Dear Watchers: an omniversal comic book podcast

In another multiverse, I would have a really funny intro

line, but in this multiverse, I would just say,

welcome to Dear Watchers, an omniversal comic book

podcast where we do a deep dive into the

multiverse.

So this is the dark universe for Rob, and we are

traveling with you through the stories and the worlds that make up an

omniverse of fictional realities we all love.

And you're watchers on this journey

are. Me, Guido from Earth.

I have no idea. Earth.

Eight.

Three eight. I'll just pick an Earth we know and are going to talk about

today.

And I'm Rob, but on this Earth, I'm, like, really

tall. That's the only difference.

I'm not short. I'm tall.

But do you have the same face? Are you played by the

same actor? Just a taller version.

Yes. They use some of that Lord of the Rings

magic on me to make me taller.

The reverse hobbiting, basically.

Okay, well, before we begin today's trip

through our multiverse, Gita, what's new with us

in our little section of this galaxy?

Well, this is our first episode in two weeks, or I guess it

was two weeks ago that you had a new episode from us. Last, we

took a little break. As we've mentioned a few weeks ago, we'll

sometimes need a week between episodes to help us

prepare things and, frankly, do other things.

So we missed you. We missed

recording and sharing with you, and we definitely missed all

of your online chatter with us. But we

are happy to be back this week with a

very timely episode.

We want Victor timely episode, if you will.

No, not a Victor timely episode. Thank you.

so we want you to use these breaks when we

do take a week off to listen to old episodes.

We are on episode 120, as you're about to

hear in Rob's, transition. And

we have 119 other episodes for you to

listen to. So go back, find some of those interviews.

It's not Halloween, but we did some great horror coverage

last month, so go listen to those. So please

use our breaks to your advantage if you haven't

listened to every.

Episode, lots of Jason Voorhees content. Two

weeks of Jason Voorhees content, and one, he was

fighting Jason Voorhees. So that's almost like, extra.

It was. It was an overwhelming amount.

Well, if you are joining us for the first time, we have three parts

of our journey through the multiverse today. Origins of

the story, exploring multiversity, and

pondering possibilities. So thank you for joining us

on today's trip.

And remember that you can follow us on all social

media at. Dear Watchers, we want you to tell

us what you think the direction of the

Marvel Multiverse is, and please leave a review

wherever you're listening. A five star review really helps

us out.

And with that, dear Watchers, welcome to Episode

120. And let's check out what's happening in

the Omniverse with our travels to today's

alternate universe. And let's jump

right into Origins of the story,

where we'll explain today's question.

Right now on this very show, you're.

Going to get the answer to all your questions.

Our amazing story begins a few

years ago, so

we always start our episodes with a what if? Question.

And today we are asking the question, what if

Marvel's multiverse saga was

redirected by just one day in the

if.

You said multiverse as

multiverse. So that's an

interesting one. Maybe we should have an episode,

about. Is it multiverse or multiverse?

Multiverse. Multiverse. Multiverse. Now, it

could probably say it either.

And you say tomato. I say tomato.

You changed it up for that one

pronunciation.

Well, I've already said it about 12 million

times in just this first few minutes here,

so, Keto, let's jump into it. What is this

question we are asking today?

Well, it really just came to us because,

probably accidentally, ultimately, because we know that

Hollywood schedules are really not

that easy to move. But somehow,

literally 24 hours in the

same 24 hours, the multiverse saga

has been redirected, at least in my opinion, by

Marvel in the MCU. And it's fascinating to me that

these two things hit and did that.

So we are going to explore what the

MCU, which is 6116, for all intents and

purposes. I know some People get really irritated that it is

the Six one Six, because the comic book universe is the six one

Six, but it's

the on screen Six one six. We're going with it. So we

are going to look at the 6116

MCU and the Multiverse

in it, past, present, and

future. And, so to start us

off in this first segment, we'll look at the multiverse

in the MCU prior to this week. So, for our

first segment, spoilers only. For things that have been

out for a year or longer, if you were.

One of the few people that did not see Spider man, no

way home. Turn it off now.

So we cataloged the, MCU

Multiverse, helped along by this month's the Marvel

Cinematic Universe, an official timeline, a

great oversized hardcover book

that we are going to refer to a few times.

So we looked at all the places that the

multiverse has been present in the saga of the

same name or a little bit prior to it.

We don't include other dimensions. We don't include other

realms. We don't include time slips, which I know

Endgame makes a bit confusing because they're sort of

alternate timelines, but they're also trying to maintain, like,

a sacred timeline to use their own language. So, we're

not going to include any of those things. We're going to look at the

multiverse.

And we're not going to talk also about the Sony

animated Spider man movies, because those are more

multiversal than really anything the MCU

proper has done. But that's in another universe.

They are. And we're also going to leave out what if, even

though what the Marvel Studios team

really wants, what if to be treated as

MCU Canon, we're not going to do that.

It also feels like that show was on about 50 years ago,

and I do not remember many M details.

And season two might be coming out soon ish.

but season one, sure, all of those are Marvel

multiverses, but they're self contained. We're not dealing with

them. We're leaving them there, and maybe one day we'll see them

again. Who knows? So here's

what we've got for you in

our catalog. We've got Quentin

Beck's references in Spiderman, far from home to

a possible multiverse. And that movie came out in

July 2019. We've got the Multiverse in

Loki series one. The existence of it really

doesn't, occur until the finale, but there are

variants. So it's clear there's a multiverse throughout the series.

