The Other Worlds and Character Variants the “What If…?” Series Finale Teased

Full spoilers for the What If…? Season 3 finale (AKA the series finale) follow.

The animated series What If…? Has drawn to a close, but not before leaving viewers with some notable glimpses at other worlds in the multiverse.

The show’s final moments found the Watcher (voiced by Jeffrey Wright), or Uatu to his pals, delivering a new version of the narration that typically opens episodes of the series, while giving us a bunch of still images from other realities, offering some very different spins on familiar characters. These images moved by faster and faster, eventually too fast to make anything out, but at first, we got a few that definitely left us with questions about what their deal was exactly. Will we ever see more about these variants? Only the Watcher (and Kevin Feige) can say. But in the meantime, here’s what we could discern and whether there was any Marvel history tied to these teases.

Six-Arm Spider-Man

The first image we see in the final montage is also the easiest ones to source by far, as Spider-Man gaining four extra arms comes from a classic story arc in The Amazing Spider-Man #100–102, which is the same storyline that also got the world morbin for the first time via the introduction of Morbius. This story found Peter Parker trying to get rid of his powers, only to instead accidentally end up with… Well, you can guess.

Though there have been a few references and callbacks to this six-arm version of Spider-Man since, one of the most notable was issue #42 of the original What If…? comic book, which asked the question “What If Spider-Man had Kept his Six Arms?"

Samurai Ghost Rider

Next we have a version of Ghost Rider that appears to be heavily Samurai influenced based on his helmet and sword. There was a very different looking “Ghost Ronin” character in the comics, Musashi Miyamoto, however, the outfit in the What If…? finale has an unmistakable nod to Johnny Blaze, the classic comic book Ghost Rider, with the white striping on top of the black outfit.

Regardless of who this Ghost Rider’s alter ego is, it stands out that he’s there at all, as this is the first time we’re seeing any Ghost Rider in a Kevin Feige-produced, official Marvel Studios production, as we wait to see if Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s events (and their version of Ghost Rider, Robbie Reyes) will ever be made full “part of the chronological timeline on DIsney+ list” canon as far as MCU history goes. Regardless, this is far from the only character here who’s giving us a version of a Marvel comic book character we haven’t seen before from Feige and company.  

War Machine-Punisher-Heart

Next we have Riri Williams wearing the Punisher’s logo on her chest, but also sporting massive armor attachments and weaponry. This evokes the comic book storyline where Frank Castle wore the War Machine armor, though here it seems Riri has decided it’s time to start punishing.

White Witch Gamora

Things start to get more wild with a glimpse of Gamora in flowing white clothes, while also… riding a witch’s broom? Sing it with me: “Down, down, down the road…”

Moon Knight Blade

That’s Blade wearing the Moon Knight costume, who will be seen in the upcoming What If…? spinoff, Marvel Zombies. This variant was first glimpsed in the sizzle reel for Marvel’s 2025 TV slate released this fall.

Weapon X Thanos

It is pretty amusing to ponder the world where somehow Thanos, not Logan, is the one experimented on and given an adamantium skeleton and accompanying claws by the Weapon X program. And apparently that world is out there, because not only does this Thanos sport Wolverine claws, but he has a version of the Weapon X helmet and monitoring equipment attached to him as well, as established in Barry Windsor Smith’s Weapon X / Wolverine origin story back in the day in the pages of Marvel Comics Presents.

Iron Kingo

It’s Kingo in an Iron Man suit. He. Is. Iron Kingo! Who knows, maybe this is a continuation of the same Kingo we saw earlier in Season 3, given his friendship with Tony Stark’s father, Howard.

Ms. Wasp Marvel

The costume and powers seem to indicate this is Kamala Khan, with Pym tech giving her Wasp-like wings (and, one presumes, size-changing abilities), though who knows, it could be a variant on Janet or Hope van Dyne under that helmet instead.

Doctor Hulk, Sorcerer Supreme

We get another character mash-up that has more of a background in the comics with this look at an older Hulk wielding both Doctor Strange’s Cloak of Levitation and using magical powers. In the comics, as first seen in the limited series Future Imperfect, an older version of Bruce Banner/Hulk became the fearsome Maestro, a warlord who had collected trophies from all of the dead superheroes, including Strange’s Cloak. This What If…? Hulk is clearly visually modeled after the Maestro, sporting his distinctive long white hair and beard, but he actually appears to have acquired magical abilities, something the Maestro did not.

The Scarlet Duck

Yep, that’s an evil-looking, red-eyed duck with Scarlet Witch’s headdress alright!

Dragon Archer

This armored, humanoid dragon, complete with bow and arrow, is a tricker one to source. But considering all of the X-Men influences packed into the What If…? finale, perhaps it’s some sort of very different, bigger version of Kitty Pryde’s alien pal, Lockheed? Then again, it could be a smaller, more human version of Shang-Chi and the Ten Rings’ Great Protector. Or it could just be Clint Barton if he was a dragon dude!

