We’ve made it to the end. The finale of Marvel’s Secret Invasion has arrived on Disney+ and, while it provides some truly epic moments, it also leaves us with quite a few loose ends and unanswered questions. Last week, we were left with Fury gearing up for a final showdown with Gravik. Now, it’s time for that confrontation.
The finale, which is simply titled “Home,” opens with Priscilla leaving her home, but not before taking a call from Fury. He explains to her that he’s going away and is unsure if he’s coming back. It appears to be the ned of their relationship as they hang up their phones.
At the Skrull compound, a car approaches the gate and the guards open fire on it. As it gets closer though, they see there is no one inside and instead gunshots come from the side, killing them both. Fury approaches the gate as we makes his way to Gravik for their final confrontation.
At the hospital, Rhodes urges the still bed-ridden President Ritson to launch an attack on the Russians and the Skrull compound. Meanwhile, an admiral argues they still need to get proof of the Russians’ involvement. Rhodes aggressively argues with her orders her to give Ritson his options for a military response. Someone enters with images of Russian tanks taking military positions on the borders of other countries, further pushing for an attack from the President.
Fury enters the Skrull compound and it is evident immediately that the radiation is wreaking havoc on his body. He coughs and stumbles his way through the compound, struggling to take pills to slow the symptoms. Meanwhile, Rhodes takes a phone call from Falsworth who warns him that he needs to get the President out of there because Fury is coming for him.
Fury finds Gravik waiting for him in his Super-Skrill machine. Fury drops the last of his pills and Gravik menacingly mocks his former leaders. Rhodes, scrambles to get Ritson to safety and sends his men looking for Fury. Instead, they start getting taken out one by one.
Gravik continues to mock Fury and eventually reveals that the human form he has chosen is that of the first human he killed for Fury. He explains that every person he killed for Fury took a little piece out of his heart. It seems the villain of this story was created by the hero. Where have we heard that before? After some more threats, Fury tells Gravik he is right and that he failed him. Fury says he knew the only solution for the Skrulls was to build them a home here but also that he knew he would never be able to convince humanity to allow it to happen.
As Fury talks, we see more and more of the Secret Service get taken out as Rhodes scrambles to protect the President. Fury shows Gravik the Harvest, the DNA of Carol Danvers and many other Avengers. He offers him the deal of taking the Harvest and using it to take over another planet, leaving Earth alone.
Rhodes orders men to surround Ritson and the President demands one of the men give him a gun. We then get a shot of a military compound where a man hands a document to a soldier who then gets in a truck and drives off. We get a look at the folder of the document, which reads “CLASSIFIED.”
Gravik takes the Harvest and uses his machine to test it while Fury coughs on his hands and knees. A screen lists off all of the DNA it includes: Ghost, Captain America, Corvus Glaive, Thanos, an Outrider, Proxima Midnight, Captain Marvel, Abomination, Mantis, Cull Obsidian, Drax, Korg, Ebony Maw, a Frost Beast, Hulk, a Chitauri, Valkyrie, Thor, Gamora, Groot (Flora Colossus), the Winter Soldier and Black Panther. Satisfied, Gravik initiates his machine with Fury and himself inside.
Falsworth gets the drop on Rhodes, pointing a gun at his head. Ritson questions what’s going on, pointing his fun at Falsworth. As the machine finishes its process, we see Gravik back in his Skrull form, looking a bit more super than usual. He backhands Fury to the ground with ease, then picks him up and throws a punch, but Fury catches it and transforms his hand into that of the Hulk before punching Gravik through the roof of the building. When Gravik gets back to his feet, he sees Fury emerge from the building, transforming to reveal that he has really been G’iah all this time. Meanwhile, Fury takes out the remaining guards around Ritson in the hospital and tries to explain to the President that Rhodes is a Skrull.
Now, with both Skrulls having the abilities of several Avengers and villains, we get the big super-powered battle we’ve come to know from Marvel. Meanwhile, Fury tries to explain everything to Ritson, including the fact that the real Rhodes and other world officials are being kept at the Skrull compound. Ritson begins to question who to trust as the Super-Skrull fight rages on and a nuclear strike is prepared.