But that finale is the key here. And that's from July

2021. It aired. We have, of course,

Spiderman no way home, which came out in

December 2021, and Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of

Madness from May 2022.

So before we dig into the MCU chronology of

these events and what they mean, let's just talk about

now sort of our reactions to

the multiverse in those pieces.

Well, it's funny you started with Quinton Beck, because I had

forgotten about this way back in July

2019, because, of course, he,

Mysterio claims he is from the Multiverse. We see these

other creatures, and I think a lot of us were

speculating when the movie was coming out. Oh, my gosh, it's going to be a

multiverse movie. Oh, he's from the Multiverse. Turns out

that he's faking the whole time,

or is he? I'm curious how

much they had been thinking about this when

they were creating that at the time, or how much we're

now. Looking back at that

retrospectively, I would.

Think having just read the also really great,

pretty much oral history book on the MCU that came

out, my guess is

the mapping had to be to at

least where we are now. Now, things got totally

derailed by COVID and certainly this year by the Strikes,

but in 2019,

they had to know a few years out where they were going.

So I think it was intentional.

Now, was it just a sort of

Easter, eggy, teasy, jokey kind of

thing, or will it ultimately mean

something? I don't know. I just saw this week

someone speculating that, or the rumor mill,

which is all BS, of course, that Jake

Gyllenhaal is going to be Reed Richards.

So that would be a

thing.

Yeah, I don't know about that. And

I think he would have to be in the 6116, right? Because we see

he's in Tony's life, we just haven't

really actually seen him there. So

it would be quite.

Gone to another multiverse, or, like, he could have knowledge

of the multiverse that no one else has, for

whatever reason. I doubt it. But it is

possible. It is funny to think about,

and these other three examples

are the,

explicit moments in the

MCU for the multiverse, which is funny because the

saga at the time wasn't named,

so people didn't know. Of course. I was wondering about

that building in this. Ah, I should have

looked up when the saga was named, but it

was relatively recently. Perhaps it was

around the time of Doctor Strange, but I want to say it

was, slightly after, maybe even San

Diego after that. So it's just interesting that

we started getting these drops of

this narrative through line prior

to understanding that it was supposed to be

something bigger, which is, of course, what the Infinity saga

did, too. We got the teases

of Thanos, the teases of the Infinity Stones, and

then we found out, like, that is the direction we're moving

in. The infinity saga is where we're going.

So it's been sort of fun to look

back on these different examples. Let me

bring in the official chronology of these,

because that messes with you a little.

I love this book. I love that they put it out. It is so

nerdy. There are these little blurbs that Miss minutes

does when there is a discrepancy, and

that's a real discrepancy. So, like, if someone on

screen says that Wanda was

born in 1989, but in something else, it said she was

born in 1988. There's a little box where Miss Minutes

will say, oops, there's a discrepancy here. We'll have to investigate

it. And it's just a cute way of pointing to actual

contradictions in this, because, as you said,

they can't always plan everything years in advance

the way they want it. So some of it's being

retconned, and.

Everything is actually taking place a little bit more in the

future from when.

Actually, because of the five year jump in Endgame.

So that's the key here, which makes it all really

mind boggling, because we're also, right now,

at the point of the five

year jump, we're at the point of the

Return of the Blitz, people.

So it's kind of weird when you read this

timeline, because ultimately, the timeline

places Loki breaking the

timeline, creating the multiverse, if you will,

or ripping open the multiverse, or however you want to see that

by killing he who remains as the first

in the events that we have already named.

That happens around Fall 2023.

And Mysterio

does not appear to Peter until the summer

of 2024. So again,

in the MCU timeline, obviously, we're not in the summer

of 2024 yet. So this is in the MCU timeline.

That's when that happens.

And Loki really, though, is taken out of even

the very first Avengers movie, which is even

years earlier. But I guess once you're in the

TVA time, and that's what's hard about.

Placing it even on the pages when they're

running the timeline of the TVA and Loki, because

the whole book is organized chronologically. But the

TVA timeline is like a separate timeline that

they show. So, yeah, time is a little funky there, but

they clearly position

fall 2023 breaking open the multiverse.

Mysterio appears in summer 2024, makes that

reference. It's Fall 2024

that Spiderman unites with the other Spider people.

So Dr. Strange, of course, in

Spiderman, no way home, helping to pull

through the other Spider

Men. And that happens in Fall

2024, which is the same time that

America Chavez shows up with Dr. Strange. They

fight. Wanda, you have the example of dreamwalking

as a little bit of a multiversal thing in multiverse of

madness. And, of course, you then have Earth eight three

Eight, which is where the Illuminati are. And we meet all these

different characters, some who are familiar, Xavier and Agent

Carter. But it's a different Earth than any Earth. We've met them

on before, and Clea showing up to

talk about the multiversal incursions at the very end,

all of that eight three eight content that is fall,

2024. And so that's actually the last

time until this week. That is the

last time that we see the

multiverse explicitly that we know of right

now.

Well, what's interesting is that we really have

these three, really only

really three tangible examples of

multiverses, even though everyone seems to be

talking about multiverses today. We've been talking about this

on the show, where this is a word that's so much in our

lexicon right now, everyone's kind of talking about it. And yet,

in this giant series, which, as you've said, even

this whole arc is being named

Multiverse, we've only had these three segments. And even within

those segments, they haven't even been super

multiversal.

No. Even if you think

about, first of all, we haven't spent more

than a few minutes in another universe.

That's true. Yeah.

