Running MCU thread

I generally enjoyed Secret Invasion. For whatever reason, this is the first MCU Disney+ show that I've watched in real time. There was some potential with it, but that ending fell flat. Way too rushed, things that didn't makes sense, and several plot holes that looked like the ones the 1990s Cowboys' offensive line used to open for Emmitt Smith:
• There is a major assassination attempt on the President of the United States. He's not immediately returned to the U.S. even though he's not seriously injured? They were only a few miles from the airport and Air Force One when the convoy was attacked, for chrissakes.
• The president is in a hospital that is not on total lockdown? The city is not on total lockdown? Superspies or not, Fury and Falsworth should not have been able to get within a literal mile of that hospital.
• If Rhodey has been a Skrull for almost 10 years, seemingly replaced after Civil War, then almost his entire MCU character arc is null and void. It means that he was a Skrull during all of the Infinity War saga, and the real Rhodey doesn't even know Tony Stark is dead. I think he at least has a show coming up to deal with that fallout, but that seems insulting to his character and the audience.
• The fucking president again ... I don't care if Fury called him out on it, or if they immediately showed how dumb it was by having at least one of his counterparts assassinated, the U.S. president just declared to the world that an army of shapeshifting aliens who could impersonate anyone is invading the world. How does that not immediately launch the entire world into chaos?
• Before he went back to space, Fury didn't take 10 minutes to explain to the president that he's had thousands of Skrulls working for the government for the past 30 years?
• G'iah (Gaia? Gaea?) is going to be trouble. And I don't mean for anyone who crosses her. How the hell do they handle a character who is that overpowered? If you have questions about why they don't call in the Avengers for certain world-threatening situations, is the answer for why they don't have G'iah on speed dial that she's on her lunch break? They're going to have to nerf her hard or have her pull a Poochy while searching for a new Skrull home world.

The first five episodes of this were fine. The last one, they faceplanted and fell into a sinkhole.

 

I think only one part of the body at a time can have that power.

That’s why she went sword right away to take his head off.

The F4 can beat a Super Skrull, right?

 

Also, the first batch of DNA Gravik used to augment himself made some sense. Cull Obsidian lost an arm in New York. The Frost Beast was running loose somewhere on Earth, so they could've easily killed it and gotten a sample. Groot and the Extremis folks probably left parts at various times.
But some of the final batch made no sense. Abomination was not at the Battle of Earth, at least that we saw. Did the dust that Thanos' crew turned into still contain DNA? How did they find, separate and then identify the bodily fluids from the literally hundreds of beings who were present at that battle, when it was mixed with tons of rubble, debris and ash?

 

That was past Thanos. The Thanos who snapped half of all life away was beheaded, so maybe someone took a sample? Maybe Thor took his head as a trophy?

Abomination was actually easier than the beings at the Battle of Earth. He was in prison for a long time. At the start, he was in Thunderbolt Ross's custody. Is there any doubt he got samples of Abomination's blood? Sure, they went a bit overboard and some of it is really out there, but I think your other point is the better one. G'iah is ridiculously overpowered.

 

I already responded about G'iah. I agree with you.

I don't think Fury had that many Skrulls working for him. I thought it was 30 or 40. Remember, he had no idea that there were over a million of them on Earth until Talos told him during the series. I also doubt Fury was trying to tell Ritson much of anything at that point. He was that disgusted with his speech.

President Ritson is an idiot. There is no doubt about it. Having him take the Secret Service agent's gun was stupid, too. It makes a little sense in the larger storyline. His declaration of war on aliens is a disaster. As Fury said, it's going to make him a one-term president. The rumor is that Thunderbolt Ross will be president for Captain America 4, most likely after beating Ritson in the next election.

You are probably right that the president would be rushed home as soon as he was healthy enough to travel. His status was really vague. Why the hell were they moving him in a hospital bed instead of a wheelchair?

I'm trying to remember what Rhodey even did since Civil War. There was the Tony Stank scene at the end of that movie. He messed with Banner when they arrived in Wakanda and fought in that battle. He also fought in the Battle of Earth. Remember, the Skrulls were mostly working with humanity at the time. Even those who weren't wanted Earth as their new home, so he had a vested interest in fighting off Thanos. I do get what you are saying about disrespecting the character. In that regard, the comic version of the story was much worse. In most other ways, it was a hell of a lot better.

It does seem like they are taking only some of the broadest strokes from the comics, with both stories leading to villains ending up in positions of power.

 

Secret Invasion is the direct lead-in For the Armor Wars movie.

 

I was going to say that Old Thanos was beheaded on a different planet and only a handful of the Avengers would've known what happened during that fight or where it was. But then I rewatched the scene and Rhodey was one of the ones there. He even helped to restrain Thanos. So maybe? Although it would require him to have the foresight to collect a sample, which seems like a stretch.

Good point on Abomination, although for those reasons he would've made more sense to include in the first batch of the ones that were available through other means. I thought they implied that the Harvest itself was solely from the Battle of Earth.

 

And it didn't even seem like Ritson was injured that badly. He wasn't shot during the ambush, he passed out because he was hanging upside down in the wrecked car. It didn't seem like he had much more than some cuts and bruises. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, maybe they were trying to lay low and keep his location a secret. But good luck with that.

IIRC, Rhodey was more or less running the Avengers' day-to-day operations when Infinity War starts. Cap and his crew roll into Avengers HQ and interrupt a call between Rhodey and Ross. He fights in Wakanda, then helps get the Power Stone during the time heist in Endgame, before fighting in the Battle of Earth. He'd always been a bit of a side character, but he had his moments sprinkled throughout those films.

 

I believe you are right about that, which is another bit of sloppy dialogue in the show.

Remember, that was probably Skrull Rhodey who was with the Avengers when Thor beheaded Thanos. Skrulls are spies. They are also aware of their difficulty in copying beings with superpowers. I'm not sure it is that much of a stretch to have her collect the sample. (It's weird to use female pronouns there, but the Skrull who replaced Rhodey was female.)

 

I'm just thinking we didn't see him much, which was a waste of Don Cheadle. Then again, maybe he only signed on for a smaller role. He was important and had no superhuman abilities to replicate, which is why the Skrulls wanted to replace him. The theory I've heard is that he was replaced shortly after the crash which cost him the use of his legs, or maybe right after getting mechanical ones, which is why he was in a hospital gown.

Maybe it doesn't bother me because I already saw some of the same problematic stuff in comics version, and that was so good that fans largely ignored the issue of having read stories about characters without realizing they were Skrull replacements.

 

Okay, this is actually pretty good. Two guys from the ScreenCrush YouTube channel described what they think Phase 4 should have been instead of what we got. I'm not sure I love the conclusion, but the overall storyline makes more sense.

 

But that’s not the overall storyline, just 2 guys whining on YouTube.