Jubilee Surfer

This looks to simply be Jubilee having been granted the powers of the Silver Surfer. This gives us the first version of Silver Surfer in any form since Disney/Marvel got the rights to the Fantastic Four-related characters back – before we meet a different female Silver Surfer, Shalla-Bal (Julia Garner), in next year’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

Avenging Skrull

We then see a Skrull wearing Captain America’s uniform but also sporting what looks like Iron Man armor on their right arm. Perhaps this is a version of Kl'rt, the comic book Super-Skrull, who typically had all the powers of the Fantastic Four.

Sersi & Stark

This couple, looking very retro in design, is made up of Eternals’ Sersi and a mustached man who is almost certainly Howard Stark. That would make it a real life Easter egg of sorts, because Dominic Cooper, who plays the younger version of Howard Stark, and Gemma Chan, who plays Sersi, are a real life couple.

Mega Liefeld Cable-Pool

This hybrid of Deadpool and Cable (who also looks to be female) is amusingly going full Rob Liefeld, clearly providing an over the top homage to the famous love of excess comic book fans expect from the artist who co-created both characters, via the ridiculously large amount – and large-sized – array of weapons and pouches they’re sporting.

Lil’ Hela

Hela appears here in a youthful form, much like she did in the What If…? – An Immersive Story game released on Apple Vision Pro earlier this year.

Star-Lord and the Ten Rings

Based on the costume details, along with the presence of both the Ten Rings and the staff, that’s Shang-Chi, who’s not only mastered Kung Fu and the Ten Rings, but also become Star-Lord along the way. Though in the vastness of the multiverse, there is the small chance it’s a much more physically proficient Peter Quill instead.

Pistol-Packing Loki 

Things get so blurry at this point, it’s nearly impossible to get many details, but you can see a character with Loki’s horns, who is also holding a pistol up and wearing a hat that seems to be either cowboy or early 1900’s-gangster style.

Infinity Witch

That Loki is followed by one last deep (albeit recent) cut – The “Infinity Witch” version of Wanda Maximoff from the What If…? – An Immersive Story game.  This Wanda has collected the Infinity Stones in an attempt to save Vision.

Lastly, there’s a character with large horns (or a horned helmet) and golden armor, but who’s too blurry to make out otherwise, before the rest turns into a full cosmic swirl.

Of course, those final moments aren’t the only time we get glimpses at some wild and wacky variants in the What If…? finale. There’s also the sequence where the Eminence (Jason Isaacs) attempts to kill Captain Carter (Hayley Atwell), Byrdie the Duck (Natasha Lyonne), Storm (Alison Sealy-Smith) and Kahhori (Devery Jacobs), vowing to wipe every variant of them from existence as well – which we see begin to occur, as different variants of the characters are pulled away from them. In this sequence we see the following.

Storm Variants:

Storm gets the least amount of variants during the final battle, including one that is very hard to discern, but there’s also one where she’s wearing a Black Panther suit. In the comics, though she didn’t tale oh the Black Panther identity herself, Storm and T’Challa were married at one point.

Byrdie Variants:

One Byrdie variant is wearing Nova Corp armor, while the other seems to have taken after her father much more, looking like a full duck, just as Howard does. There’s also one glimpsed from afar that seems to be holding a bow and could be a Hawkeye mash-up and one where she has become Archangel, the darker version of Angel/Warren Worthington from the comic books after Apocalypse transformed him into one of his Horsemen, AKA Death.

Kahhori Variants:

We get a lot more recognizable variants for Kahhori and Peggy Carter compared to the others, though the inspiration is less obvious for a couple of them for Kahhori at first glance, including one dressed similar to when we first met the character and one wearing a cloak. There’s also an armored, helmeted Kahhori – and perhaps that’s Asgardian armor?

However, the two big variants that bookend what we see for her are much more obvious in terms of their source, going back to the X-Men in both cases. The first is Kahhori wearing Apocolypse’s armor, while the last we see for her is a very classic-style X-Men team uniform.

Peggy Carter Variants:

Lastly, Peggy’s five variants are the ones that are all the easiest to source, showing her with several different mash-up personas. There’s a Peggy who has become the Black Knight, one who is somehow a hybrid with Sabretooth, and another who is dressed like Elektra in her classic comics costume.

There’s also a Peggy who has become Deathlok – another character whose only previous MCU-adjacent appearance was on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – and finally a Peggy in what is pretty obviously Asgardian armor, compared to Kahhori’s “maybe it is?” appearance.

Though What If…? has come to an end, at least one of the worlds we’ve seen in it will definitely return via the upcoming Marvel Zombies spinoff series. Other Marvel Animation series coming up include Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Eyes of Wakanda and Season 2 of X-Men ‘97.

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