Eight three eight is the closest example, and we

don't spend too much time there. And then we haven't gotten

to know people that we know

of from the multiverse. If you

count Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, I guess they

probably get the most screen time. Or Willem Dafoe. Right. He's from

the multiverse in that.

Yeah, most of them. And the Doc ock. Yeah, most of,

Yeah, so, sure. Those are the people we get to

spend the most time with, and then a little bit less.

So the Illuminati, they die

pretty fast. so we get hints at

it. We get hints, which this is relevant. We

get that Maria Rambeau on Earth Eight three Eight

is Captain Marvel. We meet the

first read that we've ever seen on screen in the MCU, of

course, but it's a different one, and it's been confirmed that it will

be a different one than we see. So, yeah,

we barely spend time even

with these people.

Well, it's interesting, too, because the Spider man,

it's no way home, and multiverse of madness are kind

of almost the inverses of themselves, because in no way

home, we get a character

meeting himself from other multiverses, but we don't really

go to the multiverse. In Multiverse of madness, we

don't really have Doctor Strange interacting with another Doctor Strange,

except, like the Zombie one, which doesn't really count, but he's

in the other universe, but he doesn't really see another

version of himself. Why I'm thinking almost the Sony

movies are like, the perfect combination is because it's

another world and the characters interacting

together. We haven't really gotten

that up to this point yet.

Yeah. Though in part, it only works

because they're characters we

know.

Yeah, that's true.

Spiderman. No way home. Could you imagine if those

were like, let's just say they cast two random people

as two other Spiderman. The story wouldn't

work as well because as an audience,

you'd just be like, okay, so there's two different

Spider Men. Like, who cares?

if they were the. And we've talked about the nostalgia factor. We did

an episode on no way home and talked a lot

about the problems with that that we.

But.

And if it's the same actor, you run into a little bit

of kind of what the flash movie did, too, where it's like,

okay, now we're tracking. Okay, wait, which Barry is

this on screen?

Who am I with the short hair? The one with the long hair. So that

you can tell. They always do little M cues.

Like,

yeah, you're right. They are two different ways

of doing the multiverse. But for sure, both of them

are multiverse light. And I think that's by

design. And some of this is, in retrospect, after this

week. But this doesn't spoil anything. In

retrospect, I realized, like, okay, these were designed

to show us the cracks in the

universe, in the multiverse, in the omniverse,

let's say. So all of these stories

were just there to tell us, like,

there's an instability that's

coming, and the instability is starting to

make the boundaries more porous.

Again, in hindsight, I realized that's what these

projects were doing. And I appreciate them a little more

because.

And, it's interesting, too, both of them

really well. And then Loki, but they

both needed. Dr. Strange plays an integral

role. I mean, I know America is the one who's kind of breaking it

in, but maybe they almost felt like, oh, they needed

magic or something. Like they needed some kind of

device like magic where you can kind of make anything

happen with that.

So he's also the one, of course, in Endgame

who sees 14 million

multiverses and realize they're only going to win

in one. Now, again, I left out

time. We should have had Elliot on this

episode because he likes Time travel. I do not like

time travel. And I am sure,

of course, you can argue that every alternate

timeline is a multiverse in and of itself, but I'm

sort of leaving that out. But I think that's probably also why

Doctor Strange made sense at that point,

because his ability, if you will,

to at least see across the multiverse, if not actually

visit it was established by Endgame.

And even in his first movie, where he goes to other

dimensions, which are also not really multiversal

verses as well, but he's able to pull in those

other dimensions, the mirror world, and where Dormammu

is.

Well, and he creates the time loop with Dormammu,

he's essentially creating. I mean, actually, again, in the

official chronology book, they do this cool little

loop of time. Anytime

someone steps out of time, they do, like, a break in the

timeline, and then they have it loop around and show you

what's happening. And so that's essentially a

multiverse, for all intents and purposes.

And just like the other one that we haven't mentioned that came

before this week, is Quantum Mania, where you

have not really a multiverse there. I

guess the quantum realm vaults more into other

dimensions.

To me, it does to that. The multiverse in

Quantum Mania, I'd say, which we didn't talk

about, is the

character of Kang. I think that would be the

example of the multiverse there, because it's established

that he's a variant, and it's established, I guess, that he

can transverse

universes. But outside of that, I don't see

that movie as having too much of a multiverse.

Yeah, there's a singer there as well, where we meet other

kangs, which may or may not be moot at this

point.

So we know that there is, a nexus, if you

will. Not a nexus in the Marvel definition,

but an actual, just central point where

different kangs can come togetheR. So, yeah,

a little multiverse in Quantum Mania skipped over that.

Let's get on to how this all,

in my opinion, has changed for the better.

Did you know, Guido, that our segment two is actually

called exploring Multiversity? So why

don't we do that?

I am your guide through these vast new

realities. Follow

me and ponder the

question,

what if?

And this is also the section where we'll be

starting to get into some.

Heavy duty, very recent

spoilers, very, very.

Spoilers, have not seen Marvel and Loki. And I think a lot

more people are waiting to see these movies than they

were a few years ago.

True. So just be warned that this

segment, Marvel's spoilers, abound.

Yes, because we are answering the question, what if

Marvel's multiverse saga was redirected by just

one day in the MCU? And

we're starting with the Marvels with a special

focus on the Stinger mid credit scene.

And that, of course, came out in.

November 2023, when we were recording

this episode. This movie was directed by Nia DeCosta,

who wrote it with Megan McDonald and Elisa Kurasek,

and it's produced by Kevin Feige. This, just a little

background on those creators, is DaCosta's third

ever feature. Her second film was the Candyman

Reboot, and she's the youngest MCU director.

