avengers Secret wars,
that I think we're going to start to pull every character into
this, just like we did for Infinity Warm and
Endgame. So, yes, I think there will
continue to be movies that tell
stories that don't get wrapped up in this. And that's
some of the fun part of stabilizing it right now,
is that that would be okay. We don't
have to worry or wonder, like, Captain America
Four can exist on the timeline and we don't
have to think, like, wait, why aren't they addressing the
multiversal incursion that's happening? It's like, well, m they don't need
to. Everything is stabilized right now. Sam
Wilson is not going to get involved in Monica Rambeau
being on the other side of the.
Two more. Two more questions for you that I'm coming up. I
want your opinion on is
one, do you think now is
the time after what I've been saying for a long time, which
is that they'll use this
multiverse to recast some of
the iconic characters. Like, there's been a lot of
the news of like that. Is Downey Jr. Coming back. But do you
think?
I don't know the answer to that.
I think it's so hard. I think this is
where I get into, and I know this is like, everyone knows this and
says this, but this is where I really just remind myself, like,
we are in such uncharted
waters. This is so unprecedented for a
movie universe to exist like this, that I really
can't see the future. I do not
think we will end up in a
place where there is like a young
Tony Stark being played by someone else. I don't
think we will end up there in the next
1020 years. But again,
we're in such uncharted waters that
who knows? I have no idea, but
I don't think so. I don't think that's what Secret
wars is going to give us. Could secret wars do something like bring
us a Miles Morales Sure. I think there's a lot of ways
Secret wars could shake up the world,
but I do not think it's going to be through
younger new actors
playing roles that have already been
established in the on screen
6116. I don't
think so.
Let's see. I'm not sure, because I
think.
At this point it would rob the emotional
hefT. We are still
living in a world where
I have multiple tattoos on my body from
Endgame. People who watch movies
like that is still the pinnacle
moment. I still cry when
Peter Parker reaperates
and hugs. Like, it's making
me teary thinking about it. Right? Like, there is so much
emotional weight in that story and
bringing someone back
permanently takes away from
that.
There could be a temporary, they could.
Go to a world where there is like a young Tony Stark and they
deal with that. And that's fine. I don't have a problem with that.
But I think if we get to a new prime
universe post Secret wars, like has happened in the
comics from the 2015, I don't think
it's going to be with a bunch of new
versions of people we've already met.
And my last question for you, my last pondering
possibilities question for you, we were talking about this this
morning is, do you think so? Of course,
Marvel is owned by Disney. Disney also owns Star
Wars. They have, of course, the Disney properties as well. Do
you think we'd ever see a world
where we are mixing
bringing in other properties? Like, do you think there's ever
a world where suddenly in one of these outer space
journeys through the multiverse. We're in Star
wars or Wakanda, and
there's Simba talking. I don't know.
I think there's only two ways it happens.
One, for comedic effect.
So in Deadpool, three,
they're traveling to a bunch of different worlds and
they end up in a world
with, I don't know, even Elliot joked when we were talking to
him, the Simpsons.
Sure. So that I could see. So one,
for comedic effect, the only other
way is a little bit more of what I'd want to
see. And I don't know if it will happen. I do not think
it will happen in the course of an ongoing
story because I think we live in a world
where even within a company. So, yes, I
understand Disney owning Fox means they own the world of
alien. They own the world of Planet of the Apes, they own the world
of Predator. But I don't think they own Star Wars. I don't
think they're going to want to mix those things up. Even in
the comics, they don't mix them up like, alien
and Predator are under different imprints. They keep them
separate. They're not part of the six one six.
And here's my comic inspired,
answer right now. For example, there's a little
miniseries of Predator versus Wolverine.
Sure, why not? Who cares? So that would be
if it were to happen or I'd actually kind of like it to
happen. Like do a one movie standalone.
It's not a part of the saga. It's
a use of the multiverse where, yeah, Wolverine
ends up in the Predator universe and has to fight the
Predator. Like, sure, that's fine with me,
but I don't think it'll be part of a
larger story. It certainly won't be a
permanent status quo. And,
yeah, I think there's some fun potential. What would you like to see if
there was, like, one fun standalone movie
that mixed worlds?
Well, it's funny, I hadn't really thought of Predator and alien
because they're not as famous as
Star wars, but they actually could lend
themselves pretty well to something like,
well, alien. And then you also introduce the
brood or in Secret Wars. Of course,
the Predator would be a natural inclusion
person to thing to include there as
well. I think the other thing that they could play around with
is some of the actors who have been cast as multiple
things. Natalie Portman is in Star wars universe
and the MCU, Harrison Ford is now going to
be in both universes. So there's other actors that they
have also worked with which I think would fall more
into the jokey world of it. But
it's interesting, the
Star wars universe, as best as I know, and there's
plenty of people that know more about Star wars than me, but it
does exist in a galaxy far, far away, Earth. And
things have never come into it, as far as I know. But.
So it would be interesting to have an Earth
character like Starlord, for example.
I was going to say the next Guardians movie. They end up on whatever
the planet all the Ewoks are on.
Oh, that would be, yeah, totally. Yes. I mean, I could
totally see that if they bring in, Taika to direct that
movie with Ewoks or something like that.
Yeah.
But again, I think it would have to be like a one shot
deal.
Oh, totally. Or even a special.
These worlds don't overlap.
Yeah, like how we had the Kevin Bacon Holiday
special or something like that. I think that would be really
special. Star Wars Holiday special. But that would
be so I could totally see that. And
you have Groot and Chewbacca. Like,
neither of them are speaking a language that we
understand.
And Nebula or Mantis reacting to the.
Can. I can totally see that, actually.
So that would totally be maybe the one that they would
go with. Yeah. Play off that iconic holiday
special.
Well, if it happens, hopefully we'll get credit for
it.
All right, well, we're excited for the
future, and we're excited to hear what
you think about the future, so please find
us, let us know because that is a wrap. Dear
Watchers, thank you for listening. I have been Guido
from Earth Eight, three eight, or whatever Earth I said.
I was from, and I have been several, inches
taller.
Rob, the reading list this week
is watching list, and you can find it in the show notes. And
again, find us on social media at Dear Watchers, all
social media.
And we'll be back soon with another trip through the
multiverse.
In the words of UAtu, keep pondering the
possibilities.