Well, “Secret Invasion” had to end. The show had a few great episodes, but coming into the finale, it has overall been a lackluster affair. I gave it a 50/50 chance of either going out with a bang or a whimper.
It was the latter. Spoilers ahead.
So, what went wrong? It’s a culmination of everything the show has failed to nail down.
We start the episode with dual plot lines involving Nick Fury (Sam Jackson) going after Gravik (Kingsley Ben-Adir) at New Skrullos in Russia, where he essentially gives Gravik the Harvest — a cocktail of DNA from multiple Avengers collected after their fight against Thanos. Gravik for some reason uses his machine to give both him and Fury superpowers, which allows Fury to fight him off.
There is a twist — shocker, this Fury is actually Gi’ah (Emilia Clarke) in disguise — one of the few times the show has used the misdirection the Skrulls’ shapeshifting offers them.
Meanwhile, the real Fury is out to protect the U.S. president from Skrull Rhodey (Don Cheadle), who is trying to convince him to launch an attack on Russia.
At the end of the day, all is well as the bad guys are all killed and armageddon is averted — for now. The president overreacts and decides to declare war on all Skrulls — even the ones that are trying to help Fury. This is incredibly bad, as with Skrull Rhodey and Gravik out of the way, there is no dangerous Skrull leader to deal with, but it might force Gi’ah into that role. It was a clear mistake, but I suppose something had to set up “Secret Wars” …
The action in this is terrible — Gi’ah and Gravik’s fight is less compelling than Ryan Reynolds’ Marvel-inspired fight in “Free Guy” and it looks somehow worse in this episode despite being the same concept (a hodgepodge of Avengers’ superpowers) in an original Marvel production.
Fury’s arc comes to a close with a whimper. Jackson is clearly too old to be playing this sort of action character and the show adds insult on top of injury by giving him nothing to work with. Fury from Episode 1 is the same Fury from Episode 6 — he doesn’t change, gain or lose anything. Jackson is an incredible talent wasted by a subpar script.
Gravik and Gi’ah represent the largest missed opportunities for the show. Gravik was almost a sympathetic villain but his lack of development makes him join the very large Hall of Forgettable MCU villains, while Clarke was absolutely wasted by being given no developmental screen time. Her character drifts from one event to another, but we never take the time to understand her or her conflict. Then there’s the crime of killing off Ben Mendelsohn’s Talos, who was the one thing pumping air under this show’s wings — without him, there’s nothing to ground this conflict.
“Secret Invasion” serves as a complex mess of a backstory as to why Skrulls in the MCU have a tenuous relationship with humans on Earth. This should have been a slick 2-hour feature with Fury and some lesser-known Avengers (perhaps Hawkeye or Yelena, the new Black Widow). It doesn’t work as a 6-episode TV show.
“Secret Invasion” Season 1: Episode 6 “Home” gets a 6/10
“Secret Invasion” Season 1 gets a 6/10
InReview 
Leave a comment