Co writer McDonald wrote some of WandaVision, and

co writer Karasic wrote one episode of Loki's

first series. So an interesting

team to be working on this and definitely

makes sense considering the threads they're pulling

together here. So we could talk

about the movie overall. I want to

stay focused on the Multiverse because the

movie overall is

less relevant to our conversation today.

I'd say with one exception, which is

the jump points and

what happens to Monica in the movie. So

before we get to the Stinger, I think there's a few things.

Where do you want to start?

well, I know some of our opinions are

differing on the movie itself, so we won't go,

as you said, too much into no.

And whether we like to review the movie. I really liked the

movie. I think it's fun. I think it works. I think it's

narratively strong. Rob?

I thought it had some fun moments

to it. I thought it

had some lessons that I will have to maybe

revisit and see if my mind

changes.

But yeah, I think the key

thing that it's doing, I'm

interested in the fact that, in fact, we

were debriefing it with Elliot, as we always do, and

he mentioned not even

realizing that the jump

points were creating the opportunity

for a multiversal story.

And I did realize that right

away. Elliot, I'm just smarter than you.

But I think they

did definitely do a soft touch on it. And

I'm really curious why. I

appreciate it. I think that it

wasn't yet another. It's

funny because in our first segment, we just talked about that the multiverse hasn't

showed up in the MCU. And yet I think you're right. Everyone

feels that there is oversaturation. We've passed

saturation on multiverses. So I sort of appreciate

that they framed this as these jump points, this

teleportation. It sort of rips space and time

and don't lean into like, this is a

multiversal story until the Stinger.

Yeah.

What did you think of that?

Yeah, I think what this movie

highlighted, well, you were talking about in our first segment that we're

not going to focus on time, but it really made

me think, well, time and multiverses

are so connected, and the line

blends together because this

movie, I think, for better or for worse,

this movie, more so than other MCU movies, I

think you do need to have a sense of the timeline and

the history with these characters, while

some of the other projects, I think you can kind of just go

into. So it was making me think,

yes, maybe it's not multiversal, but we

really need to know. Like, there's the segments where

Captain Marvel, where Brie Larson is trying to recount

her, get her memories back, and that's

time, but it's almost on, the

border and multiversal in a way, because she's bringing

in these memories from almost another person or

another life that she had. So I almost

see a connection there as well. What do

you.

I think. I think it's just woven into the

storytelling now. Again, they don't have to make it that,

ooh, there's some incursion from another universe, or,

ooh, we might end up in another universe, which is, of

course, spoiler. Now what happens to Monica?

But, yeah, they can just sort of play

with a sense of boundaries, of time and space.

Even Miss Marvel, Kamala, in this movie,

reminds everyone that she has traveled through time

and space with the bangles. That

is kind of multiversal storytelling now. She

doesn't alter the past, she

doesn't go to a different universe, but just the fact that she's

able to do that has a ton of potential for

multiversal storytelling. So I think there

are lots of elements of multiverse

in here, but without making it a movie about the multiverse,

that's what I was really struck by.

Yeah, I was almost half expecting

watching it for America

Chavez to show up, too, just because it was like, I.

Would have made it a multiverse movie.

Yeah, well, it's such a female fronted movie and

also a, diverse cast as well. So I was thinking, oh, it would just make

sense that America shows up and maybe she's going

to Jersey City High School now or something like

that.

I think Kamala is going to be recruiting America for that team she's

putting together. Yes, I'm sure we'll see

her. So now, the Stinger,

of course, if you're listening, it's because you either

don't care if you're spoiled or you saw it, but if you're

listening and didn't see it and don't care that

you're spoiled? In the Stinger, Monica, who has been

trapped past the boundaries of a

hole in space time that's created by the villain

of the film. She gets trapped when she seals

it from the side she's on. She wakes

up, and she is now in a universe where

she's, I presume, in

the X Mansion. And she is

with Hank McCoy, Beast being played by

Kelsey Grammar, who plays him in X Two

and three, and she's with her

mother, Maria Rambeau, being played

by the actor who plays Maria in the

6116. But we find out that Maria is actually

binary, so there is a lot to unpack

in this. What was your

reaction when you were experiencing

it?

Well, I think, like you and

so much of the world, I was expecting some kind of

X Men thing to come up, and

I wasn't actually expecting this. I was

definitely pretty surprised.

But I think overall,

I was then thinking, oh, this is going to make a lot of sense,

knowing the things that we've had trickle out

about Deadpool and that the way that they're.

We'll talk about the future in our next.

But I think. I think the ways that I was seeing,

oh, this is the kind of ways that they're easing us

back into the X world with

familiar characters.

Into the Fox world.

Into the Fox. Well, I think the X world.

Yeah. Because what I liked about the

presence of Maria and Maria being

binary and Charles being alive is.

It's clearly telling us that's true.

This is neither the Fox universe,

nor is it the eight. Ah, three eight, where we've already

met Xavier, that Xavier and that Maria are

dead. And so I appreciate that this

is a different universe, even though it's using an

actor for a character that we've seen

played, is, I believe it will

be a completely different universe. I wouldn't be

surprised if some of the other characters we know

are different people if Xavier is not Patrick

Stewart, not James McEvoy, but someone else.

