The following is a spoiler-free review of episode 4 of Secret Invasion, ‘Beloved’, streaming now on Disney+.
Things are getting explosive – sometimes literally – as we head into the second half of Secret Invasion. Episode four is a chapter of significant reveals, pulling back the curtain on one of the Skrull rebellion’s biggest secrets and enacting some of leader Gravik’s most dastardly moves. It’s damning, then, that this mercifully short episode is the weakest of the season so far, suffering from impactless drama, poor dialogue, and dull direction.
As you’d expect from the middle act of an espionage thriller, this week’s Secret Invasion starts to unravel the story’s knots and play some of its major cards. But every single one of these dramatic revelations feel muted; some were so clearly telegraphed in prior episodes that they simply are not surprises, while another is given so little room to breathe that it feels far from the major event that it should be. While there’s definitely a sense that significant things are happening and the plot is moving forward with some pace, the lack of genuine shock or surprise means it all feels at best mundane and at worst inconsequential. The events of Secret Invasion should feel pivotal to the MCU, but even in its most eventful half hour it feels disappointingly dull.
The first half of the season could at least rely on its solid script to push it through the lack of excitement, but this week even that falters. Any sense of Fury wrestling with his post-Blip PTSD has been left by the wayside, and he’s operating closer to business as usual rather than a man fighting through his darkest hour. Writer Brian Tucker attempts to find a more tender side to him through a romantic conversation with his wife, Priscilla, but despite admirable efforts from Samuel L. Jackson and Charlayne Woodard the whole thing comes across corny rather than authentic.
Secret Invasion still feels the need to deliver on the franchise’s seemingly mandatory comedy quota.
Much better scripting can be found in a playful conversation between Fury and Don Cheadle’s Rhodey, which makes full use of Jackson’s signature wit. But good as the sequence is, it once again brings into question Secret Invasion’s struggle with tone. Its colour palette, subject matter, and events frequently drive home that this is a serious, gritty outing for the MCU’s more down-to-earth characters, and yet it still feels the need to deliver on the franchise’s seemingly mandatory comedy quota. The promise of the MCU was that it could use its many different characters and stories to explore a variety of genres, but Secret Invasion is further proof that it can’t escape its own formula trappings.
After a fairly action-light first three episodes, this week sees an extended sequence of gunfire, explosions, and crashing vehicles. But despite the potential for excitement, the scene is directed in a pedestrian fashion that does little to elevate your heart rate. While it uses the muted colours of the Russo’s Captain America films, there’s none of The Winter Soldier’s energy to the shooting style, nor the fun framing of Civil War. Instead we have a series of boilerplate images of men with guns, punctuated by CGI shots of missiles and helicopters that feel oddly choppy. Characters move almost reactionless through the fray, and moments in which there’s supposed to be some crunch – such as when Ben Mendelsohn’s Talos punches his way through a window – feel flat and flimsy. While the lack of superheroes always meant that Secret Invasion was going to miss the action flare of other MCU projects, it’s baffling that it doesn’t try to match the energetic direction of the Bourne movies that are arguably the origin point for Marvel’s espionage aesthetic.
Perhaps episode four’s biggest failure, though, is to add any sense of complexity to Gravik’s plot. The Skrull rebellion is working to take control of the entire planet, and yet there’s still no great sense of how Gravik aims to achieve this. Last week’s episode revolved around simply infiltrating a nuclear submarine, with little time spent explaining how the Skrulls achieved this and why it was vital to their overall plan. It’s a similar story this week – another rote concept with little underpinning it – and once again the only real detail in the plan is that the Skrulls’ ability to disguise themselves as humans allows them to do pretty much anything they please. But it’s not just Gravik’s side of the war that suffers from such simplification; this week we also see Talos explain his own plans for survival, and it’s equally weak in its reasoning. Secret Invasion should be knotty, twisty, and layered with complications. Instead, all we have is a barebones idea that’s already outstayed its welcome.
After a couple of years of multiverse-hopping stories and space adventures, Secret Invasion is a welcome return for the MCU’s lesser-used gritty espionage template. It shares a lot of common ground with the Winter Soldier projects, but manages to stand apart thanks to an almost total absence of superheroes and a solid cast of messy central characters. The first two episodes lack the sense of fear that a paranoid thriller really needs, and there’s already the sense that any reveal won’t match the impact of those in the story’s comic book inspiration, but Secret Invasion’s dark tale is nonetheless off to a solid start.
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