Warning: this article contains full spoilers for The Marvels!
The MCU is currently in the midst of The Multiverse Saga, with the current crop of movies and shows slowly building to the twin climax that is Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars. Now that we’re in Phase 5, more pieces are beginning to fall into place, and the multiverse itself is becoming more and more important to the bigger picture.
On the surface, The Marvels might not seem like one of Marvel’s more important Phase 5 films. It’s a largely standalone adventure featuring the first big team-up between Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers, Teyonah Parris’ Monica Rambeau and Iman Vellani’s Kamala Khan. But the truth is that The Marvels does provide some important setup for Secret Wars. In fact, alongside Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness and Loki, it may be one of the most significant pieces of the Multiverse Saga so far. Let’s explore how this sequel lays new groundwork for Secret Wars.
Monica Rambeau and the Incursion in The Marvels
Over the course of The Marvels, we learn that Kree Supremor Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) is using the power of the Quantum Bands to open new jump points in space. Dar-Benn hopes to steal the resources of other worlds to replenish the Kree homeworld of Hala, which was ravaged by civil war after Captain Marvel destroyed the Supreme Intelligence. We also learn that the Quantum Bands were used to create the jump point network in the first place, effectively opening the door for interstellar travel in the MCU.
Unfortunately, these new jump points are unstable, as it turns out you can’t just open holes in the fabric of space without there being severe consequences. Dar-Benn finally bites off more than she can chew in the climax of the film. Having acquired both Quantum Bands, she attempts to open a new portal to draw Earth’s sun into Hala’s solar system. Instead, Dar-Benn loses control of her newfound power. She accidentally opens a doorway to another universe and is annihilated in the process.
Dar-Benn winds up creating a phenomenon known as an incursion. In Marvel lore, incursions occur when two parallel universes begin to intersect, causing two Earths to exist alongside one another. However, if the incursion isn’t halted, or if one of those Earths isn’t destroyed, a chain reaction begins that culminates in the destruction of both universes.
That’s essentially what we see in the climax of The Marvels. Dar-Benn inadvertently creates an incursion and places two universes in mortal peril. Fortunately for everyone, Monica is able to use her light powers to seal the breach and stop the incursion. Unfortunately for her, that leaves Monica stranded in the other universe. But on the plus side, at least she’s made some new friends in the X-Men.
How Incursions Lead to Secret Wars
While incursions are mentioned in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, The Marvels marks the first time we see this phenomenon in action. That’s important, as incursions are basically the entire catalyst behind the plot of 2015’s Secret Wars comic. Presumably, the same will hold true for the movie version.
The buildup to Secret Wars occurs in writer Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers comics. The Illuminati (the secretive group that includes Iron Man, Mister Fantastic, Doctor Strange, Black Panther, Beast, Black Bolt and Namor) discover that incursions are a growing problem threatening the entire multiverse. They begin happening with greater and greater frequency, meaning it’s only a matter of time before the Illuminati have to make hard choices to save their universe from annihilation. Because incursions seem to hinge on Earth specifically, destroying one of the two Earths involved stops the incursion in its tracks. Can the Illuminati bring themselves to destroy an entire planet if it means saving two whole universes? And even if they do, are they merely staving off the inevitable?
The answer to that second question turns out to be yes. The multiverse violently collapses over the course of Hickman’s Avengers run, setting the stage for Secret Wars. When the last two universes are obliterated in Secret Wars #1, existence itself comes crashing down. All that remains at that point is Battleworld, a patchwork planet Doctor Doom constructs from fragments of various dead universes. Secret Wars is the story of Marvel’s heroes rallying against the self-proclaimed God Emperor Doom and finding a way to restore the multiverse.
There’s no indication so far that the MCU will be using Doctor Doom for its version of Secret Wars. Doom himself has yet to make an appearance in the MCU, while Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror has been positioned as the overarching villain of The Multiverse Saga. But it does appear that the MCU is drawing on the basic plot of 2015’s Secret Wars for its own Secret Wars movie. The incursion we see in The Marvels is a harbinger of much darker things to come for Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
Incursions in Other MCU Movies and Shows
Again, while The Marvels marks the first time we’ve seen an incursion in action, it’s hardly the first MCU project to explore the concept. They’re a major focus in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which reveals that Stephen Strange has a knack for accidentally leaving incursions in his wake.
First, the Illuminati of Earth-838 reveal that their Doctor Strange accidentally caused an incursion when he used the Darkhold to kill Thanos. Later, the MCU’s Strange meets another of his counterparts in a universe that’s been all but obliterated by an incursion. As “Sinister” Strange puts it, “Things just got out of hand.”
The movie ends with the reveal that the MCU Strange is following in the footsteps of his other selves. Like Sinister Strange, he grows a third eye due to his exposure to the Darkhold. He’s then approached by Charlize Theron’s Clea, who blames Strange for causing an incursion and demands his help in fixing it.
Incursions also play a role in both Loki and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. The former reveals that the multiverse was previously ravaged by a war among the many variants of Kang. That causes He Who Remains to establish the TVA and preserve the one Sacred Timeline, thereby wiping his other selves out of existence. The multiverse is restored when Sophia Di Martino’s Sylvie kills He Who Remains, and the many versions of Kang return along with their universes.
The word “incursion” never comes up in Loki, but Quantumania makes that connection when Michelle Pfeiffer’s Janet Van Dyne meets Kang in the Quantum Realm. Kang tells her, "I saw their [the other Kangs] chaos spreading across realities. Universes colliding. Endless incursions."
The takeaway from all of this is that incursions are about to become a growing problem for Marvel’s live-action multiverse. With the many variants of Kang back in action, it’s only a matter of time before their war causes a new ripple of incursions throughout the multiverse. But Kang isn’t the only one responsible for incursions. At least three versions of Doctor Strange have caused their own incursions so far. And now Dar-Benn has created the first incursion inside the MCU (that we know about).
We may look back in a couple of years and realize just how important The Marvels is in terms of setting up the endpoint of The Multiverse Saga. Thanks to the events of this film, we’ve seen an incursion take place, and we know that Dar-Benn’s actions have caused damage to the fabric of space-time in the MCU. And now that Monica is trapped in another universe, she can’t be called upon to fix the next incursion that crops up.
Other conflicts in the MCU may further weaken the fabric of the universe, culminating in the inevitable showdown with the Council of Kangs in Avengers: The Kang Dynasty. At that point, we’ll surely see Marvel’s live-action multiverse follow the path of its comic book multiverse, being utterly destroyed and leaving only Battleworld in its wake. Avengers: Secret Wars may still be years down the road, but the buildup is really kicking into gear now.
For more on The Marvels, check out our full breakdown of the film's ending, brush up on the history of the Young Avengers and learn more about Maria Rambeau's Binary.
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