Well, I think that's the thing about

how they've approached variants and the multiverse

that has been a little inconsistent,

which is we have. Sometimes the

people look just like them, like in Loki,

where there's a lot of other people that look like Loki, but then there's

some that don't look like Loki, and then there's only really one

we're introduced to that has a different

gender than. Yeah.

although we don't know the alligator's gender, but.

Okay, that's true. We do not know the alligator's gender. Yeah,

that's that is something that has been. So

here we have Beast, who is played,

by the same actor from the Fox universe. But I

agree, would

Charles now be someone different? We've seen Charles,

though, from, I guess, kind of the animated universe

in person, in multiverse of

madness as well. So I think that's the one thing that

they haven't quite really figured out

yet. and like Kang, we saw his variants and they

all were played by the same actor. every KaNg we've

seen so far that we know of has been played by the

same almost.

I would like to see that we almost

need. Well, actually, maybe Hank McCoy, is it? Because I was going to say

we almost need a geneticist to

give us some, explanation. And it doesn't even have to be rooted

in true genetic science, but just to explain

that probability

of genetic makeup

dictates, and the fact that there are infinite

universes then dictates that

there are many variants who are identical to

you and there are many variants who are not.

We would just need someone to say that. And maybe it will be

Hank, because the other thing that struck me about

this scene is that he says,

you could be from another universe, but of course, we all know

those don't exist, or he says something to that effect. So

he doesn't yet know this is true. And so I'm assuming

his learning about this is going to be part of the next story

we see. And maybe he'll then be the person

to explain variance, the science of variance.

To us, even for our 6116 characters.

Right. Because someone like Captain

America and Bucky will have not been

involved at all in any kind of

multiversal story. So those characters might

not know that such a thing as the

multiverse even exists because they've just been off

having their own.

Yes. Yeah. as we build in the multiverse

saga, we are going to have to introduce and explain it to a

lot of other people. That's true.

It kind of reminds me of how aliens were

introduced into the world, because some of these

characters, like Sam, were not. They

didn't know aliens existed. And suddenly there's aliens, or

suddenly you have characters being brought into outer

space. It's kind of like how we were

brought into the world through Scott Lang

in civil war, where, oh, he was just kind of

doing his own thing, and now suddenly we're going off with

him and he's experiencing a much bigger world.

So I think we're going to have that. See that again

through some of these characters.

Well, and the storytelling shows it. Your space example is

a good one, because in the Marvels, of course,

the fact that Kamala's parents and brother

get to go to outer space and talk about being in

outer space just shows how big the world has

become. Ten years ago, or

when Guardians started, which was close to ten years ago,

you had people remarking on

the outlandishness of this space

existence, and now you have

this regular old family, can just be brought

into space and is not surprised, doesn't need

some big explanation. They know it exists. They know it's

happening in the world around them. So, yeah, I suspect

that the same thing will happen with the multiverse.

And I think you bring up a good point about

it being beast. And of course, there's so

many things and studio politics and all this

stuff. But I was thinking, oh, why did they

choose that character?

Because there's probably more iconic

Fox characters to choose from. And we know,

of course, we're going to see Logan, Hugh Jackman in

the next movie, but maybe it is

because of the science aspect that

they needed it to be. Hank, what do you think

about that?

I think that makes sense, because if you think about it,

like, you could get look at Days

of Future Past, the X Men, the movie,

you could use Rogue or Shadowcat

or any telepath and start

to play with a multiverse question, because if they

shunt their mind into the past, if they're

on the Astral plane or any of those things,

but all of that is metaphysical. And so that

is a little bit more like dreamwalking. And it feels like

Wanda's done that, Dr. Strange has done that. We've seen that.

We haven't yet had someone analyze,

from a scientific perspective, the multiverse.

And so, yeah, I think you're right that he's a

good character for that. He's also, I had

not thought about this until you raised, like, why

hem? He's such a good charaCter, too, if they go

in this direction with him, because

especially the last five years in comics,

he's morally ambiguous. He's increasingly

morally ambiguous. He's so driven by

science that he makes really horrible

decisions. And so he could

be an interesting character to have a part of

this unfolding storyline, because, or if

we saw.

Some kind of age of apocalypse story and we know

that there's dark Beast there as

well, which is also timeline,

multiversal, whatever you want to call it,

that we've, of course, covered on this podcast.

Before we move into, our third segment, what, I

was going to.

Say one thing that is clear to me is

whatever multiverse we are living in,

Kelsey Grammar has done very well because we've

had the return of Fraser and the return of career

in 2023.

It's true. Too bad he can't rebuild his politics, but he, has

rebuilt his career. So the last thing

on this stinger before we get to Loki and

the future is just Maria being

binary. I loved it. I

loved it because what it was, to

me, was a deep cut

meant for X Men fans.

And that was perfect and beautiful to me

because it

was shocking, it was cool, it was a

revelation. A binary, of course, in the comics

is Carol Danvers. When her

powers go binary, her powers get messed up, and

she starts to have the powers of a star and is a being made of

fire, et cetera, joins the X Men in

space. So it really is, like, just the perfect

plot. And we saw in

Multiverse of Madness, and we had alluded to

in the Marvels that Maria could easily

have become Captain Marvel, that it didn't have to be Carol,

it could have been Maria. So it makes sense that in some other

world, Maria became Captain Marvel and then became binary and

joined, and they.

Could have easily called her Captain Marvel like they did in

Multiverse of Madness, but they made that very

deliberate choice to bring back this other

character name, which was not a name, with a name I

had heard, but I didn't really know the backstory, and I did

not know that this was a character who was on The X Men

that was also Captain Marvel. So as you were saying, that was

definitely a deep cut comics

fan kind of inclusion.

