Marvel’s What If? Episodes 7-9 Review
Credit to: Disney and Marvel StudiosLooks like we’re in the endgame now
Welcome back, y’all! This time around, we’re taking a look at the last three episodes of Marvel’s What If? Wow, it feels like this series only just recently launched, and now it’s already ending! Gotta say, this was a very good way to close out this first season. While I do of course have my issues, I have been having a good time with this series. The final episode was a great closer, and has definitely kept my interest, but let me not spoil my final thoughts. Without any further ado, let’s just jump right into it.
Episode 7: What if… Thor were an only child?
After the usual monologue, we find ourselves in the middle of the night, in the van of Jane Foster and good old Darcy Lewis, who’s trying to flick peanuts in a coffee cup as Jane sleeps. A beep goes off on one of their devices, and Darcy shakes Jane awake. Jane calls SHIELD, informing them that if her data is correct, then an alien invasion is about to happen, but she’s shut down. After many failed calls, she’s interrupted by more intense beeping from her device. Both Darcy and Jane look outside when they see a bright light shoot across the sky, thinking the “invasion” has begun. The light lands in Las Vegas, and the citizens stare in fear. Multiple silhouettes stand in the light, with a deep ominous voice informing the people that their lives are about to come to an end. The figure walks out and tells them to prepare… for the party prince, and reveals himself as Thor. Now, if “party prince” wasn’t obvious enough, let me tell you, this episode is terribly corny, which is why this breakdown is going to be pretty short. Anyways, the people are suddenly okay with these extraterrestrials when random techno music starts playing, and they all start partying. Jumping ahead, we find out what Thor was up to before coming to Earth. He watched Odin fall into Odinsleep, was told by his mother Frigga to study and behave, and was stared down by Heimdall. Thor explains to his usual buddies, the Warriors Four, that he won’t be a boring king like Odin, and says Heimdall won’t be watching Earth because… plot. Anyways, we cut to Thor’s party on Earth, and it attracts all kinds of aliens looking for a party, including Loki and the Frost Giants, with Loki actually being a giant… and frosty. Jane and Darcy head to the party to investigate, and of course Jane is attracted to Thor. Howard the Duck is present, and hits on Darcy who plays hard to get. The party rages on, Darcy and Jane get drunk with Thor and friends, Jane and Thor get tattoos together, and Darcy and Howard the Duck get married by an Elvis impersonator. Um, alright. The following morning, we see Jane and Thor asleep in Jane’s house, with a couple of other alien creatures, including Rocket Raccoon, who’s fast asleep in her sink. Jane rushes to the door as SHIELD knocks, and we see Maria Hill, the Acting Director of SHIELD interrogating Jane about her involvement with the aliens. She’s the acting director since Nick Fury was knocked unconscious by Korg, who accidentally ran through Fury as he cannonballed into a pool. Ha. Ha ha. Ha. Hilarious. They take Jane and Darcy to a helicarrier and continue to question Jane, who tries to play coy even though she and Thor… well, you know… bumped uglies. Anyways, Maria pulls out a beeper to make an important call to someone that might be able to sort Thor out. It’s Captain- ugh. It’s Captain Marvel. Since basically nothing important happens for the entire episode, let me wrap this up as much as possible. So Hill calls Captain Marvel, who flies to Vegas to try and stop Thor’s party. The two fight of course, as Thor jokes around during the brawl. It comes to a stop (the first time) when Thor places Mjolnir on her chest. The two get into another fight eventually, which brings them to a desolate area far from civilization, and Hill is about to hit Thor with a nuke for some stupid reason. The fight stops when Frigga appears as a magical vision, and she says she’s coming to Midgard. Thor and everyone clean up Earth, and by the time Frigga arrives, Thor and everyone pretend that they’ve been studying. Mjolnir however has graffiti on it, giving away Thor’s deception, but Frigga lets it go. Jane and Thor get together, aaand that’s the episode. At least until a silhouette of Ultron appears, and his armor is full of the Infinity Stones. Ugh. What… I mean… what even was this?
I don’t have much to say, honestly. Was it funny? Not too much, no. Was it interesting? Barely. Was the story good? What story? This episode was just garbage. Cool little scene at the end, but nothing else was interesting or funny here.
0.5 out of 5.
Episode 8: What if… Ultron won?
