“Chaos. And that’s only the beginning.”

Secret Invasion is Marvel’s new Disney Plus streaming show. Set in the present day MCU (which is 2025 for anyone who has trouble following the MCU timelines), this is an adaptation of one of Marvel’s most popular comics, Secret Invasion. In both the comic and show, a group of shapeshifting aliens begin an invasion to take over earth. Marvel has tried to dip its toes into the espionage genre with both Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (2021). Whereas the second Captain America film was a great spy thriller and is still one of Marvel’s best films released to date, the tv show of a very similar name is dull, predictable, and one of Marvel’s many disappointing releases post-Avengers: Endgame.

I believe Marvel made a huge mistake by not making it’s adaptation of Secret Invasion into an Avengers-level movie. For as much as Marvel likes to brag about a larger plan at work with every release, so many of these don’t seem to connect to one another besides a brief reference or two. The first episode of Secret Invasion is mostly boring storytelling with each character speaking in exposition only. The first line of the show is literally Beric Dondarrion from Game of Thrones telling Everett Ross, as well as the audience, about the Skulls infiltrating Earth. A good rule of thumb is for movies/shows to “show, don’t tell”. Secret Invasion, like most recent superhero projects, decide to do the exact opposite. What makes a story interesting and engaging is the not knowing what is going to happen. But Secret Invasion tells us what the Skrulls are doing from the first few minutes of the show.

Maybe the worst thing about the first two episodes is the lazy characterization. Maria Hill is given literally no depth except a brief tear-jerker attempt by her mother in the second episode’s opening moments. Talos is also another character butchered by the script’s character development. We know that he has been on Earth since the events of Captain Marvel and that his wife has since passed, but aside from that he is mostly a blank slate. Emilia Clark is criminally underused despite being one of the show’s selling points. Nick Fury is definitely the most interesting he has been since his brutally short role in Avengers: Age of Ultron. He is old and battered, with his confidence in both himself and the other super in the universe after the events of Avengers: Infinity War. However, this feels like a poorer version of Wolverine from 2017’s Logan. In one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, Logan was done with life, with nothing to live for until he met his daughter X-23. Hugh Jackman’s portrayal of an old man Logan completely changed the way audiences see the character of Wolverine. I doubt many of us will change the way we see Nick Fry after these first two episodes. Every character that sees Fury tells him that he was different after the blip, but how? We didn’t see him after the blip. Fury was actually blipped himself so he didn’t really miss anything so why is this having so much of an impact on him? We also saw Fury in a post credit scene in Spider-Man: far From Home and he was living his best life on a spaceship in a beach setting. Why does he seem to wish he was dead now? These are questions that have not been answered thus far, but seem like a cheap way to add dimension to a character where it wasn’t earned.

This show really feels like it should have been a grand movie for us to see on the big screen. I would love to see the Skulls battling and imitating the Avengers and making everyone, audience included, wonder who was truly our heroes. Disney continues to pour millions of dollars into projects that should have been major successes but instead are cheaply-made, boring, disappointing messes. I will continue to watch Secret Invasion as it comes out, but I doubt it’s going to get much better from here. If past marvel shows are of any precedence, it will only get worse. I am giving Secret Invasion’s first two episodes “Resurrection” and “Promises” a C.

Marvel’s Secret Invasion releases a new episode every Wednesday on Disney Plus.

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