Yeah. And it's a good way of putting

emotional stakes in it, because it's Maria. It's Monica's

mother. And so it's interesting.

It could have been Carol as binary, but

it was Maria's binary, and that means something very

different based on what happened. And so we'll get to the

future in our final segment.

Yes. So let's, start pondering some

possibilities.

Will the future you describe

be averted, diverted? Diverted?

And we are talking Loki, series

two, with a special focus on the

finale from November 2023, which

was entitled Glorious.

Purpose, and was out the day the

Marvels premiered. That is just

wild.

But as you said, it wasn't supposed to be. Right, because

all these dates were moving around and everything.

But it is wild to me that last

Thursday, that you could

see both these things at the same time. That's why we're talking about them

together. This series was mostly directed by

Justin Benson. And Aaron Morehead, mostly written by Eric

Martin, executive produced by Kevin Feige, Brand Witterbaum,

and a whole bunch of other people who are in Marvel Studios

TV. Martin wrote for season one

of Loki. Benson and Morehead have done a lot of

Sci-Fi films that had similar themes

and reality warping effects and visuals.

They did work on Moon Knight and are going to be involved

in the rebooted Daredevil. born again.

Redirected Daredevil, born again. So

we are talking about the

impact of the finale of Loki series two.

Before we get into what happens in

the finale of Loki series two and

what we think it tells us about the future of the

MCU's multiverse saga, I do want to mention

that, of course, we don't know the chronology

of these things. Sadly, this book was

published and had to be sent to the printers some months

ago. So we don't know

where, secret Invasion lies, though we

can safely assume that might be added to the pile of

Inhumans properties. We

don't know, though, where

the Marvels and Loki series two

take place in terms of their relationship

to each other. We have no idea which one comes

first or after. And frankly, I don't think

it matters that much.

But it will matter in the future,

and so we can assume both will have occurred before we get to

Deadpool next year, which we're going to talk about. But

real quick on Loki series two,

do you want to give an overall impression of the series before

we talk about the content of the

finale?

Oh, sorry. I was falling asleep there thinking

about Loki series two, but

I thought there.

Was a lot of most enjoyable, I'll say.

I think the bones were there, but I think it

was not doing what I really

wanted from this series, which some of its

expectation, but it felt so prolonged. I

think you and I were saying it would have made a really probably

great two hour movie, not six hour series.

And we were saying maybe the Marvels, you might disagree,

but the Marvels might be the opposite. The Marvels might have made a really

good six.

Oh, I would have been fine with it being a six part series.

It felt kind of rushed to me as an hour 40

movie where I think they could have definitely expanded

on and had more emotional beats. So they wish

they had kind of switched places in that way.

Yeah. So you and I weren't too into

Loki series two. We were watching it

kind of out of obligation

and curiosity. The finale, however,

I think we both liked what they did with the

story, and I really

liked. I saw the Marvels before I

watched the series finale, and I had really

liked how it made

me think about the future of the multiverse saga.

So, again, spoilers. And if you're

listening, we're assuming you don't care about spoilers if

you didn't watch Loki. A very brief synopsis

of a kind of complicated

and overly simple, maybe a little too

complicated.

Yes, you and I were saying it's a little too complicated and a little

too simple at the same time.

But ultimately, what happens is, because the multiverse

is completely destabilized, and the choice is

presented between something that will

annihilate, everything and every timeline,

or going back to compressing down to the

sacred timeline and starting to cancel,

Prune, destroy the other

deviating timelines.

Now, Loki inserts himself as the god of stories, if

you will, and takes on the power of the

multiverse, stabilizes it gets to sit on his throne at the heart

of the Multiverse, creates

Idragasil, the world

tree of the Nine realms that we've heard about in the

MCU before. And essentially now

the Multiverse is a stable

series of branches that coil around

each other like the trunks of a tree or the branches of a

tree. It's no longer a single line with

deviating branches. nor is it

a threaded mess that we're led

to believe it was between series one

finale and series two finale of Loki.

So, m

huge change, huge

shift. And for me,

I'll start because I did have

the experience of seeing the Marvels. What

the Loki finale did to me is it

made me realize that the rest of the multiverse

saga is going to now get to

be actual stories just being

told in other worlds. And m

knowing that Secret wars is four

years away, if that's when it happens,

there's an end date. And I appreciate both

of those things. I like, one,

that we're going to finally just get a, stabilized way

of telling stories in different worlds. The story doesn't have to

be about breaking into another world

or an incursion or a destabilization or

anything like that. We can just get stories in other worlds.

And two, that this won't last forever. And I

like that because, especially with the Fox X Men

franchise, I am ready for the MCU X Men. And

while it's fun to see some of these folks, I

appreciate knowing that we're not going to see any of them past

Secret wars if I had to, yeah.

I mean, you think it's going to be four years? I think we're not going to see those

Fox people pass Deadpool, frankly.

And that is possible because.

Yeah. so what did you think of these two

things together? The Loki change to the

Multiverse and the Marvel Stinger and the

future?

Well, I think what we saw from Loki is that it's

removing, as you were saying, having a

giant plot device to get

us into the multi worlds. We were talking at the start of

our conversation that Dr. Strange and

magic had to constantly being brought in. And really,

that whole first quarter of no way

home is Peter asking for

Dr. Strange to do this favor. And then the

box explodes or whatever happens. So I

think you're just going to eliminate that now. And it also

will free them up story wise, where we don't have

to give 30 minutes of the movie

or two episodes of a TV show

to explain the mechanics. It's just going to

be, the transparency

between these worlds is going to be a lot different. I think

Monica sacrificing herself at the end of

the Marvels might be like the last time we're going to see

one of those big occurrences

until after Secret Wars.

