Last night, the full trailer for Marvel’s next Disney + series Moon Knight dropped, along with the announcement for its debut date on March 30. Give it a looksee:
Moon Knight is one character who really shouldn’t get the “clean up” and “woke up” treatment Disney’s Marvel shows have done in the past. He doesn’t need a scrappy sidekick or a “cause” to make him interesting.
Moon Knight has been around since 1975, when he made an appearance stalking the lycanthropic hero Werewolf by Night in issue #32 the comic of the same name. We learned in this issue Moon Knight (Marc Spector) was a soldier of fortune and the avatar for the Egyptian God Khonshu. That alone is a cool back story, and when readers caught a glimpse of him they wanted to learn more. He didn’t get his first solo series until 1980.
He as often been compared Batman, as Spector was a millionaire with a dark secret. He’s much darker, and much more dangerous if the writers handle him correctly. He’s been a Marine, worked for the CIA, and eventually a ruthless mercenary who was on a mission in Sudan when he unearthed…you guessed it…the statue of Khonshu. You can guess what happens from there.
Once more, this alone would make a cool story. However, there’s one other thing about Moon Knight that needs to be handled just right. Since childhood, Spector has had dissociative identity disorder. That’s right, he has multiple personalities. He’s also been said to have schizophrenia, but that’s not the case.
There was already a good-versus-evil conflict happening inside him before he got his super-powered altar-ego. That is a well done character, indeed.
The question is, will Disney do him right? Well, the trailer certainly looks dark enough, and more inline with the Marvel Netflix series than Disney. That’s good. I like Oscar Isaac as an actor, and think he was dealt a crappy hand in the Disney/Star Wars trilogy. Poe could have and should have been a much cooler hero than they wrote him. As far as casting, I have no issue.
It looks like they are hitting his personality disorder head on (almost in sort of a Cybil like beginning), and I hope when Marc finally emerges (not just the Moon Knight for whom he is acting as a conduit). If they keep this story focused on Spector’s own battle and story….and leave the “multiverse” story out of it as much as possible, it might work. I’m also worried he’ll be more of an advocate for mental illness rather than a dark and cool character who you don’t want to turn his back on. Let’s hope they give Isaac a chance to be the weirdly awesome hero (and antihero) he deserves.
We will have to wait until March 30 when the series debuts to find out. Oooh, maybe we’ll meet the Werewolf by Night.