We see the two Super-Skrulls utilize the abilities of several other characters, but it’s the Captain Marvel powers that lead to the beginning of the end. G’iah uses Mantis’ abilities to get an advantage before killing him with a photon blast.
Eventually, Rhodes takes the gun from Falsworth and points it at Fury but Fury shoots Rhodes first, killing him and revealing him to be a Skrull. Ritsons asks for a phone to call off the strike.
G’iah heads into the compound to begin freeing the prisoners who have been impersonated, including Rhodes and Everett Ross. Interestingly, Rhodes is in a hospital gown and G’iah informs him he’s been held hostage “for a long time.” Has Rhodes been a Skrull ever since his accident in Captain America: Civil War? If so, that would mean it was not him fighting alongside the Avengers in Infinity War and Endgame.
Ritson address the nation, informing everyone about the presence of Skrulls. He also announces he is presenting a bill to declare all off-world born species enemy combatants and he threatens to kill every last Skrull. The message is delivered in such a menacing way that it make the President appear to be the MCU’s newest villain.
Fury returns home to see Prisicilla one more time and she again questions whether Fury loves her or the woman she is pretending to be. Fury leaves but tells her that if she can forgive him, she’ll know where to find him.
G’iah walks down an alley when she notices a car is following her. Falsworth emerges from around a corner and quickly informs her she hasn’t come to fight. Instead, she offers a proposition that they help each other to “make this planet safe for both our people.” She specifically mentions the war Ritson has waged on Skrulls. G’iah appears to agree and it seems as though we have a potential spinoff in the works. If that is the case though, it seems to be a completely original story and not one based on any Marvel Comics history, which is an interesting decision. Still, it does pair up two of the most compelling characters of this series, which is enough to draw some interest.
Fury parks his car in a dark field and we Ritson takes a call from him. Fury calls Ritson’s speech “hateful” and we see Falsworth and G’iah discover far more Skrull prisoners who have been impersonated. Fury continues to explain that Ritons made the situation worse by calling for the murder of all Skrulls and we see three men kill the newscaster who we saw was part of the Skrull council. We also see a man shoot and kill a politician who turned out to not be a Skrull, furthering Fury’s point about the chaos the President has caused. Ritson refuses to call off his war and tells Fury to get the Skrulls off his planet. Fury refers to his actions as “one-term President stuff,” which is noteworthy because we know “Thunderbolt” Ross will be President in the upcoming Captain America: Brave New World.
Fury approaches a beam of light, as though he will be heading back to SABER and leaving Earth once again. Before he leaves, a car pulls up and Priscilla steps out. The two discuss working together on SABER because the Kree have reached out to establish a peace with the Skrulls. Fury asks for her help, and she agrees to help him get started but that her work is on Earth. After telling him she wants to be called Varra, she transforms back her Skrull self. The two share a kiss with Varra in Skrull form before heading onto the ship and the episode comes to a close.
There are a couple of interesting points to this final scene. First, the potential peace between the Skrulls and Kree points to a recent comic story arc titled “Empyre,” which sees the Kree-Skrull empire become one of the most powerful forces in the cosmos. It seems as though this plot line would be continued in The Marvels, the next Marvel Studios film on the slate. Perhaps Carol, Monica and Kamala will be fighting to help this alliance be born while some Kree radicals, like Dar-Benn, refuse to be aligned with their longtime enemies
The second thing of note from this ending is that Fury is once again leaving Earth in chaos. Ritson just told him he is not going to stop having innocent Skrulls, and sometimes humans, killed. His work on SABER appears to have nothing to do with this war here on Earth. It leaves us with a major storyline started and no solution on the horizon, aside from Falsworth and G’iah’s apparent team-up. It’s a move that seems to undo a lot of Fury’s development over the course of this series.
Overall, Secret Invasion was a very strong series from Marvel. It was incredibly well-acted and gave us some great characters. The ending left me wanting a bit more in terms of either wrap up or clear connection to the next project, though. It appears we may have to reserve some judgment on this series for after we’ve seen The Marvels.
All episodes of Marvel’s Secret Invasion are now streaming on Disney+.