Well, the only thing, I agree with

everything, but at the end, I don't know if I agree, and here's why.

Because what I'm excited about is I'm

excited that Monica being in

this other universe made me realize that would be a

great way to get us to secret wars, is if you

start to have people almost trapped in these other

universes. Because even though we know

Doctor Strange and Magic and America

Chavez and her powers, and maybe some

extreme cases, Miss Marvel's powers

can transgress dimensional

barriers. It's still going to be hard. So even post

Loki finale, it's not like you can just take a

plane and decide you're going to go to Earth

One, three three, or whatever it is, it still

is going to be a challenge. And so I like this idea that

people might get stuck, people might get trapped.

Monica being there, she might want to be there because

Maria's there. And then what happens if Carol and

Kamala are trying to bring her back here?

I could just see that creating the potential for

wars to battle each other, for there to be, like,

conflict between worlds. With

conflict being that someone broke

the barrier, the conflict is more just like, wait,

where do I want to end up? And where Should I end

up?

Yeah, I think that is where the

emotional payoff will be. Is

what if you could suddenly be

with your dead parent again?

Or is it actually your dead parent because

it's not actually the same person?

That's why that final moment of the Marvel Singer is perfect when

she says, who are you? And Monica's

like, oh, shit. So, yeah,

Monica's feeling all this emotion, and Maria's like, oh,

I don't know who you are.

I hope they go there, though, because I think

they've stopped short of really getting into a lot of,

like, we didn't get,

like, her. Her experience of what if you were

separated from your family in this other universe? We didn't,

in secret Invasion, get, what if you were married to somebody and

you never saw their true, like, these are really

interesting philosophical questions to

actually bring into a superhero world. And

the shows, and movies have stopped short of doing

that. So I hope we could get into, oh, what

if Tony Stark can be back in this

universe? But could that also mean that Thanos

could win there if he didn't had, like, I

think there's a lot of interesting quantum things

and emotional things to discuss if they choose

to go there.

Yeah. Part of me even thinks what I've been starting

to, I think, hope for, actually, because I think it's at

least rumored that Marina Baccarin is in Deadpool Three.

And part of me wonders if Deadpool is

going to be trying to get to a world where she's still alive,

because.

I think her dying was premature. I think it was

fridging her. I think it was an awful decision. She's

a comic book character that had so much potential. She's

an actor that had so much potential, and both were

so. But what was clear in both

movies is what a love story they had. And so part of

me wonders if that will be some of the plot

is Ryan Reynolds or Deadpool trying to get to

her, because that would do exactly what

you're saying. It would bring in that emotional

selfish, which Deadpool certainly could be

part of the storytelling that we lack when everyone is

being a herO, which is,

think.

I think Monica is going to be, like, the third lead of that

Deadpool movie. I don't know. I hope that will turn out to be

true. But I just think incorporating her into

that Stinger, I think she's really going to play

a big part in there. And I think the cool

thing about, well, and I think the cool thing

about having Deadpool, as well as a

character is that he'll be able to break the

fourth wall. Like, he can say, to tell

Kelsey Grammar, like, aren't you Frazier? Or. I really want him to

sing the Frazier theme song.

Yes.

Niles or something.

yes, exactly. But we've already had him

mention Hugh Jackman as an actor in one of the other

movies, and now he's going to be aside Hugh Jackman. So I

think there's all that

fourth wall breaking, which I think is also maybe

what the multiverse stuff needs at this point. It needs, Some of that

inflation, that air to be taken out of it.

Yeah. Well, now that it's stabilized, I feel like that kind

of thing can happen. And

I just think, the

potential is so great at this point. I'm excited

again, and I've been someone who, for at least two years,

at least since Wandavision, I've not been

excited for the MCU. And these two projects

made me really like, okay, I can

sort of start to see a sense. I think there's a lot of

mistakes and loose threads that are still

out there from this phase,

but I think all of these pieces

together make me really hopeful about what's

coming. And I agree. I think Deadpool Three

is going to do a lot to move that

ahead and move it into new Directions.

Now, a couple of questions I'm thinking is,

do you think that we will still

have these more

multiversal stories versus the more

earthbound stories that might be coming in with, let's

say, Thunderbolt.

Thunderbolt and Captain America Four? Yeah, I think

those two for sure are going to be

Earthbound. No question there might

be a stinger that leads us to something more.

Because I think it's not until we

hit the Avengers, maybe Kang

Dynasty and the Avengers Secret wars,

that I think we're going to start to pull every character into

this, just like we did for Infinity Warm and

Endgame. So, yes, I think there will

continue to be movies that tell

stories that don't get wrapped up in this. And that's

some of the fun part of stabilizing it right now,

is that that would be okay. We don't

have to worry or wonder, like, Captain America

Four can exist on the timeline and we don't

have to think, like, wait, why aren't they addressing the

multiversal incursion that's happening? It's like, well, m they don't need

to. Everything is stabilized right now. Sam

Wilson is not going to get involved in Monica Rambeau

being on the other side of the.

Two more. Two more questions for you that I'm coming up. I

want your opinion on is

one, do you think now is

the time after what I've been saying for a long time, which

is that they'll use this

multiverse to recast some of

the iconic characters. Like, there's been a lot of

the news of like that. Is Downey Jr. Coming back. But do you

think?