For this episode, we get the usual monologue, but as The Watcher explains this story, he surprisingly tells us that this story breaks his heart. It doesn’t surprise me that he cares, but it’s surprising that out of all the things he must’ve seen, this is the one story that really gets to him. That’s pretty deep. Moving forward, we see our good old Black Widow zooming on a motorcycle in a destroyed city, wearing a post apocalyptic outfit. She’s getting chased down by a wave of Ultron sentries, but is supported by Hawkeye, who’s sporting the Ronin haircut, a cloak that has invisibility tech, and a robotic arm. He’s been through some serious S-word. He rains down a bunch of arrows down on the bots as Nat zips through the city, but the bots notice Clint, who’s forced to use the last of his arrows and engage in hand-to-hand combat. Nat is tackled off of her motorcycle, but handles the bots with her impressive fighting style. Nat and Clint meet up after handling the bots, and we find out that they’re actually in Russia, looking for clues to take down Ultron. The Watcher explains what exactly went wrong in this world. Here, Ultron successfully completes Vision, and uses Vision as his new body. Not only does Ultron successfully defeat the Avengers, but he launches every single nuke in the world at every single corner of the planet, destroying all of life, leaving Nat and Clint as the only known survivors. Not only this, but after his victory, Thanos comes to Earth with the Infinity Gauntlet. Ultron finds it fascinating, and uses the Mind Stone to literally cut Thanos in half. He cuts the stones out of the gauntlet, and they swirl around Ultron’s body, creating an intense suit of armor that combines the Vision and Ultron designs together. He uses the power of the stones to raise an army of Ultron sentries, and proceeds to use his power to destroy every single corner of the universe. After this universal conquest, Ultron rests in space. The Watcher begins to speak to us as the audience about Ultron’s victory, but something goes… wrong. Ultron hears him. He actually hears The Watcher, and tries to find him. The Watcher gasps and backs away from this sight, but assures himself that Ultron isn’t so invincible, that there’s still hope for this universe. We head back to Nat and Clint, who venture deep inside of an old Russian base, searching for files upon files of intelligence that could possibly help in their efforts against Ultron. Nat finds the old shield that used to belong to the Red Guardian, and keeps it for herself. Clint gives up as he becomes more and more hopeless, but Nat finally finds the right file, a file on Arnim Zola, the old HYDRA scientist who uploaded his brain to two top secret data banks. The Watcher rests for a moment knowing that they finally did it, but is caught off guard when Ultron suddenly bursts through into his dimension. Ultron actually attacks The Watcher, as he tells him he needs to silence all of the universes. Back with Clint and Nat, we see them threatening the Zola AI to help them dismantle the Ultron AI, and he agrees after seeing Clint about to pour water all over the data bank. Wrapping up a bit here, Clint and Nat transfer the Zola AI into an arrow and decide to attract some Ultron sentries. A massive horde of them appear, but they successfully draw one out to implant the Zola AI into, giving him a body to move around in, but they wisely take out his legs. Zola tries to establish a hive mind connection with the rest of the sentries, but it fails when he informs them that Ultron doesn’t seem to be in the universe. As they escape, Clint sadly has to sacrifice himself, by causing a huge explosion, taking out the enormous horde of sentries, saving Nat and the Zola AI. We finally cut to Ultron and The Watcher, who have an INSANE inter-dimensional battle that goes from universe to universe. Ultron eventually comes out on top when The Watcher flees, but before the episode ends, we see The Watcher find none other than Evil Doctor Strange still trapped in his little pocket dimension, asking for his help. The end.
This episode was absolutely insane. The level of power we see Ultron have is frightening, and the amount of despair and hopelessness is just intense. This was a very well thought out episode, and it’s one that actually connects to the next, final episode. This was a huge job well done, I really enjoyed this one with literally no complaints.
5 out of 5.
Episode 9: What if… The Watcher Broke His Oath?
