Marvel's ‘What If..?’ Episode 3: “What If... the World Lost Its Mightiest Heroes?” Recap and Review
This week, Marvel’s most imaginative series takes us to a dark reality where Nick Fury was never able to bring the Avengers together.
WARNING: Contains Spoilers
The third episode of What If..? is here, and the show seems to really be finding its stride. In the show’s darkest timeline to date, we return to Nick Fury’s recruitment of the original Avengers. We watch heroes fall and villains rise in a chaotic reimagining of the early days of the MCU, which certainly does not shy away from altering the timeline and guiding it down some darkly twisted paths. The episode mostly takes the form of a murder mystery, following Fury and his S.H.I.E.L.D. agents as they try and discover who is responsible for the murders of earth’s mightiest heroes - and deal with the fallout.
The Recap
This instalment of What If..? opens with Nick Fury approaching Tony Stark and presenting the concept of an Avengers Initiative - a team of super-powered heroes to come together and protect the planet from invasion or threat. The scene, which initially appeared in Iron Man 2, quickly diverts from the way it originally played out, with Tony Stark’s sudden death seemingly at the hands of Black Widow’s lithium dioxide injection. Agent Romanoff is then apprehended by S.H.I.E.L.D. and held for the murder of Tony Stark, as Nick Fury is called away to another familiar scene from the MCU’s past - Thor’s signature hammer Mjolnir arriving on earth. Exactly as it happens in Thor, the team sets up a perimeter around the mysterious hammer and watches it closely, until Thor manages to break through and make his way towards it. In another shocking diversion from the original story, Hawkeye’s arrow unintentionally flies from his bow, striking the God dead as he reaches for Mjolnir. Hawkeye is also imprisoned by S.H.I.E.L.D, and kept on site at a secure prison facility. Meanwhile, Romanoff manages to escape from custody as she is being transferred, but not before beating up a bunch of armed guards in classic Black Widow fashion and sneaking away.
When Nick Fury goes to interrogate Clint after the shocking murder of Thor, things start to unravel even further - as he finds him dead in his prison cell. The guards insist that nobody has been inside the cell other than Clint, and Fury begins to realise that something extremely suspicious is happening with the potential members of his Avengers Initiative. At the same time, Natasha has made her way to the laboratory of Dr Ross, daughter of Thaddeus Ross and girlfriend of none other than the Incredible Hulk. Seeking advice over who could have framed her for Stark’s murder, Natasha asks her to take a look at the evidence she has brought along. From examining the syringe with which Natasha injected Stark, Ross is able to deduce that some sort of small nanotech device was installed and used to trigger whatever killed him.
Back at the S.H.I.E.LD. camp, Fury receives a call of distress from Coulson as he watches Loki and his Asgardian army descend to earth, seeking revenge for the murder of his brother. After a few moments of threats and negotiations, Fury manages to convince Loki to help him find out who has been killing his prospective heroes, in return for his revenge. He goes on to call Natasha and warns her that either she or Bruce Banner will probably be next. As S.H.I.E.L.D’s forces advance on her, she finds Banner and warns him of what she’s just been told. Inevitably, however, it’s just too late. The agents that have arrived to apprehend the fugitive Black Widow, led by Thaddeus Ross himself, wind up killing Banner during his transition into the Hulk, and Black Widow is forced to flee again. She manages to use Coulson’s secret details to access a classified file that has all the answers to the mystery, and manages to tell Fury that the answer lies with ‘Hope’, before she is attacked by an unknown force and disappears. It doesn’t take long for Fury to realise that the ‘Hope’ in question is Hope Van Dyne, Hank Pym’s late daughter who died on a special ops mission in Ukraine several years earlier. Fury confronts Hank and manages to subdue him with Loki’s help, but not before Loki predictably betrays him and proceeds with his quest to enslave the human race and conquer the world. Without the Avengers to stop him, he is easily successful. The episode ends with Fury calling upon the only two remaining forces to help bring the world back to balance, Steve Rogers and Captain Marvel.
The Review
As you will be able to tell from the syopsis alone, this week's episode is much darker and mature than the previous two. However, the show still presents this concept in a way that is accessible to all audiences, and uses its animated style to mould the show's tone and atmopshere around the story. It doesn't feel all that different from the previous episodes in that respect, but the way it blends a totally original story with previously established MCU events is exactly what the series had been missing until now. Episode 1 brought us a fairly predictable and ordinary reimagining of Captain America’s origin story, and Episode 2 explored the cosmic world with a completely new story - Episode 3 takes the best aspects of the show’s previous instalments and develops something totally unique and exciting, using the MCU’s most successful and entertaining components. It’s almost entirely character-driven, and its use of characters that we already care about such as Nick Fury, Black Widow, and the entire Avengers team makes this easily the most exciting and captivating story that the show has given us so far, even if it’s going to be fairly inaccessible to those who aren’t familiar with this period of the MCU.
The episode perfectly blends a serious, dark narrative with the show’s signature light humour and bold animation in a way that finally works really well. The episode’s take on a murder mystery is totally original and fun to watch, whilst blending that with this world that fans can easily lose themselves in and spend more time with characters that probably won’t be returning to the main timeline. In that respect, the show has finally found its place within the franchise. It finally uses its premise of alternate realities to explore wild and wonderful concepts that are only possible in this format . When it doesn’t take itself too seriously, the show can be a great outlet for traversing possibilities that the main timeline has deemed impossible, and spending time with characters that we won’t see returning any time soon. The story may be a little messy, and frustratingly ends on an unsatisfying cliffhanger, but it’s so entertaining that it’s easy to overlook this for the most part.
Overall, Episode 3 of What If? displays a huge improvement for the show, and finally has me excited to see where it goes next. We already know that the writers have some crazy concepts up their sleeves, and plan on bringing back plenty of fan-favourite characters that, if done in a similar style to this, could make for a greatly entertaining half an hour. The technical quality of the show has been consistently impressive throughout, and I’m truly excited to see which other worlds, universes and timelines they can bring to life with this original style. What If..? has finally established it’s position within (or outside) the MCU, not relying on those original stories for inspiration anymore, but rather bringing the beloved characters into worlds that are only possible here.