I don't know the answer to that.

I think it's so hard. I think this is

where I get into, and I know this is like, everyone knows this and

says this, but this is where I really just remind myself, like,

we are in such uncharted

waters. This is so unprecedented for a

movie universe to exist like this, that I really

can't see the future. I do not

think we will end up in a

place where there is like a young

Tony Stark being played by someone else. I don't

think we will end up there in the next

1020 years. But again,

we're in such uncharted waters that

who knows? I have no idea, but

I don't think so. I don't think that's what Secret

wars is going to give us. Could secret wars do something like bring

us a Miles Morales Sure. I think there's a lot of ways

Secret wars could shake up the world,

but I do not think it's going to be through

younger new actors

playing roles that have already been

established in the on screen

6116. I don't

think so.

Let's see. I'm not sure, because I

think.

At this point it would rob the emotional

hefT. We are still

living in a world where

I have multiple tattoos on my body from

Endgame. People who watch movies

like that is still the pinnacle

moment. I still cry when

Peter Parker reaperates

and hugs. Like, it's making

me teary thinking about it. Right? Like, there is so much

emotional weight in that story and

bringing someone back

permanently takes away from

that.

There could be a temporary, they could.

Go to a world where there is like a young Tony Stark and they

deal with that. And that's fine. I don't have a problem with that.

But I think if we get to a new prime

universe post Secret wars, like has happened in the

comics from the 2015, I don't think

it's going to be with a bunch of new

versions of people we've already met.

And my last question for you, my last pondering

possibilities question for you, we were talking about this this

morning is, do you think so? Of course,

Marvel is owned by Disney. Disney also owns Star

Wars. They have, of course, the Disney properties as well. Do

you think we'd ever see a world

where we are mixing

bringing in other properties? Like, do you think there's ever

a world where suddenly in one of these outer space

journeys through the multiverse. We're in Star

wars or Wakanda, and

there's Simba talking. I don't know.

I think there's only two ways it happens.

One, for comedic effect.

So in Deadpool, three,

they're traveling to a bunch of different worlds and

they end up in a world

with, I don't know, even Elliot joked when we were talking to

him, the Simpsons.

Sure. So that I could see. So one,

for comedic effect, the only other

way is a little bit more of what I'd want to

see. And I don't know if it will happen. I do not think

it will happen in the course of an ongoing

story because I think we live in a world

where even within a company. So, yes, I

understand Disney owning Fox means they own the world of

alien. They own the world of Planet of the Apes, they own the world

of Predator. But I don't think they own Star Wars. I don't

think they're going to want to mix those things up. Even in

the comics, they don't mix them up like, alien

and Predator are under different imprints. They keep them

separate. They're not part of the six one six.

And here's my comic inspired,

answer right now. For example, there's a little

miniseries of Predator versus Wolverine.

Sure, why not? Who cares? So that would be

if it were to happen or I'd actually kind of like it to

happen. Like do a one movie standalone.

It's not a part of the saga. It's

a use of the multiverse where, yeah, Wolverine

ends up in the Predator universe and has to fight the

Predator. Like, sure, that's fine with me,

but I don't think it'll be part of a

larger story. It certainly won't be a

permanent status quo. And,

yeah, I think there's some fun potential. What would you like to see if

there was, like, one fun standalone movie

that mixed worlds?

Well, it's funny, I hadn't really thought of Predator and alien

because they're not as famous as

Star wars, but they actually could lend

themselves pretty well to something like,

well, alien. And then you also introduce the

brood or in Secret Wars. Of course,

the Predator would be a natural inclusion

person to thing to include there as

well. I think the other thing that they could play around with

is some of the actors who have been cast as multiple

things. Natalie Portman is in Star wars universe

and the MCU, Harrison Ford is now going to

be in both universes. So there's other actors that they

have also worked with which I think would fall more

into the jokey world of it. But

it's interesting, the

Star wars universe, as best as I know, and there's

plenty of people that know more about Star wars than me, but it

does exist in a galaxy far, far away, Earth. And

things have never come into it, as far as I know. But.

So it would be interesting to have an Earth

character like Starlord, for example.

I was going to say the next Guardians movie. They end up on whatever

the planet all the Ewoks are on.

Oh, that would be, yeah, totally. Yes. I mean, I could

totally see that if they bring in, Taika to direct that

movie with Ewoks or something like that.

Yeah.

But again, I think it would have to be like a one shot

deal.

Oh, totally. Or even a special.

These worlds don't overlap.

Yeah, like how we had the Kevin Bacon Holiday

special or something like that. I think that would be really

special. Star Wars Holiday special. But that would

be so I could totally see that. And

you have Groot and Chewbacca. Like,

neither of them are speaking a language that we

understand.

And Nebula or Mantis reacting to the.

Can. I can totally see that, actually.

So that would totally be maybe the one that they would

go with. Yeah. Play off that iconic holiday

special.

Well, if it happens, hopefully we'll get credit for

it.

All right, well, we're excited for the

future, and we're excited to hear what

you think about the future, so please find

us, let us know because that is a wrap. Dear

Watchers, thank you for listening. I have been Guido

from Earth Eight, three eight, or whatever Earth I said.

I was from, and I have been several, inches

taller.

Rob, the reading list this week

is watching list, and you can find it in the show notes. And

again, find us on social media at Dear Watchers, all

social media.

And we'll be back soon with another trip through the

multiverse.

In the words of UAtu, keep pondering the

possibilities.