WARNING: Spoilers for Season 1, Episode 1 of What If?
The MCU's first animation has arrived in the form of What If?, a show that uses it's title question to examine alternate versions of Marvel characters across the multiverse with this first episode imaging a world where Peggy Carter rather than Steve Rogers ended up being given the super soldier serum.
The show has a framing device where the Watcher, voiced by Jeffrey Wright, introduces the context of the episode. I found it interesting that the Watcher only appeared in silhouette here and didn't narrate the whole way through the episode as I might have imagined. As much as he promises that he can't and won't interfere, I wonder if later in the series we may see him do just that, or perhaps at least see a Marvel character meet the Watcher in person.
The animation works really well here. It's done in a fairly realistic style rather than in a cartoon-ish way, mainly because virtually every character who appears is based on a real actor. It reminds me of the animation style used to recreate missing episodes of Doctor Who from the 60s although the higher budget here makes it significantly better than those. It also works really well for the action sequences, of which there are many, as it means they don't have to worry about the practicality and physics of stunts and can just do what they want. It works especially well in a montage sequence which feels closer to style of Marvel comic books than we've ever seen in the MCU before.
It's great to see that Marvel have managed to get virtually every cast member back to do the voicework on this episode. It makes sense that they can get Sebastian Stan, who incidentally has a lot of fun here, but it's impressive that they've managed to lure back the likes of Stanley Tucci and even Bradley Witford, whose small role in the Agent Carter one-shot is greatly expanded here.
There are a couple of notable exceptions- Huge Weaving isn't back as the Red Skull but that's not a great issue as they got back Ross Marquand who played the character in Endgame. Chris Evans doesn't appear as Steve Rogers which is yet another strong indication that he's not going to return to the MCU anytime soon. Prolific voice actor Josh Keaton voices Rogers in this episode and actually I didn't find it hugely distracting that it wasn't Chris Evans. It's a good move from Marvel to hire great voice actors like Keaton to fill in the roles that the original casts are returning to as they are hugely talented at what they do.
I really liked the way that the scenario of this episode was set-up. It all hinges on the moment when Dr. Erskine asks Peggy if she would be more comfortable in a booth. In The First Avenger she says yes and leaves the floor but here she says no and this seemingly simple decision has a huge influence on what happens next. Now Heinz Kruger ends up using his lighter before Steve is given the super-soldier serum, meaning Steve is shot and Peggy is forced to take the serum herself.
On the whole the plot then broadly follows the plot of The First Avenger with a few notable differences. One is that Steve Rogers still has a prominent role here and takes on the mantle of the Tesseract-powered Hydra Stomper which closely resembles the Iron Man Mark 1 suit. This is a cool addition to the world of The First Avenger and it's fantastic to see Captain Carter and the Hydra Stomper fighting together.
The other most notable difference is that Carter saves Bucky from falling off the train, complete with Barnes spouting the episode's best line "you almost ripped my arm off". One of the things I've been reflecting on is how the timeline continues after this episode. Carter of course ends up in the 21st century and events and will presumably take part in fighting off Loki and the Chitahuri in the Battle of New York in much the same way as Steve Rogers did in The Avengers.
The fact she saved Bucky Barnes though might indicate this world doesn't have a Winter Soldier and that has interesting ramifications, not least on the fact that he doesn't kill Tony Stark's parents. What would Iron Man be like if Howard Stark was still around? Perhaps Obadiah Stane killed him instead? Of course, in this timeline the iron man suit basically exists already in the Hydra Stomper so that too could have an influence on how the timeline plays out. If a Winter Soldier does exist in this universe, who holds that mantle? This is all interesting speculation as it's been reported that there will be a Captain Carter episode in season 2 of What If? and the logical assumption is that it would be a parallel version of The Winter Soldier. If this does turn out to be the case I'll be fascinated to see who they pick as this universe's winter soldier if one exists at all- could we see Steve Rogers himself in this role?
It's also been rumored that Hayley Atwell will appear in live-action as Captain Carter in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and if that does prove to be true I can see how this happens in the context of the episode. We see Captain Carter push the creature through the portal to save her world and then next appear in 2012 at SHIELD. This leaves a tantalizing gap where Carter could have had another adventure. The creature appears to be Shuma-Gorath who is primarily a Doctor Strange foe in the comic books. We don't see the creature attempt to get through the portral in 2012 and it appears that Carter has sliced off at least some of it's tentacles. This all points to a possible scene in Multiverse of Madness where Carter meets Strange and co and together they take down Shuma-Gorath.
I felt it was a strong start for the animated show and I can't wait to see what comes next. I do however hope that every episode doesn't so closely follow the plot of the films though and we get some wider variations in some future installments- the Marvel zombies episode suggests this might well be the case.
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