Nick Fury
Nicholas Joseph Fury
Series · Phase 5
Secret Invasion
2023 · 50 min
Thirty years after promising the Skrull refugees a home, Nick Fury has not delivered one, and a faction under a warlord named Gravik has decided to take Earth instead. Fury comes down from S.A.B.E.R…
The Multiverse SagaDisney+53%Released
The story
Thirty years after promising the Skrull refugees a home, Nick Fury has not delivered one, and a faction under a warlord named Gravik has decided to take Earth instead. Fury comes down from S.A.B.E.R. diminished, drinking and out of favour, and Maria Hill is dead by the end of the first episode.
The series is a paranoid espionage thriller in which nobody can be trusted, and its central problem is that it never makes that feel dangerous. It ends with a CG fight between two Super-Skrulls in a Russian quarry and a Rhodey reveal that retroactively rewrites years of MCU films with no follow-up.
Key facts
- Release date
- 21 Jun 2023
- Status
- Released
- Phase
- Phase 5
- Saga
- The Multiverse Saga
- Runtime
- 50 min
- Certificate
- TV-14
- Director
- Ali Selim
- Writers
- Kyle Bradstreet
- Seasons
- 1
- Episodes
- 6
- Streaming
- Disney+
- Timeline placement
- 2026 — after Ms. Marvel, before The Marvels
Cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Samuel L. Jackson | Nick Fury |
| Ben Mendelsohn | Talos |
| Emilia Clarke | G'iah |
| Kingsley Ben-Adir | Gravik |
| Olivia Colman | Sonya Falsworth |
| Cobie Smulders | Maria Hill |
Characters
Maria Hill
Maria Hill
Easter eggs
- Rhodey is revealed to have been a Skrull for an unspecified period, with implications reaching at least as far back as Endgame's funeral.
- Gravik's Super-Skrull powers combine Groot, the Frost Beast from Thor, Extremis and Cull Obsidian's abilities.
- The Harvest is a collection of Avengers DNA gathered from the Earth battlefield, including Thanos' blood.
- Talos and G'iah continue from Captain Marvel, where Fury made the promise the series is built on breaking.
- Olivia Colman's Sonya Falsworth shares a surname with Union Jack, the British Marvel hero from the Invaders comics.
- Fury's Skrull wife Priscilla, retroactively inserted into his life, is a version of the comics' Contessa relationship.
- New Skrullos, built inside an abandoned Russian nuclear facility, is a bleak inversion of the comics' Skrull throneworld.
- The series adapts Brian Michael Bendis' 2008 Secret Invasion event, though almost none of the comic's plot survives.
Trivia
- The AI-generated opening credits sequence caused an immediate and sustained backlash, with the director defending it as thematically appropriate.
- At 53% it holds the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score of any Marvel Studios Disney+ series.
- It was Samuel L. Jackson's first leading role in the MCU, fifteen years after his first cameo.
- Maria Hill's death ended Cobie Smulders' eleven-year run in the franchise.
- Emilia Clarke joined in her first major post-Game of Thrones franchise role, playing Talos' daughter.
- Ali Selim directed all six episodes, an unusual arrangement for a Marvel series.
- The series was originally announced as a six-episode limited run and Marvel has not revisited its plot threads since.
Reviews
Critics
53%
Despite a starry cast and an intriguing premise, Secret Invasion is a drab, sluggish thriller that squanders both its paranoia and its Samuel L. Jackson.
The MarvelGossips verdict
The nadir of Marvel television — a show about not knowing who anyone is that generates no tension whatsoever. Olivia Colman is having a wonderful time in a different, better series that exists only in her scenes. The AI credits sequence was a fitting overture for something this indifferent to its own audience.
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Frequently asked
Why was Secret Invasion so badly received?
At 53% on Rotten Tomatoes it is the lowest-rated Marvel series. Critics faulted a slow, tension-free thriller, a CG-heavy finale at odds with its espionage premise, and the AI-generated opening credits, which drew widespread condemnation.
Is Rhodey still a Skrull?
The series reveals him as one and leaves the real Rhodey imprisoned. Marvel has not addressed how long the substitution lasted or resolved it in any subsequent project, which is one of the franchise's most conspicuous loose threads.
Did Maria Hill really die?
Yes, killed by Gravik impersonating Fury in the first episode. It marked the end of Cobie Smulders' eleven years in the MCU, and the series treats it as permanent.
How does it compare to the comic?
Very loosely. Brian Michael Bendis' 2008 event was a line-wide invasion involving nearly every Marvel hero; the series is a six-episode spy story with almost no superheroes in it, a change made largely for budget and scheduling reasons.