WARNING: Spoilers for Season 1, Episode 5 of What If?
Marvel Zombies have been a popular line of comic books for some time now and there was a reference in Spider-Man: Far From Home with an undead Iron Man courtesy of Mysterio's imagery but I think most fans never thought they'd see Marvel Studios do zombies. Here though in What If? they have done exactly that.
The episode opens with Bruce Banner crashing through the roof of the Sanctum Santorum having been sent there by Heimdall, suggesting the opening scene of Avengers: Infinity War remains much the same. Things on Earth are very different and Banner finds an apparently empty city before Ebony Maw and Obsidian Cull arrive just like they do in Infinity War. Then it's revealed that this is in fact a world ravaged my zombies as zombified Iron Man, Doctor Strange and Wong appear.
It turns out that this nightmare originated from a version of the climax of Ant-Man and the Wasp. In this universe Janet Van Dyne had become infected in the quantum realm and she quickly passed the zombie infection to Hank and the pair then returned to our realm, leading to a zombie apocalypse. This is now the second universe that has had it's Avengers wiped out by Hank Pym and it's beginning to be a worrying trait.
The way the zombies are done in this episode is interesting. The general public seem to resemble the classic shambling zombies but the Avengers-zombies are a little different. For one thing they retain their powers and it was this that led to the zombie virus spreading so efficiently across the Earth. They also seem to retain some level of intelligence, or at least an instinct from who they once were- we how they can still use their abilities from portals to shrinking and growing like they could in life.
Banner joins up with the remaining Avengers who a really random bunch, mostly without powers of any kind. I found it interesting that this was a fairly unpowered group- Happy Hogan and Kurt essentially have no combat abilities and Sharon Carter may be a decent fighter but has no powers. Bucky is seriously tough and the metal arm probably is an advantage when fighting zombies. I liked how it was Bucky who had to take out the zombified versions of both his friends, Sam Wilson and then later Steve Rogers, as if the man hadn't already been traumatised enough.
Peter Parker is awesome in this episode as a Spider-Man who somehow manages to remain optimistic despite the world dying around him. For the first time we see this version of Spider-Man mention the death of his Uncle Ben which is the best suggestion yet that the inspiring character did indeed exist in the MCU. The other great hero of this team is Hope Van Dyne and I think it's the best treatment the character has had so far, not defined by Scott Lang or Hank Pym and able to step into the spotlight herself. I've never found the character to be particularly interesting in the MCU but this episode highlighted just how great she can be when written correctly.
The team head to base in the hope of finding a cure there and discover Vision, protected by the Mind Stone. Initially it appears that with the Vision's help they can relatively easily save the world and cure the zombies, indicated by the fact the Scott Lang has been resurrected, albeit as only a head. It transpires though that Vision is really attempting to look after Wanda, who is now the most powerful zombie on the planet that even the Mind stone can't save. Vision has even gone so far as to kidnap Black Panther to gradually feed to zombie-Wanda which is a really disturbing thought. I feels like an interesting inversion of WandaVision in a way, with both character doing awful things in an attempt to resurrect their dead lovers. Even Vision can't really understand what he has done and pulls the Mind Stone from his own head, in a sort of twisted Romeo and Juliet-style tragic ending.
For a moment it appears like this world will be saved as Spider-Man, the one-legged Black Panther and the reincarnated-head of Scott Lang floating with the cloak of levitation (this episode was wild wasn't it?) head to Wakanda. In a brief epilogue though the Watcher suggests that this whole universe is doomed as Thanos has reached Wakanda and become infected with the zombie virus himself. We see him about to use the infinity gauntlet and the episode ends. It's unclear exactly what happened next but I assume that this zombified-version of Thanos only has a desire to destroy and wipes out all life in this universe, not just half.
In the three most recent episodes of What If? then we've seen the Avengers be murdered, Doctor Strange lose himself to grief leading to the end of the universe and humanity being wiped out by a zombie apocalypse and Thanos ending the universe. Marvel have done an excellent job at avoiding being too bleak, somehow using love, hope and humour whilst traversing some very dark places. I'm intrigued to see whether there's any particular logic to the order of the episodes and wonder if the Watcher will find himself intervening after seeing universe after universe be destroyed...
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