Here we are, at the final episode of the first season. It’s been a pretty wild ride, but let’s wrap it up shall we? We start off with our girl Captain Carter, sporting a modern look to her Captain Britain (unofficial title) outfit and a new hairstyle, having the same conversation with Natasha as Steve did in the quinjet in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Peggy jumps out of the aircraft, boards the pirate ship, takes out a bunch of mercenaries, and engages with Batroc the Leaper just like our Cap did. Before they can fully trade blows, Peggy sees The Watcher, as he tells her that she’s being summoned. The Watcher reaches out to her, Party Thor, Killmonger, T’Challa (as Star-Lord), and Gamora, who’s wearing Thanos’s battle armor and is wielding his sword. Apparently, she’s a survivor of Sakaar (gladiator planet from the comics and Thor: Ragnarok) and the killer of Thanos. Pretty badass. They all gather in a pub environment created by Doctor Strange, and are all confronted by The Watcher. He informs them all of the important calling they’ve been given, and informs them of the Ultron threat. He dubs them the Guardians of the Multiverse. He and Strange inform them of his current goal against the multiverse, and introduce them to the idea of the Infinity Stones. They go over a plan, to which Gamora pulls something called an Infinity Crusher, something that’s been designed to destroy the stones. Um… okay, that just… exists? Anyways, with a plan in place, they’re all transported to a deserted planet that apparently Ultron pays no mind to, since there’s no activity to alert him. They all have a few drinks, but Thor gets too excited when he summons some celebratory lightning, which brings Ultron straight to them. As he descends on the planet, Strange places powerful protection spells on them all, readying them. Watcher creates a portal, transporting Gamora and Killmonger. Thor shouts “Viva Las Vegas” as he shoots ineffective lightning at Ultron, as everyone including Ultron watches him with confusion. After this embarrassing moment, the battle finally begins. There’s shooting, there’s magic, there’s all of that good stuff, but during the fight, T’Challa manages to smoothly snatch the Soul Stone from Ultron, removing a huge chunk of his power. Watcher creates another portal for everyone to escape through, but to cause a distraction, Strange summons a portal himself before also escaping with the others, transporting a MASSIVE horde of zombies on top of Ultron. Ultron immediately destroys the zombies, all except one: Wanda. Zombie Wanda uses her magic to hold attack Ultron and hold him off for a while, but Ultron creates a huuuuge explosion, destroying the entire planet instantly. Our heroes are transported to the universe that Ultron won in, meeting back up with Gamora and Killmonger. As Peggy throws the stone to Gamora so she can destroy, Natasha suddenly drives between them, nabbing the stone. They all have a standoff with her, until Peggy manages to calm her down and have her join them. Suddenly, Ultron arrives in this universe, ready to take back the stone. Strange casts a protection spell on Nat, and the fight starts again. A long, wonderful battle ensues, where we see Gamora fail to destroy the stone since it’s not from the same universe as the Crusher, we see Strange use some super powerful magic to go toe-to-toe with Ultron, and we see some remarkable teamwork. During the battle, Strange holds off Ultron long enough for Nat to shoot an arrow containing the Zola AI close enough at Ultron for Peggy to grab it, and stab it into Ultron. The Zola AI starts to successfully take over Ultron’s body, and eliminate the Ultron AI. As everyone thinks the fight is over, Killmonger uses the opportunity to take the stones and create armor for himself. As the heroes try to talk him out of it, Zola in the Ultron body separates the stones from him, and the two struggle to take the stones from one another. Strange uses the opportunity to place both Zola and Killmonger in a tiny pocket dimension, successfully removing the threat of Ultron, Zola, and Killmonger from the multiverse. Strange takes the tiny pocket dimension with him in his own pocket universe, where The Watcher entrusts Strange to watch over that pocket dimension, making sure they never escape from it. The Watcher takes the heroes back to the pub, where he informs them that once they return home, they’ll have no memory of their encounter. They all return, all except one: Natasha. She lets out her anger at The Watcher, telling him that he probably doesn’t even care about everything he’s seen when he could’ve intervened, but The Watcher informs her with a heartfelt tone that every story he’s ever watched has meant everything to him. So much so, that he takes her to a new reality where the Avengers lost their Black Widow. Natasha smiles, and joins her new friends in the battle against Loki, where she successfully defeats him after catching him by surprise. The end… not. We get a nice little end credits scene of Captain Carter and her own respective Natasha, where Natasha leads Peggy to a shipping container, and shows her the HYDRA Stomper. This alone surprises Peggy, but Natasha tells her they found someone inside of it, filling Peggy with surprise and happiness. The end.
That was such a touching ending. I really would love to see this version of Captain Carter interact with our Captain America in the MCU, that would be great. This was yet another solid episode, it really was. I loved the ending, I loved the story, it was just great. Not a fan of some jokes and the Infinity Crusher, but it’s still a fantastic ending.
4.5 out of 5.
Final Thoughts
While it sucks to already say, “See you later”, to this series, we can all be happy knowing that we’ll get the second season soon enough. Man, it’s been a great ride. This was such an interesting project, and I really can’t wait to see what they bring us next time. I’ve got my issues with this series, but it’s been almost entirely positive. But what did you think? If you enjoyed the review, let me know on my Instagram and Twitter, and make sure you’re following to stay up to date with the latest entertainment news and reviews. That’s all from me, this has been The Wolf Den!
