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Was that a werewolf? What's up with Ethan Hawke? 4 questions about Marvel's 'Moon Knight' trailer
Let's dig into the many mysteries of Marvel's newest hero.
The first full trailer for Moon Knight, Marvel's next Disney+ streaming series, finally arrived Monday night, and it's packed with as many mysteries as the character himself. The story of Marc Spector (Oscar Isaac), a former mercenary with dissociative identity disorder who transforms into the avatar of an Egyptian moon good and fights evil, the series will follow the title character as he comes to grips with who he is, in more ways than one.
Because we're dealing with a guy whose own memories and sense of waking life can't necessarily be trusted from moment to moment, the trailer is packed with disjointed imagery, emphasizing the chaos of Marc's life, his various identities, and his connections to the Egyptian god Khonshu, among other things. In other words: It does exactly what a teaser trailer is supposed to do, dropping enticing hints of what's to come without ever really giving a way the whole plot.
So, let's dig a little deeper, and discuss four of the biggest questions we have thanks to this intriguing, freaky teaser trailer.
Who is Steven Grant in the MCU?
If you're new to Moon Knight and his whole deal, you might already be confused, because we're talking about a guy named Marc Spector while the teaser introduced us to a man named Steven. Well, as we've already discussed, the man who would be Moon Knight suffers from dissociative identity disorder, which means he has multiple personas in his head, one of which is a guy called Steven Grant. It's not necessarily surprising given Moon Knight's backstory that we'd run into Steven in this trailer, but it is a bit surprising how we're running into him.
In the comics, Steven's existence begins as a boy young Marc Spector has conversations with, not realizing that Steven is actually himself. As an adult, Spector funnels money he makes as a mercenary into the Steven Grant persona, and Grant's smart investments make Spector very wealthy. In the MCU, though, Steven seems to be a rather nervous museum gift shop employee who struggles with a sleep disorder and flees from visions of a bird skull-headed Egyptian god. What does that mean for the rest of the series? Is there a billionaire side of Marc Spector? Will we see the cab driver persona Jake Lockley and the dapper vigilante known as Mr. Knight among his personalities as well? Starting things off by introducing the audience to Steven is an interesting choice, with all sorts of potential implications.
Is he Moon Knight already?
It's clear from the teaser that Marc Spector/Steven Grant is already deeply troubled by more than one thing. His DID means that he can't necessarily trust not just his own memory, but his own sense of sleeping and waking. Steven Grant might think he's asleep, but he's actually driving a truck on a cliffside road, holding a gun as Marc Spector (we think), and to make matters worse, he seems to be seeing a white-clad figure with a bird skull for a head when all he's trying to do is ride in an elevator. All of this points to a version of the character who's already had an encounter with the Egyptian moon god, Khonshu, the deity that imbues Spector with the powers of the Moon Knight.
The question is: Is Marc going out and doing battle as Moon Knight already by the time the series begins? It's pretty clear that he's at least got some version of Moon Knight inside of him already, even if it's only manifesting as weird visions, and we do see him put the costume on at various points in the teaser, but how long does it take Marc/Steven to realize that's what's going on? How much of an origin story are we actually getting with this series?
What's up with Ethan Hawke?
Marvel found a compelling choice for their title hero when Oscar Isaac was cast as the lead in Moon Knight, and they picked up an equally compelling star to play his chief antagonist. Ethan Hawke, the legendary star of films like Before Sunrise, Reality Bites, and First Reformed, will play Arthur Harrow, a cult leader who senses Marc Spector's potential for "chaos" and, presumably, tries to exploit it. What's interesting about that choice of villain, beyond Hawke's presence in the series, is that Arthur Harrow is an extremely obscure Marvel Comics antagonist. He appeared in just one issue of Moon Knight, way back in 1985, and hasn't been seen since.
The comics version of Arthur Harrow is a surgeon who suffers from a nerve condition causing him extreme pain, and he devotes his life to work in pain theory. He's brilliant enough to be considered for the Nobel Prize, but some investigations into his backers reveal that he might also be carrying on experiments first developed by the Nazis at Auschwitz. So, very much not a good dude, but also not necessarily a cult leader. Did Marvel just borrow the name because "Arthur Harrow" sounds cool, or are there some supernatural Nazi connections we're not seeing yet? Time will tell, but we also shouldn't be surprised if a revised version of the character pops up in Marvel Comics sometime soon.
Is that a werewolf? Or Anubis?
There are a lot of very intriguing images in the Moon Knight teaser, but one of the most shocking involves Moon Knight himself, in full costume, repeatedly punching a growling creature on the floor of what looks like a very torn-up bathroom. The shot is distant, so it's hard to tell exactly what we're looking at, but the growling and the presence of ears and a snout suggest a dog-like creature, and Moon Knight's whole premise is definitely already leaning into the spookier side of the MCU. So...is this going to be where the MCU chooses to introduce werewolves into the mix? They'd certainly make sense in a show headlined by a moon-themed superhero Moon Knight debuted in the pages of Werewolf by Night back in 1975, and we already know a Werewolf by Night Halloween special is on the way, so why not give lycanthropes a little action in this series only to flesh them out more further down the line?
It's very possible, but I think it's also worth considering another possibility. Moon Knight is a representative of the Egyptian moon god Khonshu, which opens the door to the entire pantheon of Egyptian gods. Anubis, the Egyptian god of death, is a bipedal figure with the head of a dog, and Marc Spector is a man who became Moon Knight, in part, through a near-death experience. Could this creature be an avatar of Anubis come to battle him? A werewolf seems more likely, but it's something worth thinking about.
Moon Knight premieres March 30 on Disney+.
